School of Creative Solutions
The School of Creative Solutions sees itself as a program for secondary schools that see the promotion of creative problem-solving skills as an essential educational mandate. In this program, not only does imparting knowledge play a role, but also developing the ability to tackle problems and find creative solutions to them. Participating schools are characterized by the fact that they are open to new ideas and take up challenges in society and generate solutions.
Basic elements
The school program consists of three basic elements: flex- based learning , creative personality and creative problem solving.
flex- based learning
In order to impart creativity and problem-solving skills to young people, flex- based learning was developed at the Upper Austria University of Education . It contains a collection of teaching techniques for teaching science, the focus of which is on promoting intellectual and experimental flexibility. All of the following techniques are described in textbooks of the series Expedition chemistry or Expedition physics in E.Dornerverlag appeared.
These teaching techniques are:
Think flex
Think flex exercises train the change of perspective and promote skills such as “finding hypotheses”, “drawing conclusions” and “recognizing opportunities and risks”.
Wosako
As an abbreviation for word-sentence constructions, young people in Wosako's are encouraged in their linguistic creativity. Specified technical terms must be brought together in a new, meaningful context.
Nano Live Act & Modeling
The formation of analogies is a central element of creative development processes. In addition to the application of existing analogies, young people are encouraged to develop and present real, practical models based on scientific phenomena.
Memo techniques
Memo aids lead to the storage of complex specialist knowledge by means of flexible thinking strategies.
flex experiments
flex experiments train creative and experiment-oriented problem solving. For scientific problems as many and as different as possible solution ideas should be found and implemented in the experimental setting. The restriction to handling given everyday materials forces the misuse of materials and thus encourages lateral thinking. In addition to the independent planning, implementation and presentation of possible solutions, flex experiments also enable the development of a positive error culture and the cultivation of increased expectations of self-efficacy.
flex box
For the implementation of all flex experiments, innovative material collections have been developed for the subjects chemistry and physics. As a so-called flex box, it can be used as a mobile test laboratory. The flex-Box is a mobile box stack consisting of 7 Euroboxes that is filled with over 100 materials (6 to 8 copies) and over 50 chemicals (flex-Box chemistry). It contains numerous experiment instructions for basic tests, experiments and flex experiments as well as information sheets for students and accompanying material for teachers. The flex boxes have been sold by the teaching material company Conatex GmbH since 2020.
Creative personality
This basic element is intended to awaken the young people's creative spirit. The focus here is on training and promoting a creative personality and mindset.
Growth mindset
With the help of Carol Dweck's program, a so-called growth mindset is conveyed and thus personality traits such as determination, tolerance for mistakes and the conviction to be able to solve future problems are trained.
Embodiment
By Embodiment discusses the interrelationship between body and psyche. Studies show that posture, movement and muscle tension significantly influence emotional and cognitive states such as thinking styles, judgment, attitudes and self-confidence. Techniques such as asynchronous movements, meditation, qigong and juggling are learned in order to achieve a positive influence on the various emotional and cognitive states.
Qigong
Qigong is a combination of meditation , breathing technique , concentration and movement. In addition to strengthening physical fitness, Qigong calms the mind, improves physical and mental relaxation and thus increases awareness.
Creative problem solving
Based on the idea of service learning , students are confronted with real challenges in the course of lessons and develop innovative solutions from them. Young people learn how to deal with real problems. School- relevant challenges are dealt with in accordance with the typical phases of a creative process . Real problems can come from the school itself, from other national or international schools via the community or from the immediate vicinity of the community and / or institutions.
Research & publications
Research into scientific creativity is a central concern of the Didactics Center for Natural Science at the Upper Austria University of Education. Since 2010, didactic specialists from the subjects chemistry, physics and biology have been working on the following topics and research questions:
- Development of a diagnostic tool to assess divergent thinking skills in scientific problems. The DPAS-TEST (Divergent Problemsolving Ability in Science) has been able to make valid statements about the scientific creativity of young people since 2020.
- Effectiveness of flex- based learning on the development of creative problem-solving skills in adolescents
- Research into the effectiveness of courses that are offered at the Upper Austrian University of Education to convey the content of the School of Creative Solutions to teachers.
Community
Building an international community is a concern of the School of Creative Solutions. The Upper Austria University of Education acts as a platform to network participating schools so that they can support each other, share their expertise or benefit from problems from other schools.
Advanced training
The Upper Austria University of Education offers advanced training programs for teachers. In courses and seminars, participants are trained to implement the basic elements of the School of Creative Solutions, in particular "flex-based learning" and "creative personality" in the classroom.
team
Since 2010, a team of 10 under the direction of Kurt Haim has been working on the development of teaching techniques that promote creative problem-solving skills in science classes. Wolfgang Aschauer heads research into creative problem-solving skills in the scientific domain. Wolfgang Aschauer, Christian Kloimböck and Philipp Lechner are responsible for physics. Kurt Haim, Joachim Strasser, Ines Mader and Florian Strasser are responsible for chemistry. Sabine Putz-Kollmann, Julia Schleritzk and David Eichinger are responsible for biology.
Publications
Haim, Aschauer & Weber (2020). Diagnosis of divergent thinking strategies at naturwiss. Problems. In: S. Habig (Ed.), Scientific Competencies in Tomorrow's Society. Society for Didactics of Chemistry and Physics, annual conference in Vienna 2019. (p. 381). university Duisburg-Essen
Oyrer, Haim & Aschauer (2020). Effective teacher training for teaching flex-based learning. In: S. Habig (Ed.), Scientific Competencies in Tomorrow's Society. Society for Didactics of Chemistry and Physics, annual conference in Vienna 2019. (p. 605). university Duisburg-Essen
Haim, Kurt (2013). Creative solution-oriented experimentation - KLEx In: Practice of the natural sciences - Chemistry in school 4, 62, 34 - 37
Haim & Weber (2014). KLEx - An experimental technique to promote creative problem-solving skills in science lessons In: Last or Lust? Research and teacher training Ed. E .Feyerer, K. Hirschenhauser u. K. Soukup-Altrichter, Munster, Waxmann
Web links
Homepage of the School of Creative Solutions
Individual evidence
- ^ Carol S. Dweck: Mindset - The New Psychology of Success . Ballantine Books, 2007, ISBN 978-0-345-47232-8 .
- ↑ Maja Storch, Benita Cantieni, Gerald Hüther, Wolfgang Taschenr: Embodiment - Understanding and using the interaction of body and psyche . Hans Huber, Bern 2010, ISBN 978-3-456-84837-2 .
- ↑ Stephen Mitchell: Tao Te King - A Contemporary Version for Western Readers . Arkana, Munich 2003, ISBN 978-3-426-29207-5 .
- ↑ Fritjof Capra: The Tao of Physics - The Convergence of Western Science and Eastern Philosophy . OW Barth, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-426-29207-5 .