Spark Your Creativity

In today's blog post, I'll be teaching you a simple exercise that really exemplifies the creative possibilities of teaching online. This is an activity I do when I feel frustrated and overwhelmed with my workload or maybe annoyed by all the grading I have to do, or if I just need a little pick-me-up. It's called the Spark Your Creativity Activity. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

The Spark Your Creativity Activity is all about getting you excited about teaching and reconnecting you with some of the reasons you entered this profession. I know that I love nothing more than to really engage my students and I’m always looking for new and innovative ways to teach them. So when I feel my energy dwindling, I like to re-energize myself by searching for creative and innovative teaching strategies and considering how I might be able to use them in my own classes.

The Spark Your Creativity Activity

The Spark Your Creativity Activity is very simple and is composed of only 2 steps:

1. Find a resource that shares innovative teaching strategies, such as a Journal, Facebook Group, Colleague, List Serve, Organization
2. Adapt ONE strategy for your online class

To give you an example of how I have used this activity to come up with an engaging activity, I'll share with you the Congressional Squares example.

The Congressional Squares Example

So remember, no JUDGEMENT, BUT on this particular day, I was perusing some of the K-12 arenas and came across this awesome twist on the old game, Hollywood squares.

After thinking about some ways that I could use this in my own online course, I decided to create a game called Congressional Squares where I replaced the original Sesame Street characters with some of our local congressional representatives. Each slide presents the representative’s view on a particular issue and students have to explain if they agree or disagree with it.

And it’s as simple as that! So, why not find some resources to spark your own creativity! And as you can see here, you’re only limited by your own creativity! If you're interested in learning more about the Congressional Squares Activity, click HERE.

If you're interested in some additional resources to help Spark Your Creativity, be sure to check out the awesome Creative and Engaging Assignment packet that I have created that's chock full of awesome assignments, including resources, instructions, guidelines, and a video overview of each assignment as well! Learn more about this awesome resource that is sure to get your creative juices flowing HERE.

I'd love to see what you come up with during your search! Be sure to share them in The Online Educator Facebook group.