Linking Science to Creative Writing--Multidisciplinary Practice and Exercise for the Creative Imagination

A recent visit to Adler Planetarium's Cyberspace website and a second viewing of Avatar led to the creation of a new project at DrM-Resources.  The Adler-Creative-Writing-Project was developed to give middle school and high school students (and any adults who want to participate) an opportunity to try their hands individually or collectively at working with science "facts" (from the Adler Cyberspace website) and with ideas from science fiction and fantasy to create a science fiction or fantasy short story.

Too often students asked me why I was speaking about science in a social studies class.  Because middle schools and high schools are often set-up with courses that appear to be in isolation, science, math, and English (language arts) are not seen to be related.

Research indicates that more learning takes place when schools work with multidisciplinary thematic units (see the paper on multidisciplinary thematic units).  Award-winning authors in science fiction and fantasy create multidisciplinary novels that have elements from many different areas.

Let's see what can happen with a project like this.

Creative Imagination--Inspirational Examples--Innovation

Creative imagination can push pre-existing boundaries to thought and action.  Inspirational models can inspire us to move beyond these limits.  Michaelangelo's statue of David represented an entirely new way of depicting the human form and ushered in an entirely new way of rendering art.

Michaelangelo understood the marble he was working with.  People using creative imagination to create something new need to understand the medium in which they are creating.  Our economy is evolving and there are opportunities for those with creative imaginations to create something entirely new from the medium available.

One challenge is to find positive models to serve as inspiration in the way David inspires other sculptors and artists.