Assessment of General Education Requirement

I.E. Creativity and Creative Development

 

 


Learning Goals
Students who successfully complete this General Education requirement should be able to:

  1. Be open to new and varied ideas and perspectives.
  2. Analyze and synthesize ideas.
  3. Solve problems.
  4. Take risks and think independently and unconventionally.
  5. Be self-disciplined, engaging actively and in a sustained manner in tasks requiring thought.

Assessment Strategy
Faculty assess these goals by asking students to write reflectively to one or more of the following questions:

  1. What was the one most important thing you learned in this course? Why?
  2. Did you produce something this semester that surprised you? Something that, before this course, you would not have thought you were capable of creating? Explain what you did and what you learned about yourself.
  3. What was your most satisfying accomplishment in the course? Why?
  4. What was a struggle for you in this course? Why?
  5. You see the words, “Viroosh metz fradle” on a sign. What do they mean? Where is the sign?

Recent Assessment Findings
Faculty use content analysis, a qualitative assessment technique, to analyze students’ reflective writing responses. They have concluded that students’ responses overwhelmingly demonstrate college-level proficiency in creative thinking. Some examples of responses demonstrating creative thinking:

  Evidence of being open to new and varied ideas and perspectives: “I didn’t know that I could be as creative and imaginative to think like a character that’s nothing like me. For example, the character I had to portray in my contemporary scene had a completely different personality from me, but I was able to be the character and succeed in being her. The life study that we also did allowed me to stretch my vocal skills and mannerisms. I didn’t think I would do that well.”

Evidence of analyzing and synthesizing ideas: “The most important thing I learned was how to take non-tangible things/ideas etc. and produce a piece of artwork that represented them. I learned how to then create that artwork so that it made sense visually and artistically, the way a sentence would grammatically or a song would musically.”

Evidence of solving problems: “The most important thing I learned was how to deconstruct a picture. When you deconstruct a picture into simple shapes, it makes it much easier to visualize and draw.”

Evidence of taking risks and thinking independently and unconventionally: “I wrote a poem about my grandmother who is dying, only it turned out realistic and not sugary or “nice” which, before this class, I thought poems should be… To be a writer has nothing to do with kindness.”

Evidence of being self-disciplined, engaging actively and in a sustained manner in tasks requiring thought: “My most satisfying accomplishment in this course was actually learning all the new material within three weeks… I unfortunately did not attend a high school that had a good computer literacy program and therefore needed to be more attentive and deliberate in applying myself to the lab work. This course has motivated me to acquire more of today’s most popular software programs and devote more time to practice using software such as FrontPage and Flash MX.”

How the Results Are Being Use d
Because the faculty have concluded that their assessment demonstrates college-level proficiency in creative thinking, they have not used the results for teaching/learning enhancement, although they continue to discuss ways to optimize students’ learning experiences. The faculty will continue these assessments and will monitor future results to ensure that they remain at satisfactory levels.

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    Last updated: 4.1.05

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