Torrance Journal for Applied Creativity

aspects of Thomas and Brown’s (2011)
concept of imagination are applied to
the teacher leader’s drawing: a) inquiry-based,
b) making strange, familiar,
c) building world around new idea, d)
imagination reshapes context, and e)
experimentation, design, and play.
Inquiry-based. Bernadette
said she doodled all the time, especially
during meetings because it helped her
think about what was being said. For
example, during a training session on
the Primary Years Curriculum1, she said
she doodled while the trainers talked
about the need for vertical curriculum
integration. As they discussed how
practitioners tend to get stuck on horizontal
integration, Bernadette thought,
“What we really need is diagonal
integration!” As she considered how
diagonal integration might look, she
“doodled” an intricate drawing to help
her think about “what if?”
Making the strange, familiar.
When asked to interpret how her drawing
related to innovative school change,
Bernadette used art language that was
familiar to her:
In order to think outside the box, you
can never get inside the box. Because,
in order to change the way we do
things in schools, all this [the action in
the drawing] has to occur. In the beginning
you deal plainly with the most
basic thing, which for me is line. But
then as I start to draw, I start seeing all
levels of value.
In this description, Bernadette immediately
connected school change with line,
a principal element of design. Continuing
this alignment, she delved deeper
into other design elements.
But, first it’s very simple: What are
the things we want, and what are we
going to do to get there? So, I always
start with the foundational structure,
just pure, clean line. Pure, clean line is
what’s going to establish those shapes.
But shapes aren’t anything if they don’t
have form. And form comes from
value. Then, if you keep going, you
start adding color.
In this example, as Bernadette used her
experience with art theory to describe
the nature of school reform, she made
the unfamiliar, abstract notion of school
reform, familiar.
Building new world. Initially,
Bernadette drew a box (left center); it’s
barely visible in the finished drawing
that extends substantially beyond the
box’s borders. Moving in a clockwise
direction, she drew a strong diagonal
line (lower left) surrounded by flowing
circles moving in various planes. As the
circles seem to bump into lines, they
appear to move around or over them.
All movement is under watchful eyes
that observe from the upper left corner.
As the circles flow across the top of the
box, they move outside to the right,
nearly doubling the original size of the
box. Where the circles continue toward
the point at which she began, Bernadette
drew what she described as gears
and cogs. Bernadette’s completed drawing
transforms the notion of vertical and
horizontal curriculum integration into
a completely new image imbued with
elements that denote action.
Reshaping context. For Bernadette,
her knowledge of art infused
her thinking process and informed how
she made sense of information. Her
comparison of values in art to values of
people provides another illustration:
When I talk about value, I’m also
talking about beliefs, because it’s
simultaneous. As an art person, you
look at your world in an artful way.
So when I think about these systems,
in order for us to change, we have
to deal with the values of everybody.
And values are not black and white.
It’s not easy; there are shades of gray.
Because there are so many things that
influence us.
In art, values refer to varying degrees
and intensity of color. This analogy to
educational systems complicates the
common dichotomous view that things
(e.g., educational policy, situations,
children’s behavior or aptitude, academic
achievement) are either one way or
the other.
Experimentation, design,
and play. Bernadette viewed educational
change as expansive, contested, and
messy:
It’s the same way with a piece of
artwork. In the beginning when you’re
building the foundation, you worry
about very few things. You’re just
worried about getting started. So it’s
very clean; it’s not messy. And as you
keep going, in your thinking of what
you’re trying to reform, it becomes
very messy. Then, most people go
back to the clean version—what’s
simple and clean…because it’s easier
to understand. And that has nothing
to do with change. That’s just keeping
things the same way they were before.
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Figure 3. Drawing workspace: encouraging collaboration with peers and researcher (on right).