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Vivian Moon View Drop Down
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    Posted: Dec 21 2014 at 1:13pm

HELP!

Last week I had a conversation with two educators from Middletown and they 
kept saying that we needed to produce more “Creative Thinkers". However they could not define what they meant by this statement to my satisfaction.

I would like to hear your definition and or thoughts of  "Creative Thinkers” as it pertains to the students in our current educational system.


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chmoore1 View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote chmoore1 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 2:20am
Here's one way to boost creative thinking: eliminate Libby Lolli's position. Also, since it seems to have escaped everyone's critical eye on this site, the January "Board Docs" agenda has an item called "Retire/rehire Sam Ison." Vet, acclaro, this should make your head explode. just 1 chmoore.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote VietVet Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 6:13am
Originally posted by chmoore1 chmoore1 wrote:

Here's one way to boost creative thinking: eliminate Libby Lolli's position. Also, since it seems to have escaped everyone's critical eye on this site, the January "Board Docs" agenda has an item called "Retire/rehire Sam Ison." Vet, acclaro, this should make your head explode. just 1 chmoore.


No, ch, Lolli has been discussed on this forum. There have been posts involving Lolli, specifically, how she was disliked at Monroe. How she is a "my way or the highway" tyrant type of manager. How she does very little for her money and how many would like to see her go, specifically in the academic world.

Ison on a retire/rehire? Wouldn't surprise me as Ison meets the same criteria as the preceding superintendents Middletown has had going back to the Eastridge days thru the Price days and into the Ison regime. He meets the typical criteria of what they would hire here.....a cheerleader for new schools. A levy passer. A "say all the right things to fool the public into thinking the schools are improving" type of person. They all did these things and they all have one thing in common.


They all failed miserably to attain any higher level than continuous improvement and they have not been close to the halfway mark on indicators despite all the promises, the levy passages, the new program introductions that were suppose to provide positive changes. They did get their new schools built but it didn't matter as to outcome. The schools system is still in the perverbial toilet. Total waste of money yielding zero results.

Nothing has worked under any super administration but there are some who continue to sponsor a last place horse in the race.   


The schools have been poor performers since the 70's. No head exploding. Just facts.
I'm so proud of my hometown and what it has become. Recall 'em all. Let's start over.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote acclaro Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 6:34am
Creative thinkers require;

1) Use of vouchers throughout Ohio, including fund exchange at attend private schools, including catholic.

2) Use of technology for education, 100% instruction, from best rated teachers in Ohio. District agnostic. Best math teacher teaches math throughout state, advanced placement students stake interactive classes at universities. Think Harvard prof teaching Yale student, etc.

3) Consolidation of resources statewide, infrastructure agnostic. Shared busing, services, maintenance, 4-5 regions in state, eliminate redundancy, provide cost savings benefit to set up a pool to reward outcome based teaching excellence.

4) Eliminate union. State and national.

5) Eliminate brick and mortar costs, put into technology.

 

         
'An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.' - Winston Churchill
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote processor Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 10:18am
Critical/Creative thinking is the active, persistent, and careful consideration of a belief or form of knowledge, the grounds that support it, and the conclusions that follow. It involves analyzing and evaluating one’s own thinking and that of others. In the context of college teaching and learning, critical thinking deliberately and actively engages students in:
• Raising vital questions and problems and formulating these clearly and precisely;
•Gathering and assessing relevant information, and using abstract ideas to interpret it effectively;
•Reaching well-reasoned conclusions and solutions and testing them against relevant criteria and standards;
•Openly considering alternative systems of thought; and
•Effectively communicating to others the analysis of and proposed solutions to complex challenges.



Creative/Critical thinking is the generation of new ideas within or across domains of knowledge, drawing upon or intentionally breaking with established symbolic rules and procedures. It usually involves the behaviors of preparation, incubation, insight, evaluation, elaboration, and communication. In the context of college teaching and learning, creative thinking deliberately and actively engages students in:
•Bringing together existing ideas into new configurations;
•Developing new properties or possibilities for something that already exists; and
•Discovering or imagining something entirely new.

How's that for some "edu Speak"? I think that many people in academia miss the point that this type of thinking only comes AFTER a thorough grounding in the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic. Some teachers use it as an excuse for poor test performance. I'm sure you've heard the line, "we don't need good test takers we need students who have creative thinking skills". Well I think that we need both and it starts with a proper grounding in the basics. If the students can't read or write or do basic math how in the heck will they be able to critically think!?

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Vivian Moon View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Vivian Moon Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 11:19am

The teachers seemed to equate High Achievers with Creative Thinkers…Creative Thinker may or may not get good grades while in school.

I believe the school systems can help students to become more creative in their thinking…however I believe a “Creative Thinker” is born a creative thinker not made.

The first time I ever turned on a computer and saw the word “Windows” and saw the green hillside with the big puffy clouds floating in the sky, I knew I was in the right place.  I have heard Bill Gates state that that photo was just a photo of a nearby hillside…now, now, Billy, you are telling a little fib…that photo represents the same windows you have longingly been looking out of your entire your life.
Ya see windows in schools are a real problem for little Creative Thinkers. In grade school you learn very quickly that all windows must be avoided at all cost because if you turn your head to the left and stare out a window for very long you would be transported into another world.
And when the teacher pecks you on the shoulder and brings you back to earth it can be very embarrassing and classmates will laugh at you. Even though you get good grades the teacher still writes bad things on your report card like daydreams, does not pay attention in class, etc.
By the time you are in fourth grade you have learned to avoid windows and you have now perfected the art of placing your head in your hands and looking down at a book on your desk as if you are reading...while that creative mind is far, far away, playing among the stars.
I hate to admit it but I believe I spent half my years in school...in that other universe.
All the creative thinkers that I have ever known in my life have all suffered the same “Dreaded Window Syndrome”.
So rather that spend another million dollars on another study maybe the teachers need to walk into their 2nd classes and see how many of her students are longingly staring out the windows…yep you found them.

If any of this sounds vaguely familiar to you…then you are also a Creative Thinker.

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote VietVet Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 11:21am
Based on the definition that processor has provided, there is no indication that this thinking has occurred in the past in the schools, the city building or the Journal, is occuring today, nor will occur in the future. The schools, newspaper and city are too locked into their current mindset to see other alternatives, ideas and opinions.
I'm so proud of my hometown and what it has become. Recall 'em all. Let's start over.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote spiderjohn Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 11:25am
Amen processor
Beautiful

Though I would imagine that posting on musa would disqualify since admin lumps us all together unfortunately
I mentioned to them that we don't all think alike any more than they all think alike--fell on deaf ears--disappointing

Best to everyone here throughout the season and beyond
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Vivian Moon Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 1:56pm

Well said Processor
I forget to include that these were 1st - 6th grade teachers.

Creative Thinkers love puzzles of all kinds. They love to tear things apart to see what makes them tick. They want to know the answer to WHY?
When a Creative Thinker opens their mind it is like opening flood gates and ideas flood their mind. As they grow they learn to put parameters in place much like constructing a 6 lane expressway so ideas can flow freely in and out of their mind. Then they learn to add, edit, delete and then focus.
And later in life it’s ERECKA! Here is our next new product.

Creative Thinkers do not problem solve like everyone else. However they may come to the same conclusion.
Many Creative Thinkers do not function well in the BOX known as Public Education because they were born thinking outside the box.

Many years ago I attended the 1st grade open house at my third daughter’s school. As I walked in the door the teacher said I should have no problem finding my daughters artwork among all those that covered the walls of the room. Then she smiled and walked away.
As I walked around the room I saw many paintings with a big sun in the sky, a square house with a pointed roof, a big round tree, with stick people standing in the front yard.
And then I saw it…It was an abstract painting of the S trap plumbing of my kitchen sink…the same sink that I had repaired several weeks earlier.  
Yep I knew right then that this kiddie was hearing an entirely different drummer.

 

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote acclaro Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 22 2014 at 2:00pm
Doesn't a school administrator and system have to adopt critical thinking and procedures, let's call it 'best practices' to then advance students into becoming 'critical thinkers'?

At the end of the day, is critical thinking dictated by the instructor thinking outside the box constantly, ergo, using critical thinking approaches, that in turn, create a critical thinker as an outcome. New York has done a magnificent job in using critical thinking approaches with the private sector to drive positive advances in testing and education retention and cognitive capabilities. using integrated, holistic approaches to critical thinking through technology, and the virtual classroom with the best instructors, regardless of district.

Isn't Common Core a critical thinking approach?        
'An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.' - Winston Churchill
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TonyB Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 23 2014 at 11:38am
No tax money for religious education. It is a violation of the US Constitution. I'm all for "creative thinkers" and creative thinking but I'll bet that those who support those ideas are in a minority.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Dean Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 23 2014 at 3:43pm
I agree with chmoore1----get rid of Libby Lolliy. A complete waste of money. 
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote spiderjohn Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 23 2014 at 6:19pm
after hearing about it for a year, my wife persuaded me to stop in Loveland to check it out--pretty cool and developing

an old city with old(not really historic) housing and business district on a small waterway with a bike/walking path---sound familiar?

visited a young local who works here, but now lives there and has started a small business there--I will go back

so--why do we have to caravan locals states away to visit similar municipal attempts when there are so many scattered in our own back yard?
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Vivian Moon Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 23 2014 at 8:19pm

Spider

There is no reason for them to leave the state of Ohio and to be quite honest no reason for them to leave town at all. Isn’t that why we spent tax payer\s money to join the Main Street Program and established Downtown Middletown Inc.? If City Hall doesn’t know what they need to do now…they never will.  
Or they could simply get in their car and take a 30 minute drive to Lebanon…best example around.  

City Hall had two years while the roof was being removed on the City Center Mall to come up with a DETAILED PLAN for downtown. Instead over the past 15 years we have watched building after building year after year decay and fall away.  Remember all the requirement that that City Hall put on the buildings downtown…each building had to produce x amount of jobs etc. It was City Hall that killed the redevelopment of Downtown Middletown with all their rules and regulations and potential buyers walked away.  

NO VISION..NO PLAN..= FAILURE

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Vivian Moon Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Dec 25 2014 at 12:08pm

0Spider

Many years ago I lived the Loveland-Milford area. In the summer they had a huge 2 day outdoor art show that covered all the old area downtown. The train depot was open all year and sold hand made items and art work. I sold many of my small paintings and sculptures there. People loved to come and take their kids for a ride on the train. I believe it is now called Thomas Train so it must be a really big hit with the younger kiddies. They also had a big Music Festival but I can’t remember what it was called. All this was before Kings Island opened.

The bike path has been there for years. When by son was a teenager we rode that pathway to Fort Ancient and on to Columbus and then turn around and ride back to the Mariemont Inn where we would spend the night and then back to Lebanon. It was a wonderful ride. The waterway is the Little Miami where you can rent a canoe and spend a hot summer day just floating along doing nothing.

Many years ago the Loveland area was also were the KKK held many of their annual meetings.

BTW..Mariemont has an interesting history..It was a planned community built in the early 1900's

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Just wondering Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Apr 28 2015 at 6:24am
Please read this from a "creative thinker" with guts.


 
Listen to the young people, F-this, F-that, and nary anyone will step up and correct them- even with wife and kids in tow!
 

FINALLY - - Someone in the teaching profession had the courage to set the standards so badly needed NOW.

 

PLEASE, MAKE THE TIME TO READ THIS and SHARE IT…..PLEASE.

 

New high school principal

 

We watched high school principal Dennis Prager of Colorado , along with Sara Palin and Tom Brokaw on TV a couple of weeks ago....what a dynamic, down to earth speaker. Even though Palin and Brokaw were also guest speakers they did little but nod and agree with him. This is the guy that should be running for President in
2016 !
A Speech Every American High School Principal Should Give.

By Dennis Prager .

 

To the students and faculty of our high school:

 

I am your new principal, and honored to be so.
There is no greater calling than to teach young people.

 

I would like to apprise you of some important changes coming to our school. I am making these changes because I am convinced that most of the ideas that have dominated public education in America have worked against you, against your teachers and against our country.

 

First
, this school will no longer honor race or ethnicity.
I could not care less if your racial makeup is black, brown, red, yellow or white. I could not care less if your origins are African, Latin American, Asian or European, or if your ancestors arrived here on the Mayflower or on slave ships. The only identity I care about, the only one this school will recognize, is your individual identity -- your character, your scholarship, your humanity. And the only national identity this school will care about is American.

 

This is an American public school, and American public schools were created to make better Americans. If you wish to affirm an ethnic, racial or religious identity through school, you will have to go elsewhere. We will end all ethnicity, race and non-American nationality-based celebrations. They undermine the motto of America , one of its three central values -- epluribus Unum, "from many, one." And this school will be guided by America 's values. This includes all after-school clubs. I will not authorize clubs that divide students based on any identities. This includes race, language, religion, sexual orientation or whatever else may become in vogue in a society divided by political correctness.

 

Your clubs will be based on interests and passions, not blood, ethnic, racial or other physically defined ties. Those clubs just cultivate narcissism -- an unhealthy preoccupation with the self -- while the purpose of education is to get you to think beyond yourself. So we will have clubs that transport you to the wonders and glories of art, music, astronomy, languages you do not already speak, carpentry and more. If the only extracurricular activities you can imagine being interested in are those based on ethnic, racial or sexual identity, that means that little outside of yourself really interests you.

 

Second
, I am uninterested in whether English is your native language. My only interest in terms of language is that you leave this school speaking and writing English as fluently as possible. The English language has united
America 's citizens for over 200 years, and it will unite us at this school. It is one of the indispensable reasons this country of immigrants has always come to be one country. And if you leave this school without excellent English language skills, I would be remiss in my duty to ensure that you will be prepared to successfully compete in the American job market. We will learn other languages here -- it is deplorable that most Americans only speak English -- but if you want classes taught in your native language rather than in English, this is not your school.

 

Third
, because I regard learning as a sacred endeavor , everything in this school will reflect learning's elevated status. This means, among other things, that you and your teachers will dress accordingly. Many people in our society dress more formally for Hollywood events than for church or school. These people have their priorities backward. Therefore, there will be a formal dress code at this school.
 

Fourth
, no obscene language will be tolerated anywhere on this school's property -- whether in class, in the hallways or at athletic events. If you can't speak without using the f -word, you can't speak. By obscene language I mean the words banned by the Federal Communications Commission, plus epithets such as "Nigger," even when used by one black student to address another black, or "bitch," even when addressed by a girl to a girlfriend. It is my intent that by the time you leave this school, you will be among the few your age to instinctively distinguish between the elevated and the degraded, the holy and the obscene.
 

Fifth
, we will end all self-esteem programs. In this school, self-esteem will be attained in only one way -- the way people attained it until decided otherwise a generation ago -- by earning it. One immediate consequence is that there will be one valedictorian, not eight.
 

Sixth
, and last, I am reorienting the school toward academics and away from politics and propaganda. No more time will be devoted to scaring you about smoking and caffeine, or terrifying you about sexual harassment or global warming. No more semesters will be devoted to condom wearing and teaching you to regard sexual relations as only or primarily a health issue... There will be no more attempts to convince you that you are a victim because you are not white, or not male, or not heterosexual or not Christian. We will have failed if any one of you graduates this school and does not consider him or herself inordinately fortunate -- to be alive and to be an American.
 

Now, please stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of our country. As many of you do not know the words, your teachers will hand them out to you.

 

Pass this along if you agree. . .. . If not delete
…. and later regret it!

Inquiring minds want to know.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote 409 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jun 27 2015 at 8:03pm
Every morning is the dawn of a new error...
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Vivian Moon View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Vivian Moon Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jun 27 2015 at 9:17pm
Love it....add a few field trips to this list also
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