ICTlogy

Ichiya Nakamura, Professor, Graduate School of Media Design, Keio University, Japan
Janak Bhimani, Doctoral Student, Graduate School of Media Design, Keio University, Japan
Enhancing the creativity of children through the use of digital video technology

Are children really early adopters of new technology? There are authors like Vygotsky or Prensky that have pointed at some factors that may make children more creatitve.

A research was performed by running several workshops on storytelling, playing, taping, etc. What happens behind the scenes, how documentaries are made, etc. was analyzed through action research, and looking at the different narrative activity phases

Every workshop provided qualitative and quantitative data on the activities, children and parents to demonstrate that workshops for children incorporating digital video technology provide children with means of expressing their creativity in different and enhanced ways.

Initial conclusions showed that this is a research that never ends: its ethnographic and participatory approach makes it a non-stop experience. On the other hand, replication requires the development of a manual, which was done too. 3 keys to success proved to be adaptability, simplicity and scalability. Performance and sharing with your community, and real-time evaluation by your peers are certainly very interesting and valuous aspects of creativity.

(personal note: difficult to liveblog session, due to the rich and constant examples and references to works produced by children.)

Discussion

Q: We need to find the way to put all the (digital and creative) skills together, so that things can happen. On the other hand, how do we “control” children? how do we manage the planning stage? Bhimani: having a fresh, young mindset does help. In any case, control is definitely not the option, control has to go out the window. Trust, confidence, nearness are very important, and the teacher is a facilitator, not a director. And the environment makes it all: it is not a classroom, but another kind of space where to enjoy oneself, to play, to tape. And technology is not important: is how we use technology in that specific environment.

More information

• Bhimani, J. & Nakamura, I. (2011). Enhancing Children’s Creative Output Through the use of Traditional and New Active Tools (PDF)

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