The ability of creating, ingenuity, should be an indispensable context in every educational action in any entity which undertakes to deal and to invest its resources on holistic growth – spiritual, mental, emotional or physical – of people (schools, universities, third sector societies, churches, neighborhood societies, among others).
Jean Piaget had already pointed out this path:
“The main goal of education […] must be the creation of men and women capable of doing new things, not simply repeating what past generations did, but men and women who are creative, ingenious and finders, people who can be judgemental and tentative, and people who do not accept everything that is offered to them.”(1)
It is interesting that the New Testament in the Bible says that the real disciple of Jesus is a person involved in innovation, that is to say, a daily process of giving up on the old way of thinking and continually be renewed, changing your own way of seeing yourself and the world around you [the key word in the New Testament to conversion is from the Greek “metánoia” – changing of mind!(2)]
Criativity cannot be a slave of selfishness, because it would lose its restoring function for the world and would become another item in a frank state of sclerosis. Look at the famous sentence of the outstanding Baptist Pastor, Martin Luther King Jr.:
“Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness. This is the judgment.
Life’s most persistent and urgent question is:
What are you doing for others?”(3)
I will give you a suggestion of creativity. Get inspired:
NOTES:
1 Kathe Jervis, Arthur Tobier. "Jean Piaget - Education for democracy: proceedings from the Cambridge School Conference on Progressive Education", October, 1987, Cambridge School (Weston, Mass.), 176 p., apud Janice Arcaro in "Creating quality in the classroom" - St. Lucie Press - EUA; 2008, p.42.
2 See the bible texts: Rm. 6:4 - "[...] we too may live a new life"; Cl.3:9,10 - "you have taken off your old self with its practices [...] have put on the new self, which is being renewed "; Rm.12:2 - "Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind". New International Version.
3 Coretta Scott King. "The Words of Martin Luther King Jr: selected and with an introduction by Coretta Scott King. Newmarket Press. New York. 2008, in 'The community of man', p.17. Tradução e grifos nossos.
4 Video from RefletirTV: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuFWId5W-bQ
