“Spirit Groove” - Kojo Samuels & Volker Kaczinski

From "Let the Dance Dance You," Virtual Friday Morning InterPlay:

InterPlay Warm Up - Phil Porter

InterPlay Warm Up with Phil Porter:

Gretchen Wagner on InterPlay Forms

Find more information about InterPlay.

One Hand Dance: In this video, Gretchen Wegner facilitates Dorothy Finnigin in doing a hand dance, one of the basic forms of InterPlay. 



Hand to Hand Dance: In this video Dorothy Finnigan and Gretchen Wagner demonstrate how to do a hand to hand dance Interplay-style.


Babbling: Gretchen describes the InterPlay form of babbling.


Find more information about InterPlay.

VIDEO: Tarra & Bella / A Match Made in Ele-Heaven

From "Friendbella!" Virtual Friday Morning InterPlay:

Shruti Box M1

From "Breathe In Gratitude," Virtual Friday Morning InterPlay:

What Creative Education Could Look Like ...

Check this out - The Independent Project!

And read the New York Times piece about it ...

Watch it ...

TEDxDirigo - Zoe Weil - THE WORLD BECOMES WHAT YOU TEACH

THE WORLD BECOMES WHAT YOU TEACH

Zoe Weil is the co-founder and president of the Institute for Humane Education (http://www.humaneeducation.org/) and is considered a pioneer in the comprehensive humane education movement, which provides people with the knowledge, tools, and motivation to be conscientious choicemakers and engaged changemakers for a better world. Zoe created the first Master of Education and Certificate Program in Humane Education in the U.S. covering the interconnected issues of human rights, environmental preservation, and animal protection. She has also created acclaimed online programs and leads workshops and speaks at universities, conferences, and events across the U.S. and Canada. She has taught tens of thousands students through her innovative school presentations, and has trained several thousand teachers through her workshops and programs. Zoe's most recent book, Most Good, Least Harm: A Simple Principle for a Better World and Meaningful Life, won the 2010 Nautilus silver medal in sustainability and green values. She is the author of several other books including Above All, Be Kind: Raising a Humane Child in Challenging Times for parents; The Power and Promise of Humane Education for educators; and Claude and Medea: The Hellburn Dogs, winner of the Moonbeam gold medal in juvenile fiction, which follows the exploits of two seventh graders who become clandestine activists in New York City, righting wrongs where they find them. Zoe received a Master of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School and a Master of Arts from the University of Pennsylvania.

Creativity Manifesto

By Derek Pettinelli
Creativity + Social Change, University of Connecticut
Waterbury, Connecticut

1. Society places restrictions on people, dictating what they can and cannot do. First and foremost, one must completely disregard such things and concentrate on what they want to do. Rejecting social and societal norms is the first step and also the most difficult one. It’s also important to keep in mind that one should not break any laws or harm others when doing this.
2. Rejecting societal norms is the first step and this includes the capitalist/materialist obsession of mass consumption. A goal that is purely monetary is not one worth obtaining and self-fulfillment is much more important. If one is satisfied with oneself, monetary compensation will follow, but it should not be the main goal.
3. One should be a blank slate by this point, which again is easier said than done. This is a stage in which you should acknowledge nothing except the desire to be creative and achieve enlightenment through creative self-fulfillment.
4. Being creative involves seeking out completely new ways of thinking in order to “rebuild” oneself. New avenues of thought must be explored in order to achieve a higher level of being.
5. Researching think tanks and progressive ways of thought are one part of the equation, but one must also look into classical ways of thinking by learning about classical psychology, existentialism and philosophy through works such as Aristotle, Nietzche, Socrates, Plato, etc.
6. The reading and consumption and processing of information is pivotal. One must devote a large amount of their time to not only seeking out new forms of thought, but to disregarding such useless information such as celebrity gossip, as that only serves to cloud the mind and stifle creativity.
7. Entertainment must be limited, especially TV. Advertisements and marketing are the ultimate forms of quelling creativity, as it is someone else being creative in order to trick and convince the audience into being a consumer.
8. Institutions of higher learning are an excellent place to express creativity, especially compared to pre-college schooling and the business world.
9. Random acts of spontaneity serve to further expand the creative mind. Such acts are difficult to think of and will require work until they become second nature. One must also get rid of any social anxiety by detaching themselves from the physical constraints of the real world and expanding their horizons. Being playful is a great way to accomplish this.
10. Knowing when to take feedback to heart is also important. Some people are negative and only want to bring others down and these people must be avoided.
11. Creativity comes more naturally to some than others and this should not be discouraging as it can be taught and it’s important to remember that this is a process that is constantly working 24/7 as the mind is the most complex and powerful tool in the universe.
12. Expansion of the mind is the penultimate form of creativity, when one is in complete control of the mind, the physical world bears little importance. This is referred to as opening of the third eye, which is almost impossible, almost.

Creativity in Pi(-ku)

March 14 (3/14) was Pi Day (3.14). (March 14 is also Albert Einstein's birthday!) Some celebrate by writing pi-ku -- that, is haiku (17 syllables) about pi and/or a haiku-style poem inspired by pi (3.14, or a three-syllable line, a one-syllable line and a four-syllable line). In my "Creativity + Social Change" course at the University of Connecticut, we begin class each week with a creative thinking warm-up activity. This week, we wrote pi-ku about creativity. Below are the creative outcomes from that experience.

This exercise, of capturing a key idea about creativity in just a few words, is an excellent example of the creative ability of "highlighting the essence," as described by creativity researcher E. Paul Torrance. Highlighting the essence is about identifying what is important or essential.

What's YOUR creativity in pi-ku? Share yours in the comments below!

You and I
merge
image and thoughts.
- Laurie Lukasavage

Let me see
your
creative mind.
- Laurie Lukasavage

Pam and Willy
like
to get silly.
- Chris Filek

Wandering
through
creative minds.
- Chris Filek

Free your Mind
Think
And Then Be Free
- Derek Pettinelli

If You See
Then
You Can Believe
- Derek Pettinelli

Take a Look
See
Outside the Norm
- Derek Pettinelli

From nothing
Flash -
Beauty is there.
- Robert Sireno

Something needed -
What?
Ah-ha it's there.
- Robert Sireno

Apple Pi
Tastes
Most Delicious
Hot
- Ralph Famiglietti

Pi Day is
so
cool. March 14.
- Joan Terry

Creative
work
innovation.
- April Belanger

Love and laugh
Like
Community.
- April Belanger

What is fun?
Fun!
Nothing but fun!
- Shavon Roscoe

An artist
paints
creative waves
- Shavon Roscoe

A picture
drawn
yes, from my mind
- Shavon Roscoe

creating
pie
mix, roll, bake, eat
- Catherine Capuano

Creative
me,
what next for us?
- Steven Dahlberg

Judging much?
STOP!
Yes, and ... Yes, and ...
- Steven Dahlberg

Imagine ...
Why,
what if, what else?
- Steven Dahlberg

Openness.
Think.
Imagine now.
- Steven Dahlberg

Imagine
and
connect, engage.
- Steven Dahlberg

Celebrate Pi Day With Your Own 'Pi-Ku'

Happy Pi Day. It's March 14 — or 3/14 if you write down the date in the m/d format. And that means it's time to celebrate that mysterious mathematical relationship between a circle's diameter and its circumference: 3.1415926535... Today is also, appropriately enough, Albert Einstein's birthday. So the science-minded among us have two good reasons to celebrate. He was born in 1879 and died in 1955. But back to Pi. Two years ago, NPR's Bryant Park Project noted Pi Day with this report. As they said, Pi Day is when "numbers geeks all over the world bake pies, write 'pi-kus' and recite pi to as many decimal points as possible." A "pi-ku", bu the way, works like this:

— First line: 3 syllables

— Second line: 1 syllable

— Third line: 4 syllables

[14 March 2010 - NPR - More; and More from CNN]