In my classroom, I am constantly trying to improve my lessons to make them more engaging.

I
really appreciate our professor providing us various forms of creative instruction. I had no idea
that there were websites that could change my PowerPoints to a moving or more appealing
format. I will be trying Stop Motion Studio or Powtoon. I also had no idea that visual hierarchy
existed. I will be sure that my future lessons have a size to enhance visibility, have color and
contrast, and typographic hierarchy. Time is my biggest challenge when trying to make creative
and interactive lessons. I struggle trying to make lessons when I have a ton of other things on
my plate like meetings, helping students achieve content mastery, parent emails, sports after
school, etc. After watching the creativity MOOC video. I would like to have more assignments
that incorporate creative problem-solving skills. I find students struggle with critical thinking
and problem solving so having assignments that require students to analyze or create is better
than them reciting or explaining a topic.

My favorite assessment to make my lessons creative and interactive are choice board projects.
Students enjoy choice boards because they have a choice in what project they create and pick a
project that plays to their strengths. Also, I am not stuck grading the same project over and
over. I created a Medieval Choice Board Project where students can create a movie poster
advertising the contributions of Charlemagne, William the Conqueror, or Richard the Lionheart
to Medieval Europe. They can create it on a poster or use Canva. This encourages imagining
other viewpoints. Students can build a physical model of medieval society using Minecraft,
Legos, or any other materials. Students can design a series of three Medieval comic strips using
comic strip templates or Storyboard That. Students can compare and contrast the Bubonic
Plague to one modern-day epidemics in an essay, Flipgrid, or Poster format. These are just a
few of the choices. Students love this project and are very engaged.

After reading 24 Tips to Stimulate Creativity, I noticed that I incorporate different aspects of the
article. I provide students examples of projects to model creativity. Students are encouraged to
come up with ideas for their project. I even allow students to do a different topic/person that
they find interesting. Ex: I had a student ask to do a project on Baldwin IV who was a king who
had leprosy and another student who wanted to compare the Bubonic Plague to Bird Flu. I give
students three days to work on the project to allow for creative thinking. I reward students with
bonus points if they go above and beyond on their project.