There was a desire to create more space for imagination and creativity in the curriculum. Student's voices, ideas, concepts, theories and knowledge doen't always get celebrated outside the boundaries of the curriculm. Aspects of their self knowledge ancestral knowledge are not often heard futhermore imagination can be squeezed into time niches and in time falls asleep.
During Think Tank sessions, the mentor meets small groups of 6 to 8 children in a Pow Wow format to share ideas and thoughts (Idea Shower). These can be experiences, recollections of past explorations or new proposals. If needed, a quiet moment of recollection/thinking is proposed as a way of linking with the students’ self. Then the group creates a dialogue and decides how to proceed. This is the three-step process of making the invisible.
During Think Tank sessions, the mentor meets small groups of 6 to 8 children in a Pow Wow format to share ideas and thoughts. These can be experiences, recollections of past explorations or new proposals. If needed, a quiet moment of recollection/thinking is proposed as a way of linking with the students’ self. Then the group creates a dialogue and decides how to proceed. This is the three-step process of visible thinking that accompanies the experiences.
It got tagged as best at FuoriSalone 2021, Milan Design Fair.
It started in 2015 in one school of the educational group and is now present in 2 other schools of the same group.
Articles by the art studio teacher/facilitator Holly BF Warren have been published in the International Teachers Magazine, https://www.educationthatinspires.ca/2019/11/25/the-think-tank-environment/
ImaginED, https://www.educationthatinspires.ca/2019/11/25/the-think-tank-environment/
Art in Early Childhood, https://www.artinearlychildhood.org/projects
Think Tank during the pandemic appeared Era un Altro Mondo. I nostri figli e l'esperienza, del Covid-19 by Nadia Dario & Luca Tateo, Armando Editore.
Light Narratives in the ALEA, Australian Literacy Educator's Association.
Fuorisalone 2021. https://www.fuorisalone.it/it/2021/eventi/896/The-circle-Think-Tank-Project-2020-20
Think Tank takes you for a walk inside your imagination connecting your creativity and knowledge. We will listen, ask questions and arose your curiosity which in the Think Tank is a mental wanderlust. We work as a community, once ideas are shared and the group discusses how to make their imagination come alive visibly we all work by layering the work. Everyone contributes to the artwork.
