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The Odyssey And The Aeneid

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Introduction Critical and creative thinking are two categories that analyze information and solve problems in either concrete or abstract ways. Assessing the ability to teach these skills as an overarching concept including subcategories within, is an essential piece to instruction. Without a proper evaluation of the strengths, areas for growth, and improvement plans, it becomes easy to feel misplaced or uncertain about what skills are being taught and at what depth they are being learned. As a teacher who engages with students, it is easy to identify that some critical or creative thinking training is happening, whether one, or both, perhaps one more than the other but the thing that needs to happen that often does not, is the use of reflection …show more content…

For example, I do an assessment every year on Greek culture that incorporates plays such as, The Iliad, The Odyssey, and The Aeneid. Students have to interpret scenes from the plays and determine what this would look like in the form of acting. They had to use creative thinking skills in order to take a text and show what that might look like using their imagination. There is a connection that can be made between the students in my classroom and the writers of these ancient stories. “People from widely diverse backgrounds and educational experiences have made creative, innovative contributions to all aspects or art, culture, science, and knowledge through the ages” (Trilling & Fadel, 2009, pg. 57). This quote sums up the fact that creativity can come from all people, whether it is the original creator or those that are centuries removed from that creation, time period, etc. Work Creatively with …show more content…

48). For me, a lot of time has been spent on telling the students what things are, with some autonomous exploration into a given topic. The reality is, this type of learning requires very little skill and does not prepare students for actions that they would strive for in the real-world, in their own lives. Actions that are listed in 21st Century Skills such as, “civic literacy (civic engagement, community service, ethics, and social justice)” (Trilling & Fadel, 2009, pg.

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