Transformative Education Research Seminar
Thursday, 6 October 2016
We invite all interested scholars to attend the next in the series of research seminars that explore emergent issues in educational (or, more broadly, social) research. This seminar involves a presentation by Kevin Price who will focus on the transformative potential of teaching Creative Writing in high schools.
Rising Tension: Why Creative Writing needs to be taught in high school,
and the necessity of a divorce from English
In Future for Creative Writing, Graeme Harper writes of Creative Writing’s explosive growth worldwide and its rise to distinguish itself as a key discipline of human practice. The National Association of Writers in Education (UK) point to its demand in universities as a key stepping stone into the world's emerging creative economy, and preparing high school students to engage in creative futures requires the recognition that Creative Writing and English are two distinct disciplines. While there are clear connections between the two, English,with an increasing focus on critical literacies,primarily teaches the analysis of the way the English language works in a variety of contexts. Creative Writing, on the other hand, works with alternate epistemologies and, as David Morley(biologist, poet, and Head of English and Comparative Literary Studies at Warwick University)argued at Murdoch University in 2012, to be fully effective it needs a divorce from English.Creative writing practice fosters students' abilities to think for, and express, themselves, promoting learning and understanding across the whole curriculum: sciences, arts and humanities. As well as developing a whole-student creatively critical and critically creative consciousness, it leads to the development of effective skills in working with ideas: generating them, moulding them and articulating them.
This fictocritical analysis—originally presented at the 2016 English Teachers Association (WA) conference in June 2016—addresses why Creative Writing needs to be taught in high schools, and why it might better serve our students and future participants of the creative economy were it located outside of English and taught as a general capability, and a foundation component of STEAM education.
About the Presenter
Kevin Price is an English teacher undertaking PhD research in Creative Writing and STEAM education at Murdoch University. He taught creative writing in Western Australian schools between 2005 and 2015 across a range of creative writing disciplines to primary and high school students, and is currently teaching English at a local high school. His primary supervisor is Dr David Moody, Senior Lecturer, School of Arts, Murdoch University.
Date/Time: Thursday, 6 October 2016 (4.30–6.00pm)
Venue: School of Education, Murdoch University (Bldg. 450, EH2.021: staff common room)
Parking: If driving to Murdoch University please use car park 4
All Are Welcome!