Lecture Notes_U4

Electronic Teaching PortfolioBook TwoUnit Four: Being CreativePart I Get StartedSection A Discussion▇ Sit in groups of threes or fours and discuss the following questions.1.Do you see yourself as a creative person? Please illustrate your point.2.Who do you think is the most creative person the world has ever seen? What do you know about him orher?3.Why do you think being creative is important for a person or a nation?4.Are there any creative activities in your college or university? Give some examples.▇ Answers for reference:1.Possible answers:a)Yes, I think I am a creative person. To begin with, I can very often come up with unusual solutions toproblems that may baffle most of my classmates. I think I am blessed with the ability to see connections between two seemingly very different things. Besides, I’m never satisfied with just following the well-trodden paths. I’m always eager to try new things and have new experiences.b)I wish I could say yes, but I’m afraid I’m not very creative. I like to “follow the herd” and it seldomoccurs to me to challenge available answers or explanations. In fact, I feel very comfortable when there are clear instructions for me to follow when doing things. And if I am asked to do anything creative such as composing a poem or doing a painting, I truly have no idea where to start. I’m not satisfied with my “follow the herd” mentality, but I don’t know how to get rid of it.2. A possible answer is as follows:In my opinion, Thomas Edison is the most creative person the world has ever seen and one of the greatest inventors of all time. He obtained 1093 patents in the United States alone and laid the groundwork for many technological innovations of the 20th century. His major inventions include the phonograph, an early movie camera and the first practical long-lasting light bulb.3. A possible answer:I think being creative is important for a person or a nation because creativity is the essence of life andnature and the whole world is in the process of creation. If a person is not creative enough, he or she cannot solve problems or make any progress, and consequently he or she can hardly survive in this competitive world of ours. The same is true of a nation. If a nation is not creative, it cannot develop and may soon weaken.4. A possible answer is as follows:Yes, there are many creative activities in our university. For example, we have initiated a project on campus, called the Innovation Project, which aims to encourage students to be creative in the course of their learning and research. I’m involved in a mini-project on energy saving. We group members meet regularly to exchange information and ideas. It is required that each of us should come up with some inventive ideas about energy saving. We pool our ideas and will present our energy-saving plans to the departments concerned. The Innovation Project in our university has been going on smoothly and some of the resulting inventions have won national awards.Section B Quotes▇Study the following quotes about being creative. Do you agree with each of them? Give reasons to support your view.Pablo Picasso⊙Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.—Pablo PicassoInterpretation:When we are young, we are naturally creative because we don’t know much about conventions and rules and our imagination knows no bounds. But as we grow up and know more about the world, we tend to feel restricted by conventions and rules and must live with them in order to survive and thrive. Gradually we become less creative or not creative at all because rules and logical thinking tend to limit our creativity.About Pablo Picasso (1881-1973): Spanish artist regarded as one of the greatest and most original artists of the 20th century. He helped to develop cubism (立体主义) and other styles of abstract art. His many famous paintings include Les Demoiselles D’avignon (《亚威农少女》) and Guernica (《格尔尼卡》), a criticism of war and fascism.Edwin Herbert Land⊙An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail.—Edwin Herbert LandInterpretation:Being creative is not about finding the right way to do something in the shortest possible time. It is about having the courage to try many different ways before finding the right way.About Edwin Herbert Land (1909-1991): a US scientist who invented polaroid which is used on sunglasses and car windows. He also invented the Polaroid camera, which uses a special film to produce photographs as soon as they have been taken.Henry David Thoreau⊙The world is but a canvas to the imagination.—Henry David ThoreauInterpretation:Human beings, with their imagination, shape the world around them. So in a sense, the world becomes what human imagination wants it to be.About Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862): US writer and philosopher best known for his book Walden, or Life in the Woods, (《沃尔登》或《林中生活》) in which he describes his simple life in the countryside, and for Civil Disobedience (《论公民的不服从》), an essay on refusing to obey unfair laws, which influenced Gandhi and Martin Luther King.George Bernard Shaw⊙Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will.—George Bernard ShawInterpretation:To create things, you first need an imagination. If you need something new, you must picture it in your mind’s eye first, and then, when you want it badly enough, you will move on to create it.About George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950): Irish writer famous especially for his clever plays which criticize society and the moral values of the time. His best known works include the historical plays Caesar and Cleopatra(《凯撒和克娄巴特拉》) and Saint Joan (《圣女贞德》), and the comedy Pygmalion (《卖花女》), which was later turned into the popular musical show My Fair Lady (《窈窕淑女》). He was a leading socialist and wrote about socialism.Section C Watching and Discussion▇ Watch the following video clip “How to be Creative” and do the tasks that follow:插入视频片段：“How to be Creative.wmv”1.Please decide whether each of the following statements is true (T) or false (F) based on the information inthe video clip.( F ) The video is to summarize why some people are creative.( T ) There is no right or wrong about being creative.( F ) Creativity can only be related to artistic activities.( T ) We need to set aside some time and do things which can ignite our creativity.( T ) Other creative people can inspire us to be unrestricted.( F ) By copying other creative people, we can be creative in our routine life too.( T ) We can find so many new things out there and start thinking of creative ideas.2.Do you agree with the speaker that we can cultivate our creativity in all kinds of activities? Can you givesome examples to illustrate your opinion?Answers for reference:Open.Script：How to be CreativeIf you don’t see yourself as a creative person but would like to, maybe all you need is a spark of inspiration. This video tutorial suggests several ways you might try to kindle that spark.How to be creative? There is no right or wrong when it comes to being creative. Creativity is all about being unique and being true to yourself and doing something that really moves you.There’s no right or wrong. You could be right. You could be walking; you could be riding a bike; you could even be singing or playing a tune.You could be doing anything. But how to actually tap in and be creative yourself? First things first. You need to actually make some room for your creativity.Set aside some time to sit down and look at your daily schedule so you’ve got some time to actually do something that’s creative and means something to you. And then, you can. The idea of being creative is to come up with lots of different ideas.So, what you could do? You could do some word association games. You could actually make some mood boards. Find out what it is that actually moves you.And if you’re still unsure about how to actually be creative, open a book randomly and look at the first thing that jumps out to you. From then, get a blank piece of paper and write down what it is, the first thing that came to you, and then see if you can make up a story. See if you can make up a song.Do something that actually ignites your creativity. The idea is not to restrict yourself. If you’re still unsure, look at what other creative people are doing, people that inspire you.Look at what they’re doing and see what makes them tick, and then perhaps, not so much copy them, but replicate some of what they’re doing and move it a step forward but have fun. You know, ideas come to you when you least expect them to, so perhaps make a change to your routine. If you usually get the bus to work, get on the train.See what new things you can see out there and then make some notes and start thinking of sort of creative ideas to actually enhance yourself. Just enjoy being creative. There’s no right or wrong answer about being creative, but there’s so much going on out there, from looking on the internet to going for a walk in the park.So, just do what you want to do and have fun with the process.Part II Listen and RespondSection B Task One: Focusing on the Main Ideas▇Choose the best answer to complete each of the following sentences according to the information contained in the listening passage.1. The speaker wants us human beings to think about why ______________.A) some people sometimes appear to be so creativeB) we sometimes seem to be so dull and stupidC) some of us appear to be so imaginative sometimesD) creativity is the essence of life and nature2. According to the speaker, ____ _____.A) a young child can walk and talk without being creativeB) a baby can sing and play without being creativeC) a scientist can play with his ideas for hours and hoursD) a young child can create a world of its own imagination3. In the passage the speaker intends to convince us that _________________.A) we can make ourselves creative in some waysB) children are born to be creativeC) some children are not so creativeD) we can stop creativity in a young child very easily4. The speaker points out that the first step to make our children more creative is______________.A) to allow ourselves to be creativeB) to give our children a free and safe surroundingC) to allow our children to make mistakesD) to prevent our children from making mistakes▇ Key:1. B2. D3. B4. ASection C Task Two: Zooming In on the DetailsListen to the passage again and fill in each of the blanks according to what you have heard.1.Creativity is the essence of life and nature. The world is in a __________ act of creation so we should askourselves — Why do some of us sometimes appear to be stupid, ___________, and ___________?2.The whole _________of a baby is creative —it is creative in learning to walk, talk, ________and___________. Since children simply are creative, we can guide our children in a free and _____________ way and let this creativity happen.3.If we know a _________ way to do things, we should guide or “_______” the children.▇ Answers for reference:1.Creativity is the essence of life and nature. The world is in a constant act of creation so we should askourselves — Why do some of us sometimes appear to be stupid, dull, and uncreative?2.The whole essence of a baby is creative —it is creative in learning to walk, talk, sing and play. Sincechildren simply are creative, we can guide our children in a free and unconditioned way and let this creativity happen.3.If we know a better way to do things, we should guide or “help” the child.Script:Creativity Is the Essence of Life and NatureCreativity is the essence of life and nature. The world itself is in a constant act of creation, so we human beings should ask ourselves — Why, in such a creative world, do some people sometimes appear to be stupid, dull, and uncreative? — Are people really dull? Or are we all, in fact, creative?To answer this, let’s look at a baby. The whole essence of a baby is creative — it is creative in learning to walk, talk, sing, and play. Just imagine, a child can create a world of its own imagination and play with it for hours. A scientist who creates a theory is just like that — it is a play of ideas within the mind. It is hard to stop creativity in a young child. You can’t make your child creative. It simply is creative.Then, how can our children be still more creative? I would suggest that the first step is to allow ourselves to be creative. If we ourselves are creative, we can guide our children in a way that is free and unconditioned.We should give our children a free and safe surrounding for them to explore, make mistakes and create. If we know a better way to do things, we should guide or “help” the child.Part III Read and ExploreText ASection A Discovering the Main IdeasExercise 1: Answer the following questions with the information contained in Text A.1)Did Steve Jobs ever go to college?2)Did he graduate?3)What did Steve Jobs mean by talking about connecting the dots?4)Why was Steve Jobs fired from Apple, a company he started with Woz?5)Why did he say that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to him?6)Why did the doctors start crying when they saw the tumor cells of Steve Jobs under a microscope?7)Why did Steve Jobs talk about his cancer?8)What was Steve Jobs’ wish for the graduates?9)What is meant by the phrase “stay hungry, stay foolish” according to your interpretation?▇ Answers for reference:1)Yes, he did. But he dropped out of college after the first six months and then stayed around for another 18months going to the classes he was interested in.2)No, he didn’t.3)He meant that one should follow his curiosity and intuition. The seemingly “meaningless” unconnectedexperiences might contribute to one’s later success.4)The man hired to run Apple and Steve Jobs had different opinions about the future of the company. TheBoard of Directors didn’t side with Steve. So, he was fired.5)He found that he still loved what he did and decided to start over. He was freed from the heaviness ofbeing successful to enter one of the most creative periods of his life.6)Originally, the doctors believed that his cancer was incurable. After viewing the tumor cells under amicroscope, they found that this form of cancer was curable with surgery. They cried because they were happy for Steve Jobs.7)He wanted to say that one’s time was limited. So, don’t waste time. Don’t be trapped by dogma. Oneshould have the courage to follow heart and intuition.8)He quoted a sentence from The Whole Earth Catalogue and wished them “Stay hungry, stay foolish”.9)Most students would most probably accept the following points:a)Be eager to learn and remain intellectually curious all your life.b)Be open to new ideas and thoughts and never be trapped by dogma or conventions.c)Never feel satisfied with what you have learned or achieved.d)Always feel hungry for knowledge and success and never rest on your laurels.e)Remain humble and modest no matter how successful you may be.f)Always be wise enough to know what you really are and have the courage to follow your curiosityand intuition.g)Never assume that you’re the smartest guy in the world and be always ready to learn from others. Exercise 2: Text A can be divided into 3 parts with the paragraph number (s) of each part provided as follows. Write down the main idea of each part.Section B In-depth StudySteve Jobs was undoubtedly the superstar of high-tech industry in recent times. In this commencement address, Jobs recounts his life, his bold decision to drop out of college, the triumph and failure of his first venture into the world of computer technology, and finally his close encounter with death. It provides us with an opportunity to explore the creative mind of this extraordinary genius.Stay Hungry, Stay FoolishCommencement address delivered by Steve Jobsat Stanford University on June 12, 2005(Abridged)1I’m honored to be with you today for your commencement from one of our finest universities. Truth be told, I never graduated from college and this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to a college graduation. Today Iwant to tell you three stories from my life.2The first story is about connecting the dots.3I dropped out of college after the first six months but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months before I really quit. So why did I drop out?4It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so when she found out that my mother-to-be had never graduated from college and that my father-to-be had never graduated from high school, she refused to sign the adoption papers. She only relented when my parents promised that I would go to college. This was the start in my life.5And 17 years later, I did go to college. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life, and no idea of how college was going to help me figure it out, and here I was, spending all the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. Looking back, it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out, I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me and begin dropping in on the ones that looked far more interesting.6And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example.7Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer was beautifully hand-calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and sans-serif typefaces, about varying the space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.8None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me, and we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts, and since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on that calligraphy class and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college, but it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.9Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backwards, so you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. Believing that will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well-worn path, and that will make all the difference.10My second story is about love and loss.11I was lucky—I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents’ garage when I was 20. We worked hard and in ten years, Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4,000 employees. We’d just released our finest creation, the Macintosh, a year earlier, and I’d just turned 30, and then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew, we hired someone to run the company with me, but our visions of the future began to diverge, and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him, and so at 30, I was out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating. But something slowly began to dawn on me. I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. And so I decided to start over.12I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods in my life.13During the next five years I started a company named Pixar and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the world’s first computer-animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world.14I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. Sometimes life’s going to hit you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me goingwas that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love, and that is as true for work as it is for your lovers. The only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work, and the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking, and don’t settle.15My third story is about death.16About a year ago, I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months.17I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening they stuck a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. When they viewed the cells under a microscope, the doctor started crying, because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and, thankfully, I am fine now.18This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. No one wants to die, even people who want to go to Heaven don’t want to die to get there, and yet, death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice, and have the courage to follow heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become.19When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalogue, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by Stuart Brand and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. It was idealistic, overflowing with great notions. Stuart and his team put out several issues, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitch-hiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words, “Stay hungry, stay foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off. “Stay hungry, stay foolish.” And I have always wished that for myself, and now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you. Stay hungry, stay foolish.20Thank you all very much.配图1（Para 1）：乔布斯站在演讲台上讲话，台下是戴着学士帽的毕业生。