Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber
Martin, do you feel that with this loss of creativity there has also been a loss of inspiration? Specifically for teams in the lower quartile of performance, do you think the students on those teams are more inspired by a creative solution that may score a grand total of 1 point all season or by a less creative solution that may reliably score even if it isn't going to win many events?
Basically, does "raising the floor" help increase inspiration? Are there other methods we could go about doing this without impacting creativity?
Not attacking your view, just curious. The crux of the anti Ri3D/BB arguments seems to think that Creativity is correlated with Inspiration and Performance is not correlated with Inspiration.
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Part of being inspired to enter a STEM field is the realization that "hey, I can do this!". If FIRST published a set of plans, and the kids just followed the plans, I doubt they would get that feeling. While I understand that Ri3D and others is not a set of plans, I do believe that a teenager (notorious for taking the easy way out) will have a tendency to watch the videos rather than try to come up with their own unique concept.
The biggest challenge we as mentors face is to reign in our own enthusiasm and let the kids come up ideas. I absolutely believe that we can help, influence, guide and correct without giving them the answer on a silver platter.