 Creativity Series is a learning quest designed with concept and content convergence in mind supported by meaningful technology integration. Each connecting creativity concept is designed so teachers can repurpose the idea to meet the needs of their students and the needs of their curriculum goals. Each month we share a quest for teachers to repurpose. You can visit our website to find all of our monthly quests. The four monthly quests we will feature for you include opportunities for students to combine poetry, photography, design, video, and of course creativity. The numerous facets of visual arts and literacy converge in the highlighted quests. Additionally, connecting creativity is not only about meeting learning goals, it's about helping students see their world and share their world. Our hope in sharing connecting creativity with you is to involve more classrooms in the quest to gain global perspective. To showcase the power of content and concept convergence. To provide an example of meaningful technology integration. And to honor student voice and ability to create for an audience. The idea for Out My Window was born during ISTE 2013 in San Antonio while Leslie and I were at the Global Education Summit. Our passion for the humanities and conversations centering around global collaboration converged to create Out My Window. The first quest in the Connecting Creativity series. Welcome back to Connecting Creativity. September's quest is Out My Window. The first step's easy. Just take a picture. But first, let me take a selfie. Keeping in mind, this picture is of what you see every day. What you experience, your geography. Edit your picture to showcase and highlight the area. Matching the mood and tone you wish to convey. After you've finished editing, think about the themes of geography. How can you use them to illustrate your perspective? Location, movement, region, place, and human environment interaction. Address the five themes through poetry. No matter the poetic style, your writing can capture your perspective. Near the cornfield, waiting harvest, just outside of town, where connection meets connected, supplying fuel, energy, sussments. In the corner of Northwest Iowa, tucked gently in the green. The final step is to publish. Make sure you're sharing your students' work with the world. We want them to be able to share their perspective with others so that we can learn with and from each other. Share your work to our hashtag, OMW1516, to spread your students' poetry like glitter and confetti all over the world. A cool opportunity for students to learn more about where they are and what they see as well as appreciate their geography, their world. This can also be a great collaborative quest. Classrooms can connect with other classrooms, sharing perspective. Imagine how an appreciation of what we see and live as well as an appreciation for what others see and live affects how we hear the news, our empathy for others. There's so many possibilities with this quest. Just as Picture is powerful and out my window, so it is in 5 Photo Stories, there is a story in a picture. Connecting Creativity's 5 Photo Stories quest honors the story. The idea is simple and can be repurposed to fit your curricular goals. Welcome back to Connecting Creativity. October's learning quest is 5 Photo Stories. Let's go! Too fast? Okay, let's slow it down. First, identify a concept, idea, process, or narrative you would like to illustrate. Next, use a storyboard to organize your ideas. Then, take 5 photos to tell a story. After that, you're going to edit your photos to support your story's theme. Finally, publish your story. Still too fast? Let's break it down. Show the process from the start, capturing initial ideas and notes. The beginning stages of the creation process. Find a way to organize your thoughts. This could be sketch-noting, storyboarding, a rough draft. How will you best convey the message you want to share? How can your storyboards show evidence of learning, content vocabulary, connection to concept, evidence of application? Use photography to illustrate the concept, idea, process, or narrative you want to share. How will you reveal your learning, show evidence of understanding, and utilize concepts? How can you edit your 5 photo story to convey your purpose? Find a publishing avenue that works for you and share your work with the world. Whether it's Twitter, Instagram, or your blog, find an audience and space to share your genius. No matter the content, the framework for 5 photo stories can be used to show a concept, idea, process, or narrative. Make sure you share to our Connecting Creativity hashtag CCS1516. The adventure of Spider Squirrel. One day, Mr. Squirrel decided to go on a trip. When he got on the air balloon, he was afraid to jump. But when he jumped, he was no ordinary squirrel. He was a flying squirrel. When he jumped to the boat, he landed safely on the boat, and he was happy that he could fly. The boat went under the bridge, and the squirrel jumped to the side of the bridge and climbed up. Wee bee! And he jumped on a train, and the train went on this old rickety bridge, and the bridge led to his home, and he was safely back at his rock. Yay! The Loan. There was a lonely deer in the woods, so he went over a rickety bridge. He found a butterfly and chased it. The butterfly went across the orange flowers. The deer chased it, and they played until sundown. Author, Addison Fox, Arthur Lail Scruggs, and bye. Five Photo Stories is just one of many ways to use what our students use naturally, the camera. And our students have stories to tell, stories to share. Five! Five! We do have a contribution to make. Connecting Creativity knows there is expertise in our classroom, knowledge bursting at the seams. The How-To Quest invites us all to share a process, an explanation. So let's walk through the process of the How-To Quest. First, Brainstorm, then you're going to use a storyboard to organize your ideas. Create a How-To using video, screencasting, or even images to tell your story. Then it's simple. You publish. Let others benefit from what you've created. Whether you're using this as a means to connect to expository writing, or whether you just want to gain insight into what students understand, asking students to demonstrate understanding with the How-To Quest is one of many ways students can combine creativity with content and concept. This is how you make a master plan. First you get this fur color, then his skin color, then his hands size, then his feet size, and then you tell him what to do, and then he dances, and then he headsband, headsband, headsband, headsband, headsband, headsband, he dances, headsband, comes off the stage. You have to step with your bad leg, arms up, and kick. It takes a lot of practice and you have to squeeze over the top. Oh, again. And then it's going to show you the correct way to throw a football. What position do you play, Landon? No matter the design, giving students an opportunity to share and show can support classroom community, as well as provide insight into student interest and understanding. Students have so much to teach us in all areas. Endless curricular options. The opportunity for endless curricular options exists in found poetry found by me. There are so many ways to connect literacy and creativity across contents and concepts. This quest does just that. Identify a current event, news article, and begin with any content or concept connection. You want to establish a purpose. You want to choose words and phrases that support your purpose and your theme. You can choose other texts to accompany of various genres, styles. Mash it! Arrange your words and phrases intentionally. So it adds to your theme. Of course. Design. If you want, you can slam it. Share it and a must publish it. And poetry is not confined to the Language Arts classroom. What a beautiful opportunity. I urge you to adapt each Connecting Creativity quest to fit your curricular goals and your students' interests. The four quests are from our year-long series. There's support for each quest on our webpage. Please share with us your students' work so we too can celebrate their creations. Thank you for joining us in our mission to connect creativity. For more information, contact us at connectingatplaa.org.