I came across this post from September 2014 by George Couros (@gcouros) on the Innovators Mindset and it got me thinking that it could be a nice little model to use with students and staff at school.
In his post Couros lists eight characteristics that seem common in developing students (and teachers?) as innovators:
1. Empathetic – To create new and better ways of doing things, we need to first understand who we are creating them for.
2. Problem Finders – All innovation starts from a question not an answer.
3. Risk-Takers – Many would argue that “best-practice” is the enemy of innovation. To be truly innovative, you sometimes have to go off the beaten path.
4. Networked – Innovation does not happen in isolation, as it is often ideas that are being shared amongst many that lead to new and better ideas being developed.
5. Observant – A practice normal amongst those that would be considered “innovative” is that they constantly look around their world and create connections.
6. Creators – Innovation is a combination of ideas and hard work.
7. Resilient – To simply try something and give up as soon as it fails never leads to innovation only a definitive end.
8. Reflective – If we started again, what would we do differently? What can we build upon?
You can read the full narrative behind his thinking in the original post.
On Frank Crawfords (@frankcrawford) previous advice I think I would change ‘risk taking’ to ‘adventurous’ as I think people find it a more acceptable term – but then perhaps I’m just being picky?
George up-dated is post in March 2015 with this great image by @SylviaDuckworth.
Food for thought…