Ruling Classes
This week I have been writing conference paper for Edinburgh University’s Learning and Teaching Conference which I will be delivering in June. In doing so, I began researching playfulness in Higher Education, and how we as educators can engage with our playful selves, and allow students to engage with theirs. One idea I keep coming back to is this idea that playfulness isn’t an activity - it’s a state of mind, highly context-specific and personal. Sometimes I feel playful, and sometimes I’m just not in the mood; and sometimes I need to be reminded to play.
Last week I wrote about Corita Kent and the impact her work has had on my research so far. In essence, her book Learning by Heart creates a kind of magic circle for creative play - following her assignments gives you permission to explore, experiment, to try and to try again, as she believed there was no ‘fail’ when making art, there was “only work”. One of the key aspects of her teaching was the setting of her classroom rules. Her rules not only set the restrictions she wanted on her students, but perhaps more importantly, they set the tone for the kind of classroom and the kind of attitude she wanted students to approach their work with, the attitude which framed her methodology: “Begin, look, connect & create, work & play, celebrate!” (Loste 2008). Corita’s playful approach was centred around her belief that art cannot be learned “except by the heart” (ibid), that is, intrinsically, personally. Her rules serve as a constant reminder to her students to play, and be playful.
Rules as an essential tenet, a standard, a defining feature of play is widely written about (Huizinga 1949; Salen & Zimmerman 2003; Burghardt 2005; Henricks 2006; Eberle 2014). Play needs rules. The act of playing, Ian Bogost writes, is “The process of manipulating the capacities of something, working withing the constraints and limitations it provides” (Bogost 2017).
As it turns out, rules are also key to creativity. Vygotsky proposed the concept of “tool-mediated and object-oriented action” by which he identified how human development is affected by the role of their tools. Tools in this regard could be anything from utensils, toosl, machines, signs…or rules. All human activity, argued Vygotsky, is mediated by tools, either physical or psychological:
They mediate the relationship between humans and objects of their environment and are cultural means that were built by humans to control and transform their behavior and their environment”
(Vygostsky quoted in Kern 2006, p65)
Building on these ideas, Rabardel proposed that all human activity is based on three elements: the subject, the instrument and the “object toward which the action aided by the instrument is directed” (Rabardel 1995, p65). Figuring out how to use these tools for oneself, Rabardel suggests, calls for creativity (ibid. p135-145). As Kern summarises: “The individual’s creativity is based on the use of cultural artifacts such as language or rules” (Kern 2006, p65). In fact, the use of rules in the creation of art is particularly prevalent:
“…the dialogue between creativity and rules is obvious, as it is part of the artist’s work, on the one hand, to master certain techniques (rules) and, on the other, to strive for their transgression”
(ibid. p78).
Artistic creation thrives on the mastery and transgression of rules, much like play does. And when in a position to manage activity - a teaching position, for example - “support should be provided to the agents in integrating rules in their activity” (ibid. p66).
This is essentially what Corita was doing: supporting her students by creating a ruleset and demonstrating to them assignments that would help them integrate these rules into their work. By creating rules, Corita was not only setting the student’s challenges to master and overcome, but setting the context for the classroom as well. In essence, Corita was demonstrating the values and ethics of her classroom: that hard work was vital, that there was no failure, that a positive, self-disciplined mindset was integral to the studio. And that she herself was playful - that the rules were made to be trangressed, adapted, iterated on.
Recent studies have shown the importance of this context-setting when striving for playful, creative mindsets, particularly in education. Rikke Nørgärd et al. developed what they call a ‘signature pedagogy for playful learning in Higher Education’. This model for developing strategies for playful learning forms a three-tiered structure with attitude and motivation-centred “implicit” or playful structures at the bottom, moving through “deep” or play structures towards the final manifestation of the structures which focuses on a surface or “game” level of structure. Their research suggests that in order to utilise play as a learning and teaching practice, you must in the first instance engage not play, but playfulness, by creating an environment in which participants feel comfortable to play. The signature pedagogy focuses initially on engaging, encouraging and manifesting the most foundational element of playful learning - the playful attitude.
So play and creativity both need rules. That means that setting up a playful, creative environment - either for myself or for students - could benefit from rules. And we know that at the foundation of playful pedagogy there needs to be the creation of a ‘magic circle’ of sorts where the context for play is set. It seems logical then that if I want to engage not only my own playful mindset, but one of my students as well, I could use the setting of rules to describe the kind of playspace that I want to work in. As such, I propose revisiting Corita’s rules through the lens of my own practice, to create a ruleset for my own playful work.
Corita’s rules are, of course, not the only rules out there for creativity. There are a plethora of rulesets, guidelines, manifestos out there which mention play - this deserves a post of its own. But by focussing on Corita’s rules, I lay out one of the core possible outlets for my research - a framework for PLORK, starting with the setting of a context in which students, teachers and practitioners can be brave, can fail, and can be playful, as long as they put in the work. Rebardel believed that a rule can become an instrument when it is used with purpose towards a goal. Rules support play and creativity; they give agents (users, players, participants) frameworks to master and transgress. Perhaps they could do the same for my research, and my practices.
References
BOGOST, I. 2017. Play Anything. Chicago Humanities Festival. Chicago Humanities Festival.
BURGHARDT, G. M. 2005. The genesis of animal play : testing the limits, Cambridge, Mass. ; London, MIT.
EBERLE, S. G. 2014. The Elements of Play: Towards a Philosophy and Definition of Play. Journal of Play, 6**,** 214-233.
GOLDSTEIN, M. 2023. How to Be a Design Student (and How to Teach Them), Princeton Architectural Press.
HENRICKS, T. S. 2006. Play reconsidered : sociological perspectives on human expression, Urbana, University of Illinois Press.
HUIZINGA, J. 1949. Homo ludens; a study of the play-element in culture, London,, Routledge & K. Paul.
KERN, A. 2006. Exploring the Relation Between Creativity and Rules: The Case of the Performing Arts. Int. Studies of Mgt. & Org., 36**,** 63-80.
KENT, C. & STEWARD, J. 2008. Learning by heart, New York, Bantam Books.
LOSTE, B. 2008. Corita: A biography. In: STEWARD, J. (ed.) Learning by Heart. New York, NY: Allworth Press.
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NØRGÅRD, R. T., TOFT-NIELSEN, C. & WHITTON, N. 2017. Playful learning in higher education: developing a signature pedagogy. International Journal of Play, 6**,** 272-282.
RABARDEL, P. 1995. Les hommes et les technologies: une approche cognitive des intruments contemporains., Paris, A. Colin.
SALEN, K. & ZIMMERMAN, E. 2003. Rules of play : game design fundamentals, Cambridge, Mass. ; London, MIT.
VYGOTSKY, L. 1971. The Psychology of Art, Cambridge, MIT Press.
VYGOTSKY, L. 1978. Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes, Cambridge, Harvard University Press.