#  Balance of agency and flexibility helps students develop their own artistic process 

 



   ![Nora Schultz](/sites/g/files/omnuum12666/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/vpl/files/scultzapproved.png?itok=ahStZTgS) 

 

*Out of appreciation for Professor Shultz’s commitment to flexibility in artistic expression, this issue of Into Practice employs a slightly modified format.*

**Nora Schultz, Assistant Professor of Visual and Environmental Studies,** encourages experimentation and a diversity of readings for her courses [*Shape Shifting Your Reality*](https://canvas.harvard.edu/courses/28543) and [*Object Matter of Jelly Fish: Sculpture Course*](https://canvas.harvard.edu/courses/27649)*.* Her goal is to create a “structure that gives students the awareness and 'space' to develop their unique creative processes.” One assignment, for example, involves students visiting [“The Onion” sculpture](http://collections.si.edu/search/results.htm?q=record_ID:siris_ari_299738) by Alexander Calder outside of Harvard’s Pusey Library and then creating a short dialogue between the sculpture and its surrounding buildings. Schultz also encourages students to add to the course reading list and has found that student-provided readings can significantly shift the discourse.

## Encourage studio time. 

Schultz encourages students to use the sculpture studio outside of class hours and works with the department to coordinate optional intensive workshops. “It’s important to have access and understanding of the range of tools at their disposal, so they are aware of different possibilities.” As a result, at the end of the course, students “may end up with 30 completed projects or just one that may not even be finished, and they have all succeeded.”

## Increase awareness about our physical environments.

A balance of student agency and flexibility in the courses helps students become critically aware of their environment—people often take public structures and architecture for granted—while their individual process is developing.

## It isn’t about the final product.

“The physicality is not the most important part.” Schultz refrains from grading students based on “completion,” and instead evaluates the level of commitment demonstrated throughout. Students must have certain levels of commitment to practice, independence, and maturity to make full use of the course and the VES department resources. This can be difficult given students’ many competing demands: “It’s important to provide time for students to support them as individual artists.”

Flexibility allows students’ personal interests to be integrated with the conceptual frameworks they are learning and it enables them to develop creative and critical thinking.



 

##  Related Research 

 



  [### Research: “I’m in a Professional School! Why Are You Making Me Do This?” A Cross-Disciplinary Study of the Use of Creative Classroom Projects on Student Learning

 ](http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/87567555.2012.731660) Various studies demonstrate the benefits to student learning, including a deeper understanding of course content. 

 

 

   [### Research: Gave projects, tests, or assignments that required original or creative thinking

 ](http://www.ideaedu.org/Resources-Events/Teaching-Learning-Resources/Gave-projects-tests-or-assignments-that-required-original-or-creative-thinking) Various studies demonstrate the benefits to student learning, including increased engagement and student satisfaction. 

 

 

  

 

 [ More Research arrow\_circle\_right ](/intopracticeresearch) 

 

 

 

##  Related Resource 

 



  [### The Architectural Imagination (HarvardX)

 ](https://www.edx.org/course/architectural-imagination-harvardx-gsd1x) In K. Michael Hays’s HarvardX course, The Architectural Imagination, learners explore fundamental architectural concepts through various “making-as-learning” activities, like building a cardboard model of Aldo Rossi’s Cuneo Memorial and designing a pied-à... 

 

 

   [### Prototyping Lab (i-Lab)

 ](https://i-lab.harvard.edu/news/harvard-i-lab-expands-prototyping-lab-in-response-to-student-demand/) Harvard i-Lab renovates 'maker space' and prototyping lab 

 

 

  

 

 [ More Resources arrow\_circle\_right ](/intopracticeresources) 

 

 

 

 



 

 See also:- [ FAS ](/featured-faculty/fas)
- [ Into Practice Issues ](/practice-categories/practice-issues)
- [ learning by making ](/topics/learning-making)