I've always been fascinated with Walt Disney's creative process. The story says he had three physical rooms in his animation studio-one for the 'Creative', one for the 'Realist' and one for the 'Critic'.

In the Creative room, ideas flew. No ideas was a bad idea. Everyone was encouraged to go out on a limb, and the walls were covered with contributions.

In the Realist room, the big ideas met reality. Disney and his animators started to ask 'would this actually WORK?'. They became harsh judges of their previous brainstorming and weeded out many of the ideas.

In the Critic room, Walt made grown men cry. Only the very best ideas made the cut, with many sessions having every idea thrown away at this point.

After he and the animators left the Critic room, they went back to the Creative room to start over.

What if we brought this thought process into the classroom? What if we asked students to become Creatives, then Realists, then Critics with their projects? I'm just beginning to explore this thought, and this is my first stab at a visual. My students responded really well the idea as so many are Disney fans to begin with.

Enjoy, and please let me know if there are areas in your classroom that you'd like to see this thought process expanded in to!

To read more about the creative process, start here! http://creativethinking.net/articles/2011/08/29/walt-disney%E2%80%99s-creative-thinking-technique/