Creative school means autonomous rediscovery, not originality at all costs

Evidence

The creative school is the culmination of the active school. In the first phase the aim is to discipline, hence also to level out—to obtain a certain kind of “conformism” which may be called “dynamic”. In the creative phase, on the basis that has been achieved of “collectivisation” of the social type, the aim is to expand the personality—by now autonomous and responsible, but with a solid and homogeneous moral and social conscience. Thus creative school does not mean school of “inventors and discoverers”; it indicates a phase and a method of research and of knowledge, and not a predetermined “programme” with an obligation to originality and innovation at all costs. It indicates that learning takes place especially through a spontaneous and autonomous effort of the pupil, with the teacher only exercising a function of friendly guide—as happens or should happen in the university. To discover a truth oneself, without external suggestions or assistance, is to create—even if the truth is an old one. It demonstrates a mastery of the method, and indicates that in any case one has entered the phase of intellectual maturity in which one may discover new truths. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 347

Categorization

• DEFINE: Distinguishes ‘creative school’ from both ‘active school’ and mere inventiveness—a precise conceptual distinction worth carrying forward.
• SEED: The idea that self-discovered old truths demonstrate intellectual maturity could anchor an essay on pedagogy and critical-theory reading: students arrive at the discipline’s conclusions on their own.