Can we have imagination without comprehension?

Imagination.  What is it?  Is it the movie theatre or TV set in your mind's eye?

Comprehension.  What is that?  Understanding a topic?


 Recently I was part of a discussion where the question was raised:  When did today's generation lost their imagination?



Upon further discussion, the topic was revealed that upon reading information on a topic, students had a hard time taking that information and imagining different scenarios or scenes.  Once the topic was explain via verbal descriptions the students were able to continue the assignment of imagining. 

My initial thought was that imagination was not the problem.  It seems from this description that reading comprehension was the issue. 

Can you imagine what you can't comprehend?  Imagination helps young children process and understand the events that they observe.  Does today's generation have the imagination yesterday's generation had?  Do they know how to play with rocks and sticks?

As a leader and teacher of young soldiers, I would say yes, today's generation do know how to imagine using rocks and sticks!  Young people, 18-19 years old, would use rocks, dirt, string, etc. to come up with field expedient sand tables to work over battle drills.  They could pretend, visualize, and verbalize the concepts using whatever was available to them.  They didn't have laptops or powerpoint, but were able to make do.  The same soldiers could make the fancy powerpoints as well.  Learning battle drills may be a little different than the situation but the ability of the young men and women to imagine was not deterred by video games or television. 

By being able to use rocks and draw patterns in dirt, showed us as military leaders that the young men and women comprehended the battle drills.  Their comprehension was done through several methods until the battle drills were second nature.  First we read the descriptions, then we talked about the drills.  This was followed by practice, usually walking through the position as if in a play.  Finally, half speed drills and full speed drills solidified the understanding. 

How can we put this in the classroom?  First we read about something abstract such as the structure of an atom.  Then we talk about it.  Then we can draw the different models of the atom.  And then make scale models of atoms.  By engaging many different styles of learning, comprehension can be achieved.  Once comprehension is achieved there is no limit to the imagination of today's young people. 

-p