Conclusion
Going into this seminar and into the writing of this unit, I thought I’d find a magic bullet, a trick of some kind to help my students tap their hidden imaginations. What I realized along the way is that this does not exist, but that by conscious practice teachers can provide opportunities that do encourage students to use creative faculties they did not know they have, while also building literacy skills and experiencing rigor. It was important to me, though, that the literature and art in this unit be different and unexpected experiences for them, both for the nature of the works and how we approached them. We have taught our students to have superficial dreams about careers and futures, but maybe we’ve sold them short on the kind of dreams they may have. We work hard to prepare them for jobs, college, the predictable life, but we can also open the door to a little fantasy and magic and escape from these things. There are solutions to life’s problems to be found here, as well. The old man in the Marquez story has wings. And while not glamorous, he has a subtle power and mystery and magic. As Ali tells us, without imaginations, we can have no wings.
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