Revised
and Updated Saturday, November 05, 2016
WELCOME to NAIJAGRAPHITTI
BLOG, Nigeria’s
premier educational blog on CREATIVITY & INNOVATION. NAIJAGRAPHITTI
Blog is published as an online portal of fourteen (14) concatenated blogs interspersed
with bespoke live, face-to-face activities and media events to democratize and
popularize everything CREATIVITY and INNOVATION.
The
whole concept of the NAIJAGRAPHITTI BLOG is an attempt to make CREATIVITY and
INNOVATION more exciting than gossip and scandal in Nigeria!
Research
has shown Nigeria suffers a chronic skills gap because creativity, problem
solving and thinking skills are not incorporated into Nigeria’s education
system at all levels. Yet CREATIVITY, LIKE MANY OTHER SKILLS, CAN BE LEARNT,
PRACTICED AND IMPROVED! The growing
attention and interest in creativity is due to the recognition of how important
creativity is in the workplace and how educational systems, through teaching
institutions, have to teach creativity alongside mathematics, science, and
several other skills set. The realization has dawned on stakeholders that
creativity matters several diverse sectors. Based on empirical evidence and
scientific inquiry, creativity is seen as purposeful, team-based, learnable,
teachable, assessable, and generally applicable across disciplinary boundaries.
Through further scholarship, creativity is established as a key skill with
increasing relevance and has emerged as key to social and economic progress.
Fostering
creativity has become topical in education and creativity pedagogy embedded in
several countries’ national curriculum. Unfortunately, Nigeria's education
system has not prioritized creativity. This robs graduates of this system
certain competencies including creative problem solving and inventive thinking
skills. Yet qualitative education is possible in Nigeria as long as those who
want the qualitative education to identify the sources of learning, explore and
exploit them effectively.
Thus
NAIJAGRAPHITTI BLOG aims to bridge this gap in Nigeria’s education system by
fostering CREATIVITY and its related concepts through informal e-learning
platforms using ICT and social media. NAIJAGRAPHITTI BLOG would educate, inform
and propagate the concepts of CREATIVITY and INNOVATION and their relevance and
application in Nigerian social/public sphere.
Additionally, NAIJAGRAPHITTI
BLOG would advocate for a culture
enabling CREATIVITY and INNOVATION, at policy level, promote the propagation
and fostering CREATIVITY and INNOVATION by making the topics of CREATIVITY and
INNOVATION more popular, at individual and community levels, in order to
increase Nigerian wit African publics’ awareness, knowledge, understanding and
practice of the topics. This commitment entails delivery of offerings that
educate, inform and propagate the concepts of CREATIVITY and INNOVATION and
their relevance and application in the Nigerian public/social sphere.
The Vision and the Conviction That Powers Publication of NAIJAGRAPHITTI
BLOG
The vision which drives the publication of NAIJAGRAPHITTI
Blog is to contribute toward evolving a
Nigeria repositioned to take the full advantage of the AGE of CREATIVITY and
INNOVATION in order to achieve its creative potential and economic prosperity.
The conviction that drives NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog is
the possibility of exploiting the concepts of CREATIVITY and INNOVATION to add
value to Nigeria as a nation, in areas of national inventive capacity, economics,
social development, leadership and political governance; to develop citizens
with enhanced problem solving skills and exercising great critical judgement;
to create wealth and maximize our potential is a phenomenon which time has
come.
To
create real and sustainable wealth, Nigeria and her citizens must tap into
individual creativity and the collective creative potential as other countries
have done. Firstly, Nigeria would turn a corner, as all our performance indices
would improve: the link between CREATIVITY and INNOVATION in economic
development is well documented (and we have published some on this blog). Secondly, the quality of our leadership would
improve (creative thinking and problem-solving proficiencies make for more
effectual and qualitative leadership).
In terms of the individual, the vision of the
NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog is to empower
individual with lessons sharing, information and motivation to develop their
ideas and to turn a moment into an opportunity to secure financial security and
economic freedom while adding value to Nigeria as a whole.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI
Blog publishes
informative
and articulate posts based upon empirical principles, grounded in theory and
better practice but without allowing theoretical conceptualizing get in the way
of easily digestible and accessible knowledge and lessons sharing.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI BLOG’s Mission
The Publisher
and Managing Editor was inspired to start-up NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog on the theory that Nigerians and Nigeria’s education
system were paying lip service to the propagation and fostering CREATIVITY and
INNOVATION thus not benefitting from the propagation and fostering of the two
closely related concepts.
What is the proof Nigeria is paying lip
service to CREATIVITY and
INNOVATION?
The
most egregious evidence is that the larger percentage of African countries’
education systems including Nigeria’s generally lack effective strategy to
ignite students’ imagination, foster their creative drive, stimulate innovative
thinking and generate implementable new ideas which are vital to long-term
economic interest of the country. In Nigeria, as a direct result of this and
other vital factors, the country remains marooned at the periphery and not in
the mainstream of the dynamic global economy in which three national assets — the
capacity for creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship, the capacity for
problem solving and a skilled, versatile and highly adaptable workforce — play
vital roles and provide a decisive edge. Yet in order to be competitive and
succeed in today’s economic climate like other players, Nigeria, as a
developing country with lowly diversified economy, needs a well-educated,
technically proficient workforce in all sectors and for nearly every
occupation, including entry-level positions.
Additionally, Nigeria lacks
workers who possess a deep, expansive knowledge in a broad range of subject
areas as well as advanced numeracy, reading, writing and computational skills
which other countries in the global north have made cornerstones of their own
development strategy. Nigeria is yet to integrate science, technology
and innovation into the nation’s national socio-economic development process.
In terms of knowledge production, Nigerian academics proliferate in the
business of acquiring esteemed positions and prizes while producing pedantic,
often superfluous, research/publications rather than pursuing original discoveries,
inventions and innovations.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog’s mission would be implemented
through a seven-prong approach.
The first prong is to operate and manage a user-friendly
and accessible website publishing articles and posts on core topics which could
be original, invited and/or
sourced/curated.
The second prong of the NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog’s
mission is to advocate for Nigeria and Nigerians to prioritize CREATIVITY and INNOVATION in practice by direct
lessons sharing with website readers as well as teachers, educators, parents,
creativity enthusiasts and other key influencers to become more educated on the
rudimentary elements of CREATIVITY and INNOVATION.
The third prong of the NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog’s
mission is to promote a culture of enabling CREATIVITY and INNOVATION in private and public sphere in Nigeria, empower
individuals, organizations and public institutions with information and
knowledge that will increase their capacity to create and innovate.
The fourth prong of the NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog’s
mission is to facilitate a systematic democratization of inventive thinking
skills and provide support for inventors (both professionals and hobbyists) and
prospective inventors in Nigeria.
The fifth prong of the NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog’s
mission is to provide support for Nigeria’s forte in artistic creativity
including creative writing and others.
The sixth prong of the NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog’s
mission is to promote traditional and cognitive apprenticeships in order to
facilitate Nigeria’s renaissance in culture-based creativity.
The seventh prong of the NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog’s
mission is to contribute and encourage research into creativity.
The Subject Matter of NAIJAGRAPHITTI BLOG
The fourteen concatenated blogs publish areas of focus which pertain to or are
influenced by CREATIVITY and
INNOVATION.
The areas of
focus are namely PARENTING FOR CREATIVITY, CREATIVITY FOR NATIONAL
TRANSFORMATION IN NIGERIA (formerly Building A Creative Nation), INTELLECTUAL
PROPERTY FROM A NIGERIAN PERSPECTIVE (formerly Creativity and Innovation), SCIENCE
AND TECHNOLOGY NEWS, SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP, CREATIVE WRITING/FICTION, NOLLYWOOD,
PALAVER TREE COMMENTARY, GRAPHITTI NEWS and i@AFRICA (news/current affairs,
political commentary, leadership, politics on African affairs and development).
Two new
additional sections are GET KEY SKILLS and CREATIVITY TELEVISION which would,
when fully operational, help make NAIJAGRAPHITTI BLOG more interactive and
intuitive as an ICT-based learning portal.
Additional core
topics published in NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog are namely creativity, its pertaining concepts (including
creativity in culture, critical thinking, initiative, problem solving, risk
assessment, decision taking), innovation, innovation systems, technical and
vocational education, national inventiveness, cultural and creative industries,
and productivity.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI
Blog treats select topics drawn from a number of relevant disciplines due to scholarly interest in creativity
such as fields like education, psychology, cognitive science, science,
technology, philosophy, theology, sociology, linguistics, entrepreneurship,
business studies, and economics, covering the relations between creativity and
general intelligence, mental and neurological processes, personality type and
creative ability, creativity and mental health; the potential for fostering
creativity through education and training, especially as augmented by
technology; and the application of creative resources to improve the
effectiveness of teaching and learning.
In addition,
issues which are topical to the culture of CREATIVITY and INNOVATION, like
cultural evolution/revolution, leadership, governance, institutional development/public
institutions management and the flow/ebb of popular culture etc, will be
considered as contexts to the blog’s core topics.
However, for
the sake of variety, the blog will also tackle topical and cross-cutting even
if we deviate slightly, as long as there are pertinent lessons for our quest.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog would disseminate information, lessons and learning
on multidisciplinary CREATIVITY and INNOVATION. These activities would be
carried out through online media platforms publishing, blogging, social media
events, bespoke workshops and research. The blog would challenge people to become more creative and
innovative by offering an internet-driven, experiential learning platform for knowledge
sharing and interaction on CREATIVITY and INNOVATION as well as related
concepts. The blog's foremost methodology would be primarily by publishing blog
posts (original, invited and sourced/curated) and bespoke live and social media
events.
What a Blog on CREATIVITY and INNOVATION Can Do for You!
NAIJAGRAPHITTI
Blog can spur a
reader or hobbyist or an amateur researcher or teacher/facilitator to garner
knowledge in all matters related to CREATIVITY & INNOVATION.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI Blog focuses particular attention
on creativity development in children and early child development.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI
Blog would advocate for the introduction of teaching creativity and its
pertaining concepts to the Nigerian education and curriculum across several
disciplines in its broadest ramifications in order to affect several aspects of
Nigerian life as we know it today.
The blog would seek to bridge the gap for
readers/website visitors between Nigeria’s formal and informal learning systems
which research has proven are, in their current form, not effectively tailored
for its graduates to gain and deploy active imagination, creative thinking and
problem solving skills.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI
Blog would hopefully support prospective hobbyists in gaining a
skill/competence in any area pertaining to CREATIVITY and INNOVATION.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI
Blog hopes, with the passage of time, to provide sufficient motivation to
stimulate and encourage public discussions on CREATIVITY and INNOVATION within
MULTIDISCIPLINARY contexts while challenging poor social attitudes toward
creativity.
The
Blog Publisher’s personal philosophy is to empower colleagues to be the best
they can be. The moral purpose is to strive to prepare learners (and the
curious) for their life ahead, building innovative business and community
links, which enable all learners to make the connection between learning,
problem solving, thinking and real life.
NAIJAGRAPHITTI
BLOG is determined to help the Nigerian citizenry harness their creative
potential by contributing toward overcoming the breach of Nigeria’s lack
effective strategy to igniting learners’ imagination, fostering their creative
drive, stimulating innovative thinking and generating implementable new ideas
which are vital to long-term economic interest of the country.
WELCOME
ONBOARD!
Kenneth Nwachinemelu David-Okafor
Managing Editor/Publisher
