Jaap Haartsen:
You cannot have creativity without skills because then you end up with an empty shell. Everybody can come up with an idea, but if you cannot realize it. So if you don’t have the skills to make it into something which is useful, like Jamie was saying about a patent, it has to be novel, but it also has to be useful and implementable. So you need skills.

Matthew Worwood::
Hello, everyone. My name is Dr. Matthew Worwood.

Cyndi Burnett:
And my name is Dr. Cindy Burnett.

Matthew Worwood::
This is the Fueling Creativity in Education podcast.

Cyndi Burnett:
On this podcast, we’ll be talking about various creativity topics and how they relate to the field of education.

Matthew Worwood::
We’ll be talking with scholars, educators, and resident experts about their work, challenges they face, and exploring new perspectives of creativity.

Cyndi Burnett:
All with a goal to help fuel a more rich and informed discussion that provides teachers, administrators, and emerging scholars with the information they need to infuse creativity into teaching and learning.

Matthew Worwood::
So let’s begin.

Cyndi Burnett:
How can we ignite a passion for innovation in the next generation? If you’re eager to bring invention, creativity, and problem solving into the classroom and want to understand the power of innovative role models, this episode is for you. Get ready for an inspiring conversation that will spark new ideas and possibilities with our special guests, Jaap Hartson and Jamie Selly Tosi.

Matthew Worwood::
Jaap Hartson and a 2015 inductee into the National Inventors hall of Fame, led the development of Bluetooth wireless technology, one of the most widely used innovations in modern connectivity. Bluetooth enables countless devices to communicate wirelessly over short distances, revolutionizing the way people work, learn, and stay connected.

Cyndi Burnett:
Our second guest is Jamie Celiatosi, who is the Senior Director of Education for the National Inventors hall of Fame. She has been with the hall of fame for 16 years and leads the strategy and vision for the development of dynamic invention education experiences that serve hundreds of thousands of children and teachers. Annually, Jamie spends time with our nation’s greatest innovators and figures ways to integrate their insights into curriculum. Jamie is also a patent holder, has traveled the globe, engaged in marine science efforts to connect the public with science, is the author of the family steam book called Wonder is My Compass, and lives in Northern California with her husband and son. So welcome to the show. Jamie N. Jopp.

Jaap Haartsen:
Thank you.

Jayme Cellitioci:
Thank you for having us.

Cyndi Burnett:
So I’d love to start with the two of you around this idea of creativity and innovation, and this is something that Matt and I have talked about on the show before, but we really want to hear from you how you differentiate creativity and innovation and how do each of these fuel your work.

Jaap Haartsen:
Yeah, if I think about creativity Innovation, they are very intertwined. So to come up with innovation, you have to be quite creative to come up with new ideas that have not been done before. And to get those things in innovation projects, they have to be realizable as well. So you can be very creative and think about any blue sky kind of subjects and topics, but in the end it becomes an innovation when it really can be realized in real world. So that’s how I see the intertwining between creativity and innovation.

Jayme Cellitioci:
Like many things, I agree with Jaap. So you know, when I think about for invention education, innovation really ends up being being our vehicle that a lot of other topics fit within. So I think about STEM or STEAM plus creativity plus intellectual property, literacy plus entrepreneurship. And together all of those elements are intertwined. And when we look at the requirements for a utility patent, it has to be novel, non obvious and useful. And so when I think of novelty and usefulness, it brings me way back to the days, Cindy, when I was in grad school with you. You were a professor, I was a student. And at that time I remember hearing those words from one of your next guests, Dr.

Jayme Cellitioci:
Teresa Amalbilay. So when I saw the requirements of a patent, it brought me straight to the classroom of looking at some of the best definitions for creativity.

Matthew Worwood::
Cynthia alluded to the fact that her and I have spoken about this before and I and just to give you some context, one of the reasons why we’ve spoken about it is because it could sometimes comes from this idea of creativity being an add on, whereas we’re more likely to get buy in or participation, not just within the school community, but sometimes from the business community when we use the word innovation. So that’s really why we kind of got curious about the relationship between these two words and yap, as you said, kind of. And ultimately they can be used interchangeably quite often as well. But listening to the response, what I’m hearing a little bit is yes, we’ve got creativity as a construct to which we study and that’s obviously a big focus of our podcast. But the innovation piece is where that outcome, that process begins to interact with a real world application and all of the other components associated with that. You referenced filing a patent. Yes, the definition of a patent has new and useful, but the process to which you have to file that patent, conduct the research, and ultimately engage in the system to bring that pattern to being. Just listening to your response, that’s where we’re starting to kind of like see it transition into innovation.

Jayme Cellitioci:
Absolutely. And recently one of our Inductees Eric Swanson brought our attention to how much innovation is within the commercialization process as well. So you’re having innovation within innovation, and certainly creativity is at the core of that.

Cyndi Burnett:
So the two of you have been going on the road talking about invention and innovation with students. Can you tell us more about this program you’re doing and what kinds of things you’ve been doing with the students?

Jayme Cellitioci:
Well, YAAP was kind enough to agree to doing what I’ve referred to as a tour of innovation. We had several conferences that were lined up and we really wanted to bring the story of invention and invention education to these conferences and how this vehicle can make an impact. And so YAAP and I went to several conferences and presented together and then also visited schools. Maybe yap, you can share some of your school experiences.

Jaap Haartsen:
Yeah, it was. Well, this first time, actually I visited American school. So it’s because I’m based in Holland and I’m mostly familiar with the Dutch school system. But it was very nice to see how the children, of course, they respond everywhere the same, over the world. Telling my story about how I invented Bluetooth invention process. And they are, yeah, they are very eager to learn and also to, to find out, okay. What my motivation was and how I came to this technology and the background behind it. So it was quite nice.

Jaap Haartsen:
It’s also that I saw different age groups going from fourth grade to 10th grade, and you see that they have different interests and different kind of questions, but still all quite curious about how things like this come about.

Matthew Worwood::
So.

Jaap Haartsen:
So that was a nice experience for me as well as. As well. So then I hope, you know, I.

Matthew Worwood::
I can’t help but think that some of our listeners right now, if you don’t mind, are wanting that story. So I was wondering if you. If you could kind of just provide us a short story of that journey toward Bluetooth. And you know, I’m. I’m particularly interested whether or not the team that you were leading kind of had a sense of the impact it would have in the world when you were developing and how that also may have influenced the process.

Jaap Haartsen:
Yeah, okay. Well, I started actually in 1994 and I got a task from my manager to come up with a solution for a problem to connect small devices around the mobile phone. The mobile phone was actually in the middle of the story. We wanted to sell more phones. So how do we do that? Well, create more functionality to the phone and getting rid of the cables around his phone. So that was actually the starting point and my task was to come up with solutions to realize this. Well, what you do as an engineer, you start to look around you, what can I reuse what we call steel with pride? Is there something which we can just reuse and that fits the bill? And I was looking at mobile phone systems because that was the profession that was the mobile phone was the technology we’re working on that did not really work out even. Also another system was WI Fi, which was just coming up at that moment in time.

Jaap Haartsen:
But all those systems, they are what they call very asymmetric. So you have power based base stations or hotspots and then you have the battery device around it. And that’s not really what I wanted to do. I wanted to have something more which was similar to walkie talkie, just two devices that are battery operated and they have to find each other and that to talk with each other. So I always say, well, Bluetooth is some kind of walkie talkie, but then on world scale you can talk with any walkie talkie in the world. So that is what Bluetooth is. And actually there was no system that fit the bill there. So then you start to think, okay, how are we going to solve that? And if there is nothing, you start with a blank sheet and then you start with how do they find each other? What kind of radio waves do I need to use? It has to be used worldwide because people can take their devices with them and start just transmitting somewhere else in the world, which is normally not allowed by radio devices.

Jaap Haartsen:
So all these kind of small things that you have to solve, small steps you have to take. And in the end it becomes a complete system which has to be integrated and has to work as a whole. So it’s in the Bluetooth story is not that it’s one invention that one day you wake up and say, oh, that’s how Bluetooth will look around. It’s a complete system where I have worked for, for three, four years, small steps. And then I started alone. But the point was that my manager believed in the following concept that somebody has to put down a blueprint. You start with something with a core and then you present it in the group. And then you start talking about it and you grow it.

Jaap Haartsen:
The system grows. You have different disciplines come along, but at least you start with something which you can talk about. And I always compare that with the African proverb. If you want to go fast, you go alone. If you want to go far, you do that together. And that’s I’ve seen in many projects I’ve done also with other People that I gave them a task to come up with a core, with a seed, and then you come up with a group and you start working on that and let it grow into a complete solution. And that has worked out quite fine. So that was, yeah, in the years 1994 I started with it and in 1998 we created the Bluetooth special interest group.

Jaap Haartsen:
And then a lot of people came in from different companies. They each have to say, had a say in how they wanted to involve the system. So then it became bigger and bigger and bigger and actually up until I think it was 12 years later in 2006, I did not realize that it would come this big because I was really. I’m not from the commercial side. I’m an engineer in research. I like to solve problems. So for me all those technology challenges were great. It was like a playguard where I could do my thing.

Jaap Haartsen:
And it was in 2006 that there was some kind of press release and it said, okay, There are now 1 billion devices out there with Bluetooth in there. And then it struck me, okay, this is something which is quite big. This can be and become much bigger. And actually it was not 1 billion, it was 6 billion actually. And nowadays there are 6 billion devices every year that are added to the entire ecosystem. And Bluetooth and well, I wouldn’t have imagined that. And that was also not my intention when I was solving the problem for my manager to create a short range radio link between the mobile phone phone and the gadget around it. So I always say I was at the right spot at the right time with the right people around me that made this happen.

Jaap Haartsen:
And I was, well, maybe the start of it. But of course, thousands of people have contributed to this.

Cyndi Burnett:
Well, and also the right knowledge. I mean, you’d have to have that knowledge set to be even able to understand how to connect those, I would imagine.

Jaap Haartsen:
Yeah, well, that’s also a point that you have created the creativity in the cell, but you also have to have skills. And I think you cannot have creativity without skills because then you end up with an empty shell. Everybody can come up with an idea, but if you cannot realize it. So if you don’t have the skills to make it into something which is useful, like Jamie was saying about the patent, it has to be novel, but it also has to be useful and implementable. So you need skills. And other around is also important that the skills, if you create, if you learn the skills and you elaborate on these skills, you can come up with new ideas because they are based on the skills you have learned. So it’s really the process in education I see also is the creativity and the skills together that brings you further.

Jayme Cellitioci:
So, Cindy, you can imagine my joy as an educator of just being able to log this time with YAAP and being able to make sure that all children know and hear the story of Bluetooth, and not just for the invention’s sake, but also getting to know the inventor. One thing that I love to share about JAAP is that he takes, you know, just as many walks in the woods and turns off his devices as he spends time thinking about these engineering challenges. So, you know, that’s, I think, just a wonderful example for me to be able to tell our tweens and teens this message has been a real gift. But then, not only are our inductees inspiring the curriculum, but also helping to shape it and oftentimes giving direct challenges. And I’ve even had them say, we’ll race you to the Patent Office, because we want to provide those authentic experiences. And one secret about yap, he’s part of the innovation force, so we’ll have to send you his superhero.

Matthew Worwood::
That’s pretty cool. I did want to pick up on, on what you just said that, Miriam, because when you were kind of, you know, responding to the question around creativity and intervention, you had mentioned stem, we could talk about steam, entrepreneurial ship as well. And, you know, within that answer, you’re reminding us exactly what YAP had referenced. There’s so many components that come together along that journey toward, you know, a pro C, big C outcome. And I can see why this story of YAP is so, because there’s a recognition that everyone has, to a certain extent, something to bring to the table. And yes, you might have some incredible ideas. And going back to what YAAP said, you still need to make those ideas realized. And I think, if I recall correctly, I remember hearing Steve Jobs, and Steve wasn’t talking a lot about their relationship, but you, you kind of get the thought that, yes, sometimes Steve Jobs would present that, but then this incredible team, you know, at Apple, another company that’s really associated with innovation, all of these folks are then tasked with going and putting it together, and then they have their own teams and all these different connections that being made.

Matthew Worwood::
But then you’re also building on previous knowledge. You know, Yap, you’d referenced that, the radio, you’ve got that starting point. And I think ultimately what I’m hearing here is we had Jonathan Plucker. He quite often defines creativity as taking old stuff and putting it together. With other old stuff to make new stuff. And I really think that not only is that a creative process and I’m going to turn it over to you, Miriam, but that really is the journey of. I don’t want to just label it to STEM or steam, but that is definitely one of the missions within STEM and STEAM is bringing together lots of disciplines and helping students recognize the connections that need to be made as they go toward solving a problem.

Jaap Haartsen:
And that’s also what you said, Mata. You’re standing on shoulders of other people. So things have been done in the past. You elaborate on that. And that’s also the idea of both publications and patents, that patterns are being made and that’s where the knowledge is spread in the world and other people will build on top of that again. So in that sense, it’s getting on top of each other and you get to new things.

Matthew Worwood::
Okay, I’ve now got a specific follow up then. Some students who are creative, want to go and solve problems, are like, do we have to do research? Getting students to recognize the value of research and do good research. And I would also go as far as saying, I don’t know if we always develop the skills around good research now anyway, again, unless you take a research specific class, what advice do you have for those educators that are like, we need to, you know, promote research a little bit more within this creative process?

Jayme Cellitioci:
Yes. Well, as a mother of an eighth grader who’s working on a project right now that’s kind of a capstone project of looking at an invasive species of sea urchin here on the west coast, you know, I’m thinking very much about how do we cultivate research skills in young people. But an amazing gateway that we’ve used in our invention programs is looking at prior art. And going back to a point that you made before, we know that we really celebrate that paradigm shifting innovation, particularly in America, and looking at that full continuum to celebrate and honor adaptive creativity ends up being such an important mission as well with working with our children. So not everyone likes the tabula rasa blank slate. Invent anything you want. I mean, some kids, their eyes will light up at that. Other children will say, what do you want me to do? Think of something from scratch right now.

Jayme Cellitioci:
And so we’ve had a lot of fun with sharing prior art. And so giving them sketches of backpacks and sunglasses and familiar objects to be able to push off of and adapt and iterate has been just, you know, an amazing sandbox to be in. And, you know, one thing with research is when we try to promote research for research’s sake, I think that’s when things fall a little bit short. But when we position it as digging in so that you can know what has been done so that you can create something that the world has never seen before and to be able to make your mark, then suddenly research gets embraced in kind of a whole new way. So I think sometimes it’s really, really the framing of it. And probably my kryptonite is when I hear the phrase making learning fun because I think, oh my gosh, what are we saying about learning? So it’s sort of the same with research as well. I think it’s very much how we present what is the purpose and the point of learning and digging and pulling skills in.

Matthew Worwood::
Do you want to bring more creative and critical thinking into your school? Look no further than our podcast sponsor, Curiosity to Create.

Cyndi Burnett:
Curiosity to Create is a nonprofit organization dedicated to engaging professional development for school districts and empowering educators through online courses and personal coaching.

Matthew Worwood::
And if you’re craving a community of creative educators who love new ideas, don’t miss out on their creative thinking network. Get access to monthly webinars, creative lesson plans, and a supportive community, all focused on fostering creativity in the classroom.

Cyndi Burnett:
To learn more, check out curiositytocreate.org or check out the links in the show notes for this episode. So Jamie, I’m curious from your perspective, bringing in someone like Yap, I think I would have been starstruck as a kid having the inventor Bluetooth. I feel a little starstruck right now having you on our call with us. So you get really excited about like meeting this famous inventor. And I’m curious what you have heard from the students in terms of bringing YOP in and yop. I’m curious from your perspective what it’s like working with these students and the kinds of questions that they’re asking.

Jayme Cellitioci:
When I pulled up to the gifted conference and my Uber driver had something on his screen of his vehicle that said about the Bluetooth device connecting, you know, I had absolutely a moment. I am always continuously starstruck when I get to watch YOP with students and log anytime with him because there’s such an authenticity to STEM education, invention education, when we’re able to do these initiatives together. So it’s such a ubiquitous invention. And when I watch anyone of any age get to meet yap, they go straight into topics that are so personal to them, their music playlists and it’s such an impactful invention. So I maintain your similar starstruckness with that. And they want to share. They want to share immediately. And they have just as many questions, but they want to tell their stories as well.

Jaap Haartsen:
Yeah, when I interact with the children, they have a very open mind. So what I call is they are not hindered by experience. So that makes it very enjoyable to work with young people because they are seeing things differently than I would see, because I know that, okay, maybe I know too much of the past and have too much experience that sometimes hinders you in your creative process. But yeah, the kind of questions you get, for example, about the naming, well, it was not named by myself. I was more the technology guy, not the branding and the marketing guy. But still, to cover that story from Viking King, et cetera, that’s. Yeah, you see how their eyes are going to be opened and, oh, that’s where it came from. And the fact that if you just say, okay, I worked on Bluetooth, you don’t have to explain anything.

Jaap Haartsen:
They know exactly what it is. And that makes it also, yeah. Quite easy for me to talk and interact with those kids. And as I said, I think it’s always nice to add the kind of questions you get. For example, there was one guy, I think it was in, In Ohio when I visited that STEM school. And there was this guy where I’ve never thought about how a person could come up with that question, but he asked me whether. And the Bluetooth radio was the same in every device you have in the world. And the answer is yes, every Bluetooth radio is the same.

Jaap Haartsen:
It only has a different identity or a different address, but it’s the same radio. And I have never. Well, I thought, well, where does that question come from? As if billions of devices would have all unique kind of component or device in there. And so these kind of questions, yeah, you get from young people and I wouldn’t have expected that from older people.

Matthew Worwood::
So to say, you know, I’m thinking on a sidebar, have you ever been into a classroom where a teacher says, do you mind helping us with our Bluetooth headsets? Because we’ve got a whole bunch that’s not working.

Jaap Haartsen:
Yeah, yeah, I get it a lot that people, that people said, well, I have difficulties in pairing device or never worked or it doesn’t connect. I am not into all the details and all the nitty gritty stuff. So. So the way things work like that you have your radio and then you build on top of that, you build other layers and then on the last layer you have all the software that controls all those lower layers. I’m more the guy on the lower layers. So I made sure that how the protocols work, how the connections are being defined, et cetera. But other people have implemented those software. And, yeah, I cannot say how they did that.

Matthew Worwood::
You could just say that they didn’t follow your instructions. They went their own way.

Jaap Haartsen:
Yeah, I will take that into account next time when I get this question met.

Jayme Cellitioci:
I have watched people come up to you for tech tips, so I’ve seen it live. I have a very special story about one student that YOP really impacted. So we had a contest called Mighty Minds, and the prize winner of that contest would be able to go to our annual induction ceremony. And so a young woman named Landry had won this contest and she came to induction with her mother. And when I saw her meet YOP and have an interaction, you could tell that this was going to be a core memory. And then they were able to go on to. We had a special little session where they took a VCR apart and they just had this really great conversation together. And then we put that into our camp invention programs for other kids to watch and see and, you know, watch them wonder and describe the parts and pieces.

Jayme Cellitioci:
So fast forward years later, and her mother sent us the most amazing college entry essay saying that her experience with yops is what made her interested in the STEM pathway that she wanted to go down. And it was just this, you know, absolutely incredible narrative. So when it was time for us to go to the National Summer Learning association this past fall, we said, hey, Landry and yop, let’s all get back together for a reunion. And Landry got to share a little more firsthand. Now, here is a young woman who. She received a scholarship to a major university, and she turned that down to select another university that would allow her to shape her program a little bit more and bring in invention along with computer science. So it’s just incredible to watch that direct evidence and impact of meeting your role models.

Jaap Haartsen:
And actually, that was also motivation for me to offer Jamie and her colleague to do this trip actually in the US Because I’m working in Holland here, and, well, I’m still in a research environment. I do not get exposed to these kind of environments with the kids, etc. So I was not realizing as well, yeah, they saw me as a role model that I could inspire people. So then I thought, well, National Inventor hall of Fame always invites me to Washington every year. I wanted to do something back. So I said, well, if you think that I can inspire more of those kids, let’s set up some kind of tour in the US that I go along to schools and conferences and see how that works. And I think it will work quite well. Jamie.

Jaap Haartsen:
Indeed.

Jayme Cellitioci:
Absolutely. Plus you also brought some drops, some candy from the Nederlands, so that was an extra bonus on top. But we just had a blast. It was incredible to have so many individual and group conversations and just to travel around. I mean Yop, as you can see, is just an absolutely enjoyable human. But then the way that he is able to talk about his technology at so, so many different levels was a real gift because everyone is coming from a, they have their own starting place with their knowledge about the technology or their usage of it. And you know, I really watched him be able to meet every single person exactly where they were at. And I think in STEM that this is such a gift.

Jayme Cellitioci:
Quite honestly, you know, there’s so many people that are experts in their technology, but then to be able to relate to every person and use language that’s meaningful to them I think is a whole nother set of skills.

Matthew Worwood::
We have had past conversations that’s touched on, you know, leadership in a community and being a good ancestor. But I, I think, you know, what I’m hearing is that value and yup. Having that motivation to give back, to give back to the community. And I think that kind of leads us to one of our final questions in this first part of this two part interview is what advice do you have when it comes to that mentorship piece of promoting and supporting and I’m going to use the word raising innovators in a traditional classroom environment.

Jaap Haartsen:
Well, we talked about role models, so be an example. Always remain curious about the world around you because that’s the, well, the motivation for being creative I think. So always ask your questions why and how and do not come up with ready made answers for your students because they should start talking about thinking about themselves. Don’t put any restrictions as well in the beginning, of course it’s in the end when you must make it realizable. There will be all kind of boundary conditions before the idea is really crystallized in something you can build or can, can sell. But at least don’t start with that. So also the way when I’m working with my team in the beginning we do a lot of divergence, we think all kind of new things but then at a certain moment you start, okay, now we have looked at all kind of alternatives. Let’s pick out the best ones and then converge and then put the, the boundary conditions on it like the power consumption you have or the, the cost it will have or the time and effort to realize it.

Jaap Haartsen:
But if you start with that, you never come to something. So yes, start for something where you are very open minded and as I said, keep asking yourself about different alternatives. Are there other solutions? That’s the same way as I always explain people about patenting. You have to go through all the different alternatives because, yeah, you might have a single idea, but it may not be the best one. It’s a lot of work. You have to go through all the alternatives. Only then you can decide, okay, this was the best one. And yeah, advice would I give the educators as well when they are working with the children?

Jayme Cellitioci:
Jamie, I absolutely love to see how weaving in our inductees as well as our collegiate inventors into our programs with the National Inventors hall of Fame really has an impact and inspires children on their various pathways that they are on. But then also we have tweens and teens that are leadership interns and leaders in training. So I can see this beautiful scaffolding that happens with the exchange of giving tips and insights within this innovation ecosystem. And so I think that the mentorship is invaluable. There’s really important research you look at who becomes an inventor in America is one research initiative. Bel and Chetty and some other colleagues are authors on that. And it states how important it is for children to be able to have these role models with whom they resonate in order to really up their odds of being able to be an innovator.

Cyndi Burnett:
We have loved this conversation with Jamie and Jop. And good news, it’s not over yet because we have decided to make this a double espresso because there’s another topic we want to discuss with Jamie and Jopp and that is the role of technology and creativity and innovation and invention and where we’re going with that and ethical implications and transformational creativity. And there’s just so much more. Matt, I think we could make this a triple espresso, but I think we’ll keep it at a double. So if you like this episode and you are interested in sharing this with someone, please send them the link and go to our website@foldingcreativitypodcast.com to receive updates on what’s happening with the Inventors hall of Fame and Jopp’s work. So that concludes this episode of the Feeling Creativity and Education podcast. Stay tuned for part two. I’m Dr.

Cyndi Burnett:
Cindy Burnett and my name.

Matthew Worwood::
Is Dr. Matthew Worwood.

Cyndi Burnett:
You’ve been listening to the Fueling Creativity and Education podcast hosted by Matthew Worwood and Cindy Burnett. Our creative producer is Catherine Fu, our editor is Sam Attached and this episode was made possible thanks to our sponsor, Curiosity to create.