Lincoln Center Institute
Capacities for
Imaginative Learning
LCI has created the Capacities for Imaginative
Learning as a framework for student learning,
applicable to the Common Core Standards across
the curriculum.
The Capacities operate as both
strategies for, and outcomes of, study according 
to LCI’s practice.

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Email: lci@lincolncenter.org
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The Capacities for Imaginative Learning are:

Noticing Deeply to identify and articulate layers of detail in a work of art or other
object of study through continuous interaction with it over time.
Embodying to experience a work of art or other object of study through your senses,
as well as emotionally, and also to physically represent that experience.

Questioning to ask questions throughout your explorations that further your own
learning; to ask the question, “What if?”

Making Connections to connect what you notice and the patterns you see to your
prior knowledge and experiences, to others’ knowledge and experiences, and to text
and multimedia resources.

Identifying Patterns to find relationships among the details that you notice, group
them, and recognize patterns.

Exhibiting Empathy to respect the diverse perspectives of others in the community;
to understand the experiences of others emotionally, as well as intellectually.

Living with Ambiguity to understand that issues have more than one interpretation,
that not all problems have immediate or clear-cut solutions, and to be patient while a
resolution becomes clear.

Creating Meaning to create your own interpretations based on the previous
capacities, see these in the light of others in the community, create a synthesis, and
express it in your own voice.

Taking Action to try out new ideas, behaviors or situations in ways that are neither
too easy nor too dangerous or difficult, based on the synthesis of what you have
learned in your explorations.

Reflecting/Assessing to look back on your learning, continually assess what you
have learned, assess/identify what challenges remain, and assess/identify what further
learning needs to happen. This occurs not only at the end of a learning experience,
but is part of what happens throughout that experience. It is also not the end of your
learning; it is part of beginning to learn something else.