Valuing and Developing Students’ Creativity

Creativity and creative teaching are becomingpart of the educational psyche but let’s set the conceptof creativity within some kind of context. The governmentis beginning to recognize that young people need todevelop the creative skills that will be necessary in theworkplace of the future. Fast-moving technology and theincreasing demands for flexibility and imagination meanthat all our students need to be able to pose questionssuch as ‘what if…?’, ‘why…?’ and ‘why not?’It is also more than likely that, as young peoplestart their careers, they will move jobs several times andwill need ability to cope with change so that they canproduce creative solutions to increasingly complexenvironments. Creative teaching practices will helpprepare them for this-promoting the ability to solveproblems, think independently and work flexibly.In Expecting the Unexpected: DevelopingCreativity in Primary and Secondary Schools(www.ofsted.gov.uk) the Office for Standards inEducation (Ofsted) suggests that ‘being creative’ and‘creative teaching’ are not radical or new concepts-allthat they really involve is a willingness to observe, listenand work closely with students to help them develop theirideas in a purposeful way.Ofsted goes on to suggest that it is vital thatschool leadership is committed to promote creativitybecause this support and encouragement will permitboth students and teachers to work creatively andhelp to ensure that good practice is recognized,resourced properly and disseminated across theschool. It identifies four characteristics of creativity inschools:• thinking and behaving imaginatively• imaginative activities take place in a purposeful way, i.e. related to a specific objective• the activity generates something original• There is value in the activity that is related to the original objective.I think this is an interesting definition when it isapplied to teaching and learning because itimmediately removes any vague ideas that allcreativity is about is lying on summer lawns thinking‘creative’ thoughts that are never realized.To be able to develop students’ creativity weneed to begin with a review of our own attitudes andbeliefs and then come up with ideas and specificactivities inspiring creativity; these may becomplemented with ideas of other people (e.g.exchange ideas, talk to other teachers, go to workshops,read books)