How can creativity potentially impact on Primary Education?

    Creativity has been described as ‘a state of mind in which all our intelligences are working together’…involving ‘seeing, thinking and innovating’ (Craft, 2000, p.38) and as ‘imaginative activity fashioned so as to produce outcomes that are both original and of value’ (NACCCE, 1999, p.29).

            

        As contributors within education, we need to be able to appreciate as well as influence the idea that creativity has an essentially important ‘role to play in education’ and recognise that many can contribute to it, both ‘personally and professionally’ (Grainger & Barnes, 2006, p. 1). A few weeks back, various students and I took part in two separate creativity workshops in our local woods where we were joined by Springwood and Lisvane primary school. We were learning about ‘authentic learning’ and how it can help encourage creativity. Authentic learning is experimental learning, which enables children to experience different settings and situations, allowing them to reflect on ‘real world’ experiences (Curtin University, 2015).

         We organised a few activities that would enhance the children’s imagination and creative thinking with the help of their current surrounding environment. Resnick states that all children are ‘born with a natural impulse to explore and experiment, so we need to help them develop it further’ (Chowns, 2003), Displaying that we should encourage and enhance this idea through their education, furthermore, their everyday life.  

          We performed an activity where the primary students had to use their imaginations and think about what the trees in the woods where. For example, one of the children said that they could be heroic soldiers that tragically passed on, however they transformed into tall trees to remain remembered. As Jeffrey and Woods (2003, p. 3) once said, the physical environment is one that effectively promotes and supports creativity as it likely to "celebrate achievement and individuality" (Jeffrey and Woods, 2003, p.3). They declare that not only does the environment help with means of stimulation, but is also ‘a valuable teaching resource’ (Jeffery and Woods, 2003).

        Additionally, it is always useful to be able to differentiate and distinguish between high creativity and commonplace, ordinary creativity, between ‘Big C’ and ‘Little c’ (Duffy 2006, p.17). ‘Big C’ creativity (which has been seen in some of Gardner’s (1993) studies of highly creative individuals, such as Picasso, Einstein and Freud) is seen as innovating, being able to grasp an excellence for something in a particular field and not being afraid to challenge past ideas with new ones. While on the other hand ‘little c’ creativity is more of a ‘process of conscious invention and describes the resourcefulness of ordinary people rather than extraordinary contributors’ (Duffy, 2006, p.17), demonstrating that individuals have their own personality traits and experiences with creativity, nonetheless, it can continually be stimulated throughout life.

           

        Saying this, 'In a world dominated by technological innovations, creativity is a critical component; human skills and people’s powers of creativity and imagination are key resources in a knowledge driven economy' (Robinson, 2001). In Ken Robinson’s (2006) talk on creativity he discusses that in the workforce, being wrong is seen as a weakness, 'they are not prepared to be wrong’. They stigmatize mistakes, therefore nowadays; throughout the national education system faults are also being seen ‘as the worst thing you can make’, resulting in children and young people running away from their ‘creative capacities’ in education (Robinson, 2006).

        He makes a grand statement upon how all education systems have the same ‘hierarchy of subjects’. At the top being mathematics and languages, and the arts, being placed least interest at the bottom of the spectrum (Robinson, 2006). Due to these outcomes he strongly believes that public education is available to us, mainly to be able to educate our children of today and prepare them for future living and the economy. How our education system is ‘predicted on the idea of academic ability’, rather than creativity. (Robinson, 2006). 

            Lastly, there was no public education before the 19^th century as ‘they all came into being to meet the needs of industrialism’ meaning that the hierarchy is established from tow ideas: 

1)    The most valuable subjects for work are at the top of the spectrum, e.g. doing mathematics everyday of the week, but only having music once a week as ‘you’re not going to be a musician’ (Robinson, 2006)

2)    Academic ability. It really has come to ‘dominate our views on intelligence’. Every system has its fixed syllabus. As a consequence, those students with wonderful and creative minds are not appreciated, but rather stigmatized (Robinson, 2006).

           

            In conclusion, as society is constantly changing and evolving, ‘the ability to live with uncertainty and deal with complexity is essential’, displaying that governments are becoming appropriately involved to promote creativity (Grainger & Barnes, 2006). With the help of creativity, young people will develop the kind of skills that will assist them in this rapidly ‘changing and uncertain world’ (Grainger & Barnes, 2006), in addition to helping improve motivation, enthusiasm, self-confidence and success (Grainger & Barnes,2006). This will certainly create a positive impact on primary education.

Reference List:

Craft, A. (2000) ‘Creativity Across the Primary Curriculum: Framing and Developing

Practice’, London: RoutledgeFalmer.

Chowns, J. (2003). ‘Toy Story. Fairfax Digital’. Availabe at: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/11/21/1069027320836.html?from=storyrhs (Accessed on 1 November 2017)

Curtin University (2015) ‘Authentic Learning’. Available at: https://clt.curtin.edu.au/teaching_learning_practice/student_centred/authentic.cfm (Accessed on 1 November 2017)

Duffy, B (2006) ‘Supporting creativity and imagination in the early years’. 2^nd Edn. Berkshire: Open University Press.

Gardner, H. (1993). ‘Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences’ (10 anniversary ed.). New York, NY: Basic Books.

Grainger, T. and Barnes, J. (2006) ‘Creativity in the Primary Curriculum’ in J. Arthur, T.
Grainger and D. Wray. (eds.) Learning to Teach in the Primary School London:

Routledge.pp.209-225.

Jeffrey, B. and Woods, P. (2003) ‘The Creative School: A Framework for Success, Quality and Effectiveness’, London: Routledge, Falmer

NACCCE (1999) ‘All Our Futures, the report of the National Advisory Committee on

Creative and Cultural education’, London: DfEE/DCMS

OFSTED (2003) ‘Expecting the Unexpected’. Available at: www.ofsted.gov.uk/publications/ (Accessed on 29 October 2017)

Robinson. K. (2001) ‘Out of Our Minds Capstone’: London

Robinson, K. (2006) ‘Do schools kill creativity?’ Available at: https://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity/transcript#t-666408 (Accessed on 2 November 2017)