John Yeo is Guest Editor of this issue. He is a lecturer and the professional development leader in NIE‘s Curriculum, Teaching and Learning Academic Group. His research interests include creativity and creative thinking, teachers’ professional learning, assessment of 21st century skills, lesson study and school-based curriculum innovations.

Hot Topic

issue 37 jul / aug 2012

Creative Thinking as a Process

Creativity has been a hot topic since the Ministry of Education articulated its vision of Curriculum 2015, but many teachers are still not conﬁdent about teaching and evaluating creativity. John Yeo explains how we can better respond to the call for creative teaching.

Creativity is a complex and multi-dimensional construct. It isn’t just about coming up with multiple solutions to a problem, says NIE lecturer John Yeo. Neither is it about the outcome alone and how innovative it is.

“We want our students to learn more creatively, and we think that means we need to teach more creatively,” he notes. “Sometimes people even talk about a need to teach creativity.”

John makes a distinction between these notions of creative teaching and teaching for creativity. “Teaching creatively and teaching for creativity are related but they’re not the same thing.”

They do, however, share a common focus – helping students learn by appreciating new points of view and values. And that’s what John is interested in.

Teaching for Effective Learning

John believes we can help our students to learn better by teaching them to think creatively. For him, it begins with teachers’ understanding of the creative process as that affects the way they teach – and thus the learning that results.

Many teachers equate creative teaching with engaged learning, but an engaging lesson does not necessarily lead to effective learning.

“Sometimes teachers think that creative teaching is only about engagement, but it doesn’t always mean that being engaged results in effective learning.”

In terms of creativity in education, John explains: “It is primarily about helping students to look at things differently. How do they understand the issues and identify challenges? And then, how do they generate better ideas?”

Though some think that teaching creatively is good to have but not a must-have for students to pass exams, John begs to differ. When students are thinking and learning creatively, they become effective learners. To do that, we need effective teaching.

“Effective teaching requires a child to understand the concept and to make meaning of that. That’s a very creative process for the learners.”

The Process of Creative Problem Solving

John is especially interested in the process of creativity. For him, it’s really about creative thinking.

“I focus a lot on the process, or process learning, because you don’t get creative ideas out of nowhere,” he explains. “But if you go through the process, it helps us to then formulate better or more meaningful solutions.”

John uses a model of creative problem solving (developed by Puccio, Murdock, Mance, 2005) to help teachers understand the process of creativity.

Teaching creatively and teaching for creativity are related but they’re not the same thing.

– John Yeo, Curriculum, Teaching and Learning Academic Group

Creative problem solving is an iterative process that involves both divergent and convergent thinking, where the situation is continually analysed and assessed. It is also an imaginative process as new solutions are constantly explored and elaborated upon.

John sees this creative problem-solving process as a powerful tool for developing skills in both critical thinking and affective skills. It is especially helpful for teachers who are perhaps more comfortable with evaluating the product of the creative process.

But because creative thinking is a process skill, John maintains that we can’t just provide a rubric and expect teachers to assess students based on that.

“If you talk about 21st century teaching and learning, the teachers themselves must have the competencies. They need to understand it for themselves,” argues John. Only then can teachers truly embody the attributes they teach.

The 4Ps of Creativity

A useful lens for understanding creativity is the four Ps of creativity introduced by Mel Rhodes in 1961: person, process, product, and press (or the environment).

In his study of creativity, Rhodes collected 56 definitions of creativity and imagination. From them, he identified four common strands:

Person refers to the attributes and traits of a person in relation to creativity.
Process refers to the mental activities, tools and techniques used to generate creative products and ideas.
Product refers to the outcome of a creative process, an idea that has a tangible form.
Press refers to the physical and psychological environment that may help or hinder creativity.

Creativity in the Curriculum

Some may insist that creativity cannot be taught. “I argue that it can be nurtured,” John affirms. “It can be nurtured as a child speaks with others, as the child interacts with the content.”

We want to develop creative learners – students who see themselves as creative individuals, and who dare to take risks and explore the new and unpredictable.

For John, the greater concern has to do with curriculum design. “The question then is, how do you design that as part of your curriculum? How do you create processes to bring about that learning?”

This requires a tolerance of mistakes, among other things, by both students and teachers. Teachers also need to be mindful not to over-instruct, as that could inhibit students’ creativity.

Going back to the creative problem-solving process, John says: “If I use a process, at least the teacher can continue to go back and forth, and say, what am I doing well, and how is my process driving that learning process. The process will frame how the teacher guides the learning.”

The process certainly takes more time, but as John points out, it’s more sustainable and also more desirable for the child. “To me, that’s more precious, and that’s what teachers want.”

Creative Thinking: An Attitude for Life

Real-world problems don’t come with a how-to manual or a set of lesson notes. And that can be quite scary for many people. Likewise in the classroom, some students may not be excited about creative or open-ended tasks.

But for students to learn to think creatively, they need to go through a process of meaning-making, which is often fraught with complexities and ambiguities.

“Let the child deal with the ambiguity in learning,” advises John. “They have to go through that process of meaning-making, where they say, ‘Hey, there were a lot of ambiguities, there are a lot of things I don’t know, that the textbook doesn’t teach me or provide me with.’ “

Doing this repeatedly helps students to internalize the process, which then becomes an attitude that is theirs for life. “Process learning takes time,” he reminds us. “Process learning requires a child to find a better way and a personal way to learn.”

The same applies to teachers. In his research, John has found that some teachers try to exhibit their own creative traits while playing by the rules of the system. Some of the traits include being tolerant of mistakes and enjoying deep thinking.

He encourages teachers to have the courage be creative and to explore new things, to find the balance between convention and individuality. Only then can we ensure that learning – for both teachers as well as students – can be more rewarding.

Useful Resources
Ministry of Education. (2010a). Nurturing our young for the future: Competencies for the 21st century. Retrieved from MOE website: https://www.moe.gov.sg/committee-of-supply-debate/files/nurturing-our-young.pdf

Ministry of Education. (2010b, March 3). MOE to enhance learning of 21st century competencies and strengthen art, music and physical education (Press release). Retrieved from MOE website: https://www.moe.gov.sg/media/press/2010/03/moe-to-enhance-learning-of-21s.php

Puccio, G. J., Murdock, M. C., & Mance, M. (2005). Current developments in creative problem solving for organisations: A focus on thinking skills and styles. Korean Journal of Thinking and Problem Solving, 15, 43–76.

Yeo, J. (2011). Authentic assessment for creativity as a 21st century pedagogy. In K. H. Koh & J. Yeo (Eds.), Mastering the art of authentic assessments: From challenges to champions (pp. 37–54). Singapore: Pearson Education South Asia.