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Mary Ann JockEDUC 6125-2Walden UniversityDecember 16, 2012

Maintaining CreativityThrough AdolescenceCreating learning environments to encourage and grow creative thought

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Problem Statement:

What is the correlation between having more logical and

linear thoughts and the loss or suppression of creative thinking as we

age and go through the educational system? I see this as a

performance problem because in adult lives we are being expected

to think more creatively, but as a teacher my experience is that as

students get older they are less likely to use creativity when

answering questions. I can see educators, administrators, and even

those from the corporate world; in actuality anyone who would be

working with children from entering school to leaving academia

would be interested in the findings.

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What is Creativity?

According to Paul Torrance, Whenever one is faced with a problem for which he has no practiced or learned solution, some degree of creativity is required. (Carmond. Et.al. 2008)

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Vygostky and Piaget both spoke of stages on or around ages 7-11 which coincided with a lessening of creative thought.

Paul Torrance in the 1950s began looking at creativity and launched two longitudinal studies that followed two groups of students from elementary school through adulthood. He was able to see a correlation between those who scored high on his tests and those who were a success as adults.

Kyung Hee Kim was found distrubing proof in Torrance’s research that there has been a steady decline in creativity over the past several eras. (Britannica.com, 10/18/10)

In 1996 Caviness Jr., et al conducted an MRI study proving that the of the human cerebellum comes to adult size between the ages of 7-11.

Background:

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It appears that just when creative thought should be nurtured and enhanced our system of education is shifting its gears away from teaching that would do just that.

Torrance found a connection between how creative a child was to how successful they were as an adult.

In our current job climate, employers are searching for those who can problem solve and come up with new methods to deal with the new landscape technology has created for us.

What are the ramifications to our children?

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set up pilot programs with control groups of similar demographics.

Use Torrance’s creativity tests as a baseline of all students involved.

To gain more insight by conducting interviews of family and all adults who interact with students

Keep detailed records of high stakes tests, both before, during, and after.

This will need to be a longitudinal study to show the effectiveness of the programs.

What can be done?

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As educators our job is to create the most successful citizens we can. If we are aware of an indicator for success are we not obligated to find the best practices that will exploit this indicator we call creativity to give all our students an even better advantage in our world of new technology and possibilities that we have created for them as adults?

Final Thoughts:

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Gomez, Jose G. The Journal of Effecective Teaching, Vol. 7, No. 1, 2007. 31-43.

Hebert, T. Cramond, B. Neumeister, K. Millar, G. Silvian,A. (2008). E. Paul Torrance: His life, Accomplishments, and Legacy. University of Connecticut, University of Virginia, Yale University.

Kyung Hee Kim (2011): The Creativity Crisis: The Decrease in Creative Thinking Scores on the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking, Creativity Research Journal, 23:4, 285-295

Tiemeier, H. Lenroot, R. Greenstein, D. Tran, L. Pierson, R. Giedd, J. (2010). Cerebellum development During childhood and adolescence: a longitudinal morphometric MRI study. Neuroimage. January 1, 49(1): 63-70.

Resources:

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Vygotsky, L.S. (1931). Pedologija podrostka [Pedagology of the adolescent]. Moscow- Leningrad: Uchebno-Pedagogicheskoe Izdatel’stvo. (English Translation)

Wood, K. C., Smith, H., Grossniklaus, D. (2001). Piaget's Stages of Cognitive Development. Emerging perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology. Retrieved < 12/2/2012>, from http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/

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