Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-hgkh8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-19T04:49:39.652Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

17 - The Relationship Among Schooling, Learning, and Creativity: “All Roads Lead to Creativity” or “You Can't Get There from Here”?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 January 2010

Ronald A. Beghetto
Affiliation:
College of Education, University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon
Jonathan A. Plucker
Affiliation:
Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana
James C. Kaufman
Affiliation:
California State University, San Bernardino
John Baer
Affiliation:
Rider University, New Jersey
Get access

Summary

Consider Sophia, an entering kindergarten student, who loves to draw. Equipped with a new box of 128 crayons, she eagerly anticipates the first opportunity to express herself in colored wax. Upon entering the classroom she darts to neat stacks of blank paper and starts to draw. The teacher quickly informs her that it is not “art time.” Confused, but compliant, she stops drawing. When “art time” does arrive, Sophia is again stopped because she started drawing without being told what to draw. Finally, the teacher informs the class that they will be drawing a picture of a tree with changing leaves. When Sophia eagerly starts drawing her tree, she is again stopped and instructed to wait for directions and guidance on how the tree should look. In a few short weeks, Sophia has developed a new understanding of what it means to draw: Wait patently for instructions from the teacher regarding what to draw and how to draw it. Consider the countless students whose favorite question, upon entering kindergarten, is “Why?” And how in a few short years the question “Why?” is replaced with “What do you want me to do and how do you want me to do it?”

The experience of schooling represented in the above scenario leaves little room for student imagination and curiosity. And there is evidence suggesting that such a scenario is a reality for students in our schools (Sternberg, 2003).

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2006

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Amabile, T. M. (1989). Growing up creative. Buffalo, NY: Creative Education Foundation.Google Scholar
Argyris, C., & Schön, D. A. (1974). Theory in practice: Increasing professional effectiveness. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Barab, S. A., & Plucker, J. (2002). Smart people or smart contexts? Talent development in an age of situated approaches to learning and thinking. Educational Psychologist, 37, 165–182.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beghetto, R. A. (2005). Does assessment kill creativity? The Educational Forum, 69, 254–263.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beghetto, R. A. (in press). Creative justice? The relationship between prospective teachers' prior schooling experiences and perceived importance of promoting student creativity. To appear in the Journal of Creative Behavior.
Beghetto, R. A., & Alonzo, J. A. (in press). Supporting the learning process. In Smith, S. C. & Piele, P. K. (Eds.), School leadership: handbook for excellence (4th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.Google Scholar
Bjorklund, D. F. (2000). Children's thinking: Developmental function and individual difference (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.Google Scholar
Blanchet, A. (1977). La construction et l‘équilibre du mobile, problémes méthodologiques [The construction and balancing of mobiles, methodological problems]. Archives de Psychologie, 45, 29–52.Google Scholar
Bruning, R. H., Schraw, G. J., & Ronning, R. R. (1999). Cognitive psychology and instruction (3rd ed.). Columbus, OH: Merrill.Google Scholar
Cole, D. (2004). The Chinese room argument. In Zalta, E. N. (Ed.), The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. Retreived December 8, 2004, from http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/chinese-room.Google Scholar
Duckworth, E. (1996). The having of wonderful ideas and other essays on teaching and learning (2nd ed.). New York: Teachers College Press.Google Scholar
Ediger, M. (2001). The school principal: State standards versus creativity. Journal of Instructional Psychology, 28, 79–83.Google Scholar
Education Commission of the States. (2001). Pay-for-performance: Key questions and lessons from five current models. Denver, CO: Education Commission of the States. Retrieved June 7, 2004, from, http://www.ecs.org/clearinghouse/28/30/2830.pdf.
Fasko, D. (2001). Education and creativity. Creativity Research Journal, 13, 317–327.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feist, G. J. (1998). A meta-analysis of personality in scientific and artistic creativity. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 2, 290–309.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Feldhusen, J. F., & Kolloff, M. B. (1981). A three-stage model for gifted education. In Clasen,, R. E.Robinson,, B.Clasen,, D. R. & Libsten, G. (Eds.), Programming for the gifted, talented and creative: Models and methods (pp. 105–114). Madison: University of Wisconsin–Extension.Google Scholar
Feldhusen, J. F., & Treffinger, D. J. (1980). Creative thinking and problem solving in gifted education. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt.Google Scholar
Gorman, M. E., & Plucker, J. (2003). Teaching invention as critical creative processes: A course on technoscientific creativity. In Runco, M. A. (Ed.), Critical creative processes (pp. 275–302). Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.Google Scholar
Gorman, M. E., Plucker, J., & Callahan, C. M. (1998). Turning students into inventors: Active learning modules for secondary students. Phi Delta Kappan, 530–535.Google Scholar
Isaksen, S. G. (1987). Introduction: An orientation to the frontiers of creativity research. In Isaksen, S. G. (Ed.), Frontiers of creativity research (pp. 1–26). Buffalo, NY: Bearly Ltd.Google Scholar
Kamii, C. (2000). Double-column addition: A teacher uses Piaget's theory [VHS Tape]. New York: Teachers College.Google Scholar
Kelley, C., Odden, A., Milanowski, A., & Heneman, H. (2000). The motivational effects of school-based performance awards. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Consortium for Policy Research in Education.Google Scholar
Kirshner, D., & Whitson, J. A. (Eds.). (1997). Situated cognition: Social, semiotic, and psychological perspectives. Mahwah, NJ: ErlbaumGoogle Scholar
Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McNess, E., Broadfoot, P., & Osborn, M. (2001). Is the effective compromising the affective? British Educational Research Journal, 29, 243–257.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newmann, F. M.. (1996). Authentic achievement: Restructuring schools for intellectual quality. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Odden, A. (2000). New and better forms of teacher compensation are possible. Phi Delta Kappan, 81(5), 361–366.Google Scholar
Osborn, M., & McNess, E. (2002). Teachers, creativity and the curriculum: A cross-cultural perspective. Education Review, 15, 79–84.Google Scholar
Piaget, J. (1972). Biology and Knowledge. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Plucker, J., & Barab, S. A. (2005). The importance of contexts in theories of giftedness: Learning to embrace the messy joys of subjectivity. In Sternberg, R. J. & Davidson, J. A. (Eds.), Conceptions of giftedness (2nd ed., pp. 201–216). New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plucker, J. A., & Beghetto, R. A. (2004). Why creativity is domain general, Why it looks domain specific, and why the distinction doesn't matter. In Sternberg,, R. J.Grigorenko, E. L., & Singer, J. L. (Eds.), Creativity: From potential to realization (pp. 153–168). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plucker, J. A.Beghetto, R. A., & Dow, G. T. (2004). Why isn't creativity more important to educational psychologists? Potentials, pitfalls, and future directions in creativity research. Educational Psychologist, 39, 83–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plucker, J., & Gorman, M. E. (1999). Invention is in the mind of the adolescent: Evaluation of a summer course one year later. Creativity Research Journal, 12, 141–150.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Renzulli, J. S. (1994). Schools for talent development: A practical plan for total school improvement. Mansfield Center, CT: Creative Learning Press.Google Scholar
Renzulli, J. S., & Reis, S. M. (1985). The schoolwide enrichment model: A comprehensive plan for educational excellence. Mansfield Center, CT: Creative Learning Press.Google Scholar
Resnick, L. B. (1987). Learning in school and out. Educational Researcher, 16, 13–20.Google Scholar
Runco, M. A. (2003). Creativity, cognition, and their educational implications. In Houtz, J. C. (Ed.), The educational psychology of creativity (pp. 25–56). Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.Google Scholar
Schuh, K. L. (2003). Knowledge construction in the learner-centered classroom. Journal of Educational Psychology, 95, 426–442.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scott, C. L. (1999). Teachers' biases toward creative children. Creativity Research Journal, 12, 321–328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Searle, J. (1999). The Chinese room. In Wilson, R. A.Keil, F. (Eds.), The MIT encyclopedia of the cognitive sciences. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Shepard, L. A. (2001). “The role of classroom assessment in teaching and learning.” In Richardson, V. (Ed.), The handbook of research on teaching (4th ed.). Washington, DC: American Educational Research Association.Google Scholar
Simonton, D. K. (1994). Greatness: Who makes history and why. New York: Guilford.Google Scholar
Snow, R. E. (1992). Aptitude theory: Yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Educational Psychologist, 27, 5–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sternberg, R. J. (2003). Creative thinking in the classroom. Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, 47, 325–338.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Torrance, E. P. (1962). Guiding creative talent. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Torrance, E. P. (1963). Education and the creative potential. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Torrance, E. P. (1987). Teaching for creativity. In Isaksen, S. G. (Ed.), Frontiers of creativity research. Buffalo, NY: Bearly Limited.Google Scholar
Weisberg, R. W. (1999). Creativity and knowledge: A challenge to theories. In Sternberg, R. J. (Ed.), Handbook of creativity (pp. 226–250). New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Westby, E. L., & Dawson, V. L. (1995). Creativity: Asset or burden in the classroom. Creativity Research Journal, 8, 1–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×