Creativity is associated with feeling discomfort with the current state of affairs.
J. Fazlagić
Edward de Bono, a world expert in creative thinking skills, argues that to fully utilize creative thinking skills, one must become what he calls a thinking person. According to him, a thinking person:
Ken Robinson and Lou Aronica (2009) believe that creativity involves not only creatively solving problems but also recognizing and discovering them. They argue, firstly, that being creative involves action, that is, doing something specific and additionally new. People are not abstractly creative; they become creative only when doing something practical, e.g., in solving a problem, designing, actively participating in culture, business, etc. One cannot be creative if they are not doing something, which is why in this aspect, creativity, and thus creative thinking, is fundamentally different from imagination, dreams, or visualization (de Bono 2008). Unlike the latter, creativity involves not only imagining and creating new possibilities but also considering ways to implement them. In this sense, creativity is „applied imagination” (Bieniok 2014, p. 48).
Edward de Bono, writing about what will be important in the current millennium, emphasizes that it is becoming increasingly difficult to learn in general, to learn in advance. According to him, learning should be subordinated to designing one’s future. And this designing should be based on passions, interests, emotions, that is, in attitudes. When we like something, are passionate about something, we are more willing to engage in it, and knowledge comes almost naturally. This is also one of the theses of neurodidactics. In education, there should be a greater share of learning through action, in real, genuine, and not simulated learning opportunities.
de Bono, E. (2008), Course of Thinking, Łódź: BBC Active Intelligence.
According to Guilford, within the concept of creativity, there are also terms related to intelligence, such as divergent thinking, multiple intelligences… According to Guilford (1967), the essence of creativity is the ability to think divergently.
„The value of creativity has been devalued… The point is for teachers to learn about creativity from scientific research, not from popular media or urban legends.”
Jan Fazlagić, 2023 (School Friendly to Creativity)
Many modern organizations rely on a handful of creative employees. The value of talented employees comes from their knowledge and creativity.
Knowledge is gained through experience and systematically enhancing their competencies. Talented employees are constantly learning – they do not rest on their laurels. However, creativity is a trait acquired in the earlier phases of human development. The employer or school should rather focus on creating conditions and motivating for creative actions, as it is more challenging to increase a person’s creativity in a short period.
Going beyond the norm and surprising the audience is one of the fundamental features of creativity.
PISA definition of creativity (OECD, 2019):
Competence involving the efficient creation, evaluation, and improvement of ideas that can result in the creation of original and effective solutions, the development of knowledge, and an impact on the imagination.
In 1968, a study on the creativity of 1600 children was conducted (Land and Beth).
The main conclusion was: „schools kill creativity” – a decline in creativity with age.
Currently, the interpretation of these studies is different from the original. The decline in children’s creative traits does not mean that schools „kill creativity.” Many ideas created by children have extremely low value because they are surreal, unchallenged by reality.
In creativity, not only originality but also the value of created ideas matter.
The challenge for the education system is to develop methods and teaching systems that will effectively allow for the smooth transition of students from their childish creativity to mature creativity.
(See J. Fazlagić, School Friendly to Creativity, Success Factors, DIFIN, Warsaw 2023.)
Kaufman and Beghetto (2009) divided creativity into:
When it comes to changes in children’s creativity levels in relation to age, it is worth mentioning Professor George Land’s study (Markides, 2013). The group studied children aged 3–5. Over 98% of the studied population were considered „creativity geniuses.” The same children were examined 5 years later, and the percentage of „creativity geniuses” dropped to 32%. After another 5 years, this percentage decreased to 12%. In the adult group (over 25 years old), only 2% of respondents met the criteria for a „creativity genius.” This study is particularly important in explaining the role of school in developing creativity [1].
[1] Markides C., Do schools kill creativity?, Business Strategy Review, Issue 4, 2013.
Creative Thinking: One of the most well-known programs supporting children’s and youth’s creativity is Edward de Bono’s program based on the theory of parallel thinking. Edward de Bono is a world authority on „creative thinking.” In his publications, he presents a system of thinking different from the prevailing one, calling it „parallel thinking.” Such thinking creates dichotomies and contradictions, and information and judgment are crucial. This type of thinking overuses criticism in the belief that if bad things are removed, only the wonderful will remain [1]. The concept of parallel thinking proposed by de Bono means approaching the problem not directly, not straightforwardly. Such treatment allows for looking at the problem from another side, in a new way. De Bono’s program also includes proposals for training cognitive styles established according to his typology. He distinguishes six qualitatively different thinking styles. These are:
De Bono’s idea involves both practicing the skill of recognizing one’s thinking style and improving the ability to think in a different way, „according to the characteristics of another style.” Including such exercises in the program stems from the belief that each style is valuable and necessary in thinking about a problem, while the flexibility, variability of thinking styles, and adjusting them to current activity well serve problem-solving” [2].
In parallel thinking, the most important principle is not searching but „creating” („planning”). We try to create a „way forward.” We do not judge harshly but accept various possibilities, even if they are contradictory and mutually exclusive. We arrange them side by side. Parallel thinking accepts the importance of information but considers it insufficient until supplemented by a concept. This thinking places great importance on observing and generating ideas, not judging them. In this method of thinking, a useful result arises not through „judgment” but through „creating.” We create a way „forward” from a field of parallel possibilities. Instead of imposing a predetermined order, we can allow the information to self-organize. An example of using different thinking styles is given in Appendix A as a project proposal using the six thinking hats method „Nuclear energy – an opportunity or a threat?”
[1] See: T. Buzan, The Mind Map Book, Ravi Publishing, Łódź 1999.
[2] A. Antczak, Supporting Creative Thinking and Action in Youth. An Outline of the Issue.
Here is the translation of the text you provided:
Creativity as the Superior Dimension in the Education Process
In many publications, Professor Dorota Klus-Stańska emphasizes that teachers do not teach elementary creative thinking. „If a teacher is not happy, they cannot raise happy children, and such children should be the future of our society. A teacher can and should make children in school and through it happy, and they should create such a society in the future. It seems that one of the ways to achieve this goal is to shape creative attitudes by stimulating creative thinking and actions. Expecting the teacher to be a creator of students’ passions, to be able to catch talents and support their development, presents the possibility and necessity of gaining experience in 'being a creator’ in various areas of activity (as indicated, among others, by: K.J. Szmidt, K. Robinson, L. Witkowski) (…).
Therefore, the definition of the concept of 'creativity’ is: 'the ability of a person to create new and valuable products that make the world better, more truthful, more beautiful, to generate innovative, original ideas’ (…). K. Robinson adds that creativity is associated with particular attitudes and being able to reach deep resources. People who have achieved great things in a given field have often achieved them thanks to their love for that field, a passion for the nature of the process involved. According to him, creativity is not an intellectual process. It is enriched by other senses, especially by feeling, intuition, and playful imagination. He also suggests that creativity is a fundamental human attribute that must be nurtured among all people, not only among artists and scientists. Supporting it among people of all professions, social classes, and ethnic backgrounds is essential for the common good. 'Boredom results from a lack of tasks to accomplish and problems to solve. A creative person, when doing something, is engaged in their action, fascinated by it. A person deprived of creativity undertakes specific actions 'perfunctorily,’ is bored with them, and, as a result, achieves very stereotypical results. According to many scholars, the beginning of all creativity is a research-oriented attitude. A bored person does not exhibit such an attitude, does not notice what there is to discover, write about, or even reflect upon. Nothing surprises them, they become 'blind to things to be done.’ According to Guilford, creative thinking is primarily divergent thinking, which is oriented towards seeking multiple solutions to one problem. It should be emphasized that Guilford considers creative thinking as a problem-solving process. He even claims that problem-solving and creative thinking 'have so much in common that they can be treated as the same phenomenon’ [1]. According to the researcher developing these studies, the project method can help students with all these above-mentioned issues. The project method is supposed to facilitate learning, awaken curiosity, creativity, and perseverance, change students’ attitudes so that they want to learn, discover their talents, and not be afraid to make mistakes.
[1] J.P. Guilford, The Nature of Human Intelligence, PWN, Warsaw 1978, p. 593.
Creative Thinking, or Creativity, Occurs in Various Areas of Human Activity
As Z. Pietrasiński emphasizes: „contrary to the traditional understanding of creativity, it is not solely the privilege of artists and scholars, but can occur in every sphere of human activity. A product deserving the name of creative can take any form and be not only a work of art, discovery, or original machine but just as well – an organizational project, a sports training method, a joke, etc.” (Pietrasiński, 1969, pp. 10-11).
Creativity can be considered in four main aspects:
Creativity as a Product
The crowning effect of the creative process is the product. For a given product to meet the conditions of creativity, it must have the following characteristics: novelty, originality, generativity, and social acceptance. The originality of a work is associated with unusualness, rarity, and exceptionalness. An original product is not always creative. Such examples can be seen, for example, in fashion: currently, clothes that were worn in the 70s are appearing, which is original but not new.
Creativity as a Process
The final effect of children’s creative activities usually has little value. More important is the sheer joy of creation. Children come into the world with a natural need to create. Children’s creative activity manifests itself in the form of linguistic metaphors, neologisms, and „linguistic errors.” During games and play, children invent new rules, change and give other meanings to objects – a chair one day is a throne, another day a train car. They are also the creators of rhymes, songs, stories, where they become the main characters, and all events revolve around them. Children’s (and also adults’) creative expression stems from the need to try, experiment, be curious, and independently experience the surrounding reality. It takes place in an atmosphere of freedom and joy. „Little creators” are not discouraged by any difficulties, nor do they expect rewards beyond the satisfaction of the mere fact of action. As they age, natural activity is inhibited or developed, but the creative potential remains in the person. Whether it will evolve depends on many factors: personality and related intellectual abilities, the surrounding environment (family, school, peers), and others.
Another aspect of creative thinking is its properties. People struggling with a problem should have such intellectual abilities as fluency, flexibility, originality, and sensitivity to problems. Other features of creative thinking are critical thinking and independence of thought.
M. Kulikowska’s research has shown that with age, a child’s thinking gains flexibility, but in high school, flexibility decreases. The older the child, the more their critical thinking increases. For students around the age of 10-12, the need to check and analyze their own and others’ views begins to exist.
Creativity as a Set of Human Abilities
The quality and value of a product depend on the development of creative abilities and talents. Abilities are such human properties that allow for proficiency, efficiency, speed, and reliability in performing specific intellectual or sensory-motor operations (so-called special abilities, e.g., motor coordination). Talents, often equated with abilities, enable a person to achieve above-average results in a given area of activity, requiring not only performing elementary operations but also incorporating these operations into a constructed sequence of actions of a higher degree of complexity, involving many psychological functions. For a long time, both laymen and experts believed that a creator was characterized by a high level of intelligence. As a result of conducted research, it was proven that creativity is not the same as a high level of intelligence. The relationship between intelligence and thinking is compared by E. de Bono to the relationship between a car and its driver. One can drive a great powerful car poorly. One can drive a weaker car excellently. The engine power is only the car’s potential, just as intelligence is only the mind’s potential. It is the person’s thinking skill that determines the extent to which their intelligence will be used. From this, it follows that an intelligent person is not necessarily a creative person, and vice versa.
Text box item sample content
