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Creativity

What we mean by: Creativity

Inspiring and developing the builders of tomorrow

Contents

The creativeprocess

Creativity as dynamic and personally meaningful

The connection between creativity & learning

Introduction

The connection between creativity & play

At the LEGO Foundation

play in the world. In this leaflet, we share our view of creativity as a critical skill and mindset for today’s children, one that is personally meaningful and that all children can develop and practice through play. Because we see children as role models and active agents in the world

2, we believe that

supporting their creativity through play will nurture their capacity to authentically contribute to their communities and positively shape their present and future world.

At the LEGO Foundation, we want to build a future where learning through play empowers children to become creative, engaged, lifelong learners. In an age of rapid innovation, where children will encounter unimagined advances and navigate unpredictable dilemmas, this aim is more important than ever before.

There are many ways to understand creativity

1, and many perspectives

on the role children can or should

You may find all the referencses at the end of this booklet

Creativity as dynamic and personally meaningful

Creativity as dynamic and personally meaningful

“Children learn best when they are actively engaged in constructing something that has personal meaning to them – be it a poem, a robot, a sandcastle, or a computer program.3”Seymour Papert

At the LEGO Foundation, we see creativity as the iterative process of connecting, exploring, and transforming the world in both new and meaningful ways.

Iterative

From a toddler playing with a puzzle and trying out different strategies to a young child discovering that the angle of a slide impacts how far a marble will shoot across a room, iteration – the process of trying out different possibilities, revising hypotheses in response to new information, and discovering new questions – is essential to our understanding of creativity. There are certainly coincidental acts that result in products that are both new and meaningful; but when we talk about creativity, we mean acts that are intentional and iterative in nature, processes in which creators are actively engaged in playing with connections, exploring possibilities, and discovering transformations that are meaningful for them.

...when we talk about creativity, we mean acts that are intentional and iterative in nature

Iterative

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There are times when this process does not result in a final product – for example, when the process results in an insight about the next possibility to explore, the best revised hypothesis to test out, or the most fruitful question to ask next. In our view, this discovery – which inspires further action, rather than ending it – is in itself a significant creative production that is both new and meaningful. While final products can also be creative, when we talk about creativity we mean a dynamic process. In this sense, it becomes clear that we also mean a skill that can be nourished and practiced, not a static trait that only some are born with.

...when we talk about creativity we mean a dynamic process

Process

Connect + ing« exploring »and transforming

While children’s individual creative skill levels are important to this process, when we talk about creativity we mean a dynamic and complex interaction between those developing personal skills and the environment in which children develop. In other words, creators bring their own creative skill level and perspective of the world to that process; and that skill and perspective are both influenced by and have an influence on the environment the creator lives in. In this way, they connect (link or combine two or more things), explore (adapt, or go one or more steps further), and transform (radically change) ideas and products that already exist4.

... children’s individual creative skill levels are important to this process

Connecting, exploring, and transforming

While processes that connect, explore, or transform the world in ways that are new in never-before-seen, culture- and history-transforming ways are certainly creative, when we talk about creativity we mean processes that change things in ways that are new, first and foremost, for the one creating. In other words, we are referring to the everyday creativity5 practiced by ordinary people as they interact with and make meaning of their world.

...when we talk about creativity we mean processes that change things in ways that are new, first and foremost, for the one creating

New

having a meaning or purpose

Meaningful

When a child picks up a broomstick and playfully transforms it into a horse, we believe that child is responding to the familiar, internalised meanings in her environment by adding a new and personal meaning to it. For this reason, we do not focus exclusively on processes that are useful or valuable to society, history, or culture broadly. While some personally meaningful processes have, or will evolve to have, broader use or value to society, when we talk about creativity we mean processes that are meaningful, first and foremost, for the one creating6. In practicing this everyday process, children develop the skills necessary to participate in processes that will ultimately be meaningful for the world as well.

Meaningful...when we talk about creativity we mean processes that are meaningful, first and foremost, for the one creating 6

The creative process

The creative process

There are many valid and meaningful ways to understand the creative process across contexts7,8. When we talk about the creative process, however, we mean a process that includes three interwoven experiences – Connecting, Exploring, and Transforming – based in the three types of creativity4. These experiences can be seen easily in the context of play.

ExploringConnecting

Transforming

Being motivated and curious to investigate the world

around you.

Experimenting with, testing, and trying out new things.

Communicating, reflecting, and sharing ideas with others.

Being motivated and curious to investigate the world around you.

In responding personally to the world, we connect ourselves and others to it in meaningful ways with our attention, curiosity, and imagination. The experience of connecting can be internal or external.

When a child first notices her surroundings, asking, for example, “Can I do something with this broomstick?” she is experiencing a first internal interest in the object and becoming curious and driven to engage further. Connections can also be external, like when a child makes a connection between objects, ideas, or other people. When that child asks, “What would happen if I did something else

Connecting with the broomstick?” she begins to playfully generate ideas, searching for and imagining connections between the broomstick and other objects or ideas – like a horse. She may also find connections to a collaborative play-world, for example by meaningfully incorporating the broomstick into the larger play narrative she is building with her friends (about a horse ranch, for example).

Experimenting with, testing, and trying out new things.

In exploring the initial connection further, we begin playing with the possibilities of this relationship, trying out what happens when we add our own personal and unique contribution to what already exists, and responding flexibly to problem solve when our expectations are challenged.

Exploring

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questions like, “How can I change what I do

with this broomstick to make it different?”

and “What can I change about this

broomstick to make it something else?”

Or she may wonder and observe, “How do

others react when I try out this new idea?”

When a child begins to ride around on the broomstick or make it neigh, she begins to experience it as a horse; and when she adds a constructed horse head to one end, she shares with others (even those who come later, when she is finished riding it) that the broomstick is now a horse. She seeks out questions like, “How can I experience or show what else this broomstick is to me now?”

In both cases, we engage in a deeper level of agency, daring to take ownership and challenge the constraints of our own understanding, or of the object, idea, or relationship we originally discovered.

Communicating, reflecting, and sharing ideas with others.

When, through reflection and discovery, our own understanding of the world is changed, we ourselves are transformed internally.

When a child discovers new possibilities in her world – whether in herself, her environment, or in her relationship with others – her mindset is changed and her skills are developed. She may reflect on questions like, “What else can I do or change? What else is possible? How might my actions affect others?”When we change the meaning or form of something else by altering it, or our relationship to it, we show or experience that transformation externally.

Transforming

How creativity, play and learning connect

How creativity, play and learning connect

The connection between creativity & play

Play and creativity are so interwoven that some have claimed that play is necessary in order to be creative8, and others have found evidence that play – and the expression of emotion during play – is a facilitator and predictor of creativity9,10.

Meaningful

Joyful

Actively engaging

Socially interactive

Iterative

We believe that the creative process is infused with the five characteristics of Learning through Play, though all may not be present in each instant: It is Actively Engaging, Socially Interactive, Iterative, Meaningful, and Joyful12. In other words, when creators connect, explore, or transform ideas and objects, they do so by actively engaging with those ideas, interacting with the social environment, iterating on what they find, and making meaning of what they encounter and create.

The agency they experience in this process results in higher levels of well-being13 – in other words, even when much of the process is challenging or even frustrating, they ultimately experience the joy of having interacted with the wider world, of changing and being changed by it. At the LEGO Foundation we call this the pride of creation.

When children learn through play, they are given the best opportunity to fulfil their potential to become creative, engaged, lifelong learners.

The connection between creativity & learning

determine which constraints – like those prohibiting the harming of others – should not be challenged. They must also learn the cognitive and physical skills to holistically forecast whether their creative choices may have unintended negative consequences, whether now or in the future.

In other words, creativity must be developed in concert with a sense of ethics, an understanding of how one’s choices may affect others or a greater good14. By giving children opportunities to take risks, explore uncertainty, and iterate on their choices in safe environments – in other words, by supporting their creativity through high-quality playful experiences – we are giving them the holistic skills they need to learn not just creativity, but when various creative choices are appropriate and when they may harm others. This practice incorporates the context of creativity and the importance of choice into learning, enabling children to weave strong, flexible skills

Because child development is beautifully complex, we take a holistic view of learning, highlighting how children learn by weaving cognitive, physical, social, emotional, and creative skills together across development.

Holistic learning of a breadth of skills is critical to children’s creativity – because creative choices are not always good choices. For example, finding new and meaningful ways to bully a classmate may be a creative process, but it harms the victim and the classroom culture. While challenging existing constraints is an important part of transforming themselves and the world, children must learn the social-emotional skills to

ropes, and helping them to develop the self-reflective capacity to become creative agents for the good of their communities and society.

This understanding of creativity and learning necessitates a more holistic and process-oriented approach to assessment. In other words, while it is possible to assess the creativity of final products in standardised ways, we believe a different method must be used to document the development of creative skills in personally new and meaningful processes. Instead we can evaluate the everyday development of creativity by examining the degree to which children are demonstrating and developing the creative habits of mind – being imaginative, inquisitive, persistent, disciplined, and collaborative15 – that support deeper engagement in the iterative process of connecting, exploring, and transforming the world in personally new and meaningful ways.

Physical

SocialCreative

CognitiveEmotional

Creative choices are not always good choices

Creativity must be developed in concert with a sense of ethics

Inspiring and developing the builders of tomorrow

We believe that practicing everyday creativity through play is the best way to help children develop strong creative skills, including the history- and culture-changing creativity that is most valued by society16. Adults, whether parents, caregivers, or educators, play a key role in this by providing opportunities for children to practice their creativity in everyday situations. To do this, adults, too, must take a risk – the beautiful risk of allowing for uncertainty to unfold in their daily lives17, and inviting children to take agency in those occasions to connect, explore, or transform their surroundings. We believe that when adults and children work and play together, their collective creative skills are increased.

With the playful guidance of adults, children are challenged to think about constraints, to problem solve, and to select high-quality ideas. And under the leadership of children, adults can rediscover their cognitive flexibility, cultivate an openness to difference, and consider unusual ideas they wouldn’t entertain otherwise. Developing these creative skills provides a co-creative context for meaningful and engaged learning today, and will inspire and develop the builders of tomorrow.

Start your story about tomorrow today

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Glaveanu, V.P. (2018). Educating which creativity? Thinking Skills and Creativity, 27, 25-32.

Glaveanu, V.P. (2011). Children and Creativity: A most (un)likely pair? Thinking Skills and Creativity, 6(2), 122-131.

Kafai, Y. B., & Resnick, M. (1996). Intro-duction. In Y. B. Kafai & M. Resnick (Eds.), Constructionism in Practice: Designing, Thinking, and Learning in a Digital World. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associ-ates, Inc.

Boden, M. A. (2004). The Creative Mind: Myths and Mechanisms (2nd ed.). London: Routledge. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/52f1/53075b22469fa82ecb-35099b8810e95c31f6.pdf

Richards, R., Kinney, D. K., Benet, M., & Merzel, A. (1988). Assessing everyday creativity: Characteristics of the Lifetime Creativity Scales and validation with three large samples. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54, 476-485.

Beghetto, R. A., & Kaufman, J. C. (2007). Toward a broader conception of creativity: A case for “mini-c” creativity. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 1(2), 73-79.

Lubart, T. I. (2000-2001). Models of the Creative Process: Past, Present and Future. Creativity Research Journal, 13(3 & 4), 295-308.

Lubart, T. I. (Ed.). (2018). The Creative Process: Perspectives from Multiple Domains. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

Vygotsky, L.S. (1998). Imagination and creativity in the adolescent. In R. W. Rieber (Ed.), The collected works of L.S. Vygotsky (Vol. 5). (pp. 151-166). New York: Plenum Press. (Original work published in 1931) (as found in Rhetorics of Creativity)

Russ, S., & Grossman-McKee, A. (1990). Affective expression in chil-dren’s fantasy play, primary process thinking on the Rorschach, and di-vergent thinking. Journal of Personality Assessment, 54(3-4), 756-771.

Russ, S. (2003). Play and creativity: Developmental issues. Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, 47(3), 291-303. (as found in Rhetorics of Creativity)

Zosh, J. M., Hirsh-Pasek, K., Hopkins, E. J., Jensen, H., Liu, C., Neale, D., Solls, S. L., & Whitebread, D. (2018). Accessing the Inaccessible: Rede-fining Play as a Spectrum. Frontiers in Psychology, 9:1124. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01124

Welzel, C., & Inglehard, R. (2010). Agency, Values, and Well-being: A Human Development Model. Social Indicators Research, 97(1), 43-63.

Moran, S., Cropley, D., & Kaufman, J. (Eds.). (2014). The Ethics of Cre-ativity. London: Palgrave Macmillan UK.

Lucas, B., & Spencer, E. (2017). Teaching Creative Thinking: Developing Learners Who Generate Ideas and Can Think Critically. Wales, UK: Crown House Publishing Limited.

Wegerif, R. (2010). Mind expanding: Teaching for thinking and creativity in primary education. Berkshire, UK; Open University Press. (as found in Glaveanu, 2011)

Beghetto, R. A. (in press). Beautiful Risks: Having the Courage to Teach and Learn Creatively. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

Vygotsky, L. S. (2004). Imagination and Creativity in Childhood. Journal of Russian and East European Psychology, 42(1), 7-97. [Original work published in 1967]

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“It is precisely human creative activity that makes the human being a creature oriented toward the future, creating the future and thus altering his own present.18”Lev Vygotsky

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