Introduction to creativity

Lets begin by asking what is meant by the word Creativity? 

As you are able to see,from the mind map created by another educational studies student, there are a range of ideas to what is meant by creativity. However when researching for a more academic meaning to the word creativity there are challenges to understand one true meaning of the word. According to Robinson (2006), who did a talk on how education is killing creativity, believes that creativity is the greatest endowment of human intelligence and should be as important as literacy in the world of education. Agreeing with Robinson's theory is Duffy (2006) who believes that creativity is a vital and important function in education, 'it is the representation of one's own image', suggesting that each child needs to have a creative mind to be able to absorb the context and adapt their own thoughts to be able to move forward in life.
Following on from that, creativity can be seen as original however Csikszentmihalyi & Wolfe (2000) believe that to be able to labeled a product as 'creative' there needs to be acknowledgment of the General Model of Creativity (as seen to the right).
Three objectives to gain a creative status for the new object; the first is the Originality of the new object which has not been copied, second the Value of the object does it have any meaning to anyone, and last the Implementation which is when something is noticed and is set into society.

EDUCATION
Children from a very young age can experience creativity on such a large level and a key feature of education is to be able to teach the creative minds to develop their minds further and be able to establish their own understanding on the world. Cropley (2001) identified that there needs to be the correct education to allow young creative minds to flourish, without it there will be no economic or social progress. Therefore creativity is undoubtedly an important feature to the educational environment, to help the future of our society to expand and reach further than the limits. More about creativity within an educational environment will be further discussed on the next post Does Education Kill Creativity

References
Cropley, A. J. (2004) Creativity in Education & Learning: A Guide for Teachers and Educators. Abingdon: RoutledgeFalmer.

Csikszentmihalyi, M. & Wolfe, R. (2000) New Conceptions and Research Approaches to Creativity: Implications of a Systems Perspective for Creativity in Education, in Heller, K., Monks, F., Sternberg, R. & Subotnik (Eds.) International Handbook of Giftedness & talent (pp.81-93). Oxford: Elsevier Science LTD.

Duffy, B (2006) Supporting Creativity and Imagination In the Early Years. Berkshire: Open University Press.

Robinson, K (2006) http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity