Creativity and Play Techniques in Teaching - Essay Example

of the paper: CREATIVITY AND PLAY By Creativity and play are very important factors in schools curriculum in the UK; it is for this reason that students should always be innovative and stay fresh. Lubart (pp 3) stats in his book that “Creativity is the ability of produce work that is both novel (i.e., original. Unexpected) and appropriate (i.e., useful, adaptive concerning task constraints), According to Sternberg (Gregerson et.al, PP 44). Creativity does not only concern students or rather it involves both the students and the teachers. In reality teachers should be creative in so many areas in teaching felid such as, classroom environment, technology, and activities. To begin, and Teachers should be attention to the classroom arrangement. For example if the teacher is the one how is giving the lesson and explaining to student their desk should face the board, but if they are in team- working activity they should set in circle so they will communicate easily with each other (SARACHO,1998, p6). There should be an interaction between teacher and students; teachers must arrange the class depend on the current situation. Arranging classes properly is in the beneficial of students. Secondly, Technology is also a useful tool which enhances the creativity in classroom. Using computer, active table, and smart board will defiantly increase student engagement during the learning process (Lubart, pp 24). Educators should learn how to teach by technology to be creative. New digital technologies are very useful in classroom and educators should take an advantage of this opportunity and use it to help students in their learning process. Thirdly, activities also play important roles in creativity factor. It helps students to be innovative in solving their problems. Educators should give their students many useful activities that are aimed at helping them to participate and generate ideas. Getting involved in any kind of activity will increase the student IQ (Intelligence quotient) and make them critical thinker (LILLEMYR, 2009, p15). Learning and development depend on internal cognitive structures that are complex in their subsequent evolution and origins. These cognitive structures are intimately connected to children’s cultural and social worlds (WAGEMAKER et al, 1984, p46). Processes such as practice, exploration, mastery, repetition and revision are vital in extending, constructing and connecting cognitive structures. Play activities enable children to impose some structure or organization on a taste, engage in ongoing rehearsal of the cognitive processes and make sense of their experiences (MACLUSKY & COX, 2011, p56). It is always a point of concern for educators towards the argument that children’s play is sometimes repetitive. However, a closer examination may ascertain that subtle changes in play patterns and themes as children revise and extend what they had previously done before. Where play is stereotypical and repetitive, it is of great importance that the practitioner finds ways of stimulating new ideas and interest. Such interventions are necessary in cases of children with special needs who have the same right to an appropriate curriculum. The processes involved in learning and playing appear to contribute to building children’s brain architecture. Well advanced practice and rehearsal may lean towards editing and pruning existing connections in the brain, as well making new connections (NEW & COCHRAN, 2006, p893). Curriculum that embraces play will help children develop exploratory as well as explanatory drives hence leading to increased complexity in thinking, learning and proper understanding. This is the kind of curriculum developed in the United Kingdom. In the UK’s curriculum, students’ learning processes have become increasingly focused on the distinctive methods of inquiry, conceptual frameworks and key skills with the subject disciplines represent (MACLUSKY & COX, 2011, p34). These disciplines provide UK students with powerful tools for making sense of the world and integrate distinctive and interconnected ways of learning. Although play and creativity are processes rather than subjects, many activities that involve play and creativity provide opportunities for learning through the subject disciplines. The UK curriculum provides a framework for a more valuable design that is characterized with breadth, differentiation, balance, progression and continuity across phases. In addition, the curriculum enables the practitioners to use policy framework as a guiding structure as opposed to prescriptive straitjacket. This is important in that it enables children with special need to have more opportunities for practice and consolidation (MONTEITH, 2004, p89). In the United Kingdom, the educational stakeholders have been working to adopt a more creative approach to the education curriculum and have placed a more creative teaching and learning at the core centre of the education system. Influenced by a developed understanding of the nature of creativity, by HMI reports which describe the significant achievements in creative schools, by government documents which encourage a more flexible stance and by involvement in all kinds of creative partnership, most educational centers in the UK are increasingly finding more innovative ways forward (FUMOTO, 2012, p5). Teaching with creativity and teaching for creativity comprise all the characteristics of good teaching-including high expectations, high motivation, the ability to listen and communicate and the ability to interest, engage and inspire. Teaching for creativity is not an easy option, but it can be enjoyable and deeply fulfilling. Working with an overloaded curriculum in a culture of accountability like UK, can cause a backlash in assessment system which can eventually have negative effects on classroom practices (WOOD & ATTFIELD, 2005, p78). Such pressure can minimize the opportunities for creative ventures and may attempt an individual to stay within the safe boundaries of the known. In this regard, the UK education policy makers have recognized this tension, between the incessant drive for measurable standards, and in response they have developed a curriculum that encourages creative teaching. In order to do so, the policy makers have convinced people that creativity has a vital role to play in the education system for proper personal and professional growth (MONTEITH, 2004, p143). In the context of classroom, developing opportunities for students to possibly think their way forward is inevitable. It will involve immersing the class in an issue or subject and helping them to ask relevant questions, be imaginative, take risk, and playfully explore options while improving their innovative perspectives. From this argument, creativity and play-in UK curriculum- is not seen as a product or an event, but a process involving the serious plays of minds and possibilities. This has helped students who undergone the UK education system to solve problems rationally. Taking creative risks and moving forward in learning depends heavily on the genuine atmosphere of acceptance and security. Students should feel free to take risk and learn from failure as opposed to being victimized because of the failures (MONTEITH, 2004, p8). The sense of well-being which offers a positive answer to these challenges is promoted in the UK curriculum through respecting individuals and including children in activities which affirm both their common humanity and individuality. The curriculum also encourages active modes of learning and problem solving approaches which include independent investigation requirements for accessible resources of various kinds (PRAMLING & FLEER, 2009, p3). The United Kingdom National Curriculum in Action web-site offers suggestions as to how teachers can encourage pupil’s creativity and the importance of play in child’s development. The website includes short video clips of educators discussing their approaches to encourage creativity and then followed by demonstrations of these approaches (SARACHO & SPODEK, 2002, p134). Examples are given of encouraging creativity while at the same time much emphasize is placed upon planning, teaching, introducing activities and revising work. The most interesting part about the UK curriculum is that it recognizes that educators have great influence on encouraging children development through creativity and play, but for the development to be effective then there is need to build this creativity and play in the school ethos. Theories in childhood play Child development that occurs from birth to adulthood was largely ignored throughout much history. The simple interpretation was that children were a smaller version of adults and little or no attention was paid to the many advances in language usage, cognitive abilities and physical growth that occurred to child’s growth. However, in the recent times there has been continued interest towards child’s development. The following theories help explain childhood play and it’s relevant in child development. Play as therapy In 1920, Sigmund Freud developed a psychoanalytic play theory that was contained in this famous book “Beyond the Pleasure Principle”. In this theory, he described play as a child’s mechanism to continue working out an earlier experienced traumatic event in an effort master or correct the event that ensure his satisfaction (WOOD & ATTFIELD, 2005, 37). He argued that child development is a series of psychosexual stages. According to Freud, the stages are: oral, anal, latency, phallic and genital. Each and every stage includes the satisfaction of libidinal desire and can later play a vital role in adult personality. Play as social development Lev Vygotsky suggested that a child was use play as a means for social growth. While playing, children will encounter others and hence learn to interact through language and role-play. His is mostly acknowledged for the introduction of ZPD (zone of proximal development). According to Vygotsky, children need their peers to grow; they need to interact with the adults to master each social skill that will enable them to be introduced well in the new learning for growth (WAGEMAKER et al, 1984, p67). Play as intellectual development Known for his work in child’s development, Jean Piaget introduced the stages of child’s development. These stages are directly related to play. According to him, intellectual growth occurs as children go through the stages of assimilation. The children also readjust their own views to meet the needs of the outside environment (REYNOLDS, 2002, p296). Play as sensory learning An Italian educationist Maria Montessori, during the early 90s, hypothesized that “play is the child’s work”. Montessori’s methods are being employed in schools today. Her main argument is that children would be best served spending their play time learning or imagining. Her play is sensory, which utilizes a hands-on approach to everyday tools like sand tables. The teacher is obligated with the task of helping the child play to learn while the child sets her/his own pace (NEW & COCHRAN, 2006, p167). Conclusion The link between play and literacy development have become more clearly established especially in the 21st Century, and there is a strong support in theory for planning play environments. Children use a varied literacy skills, concepts, and behaviors in their play. Play encourages speaking, reading, listening and writing and provides context for meaningful literacy practices. When engaging in playful literacy, children are acting as readers and writers as opposed to just pretending to read and write. Some scholars argue that they are behaving ahead of their actual level of development such that their level of understanding is both situated in present and future progress. References FUMOTO, H. (2012). Young children's creative thinking. Los Angeles, SAGE. Gregerson, M. B., Kaufman, J. C., & Snyder, H. T. (2013). Teaching creatively and teaching creativity. New York, NY: Springer. LILLEMYR, O. F. (2009). Taking play seriously: children and play in early childhood education-- an exciting challenge. Charlotte, NC, IAP, Information Age Pub. Lubart, T. I., & Georgsdottir, A. (2004). Creativity :Developmental and cross-cultural issues. In S.Lau, A.N.,Hui, & G.Y. Ng (Eds) Creativity: When East meets West.Singapore: World Scientific. MACLUSKY, J., & COX, R. (2011). Teaching creative writing in the primary school delight, entice, inspire! Maidenhead, Open University Press. http://www.myilibrary.com?id=329259. MONTEITH, M. (2004). ICT for curriculum enhancement. Bristol, Intellect. NEW, R. S., & COCHRAN, M. (2006). Early childhood education [four volumes]: an international encyclopedia. Westport, Conn, Praeger Publishers. NEW, R. S., & COCHRAN, M. (2006). Early childhood education [four volumes]: an international encyclopedia. Westport, Conn, Praeger Publishers. PRAMLING SAMUELSSON, I., & FLEER, M. (2009). Play and learning in early childhood settings: international perspectives. [Dordrecht], Springer. REYNOLDS, W. M. (2002). Handbook of Psychology, Volume 7, Educational Psychology Volume 7, Educational Psychology. Hoboken, NJ, John Wiley & Sons.  SARACHO, O. N. (1998). Multiple perspectives on play in early childhood education. Albany, N.Y., State Univ. of New York Press. SARACHO, O. N., & SPODEK, B. (2002). Contemporary perspectives on play in early childhood education. Greenwich, CT, Information Age Pub. WAGEMAKER, P. J., STEINER, K., & KATZ, L. (1984). Current topics in early childhood education. Volume V. Norwood, N.J., Ablex Pub. WOOD, E., & ATTFIELD, J. (2005). Play, learning and the early childhood curriculum. London, Paul Chapman. WOOD, E., & ATTFIELD, J. (2005). Play, learning and the early childhood curriculum. London, Paul Chapman. Read More