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A systematic review of 210 educational research, policy and professional literature studies from the period 2005-2011 identified only 17 publications which met the criteria for inclusion and contained findings relating to teachers' roles in promoting creativity and 18 for how they can be supported in doing so. The evidence from the studies suggest that teacher skills and attitudes; a willingness to act as a role model; awareness of learners' needs; flexible approaches to curriculum and lesson structure; particular types of classroom interaction with pupils, together with the use of ICT and assessment, are important components of teaching for creativity. The evidence also suggests the importance of school culture in supporting or impeding creative practice; the need to elicit teachers' prior conceptions of creativity in education; teachers taking on the role of learners to develop their own creativity; working co-constructively with a mentor or coach -which may be a creative professional from an outside agency; and the importance of teachers undertaking action research and reflection on their own classroom practice.

This paper reports on a systematic literature review to examine the association between children and young people's participation in arts activities and their academic achievement. The 24 studies that met our criteria for inclusion and weight of evidence (2004-16) had mixed findings. Whilst many of the research designs employed would not meet positivist criteria for rigoursuch as sample size, statistical significance and causalitytypically required by public bodies to justify expenditure, there are examples throughout the literature reviewed of academically-related benefits to participants, such as increased confidence, creativity or more positive attitude towards their studies. Overall, there appears to be some justification from the literature for public investment in high-quality, long-term arts education programmes for children and young people in schools and community settings, on the basis of its potential to enhance academic achievement. However, there may be more intrinsic benefits to arts participation than the instrumental, essentially economic justification of improved academic standards.

This paper is based on a systematic review of educational research, policy and professional literature relating to creative environments for learning in schools. Despite the search yielding 210 documents, comparatively few empirical studies were published between 2005 and 2011 that addressed the review objectives. Only 18 studies included in the review investigated the impact of creativity on learners. There was, however some evidence for the impact of creative learning environments on pupil attainment, confidence, resilience, motivation, problem-solving, interpersonal skills and school attendance. These findings have implications for policy, practice and research internationally.