This paper is based on work carried out as part of a research study into the professional practices of secondary design and technology teachers in England. It focused on fostering creativity or teaching for creativity as defined by the Robinson Report (1999, All our futures: creativity, culture and education. London: Department for Education and Employment (DfEE)) for pupils aged 11-14 years. The overall research question that drove this study was ''to what extent can teachers influence the creativity of pupils aged 11-14 years in design and technology lessons?'' The paper provides the basis used to generate a unique theoretical threefeature model or framework that can be used to explore creativity within an educational context. The findings of three investigations in the study are presented in this paper. The first and second investigations looked at what could be learnt from the professional practices of art and design and design and technology teachers and the views of four 'expert' teachers known for their ability to develop the creative potential of their pupils. The data is discussed under emerging themes and it is used to inform specific criteria in the evolving theoretical three-feature model for creativity. The model is then used to analyse the data from the third classroom based investigation and the findings are discussed under the emerging themes to help identify the issues related to fostering creativity within the design and technology classroom. This paper discusses the implications of the research for classroom practice and suggests that, as creativity is a complex, multi-faceted concept and process, the theoretical three-feature model and related criteria evolved in the study provides a sound framework to explore creativity within an educational context. As a tool it helps identify examples of good practice and highlight areas that require further attention by teachers aiming to foster their pupils' creativity. It is suggested 2007 that design and technology teachers have lessons to learn from the practices of their art and design colleagues and 'expert' design and technology teachers. It is concluded that there is a need for greater understanding by teachers of their implicit theories regarding teaching, learning and creativity. A wider use could be made of the breadth of strategies outlined by the 'expert' teachers. This would help address the weakness identified in the school based study and strengthen classroom practice when teaching for creativity.

The purpose of the study reported here was to investigate the use of a design-without-make unit as part of the design and technology curriculum with pupils aged 14. Three research questions drove the study: (a) What sort of designing do pupils do when they work collaboratively to design without having to make what they have designed? (b) What is the teachers' attitude to design-without-make? (c) What is the pupils' attitude to design-without-make? The study is a small pilot and data were collected using semi-structured interviews with a class teacher and two pupils and detailed scrutiny of five pupils' design ideas developed during 6 lessons towards the end of an 18 lessons teaching sequence. Findings indicate that the teacher and pupils in this study responded favourably to design-without-make. The pupils' designing was highly iterative, creative, involved making a wide range of design decisions and revealed understanding of technological concepts.

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