A creative cocktail: creative teaching in initial teacher education

Abstract

Despite government rhetoric, higher education lecturers and schoolteachers in the UK remain under pressure to focus on standards and measurement in the core curriculum at the relative expense of a wider and more creative education. This article argues that the balance needs redressing and explores the nature of creative teaching in the context of initial teacher education. It reports an investigation into creative teaching, undertaken through peer review and analysis of sessions in geography, music and English. Students' responses were collected and interviews conducted. The sessions were examined in relation to content, teaching style and student experience, from which common themes were then identified. These themes included: contextualisation; using metaphor; style and pace of delivery; tutor confidence and ability to inspire; valuing students; emotional engagement; and challenging students to reflect upon their own learning. It is suggested that creative teaching is a complex and invigorating cocktail. The ingredients of the cocktail can be identified and may be taught, but much depends upon the vigour of the mixing and the individual experiences of those who attend each 'cocktail party'.

Primary School EFL Teachers’ Attitudes towards Creativity and Their Perceptions of Practice

“…It could be that middle/high school teachers were accustomed to teaching adults or older children; thus, they might believe that creative thinking requires higher-order thinking skills relative to older learners (Torrance, 1983, in do Souza, 2000. According to Grainger et al (2004), as children move through school, their voluntary creativity declines. And Torrance (1983) added that people usually under-evaluate children's ability to think and problem-solve, which has led to a focus on reproducing memorized information and ignoring creative thinking.…”

“…Teachers' practices were also studied to explore elements of creative teaching by observing them in the UK teaching three different subjects: geography, music, and English (Grainger et al, 2004). Results revealed that teachers did employ creativity in their teaching methods.…”

Teaching beliefs: a comparison between Italian primary and secondary school trainee teachers

“…These findings appeared even if trainee primary teachers had less music competence than trainee secondary teachers, probably because the innovative music teaching factor accounted for the development of informal music activities such as proposing teaching and learning activities employing sounds from the environment, proposing creative composition activities with sound events or proposing invented music notation systems. These activities involve creative teaching (Grainger, Barnes, and Scoffham 2004) and could be more relevant and suitable for primary teachers. This result agrees with Ryans (1960), who found that US secondary school teachers were more traditional in their educational viewpoints than primary school teachers.…”

Creativity Fostering Teaching: Impact of Creative Self-efficacy and Teacher Efficacy

“…In practice, though, teachers' creativity is under the pressure of national testing (Aktas, 2016;Aljughaiman & Mowrer-Reynolds, 2005;Amabile, 1996;Craft, 2001;Gordon, 1999;Hayes, 2004) and supporting creativity may be perceived as a paradox or luxury in such a performance driven system (Grainger, Barnes, & Scoff ham, 2004;Hartley, 2003;Prentice, 2000). Dobbins (2009) found that teachers' creativity is restricted by curriculum and learning objectives.…”