What is creativity? Perceptions of primary school students in Malta

Abstract

In recent years increasing emphasis was placed on the development of the 21st Century Skills. Effective use of these skills is thought to support individuals through the abilities to adapt and anticipate difficulties while being in a position to find solutions to current problems. Moreover, the ability to think creatively is sought actively by employers to address the challenging workplace settings. We felt it is important to understand what the future knowledge workers of the 21st century understand by the term creativity and what it means for them. Limited research has been conducted on implicit theories leading to how young students themselves interpret the term ‘creativity’ and how they manifest it in their daily lives. This research gap inspired the current study. Underpinned by the 5As of creativity (Glaveanu, 2012), data was collected in the form of open-ended questions submitted by 101 students. Informed by the Short Scale for Creative Self (Karwowski, 2013) quantitative data was also collected from 561 students who answered questions related to perceived creative personal identity. Both samples included students aged 9-11 years attending primary schools in Malta (EU). Findings from the open-ended questions indicate that children had a vague notion of what creativity may be and attributed positive values to it. Notions of originality and novelty emerged among the key findings. Correlations carried out on the quantitative data indicate very high creative personal identity scores although in all models, Year 6 students feel less creative than students in Year 5.