Torrance Journal for Applied Creativity

Within these characteristics
are several areas with potential pitfalls.
Creativity may also be hidden in those
that appear not very creative (Crammond,
2005). Since the characteristics
exist on a continuum, they may appear at
different times in one’s life and development
impacts their display. In adulthood
it is “easier” to focus high energy on the
creative outlet or project that is often
necessary to achieve within the domain.
“Torrance (1982) found in his longitudinal
study of creative individuals that
having a mentor was critical to children’s
ability to retain their creativity” (Crammond,
2005, p. 10).
When evaluating these multiple
characteristics along the continuum,
the question becomes, can creativity be
taught? There are two ways to think
about teaching creativity. The first
involves teaching the generic skills of creative
thinking and the second is to identify
the personal aptitude and passion of
the students and foster the connection
within that domain. Teachers should
focus on the process aspect instead of the
product. The process of creativity and
the skills identified within the process are
critical for the students to become productive
in the 21st century. These skills
include the “f ” word – failure. Failure
should be “viewed as an opportunity to
learn; understanding that creativity and
innovation is a long-term, cyclical process
of small successes and frequent mistakes”
(www.21stcenturyskills.org).
Teachers need to focus on
the development of creativity in their
students. Treffinger, Young, Selbey, and
Shepardson (2002) state, “Many of these
characteristics can be taught and nurtured.
As a result, it is difficult to predict
which students may become creatively
productive adults” (p. viii). When focusing
on the classroom and activities with
this lens, the development and inclusion
of creative thinking skills becomes more
practical and not as encompassing. It
is vital to recognize the importance of
these skills and then select the appropriate
activities, demonstrations, materials,
curriculum and instructional delivery
methods to foster their development.
Torrance developed a model for
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studying and predicating creative behavior.
His model focuses on the elements
of creative abilities, creative skills and
creative motivations (Torrance, 1979).
“The nature of creativity and societal attitudes
concerning it are such that there
may be at times little or no relationship
between creative abilities and the motivations
and skills necessary to activate
these abilities and result in “satori” and
creative accomplishment” (p. 13). It is
the overlap of all three of these elements
that lead to creative behavior. In order
to encourage teachers to teach and foster
creative behavior, it is important for
them to understand and foster their own
creative behavior.
Tools of Creative Thinking
Torrance (1979) introduced
four skills of creativity that enable
creative behavior. These skills can
be learned and practiced by everyone
regardless of age. The four skills are Fluency,
Flexibility, Originality and Elaboration.
As individuals develop creatively
these skills foster the development of
ideas.
• Fluency- is the generation of many ideas
during the creative process
• Flexibility – generation of different types
of ideas and categories
• Originality – the uniqueness of the idea
• Elaboration – the addition of detail
These four foundational skills are critical
to understand and foster the development
of creativity. Strategies and creative
thinking tools stimulate individual
growth across these areas. Tools and
strategies tie back into these four overarching
skills.
Ellie Casey
Root-Bernstein and Root-Bernstein
(1999) identified “13 thinking
tools” at the heart of creative understanding.
These thinking tools consist of the
following:
1. Observing (Paying attention to what is
seen, heard, touched, smelled, tasted or
felt within the body) (p. 25)
2. Imagining (Ability to recall or imagine
these feelings and sensations) (p. 25)
3. Abstracting (Sense experience and
sense imagery are rich and complex -
process of paring down complicated
things to simple principles) (p. 25)
4. Recognizing patterns (Discovery of
nature’s laws and the structure of math)
(p. 25)
5. Pattern forming (Always begins with
combining simple elements in unexpected
ways) (p. 25)
6. Analogizing (Recognizing patterns in
patterns) (p. 25)
7. Body thinking (Thinking that occurs
through the sensations and awareness
of muscle, sinew and skin) (p. 25)
8. Empathizing (Related to body thinking—“losing”
themselves in things they
study) (pp. 25-26)
9. Dimensional thinking (Imaginative
ability to take a thing mentally from
a flat plane into three dimensions or
more, from earth into outer space,
through time, even to alternate worlds)
(p. 26)
10. Modeling (Objects and concepts often
require some combination of dimensional
thinking, abstracting, analogizing
and manipulative or body skill) (p. 26)
11. Playing (Particularly builds upon
body thinking, empathizing, and play
acting and modeling – childlike joy)
(p. 26)
12. Transforming (The process of translating
between one tool for thinking and
another, and between imaginative tools
and formal languages of communication)
(p. 26)
13. Synthesizing (Understanding is
always synthetic, combining many
kinds of experiences – an integration of
knowledge in which observing, imagining,
empathizing, and the other tools all
work together organically not serially)
(p. 27)