What is Creative Learning?

Unfortunately there is no simple answer to this question.  There are a myriad of possibilities which adds to the confusion of what creative learning might be, but is also at the heart of what creative learning is.  The link of creativity to the arts further confuses this term in regards to wider learning and it is often discussed that creativity is maybe not the right term, and sometimes 'project based learning' or 'transformative' learning is more widely understood.  Creative Learning is skills and project based, often based on authentic questions or problems.  Much creative learning focuses on developing skills very much needed in the 21st century - for example, collaboration, creativity, curiosity, critical thinking, compassion. The creative thinking process is central to creative learning, which is described further on. 

What does Creative Learning look like?

Professor Bill Lucas from the Centre of Real World Learning describes what creative learning might look like.  This also applies to project based learning:

• Creative processes are visible and valued

• Creative learning is almost always framed by engaging questions which have no one right answer.

• There is space for activities that are curious, authentic, extended in length, sometimes beyond school, collaborative and reflective. 

• There is opportunity for play and experimentation.

• There is an opportunity for generative thought where ideas are welcomed openly.

• There is the opportunity for critical reflection in a supportive environment.

• There is a respect for difference and the creativity of others.

• Students are actively engaged as co-designers of the learning.

• A range of assessment practices within teaching are incorporated.

• Space is left for the unexpected.

To add to this, a key about creative learning / project based learning, is that learning is relevant and authentic, linked to life in the 21st century.  

Extract from: 

Your Image of the Child: Where Teaching Begins

by Loris Malaguzzi

All of this is a great forest. Inside the forest is the child. The forest is beautiful, fascinating, green, and full of hopes; there are no paths. Although it isn’t easy, we have to make our own paths, as teachers and children and families, in the forest.

We need to think of the school as a living organism. Children have to feel that the world is inside the school and moves and thinks and works and reflects on everything that goes on. Of course not all children are the same — each child brings a part of something that’s different into the school.