Creativity & Creative Pedagogies

Creativity in social care professional work and related educational practices is an important focus for the Irish Creativity and Innovation in Social Care (CISC) Network’s 2021 CPD initiative. But creativity and being creative mean different things in different contexts and situations and part of the knowledge forming process for this contribution seeks to understand the concepts of creativity that social care practitioners and educators hold.1

The proposition underlying this seminar is that creativity, like learning, is an ecological phenomenon2. By this I mean that creativity and being creative emerge as people interact in purposeful ways with their environments and the people, contexts and situations in them. This interactional and relational concept of creativity is neatly captured in Carl Rogers’ concept of a creative process and the creative outcome from such a process - 'the emergence in action of a novel relational product growing out of the uniqueness of the individual on the one hand, and the materials, events, people or circumstances of [their] life'3

The seminar will introduce the idea of ecologies for learning and practice4,5 and the ecosocial systems within which such ecologies are enacted and consider how creativity emerges from such ecologies as people interact with their environments and the people and things that matter to them. We will explore how these ideas might be used in social care work and educational practice to understand creativity and what being creative means.6

The presentation and other resources will be available at: http://www.normanjackson.co.uk/cisc.html

Sources 1 Jackson, N.J. (2021) Survey of Perceptions of Creativity in Social Care Work & Education. Social Care (CISC) Network Working Paper. Available at: http://www.normanjackson.co.uk/cisc.html 2 Barnett, R. and Jackson. N.J. (2020) Ecologies for Learning and Practice: Emerging Ideas, Sightings and Possibilities Routledge 3 Rogers, C.R., (1961) On becoming a person. Boston: Houghton Mifflin

4 Jackson N. J. (2016, 2019) Exploring Learning Ecologies Betchworth: Chalk Mountain Available at:

https://www.lifewideeducation.uk/exploring-learning-ecologies.html

5 Learning Ecologies website https://www.learningecologies.uk/ 6 Jackson N. J. (2021) Exploring Ecologies for Practice, Learning & Creativity in Social Care Education and Practice http://www.normanjackson.co.uk/cisc.html

Biography

Norman Jackson is Emeritus Professor of the University of Surrey, England, and Founder of ‘Lifewide Education’ and ‘Creative Academic’. He began his career as a geologist (university teacher/ researcher and mining & field practitioner). A mid-career change led him to roles in several national Higher Education agencies - Her Majesty's Inspectorate, Higher Education Quality Council, Quality Assurance Agency, University for Industry, Learning and Teaching Support Network, and the Higher Education Academy. In these organisations he performed many different roles: inspector, researcher, policy maker, facilitator, educational developer, broker and curator. Later he Directed the Surrey Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (SCEPTrE) at the University of Surrey.

His work as an educator has formed around the challenges of encouraging higher education to take more seriously the creative development of learners and enable them to prepare themselves for the complexities, uncertainties and disruptions of long learning lives. At the Higher Education Academy he led work on ‘creativity in higher education’. As Director of SCEPTrE at the University of Surrey, he developed and applied the idea of lifewide learning and education to give meaning and substance to the concept of lifelong learning. The ideas of ecologies for learning and practice emerged from this work and their educational value is now being championed through ‘Lifewide Education’ and ‘Creative Academic’, two social educational enterprises he founded. He is a writer and publisher (Creative Academic Magazine and Lifewide Magazine) and his books include:

• Engaging and Changing Higher Education through Brokerage Routledge (2003)

• Developing Creativity in Higher Education: an imaginative curriculum Routledge (2006)

• Learning for a Complex World: a lifewide concept of learning, education and personal development Authorhouse (2011) • Tackling the Wicked Challenge of Strategic Change: the story of how a University changed itself Authorhouse (2014) • Exploring Learning Ecologies Chalk Mountain : Lulu (2016 & 2019) • Ecologies for Learning and Practice: Emerging Ideas, Sightings and Possibilities Routledge (2020)

http://www.normanjackson.co.uk/

http://www.lifewideeducation.uk/

http://www.creativeacademic.uk/