A PAPER EXPLAINING THE NATURE OF CREATIVITY
Key points covered in this
paper:
What is creativity?
What is needed to be
creative?
Why do we create?
What is the value of
creativity?
Is creativity teachable?
What is Creativity?
Creativity refers to the
process of converting new or imaginative ideas into reality. In other words, it
involves turning something new into being or generating new ideas by changing, reapplying,
or integrating existing ideas. While some of these ideas may be outstanding and
superb, others may just be simple and practical ideas that nobody may have
explored earlier. The main characteristics of creativity include; making
connections between phenomena that seem uncorrelated, seeing the world from
different perspectives or in new ways, generating solutions, and identifying
concealed patterns. In most cases, creativity brings to light what was hidden
previously or even directs us to new life. There are two processes involved in
creativity namely; thinking, and producing (Naiman). For creativity to take
place, one has to observe passion and commitment. The features of a creative
individual include among others the following;
·
Flexibility
·
Confidence
·
Critical thinking
·
Tenacity
·
Self-esteem
What is needed to be
creative
All humans (including
children) have a substantial creative ability. However, education seems to be
the major hindrance to creativity among adults. Nevertheless, it doesn’t depart
from them and can always be reawakened through curiosity, commitment, passion,
and knowledge. For individuals to be creative, they will need the following key
things (Christensen);
·
Ability to believe in themselves, everything they do and their
capabilities
·
Zeal to drive them to do the work
·
Experience numerous things to build up knowledge in life
·
Acceptance of any outcome including temporal pain, failing or
being in the wrong
·
Time to relax their body and mind so as to work calmly into set
outcomes
·
Exploring the environment (both mentally and physically) and get
real adventures
Why do we create?
Researchers strongly
believe that we are in the age of creativity known as the conceptual age. One
adds value to their product or service thus getting a competitive advantage
through creativity. Therefore, it can be safe to say that creativity is
paramount for future success. Creativity is becoming critical because it does
the following;
·
Improves quality of life
·
Unlocks one’s imaginations
·
Improves one’s skills
·
Raises one’s aspirations
·
Brings pleasure and benefits
What is the value of
creativity?
Every individual can put
their imagination to work; which is creativity. Creativity is a practical
process that adds value to our lives. Both creative individuals and those with
creative thoughts but don’t deem themselves as creative make a living out of
it. Creativity must be exercised in everyday life including in businesses and
schools. It gives confidence to individuals to exploit their potential, helps
generate more ideas, and most importantly solve problems. Creativity is
utilized everywhere especially in solving problems. Creativity also plays a
significant role in scientific, artistic, or literary platforms (Nieto).
Creativity can have
monetary value as well aside from obvious things such as best-selling authors
or artists. Many people make a living by doing creative work even without
reaching the status of notable people such as celebrities. Some of these
creative works include graphic designing and writing. Besides, most happy and
successful individuals in their ventures or jobs still use creativity to make a
living. These include excellent auto mechanics and CEOs who discern complex
figures. Such officials can be said to be creative on the job since they deploy
expressiveness and originality in their work (Trait).
Is creativity teachable?
Creativity skills can be
taught. In fact, some places teach creativity as an academic discipline.
According to researchers, the mind can be primed to cultivate creative ideas.
Learning creativity doesn’t involve just sitting in a lecture hall but applying
creative thinking processes. A study conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of
training creativity proved the fact. The study involved a quantitative
meta-analysis of evaluated training programs spanning a period of the last
fifty years. It also relied on seventy prior studies.
The findings indicated that
decent creativity training programs induced desirable performance across target
populations, settings, and criteria. Factors that significantly contributed to
the efficacy of the training programs included; heuristics and cognitive skills
development (used in skill application). George Land indicates in his study
that humans are creative by nature and grow up learning to be uncreative. The
act of creativity starts with finding knowledge, mastering a discipline, and
learning a way of thinking. One can grasp creativity through using imagination,
synthesizing information, questioning assumptions, explorations, and
experiments. All in all, creativity is a
skill that can be developed or built through various practices and is a
manageable process (Naiman).
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