Assessing Creativity

Michael G. Ford, M.Ed, Ph.D.

Co-Department Head, Science Department

Co-Director Global Scholars Program

As a reader of our blog, you are in a position that was shared by our AOA faculty during the start of the Creative Thinking Initiative. You probably value creativity in yourself, your children and your coworkers. You no longer require convincing that creative output is a cornerstone of the modern workplace and a key to the future success of our children. Even if you are already convinced of the value of fostering creative thought, you may have some uncertainty as to how an educational institution could undertake an evaluation of creativity in its students. The prospect of placing a numerical grade on creative student work may be both confusing and a little intimidating. I hope to convince you that the production of creative output arises from a learned set of behaviors and that with systematic and rigorous application of specific principles, it can be evaluated, ranked and scored. In this work, I will attempt to show what we have learned about the process of teaching our students creative thinking, and several ways in which we foster the development of these skills in the classroom.

Before listing a set of characteristics that we seek to encourage, I believe it is useful to consider what must be absent in an environment that seeks to foster creative thinking. A number of stereotypes and preconceptions surround the language used to describe the production of creative work. Additionally, while superficial evaluation of creativity as a line item at the bottom of a rubric has been present for years, it is only by pushing creativity to the forefront that full development of creative thinking can be made possible.

Creativity is Not Character

It is common in many settings to refer to ‘creative people’ as if all of their original, interesting and impactful work is the product of innate inability, instead of the result of long years of training and honing of a specific skill set. If we are to evaluate creativity, we must possess the mindset that creative thought is not solely the product of an inborn proficiency for producing interesting, useful and novel work. This shift does not require us to ignore personality traits and habits of mind that give some advantages in producing creative output, any more than we would be required to ignore writing ability, math proficiency or scientific aptitude. Instead, we strive to set up a process which improves upon areas of weakness and utilizes an individual’s characteristics to their best advantage.

Not a Niche Market

While it is natural to think of creative output being tied tightly to specific subjects such as language arts, visual and performing arts, effective education utilizing the ‘creativity toolbox’ cuts across all disciplines. In math and science, the trend toward Project-Based Learning (PBL) strategies, is really just a specific implementation of a strategy designed to make use of student’s natural curiosity by removing rigid framework, and allowing hands-on exploration of scientific and mathematical principles. As a science teacher, I have found great joy in giving my students the time and space to develop their own questions and to find surprising solutions to open-ended challenges. Placing an institutional emphasis on creativity across grade level and subject has also allowed AOA to develop a common language for encouraging and evaluating creative work.    

Evaluating Creativity - Product and Process

Almost all scholarly work on teaching and evaluating creativity contains some attempt to define creativity, an effort to delineate what it means to ‘teach creativity’. Instead of spending time with this academic exercise, I would like to share a specific set of traits and behaviors that we seek to instill in our students. When the faculty of Andrews Osborne Academy seeks to evaluate creative output, we are evaluating both the product and process of creative thought.

The Product of Creative Work - Novel and Useful

Any valuable piece of creative work must fulfill two basic criteria; it must serve a purpose or perform a function while also containing original thought. The purpose of an assignment seeking to develop creative thinking skills may vary broadly in scope, but always there remains a specific idea that the work seeks to communicate. If the student loses sight of the specific goal, they may turn in novel work which is irrelevant or otherwise unable to meet the requirements set forth by the instructor. Similarly, work which is a simple reworking of existing ideas would likely provide a product that may be minimally functional, but will not convey any sense of the student’s own perspective on the subject at hand.

Consider an assignment in which a student was required to create a graphical personal ad for a character from The Great Gatsby. The requirements of this type of assignment might be to portray the best aspects of one major character in an engaging visual format that would make the viewer curious to know more about them as a person. A student with a design background might spend hours on the interplay of color, font and overall design while ignoring the exploration of the character traits depicted in the novel. Conversely, a bulleted list of all aspects of the character’s personal qualities may lose a reader’s interest before they can engage with the text itself. The search for the ‘sweet spot’ where a novel presentation is able to meet a specific curricular goal is the challenge faced in any classroom seeking to teach the set of skills involved in producing quality creative work.

If we look at companies, groups or individuals that embody the creative spirit, we find this same union of function and novelty. Apple remains a tremendously successful company because its products combine a pleasing form with functions that lead the electronics field. Instead of ‘thinking outside the box’, successful creative endeavors maneuver gracefully within a specific ‘box’ better than their peers. 

Creative Thinking as a Process

As educators we are taught to value the process that leads to an end product even as we grade the end result. Assignments promoting creative thinking are no exception. A brief listing of each aspect of this process is useful in understanding how we develop these skills in our students.

Divergent Thinking - The first part of many creative endeavors is idea generation. Whether called brainstorming, ideation, or divergent thinking we ask students to generate possible ways to fulfill the stated goals of the assignment. In some cases, such as a building project in physics class, we may pay little heed to the feasibility of a given design, and may simply set a goal of generating as many solutions as possible.

Taking the ‘Deep Dive’ - Digging deeply, investigating thoroughly, and researching the work of others can help to provide a first screen of a set of possible solutions, and give fuel for the creative fire. In literature, this may mean a close reading of a specific passage, or the tracking of a character through a novel. In history, it may mean getting closer to primary sources to aid in understanding of the personal effects of important events.

Risk-Taking - Thoughtful risk-taking is part of any creative endeavor, requiring a student to be willing to attempt an unproven technique or design. While risk taking includes the acceptance of failure as part of the growth process (as is so fashionable to discuss in educational circles) it also means being open with personal ideas that may leave many feeling vulnerable. The ability to listen to one’s unique inner voice means accepting the risk that your creative work may not be highly valued by peers and teachers.

Convergent Thinking - Iteration, testing, editing - we have many ways of selecting one solution from many. Ultimately we are guided by our need to fulfil the requirements put forth in the stated goals of the assignment itself. During a long-term assignment - The Big Battery Build, students in my chemistry classes narrowed down possible battery designs based on the directive to produce the highest possible voltage while avoiding toxic or dangerous materials.

While development of the creative skill set requires us to examine both the process and product, it may not be possible (or desirable) to evaluate all aspects of creative thinking in a single assignment. In our science classrooms we might seek to emphasize a ‘deep dive’ - researching current gene therapy techniques, followed by the selection of a single technique (convergent thinking) suited to treating a specific genetic disorder.

While I have not fully explored exactly how creativity is assessed for individual assignments, I have attempted to give you a sense of what traits we seek to impart to our students. I hope to take an opportunity in future blog posts to better illustrate the shared language of assessing creativity and contrast traditional assignments with versions modified to emphasize creative thought. While I may have only begun the process of uncovering what it means to assess a student’s creative work, I hope that you have come to understand the overall goals of evaluating creativity in the AOA classroom, and that it may be less mysterious to those in our community as a whole.