The bigger picture : a step toward creativity in education

Abstract

Creativity is a fundamental activity of human information processing (Boden, 1998). It is generally agreed to include two defining characteristics: "The ability to produce work that is both novel (i.e., original, unexpected) and appropriate (i.e., useful, adaptive concerning task constraints)" (Sternberg & Lubart, 1999, p. 3). Much has been written about creativity from social, psychological, developmental, cognitive, and historical perspectives, and a number of theories have been proposed from those viewpoints (Amabile, 1983; Csikszentmihalyi, 1988; Eysenck, 1993; Gardner, 1993; Gruber, 1981; Guilford, 1950; Martindale, 1995; Mednick, 1962; Simonton, 1988; Sternberg & Lubart, 1995; Ward, Smith, & Finke, 1999; Wertheimer, 1982).