Creativity , Giftedness and Education Maud Besançon

In this article, conceptions of creativity in giftedness and their implications for education are reviewed. First, the definition of giftedness is examined taking into consideration the difference between intellectual giftedness and creative giftedness and the difference between potential and talent. Second, the nature of creativity based on the multivariate approach is explored. Third, various measures of creativity are presented. Finally, the effect of different pedagogical methods and the influence of teachers on the development of creativity are examined. Creativity, giftedness and education 3 The education of gifted children represents an important engagement of a society for its future development. Numerous conceptions of giftedness have been proposed. Most have focused on academic achievement and a superior level of intellectual ability, measured by IQ tests (Feldman, 1982; Lubart, 2006). However, there have been recent calls for an expanded view of giftedness, taking into account multiple facets of cognitive functioning, including creativity (Gagné, 2004; Gardner, 1983; Lubart, 2006; Sternberg, 1985). Professionals who work with gifted students recognize that creativity is a salient issue and creative thinking is often a major part of gifted educational programs. Four issues are examined in this article. First, the differences between intellectual and creative giftedness are addressed. Second, a multivariate approach to creativity is presented. Third, different measures of creativity are examined. Fourth, implications for education are exposed, with attention to the influence of teachers and pedagogical methods. CREATIVITY, POTENTIAL, TALENT Is creativity a part of intelligence and giftedness? For some, intelligence is viewed as a general capacity (Binet & Simon, 1905; Huteau & Lautrey, 1999), others see it as a set of distinct capacities (Gardner, 1983), and finally some propose a system of capacities organized in a hierarchical way (Horn & Cattel, 1966; Gustaffson, 1984). In each perspective the question of creativity has been raised. For Binet and Simon (1905), imagination is a basic mental function. In their tests, they included a few open-ended items such as generating rhyming words or completing sentences to measure this aspect of intelligence. In the theory of multiple intelligence, Gardner (1983) distinguishes various intellectual abilities organized according to the type of cognitive stimuli. Each Creativity, giftedness and education 4 intelligence involves a particular cognitive content: linguistic, logical-mathematical, musical, spatial, kinesthetic, naturalist, intrapersonal and interpersonal. For Gardner, people may be creative in each of these intellectual domains and the nature of the creative intelligence depends on the domain of activity. Finally, Horn and Cattel (1966) make a distinction between fluid intelligence and crystallized intelligence. Fluid intelligence is the capacity for context-independent reasoning whereas crystallized intelligence is the use of acculturated, context-dependent learning. Creative intelligence involves both aspects of intelligence. Indeed, the search for new ideas relies on analogical thinking, evaluation and deductive reasoning; for crystallized abilities, domain-specific knowledge must be applied to select which information is relevant to understand and solve the problem. Thus most conceptions of intelligence suggest that creativity must be taken into account. However, intelligence tests almost never measure creativity. The first studies concerning gifted children focused on intellectual capacities. Indeed, one of the first measurements used to identify gifted children was the Intelligence Quotient (IQ) equal or higher than 130 (Gowan, 1971). The use of IQ to identify gifted children has limits. The results with such tests (1) provide a measure of the success of the pupil at a given moment, (2) do not study talents which one could observe apart from academic success (Mulhern, 2003). Many authors consider that creativity is a basic capacity for any form of high potential. In particular, Renzulli (1979; 1986) postulates that high potential in any field of activity stems from three components: (1) above-average general intellectual capacities, as measured by traditional tests of intelligence; (2) engagement in the task, which includes factors such as enthusiasm, interest, perseverance, eagerness, openness to criticism; and (3) creativity which includes fluency, flexibility and originality of thought, openness to new experiences, curiosity, risk taking and aesthetic sensibility. Creativity, giftedness and education 5 Gagné (1983) has questioned this model. One of the issues is whether creativity is a systematic component of high potential for all fields or sub-fields of endeavor. For example, in the field of dance, a choreographer must be creative in order to propose new sequences, a new choreography, whereas the dancer, interprets this choreography; so the dancer is not necessarily creative, rather expressing best what is required by the choreographer. In sports, there is the example of Fosberry who invented a new way of executing the high jump; a creative accomplishment. However, most gifted and talented athletes who compete in the high jump for field and track seek to execute it as well as possible without any concern for creativity. According to Maker (1993), intelligence and creativity are capacities that play different roles in the phenomena of high potential depending on the nature of the problem with which the individual is confronted. Different types of problems emphasize either intelligence or creativity. The problems that involve creativity tend to have a vague formulation, require a solution to be invented, and often do not have a single “right” answer. This position is consistent with the view that the distinction between intelligence and creativity is an artificial one; perhaps, there is a continuum from intellectual to creative giftedness which is more or less pronounced depending on the domain and the nature of the task in the domain (Runco & Albert, 1986). We will now examine the differences between potential and the realization of this potential. Differences between potential and talent It is one thing to have potential and another to express it, to put it to use effectively. For example, certain studies of children with a high IQ (Peters, Grager-Loidl & Supplee, 2000; Reis & McCoach, 2002) found that some do not show the expected academic performance. Rather, these children underachieve, showing low or failing grades, and clearly do not express their potential. According to Gagné (1983), the gift corresponds to a Creativity, giftedness and education 6 competence that is definitely higher than average in one or more fields of skills. Talent is defined as a performance definitely higher than average in one or more fields of human activity. These definitions highlight that a person with talent is necessarily a gifted one. On the contrary, any child with high potential does not necessarily express this "gift". For Gagné (1983), motivation makes it possible to transform the gift into talent. The phenomenon of "underachievement", the gap between giftedness and talent, is not limited to academic performance. Olszewski-Kubilius (2000) highlights the gap between children’s giftedness and their creative productiveness; different kinds of factors explain this discontinuity environmental conditions in childhood and stable individual characteristics such as motivation and personality. However, Kim (2008) has questioned the possible link between underachievement and creativity as certain characteristics of children showing underachievement are similar to those of highly creative children. In the next section, the nature of creativity and the factors which can influence it are described. THE NATURE OF CREATIVITY Definition of creativity Creativity can be defined as the capacity to produce something new and adaptive within the constraints of a given situation (Lubart, Mouchiroud, Tordjman & Zenasni, 2003). Thus a creative production must be original, at least to some extent. Is this creative capacity general or specific to each field? Although the debate is not settled, (see Lubart & Guignard, 2004), many authors support a rather domain-specific modular conception (Gardner, 1983; Feist, 2004). For example, a child may have a high creative capacity in the scientific field (mathematics, sciences) but may have difficulty inventing a story. Another child may be creative in verbal tasks (such as inventing a story) but have difficulties making an original Creativity, giftedness and education 7 drawing. Thus, creative abilities can differ depending on the field. These differences in creative performances can be understood within the multivariate approach. Multivariate approach According to Sternberg and Lubart (1995), different factors contribute to creative potential. The differences observed between individuals result from a combination of cognitive, conative and environmental factors (Lubart, Mouchiroud, Tordjman & Zenasni, 2003). Cognitive resources and development Cognitive factors refer to knowledge and information-processing abilities that facilitate inventive thinking. Creative performance is partly domain specific because individuals do not have the same level of knowledge in every field. In addition to knowledge, different intellectual abilities are required in the creative process, such as flexibility, divergent and convergent thinking (see Sternberg & Lubart, 1995). Flexibility refers to the ability to find varied solutions to a problem, to change ones’ approach to solve it and to understand it from different angles (Georgsdottir & Lubart, 2003). Divergent thinking is the ability to generate many different ideas from a given stimulus or starting point. According to Guilford (1950; Lubart & al., 2003), divergent thinking is an essential ability for c