Studies show that as American children grow from toddlers to adolescents, creativity decreases.
It's a phenomenon that can be reversed, or at least slowed, Sawyer says in her new book Creativity in Early Childhood Classrooms, co-authored with James D. Moran III, a former Virginia Tech faculty member, and Deborah W. Tegano, a former student, both now at the University of Tennessee. We don't let them find the problems and, as a consequence, as adults they don't know how to identify the issues and problems facing our society. For example, Sawyers says, when children first start expressing themselves through art, parents and teachers should let them do whatever they want, rather than moving them into formal training or trying to show them the way something should be drawn. That lesson can be expanded into any area of the curriculum. Sawyers and her co-authors attempt in the book to give preschool and early elementary teachers techniques to identify creativity in children, and then methods to enhance those skills while following established curricula.