Seven ate nine - creativity in language teaching

INTRODUCTION

Nowadays pedagogical thinking structures itself round the question How to create a human being? My paper tries to seek for the measure of man, be it pupil or teacher, which is creativity.

The human being of all times should, in my opinion, be defined as homo faber. This term implies the whole history of taming the universe that this being inhabits. The evolution of this creature named man would not have been possible without novelty, without experiments, forced to happen by some traits that are in the structure of man himself: fluidity, flexibility, power of association. But these traits are the basic grounds of creativity.

Creativity occurs whenever a person says, does or makes something that is new, either in the sense of ‘something from nothing’ or in the sense of giving a new character to something. Creativity occurs whether or not this process leads anywhere. It is present both in the thought and in the action. It is present when we dream of paradise, when we design our garden, when we read etc. We are being creative when we write something, whether it is published or not.

We are all creative in our own way, in how we perceive and present ourselves to the world, in how we make sense of the world.

Some kinds of creativity tend to be done in private, even solitary circumstances, while others require and flourish in a group, both situations being equally creative.

In the school environment we have many kinds of interaction, between people that are potentially creative: the students, the teacher.

But in order to develop creativity one should be aware of its puzzle-like structure. Creativity with pre-adolescents and adolescents is a problem of how much the teacher himself is creative and about how his or her creativity in building an activity, and furthermore the whole methodological process, is challenging for the students, meaning how well the two creativities correlate and enforce each other.

Our purpose is a plea for creative teaching and for the maximisation of the creative potential in schools. One of the reasons for doing this is the desire to encourage the subjects to be more inventive, more flexible, in all aspects of the extracurricular life. The creative approach should be a gain for both individuals and society.

Creative education is intended to promote and encourage learning and development through original or self-expressive activity on the part of those being taught.

Creative education is needed in this post-modern epoch in which every invention is vital for the adaptation to the forever-changing society.

The creative activity is one of the biggest challenges in life and it triggers great rewards. The joy of creation is unique. So, why should not we try to teach others how to benefit of and handle this gift from heavens. Our minds and our lives are too precious to waste them.

“A thing constructed can only be loved after it has been constructed.

But a thing created is loved before it exists.”

(Gilbert Leith Chesterton)

CHAPTER I

1.Defining Concepts

Creativity

Ever since the days of Aristotle and Plato people have admired and wondered about the ways in which poets, sculptors, scientists, dramatists, mathematicians and musicians seemed almost effortlessly to transcend the bounds of ordinary existence. In the Dark Ages, before the Renaissance, sanctity rather than genius was admired and sought after, but ever since then creativity has been lauded to the skies, and regarded with awe, admiration and astonished delight. So, what’s this creativity?

This section tries to extract the basic traits of the concept of creativity, which, in its turn, lies upon other terms.