Strategies for Developing Creativity and Critical Thinking

Christina Bailey

Welcome!

Congratulations on your new job. Being a teacher is very rewarding and you will shape the lives of many students.

Before beginning your job take into consideration on how you will approach your students with your lessons. How will shape your lessons to prepare students for the future? Here are a few helpful suggestions on how to make sure you lead your students on a successful path and to a bright future.

Developing Creativity

Using creativity daily in your classroom will be key to getting students involved and learning. Keep in mind that if you don’t think the lesson is interesting, neither will your students. Make it a lesson that you would want to participate in if you were that age again.

Strategies for Creativity1. Incorporate individual work, small group work,

and whole group work – Students will prefer one of these more than the other two

but keep in mind that you have to address the entire group, not just one student

– You pick the groups, not the students (you want to maintain control over the class)

– Around 4 to 5 students to a group depending on overall class size

– Remember to place struggling or lower students with more advanced and higher skilled students to help facilitate the struggling students

Strategies for Creativity2. Change it up – Don’t have students read

from the textbook the entire lesson without stopping

– Textbooks are dry and boring but as teachers, we must use the information in them

– If you have students reading from their textbooks the entire lesson and nothing else, students are going to tune out everything they just heard or read (depending on if the lesson is being read aloud)

– Have students stop at random times that you decide, and talk about what was just read

– Try having a class discussion on relating what was just read to real life

– Jot down important things as a class that are important for a future test on the material

Strategies for Creativity

3. Create Games– Anything can be made into a game– Think of board games but use your material instead– Two examples:• Gather the material that was just learned and you can turn

it into a game similar to the television show Jeopardy where the material that was learned are the questions

• Have students each write down a few questions and answers and put them in a hat, have students partner up and toss a ball around the room to each group. When a pair gets the ball, they draw from the hat and answer the question together, if they can’t answer it, the ball gets tossed to another group

*Games can also be used as a critical thinking strategy too!

Strategies for Creativity

4. Create Posters– Students can work alone, in pairs, or

small groups (depending on what you decide)

– Long pieces of paper can be used or even a bigger piece of construction paper

– Students write down key facts learned and add illustrations

– When everyone is finished, have students present them to the class

– Afterwards, hang the posters around the room for students to review and look at

Strategies for Creativity5. Reports– Depending on what is being learned in class, develop a

topic that students can do a report on– The report can incorporate research, the textbook, or

prior knowledge (maybe you want to use all three)– Have students work on a different part each day in class

and what isn’t finished is homework (you could also have students do a part in class and then another part at home for homework)

– By allowing students to work on reports in class will help them stay on task and keep them interested

– Students will enjoy taking a break from their normal routine assignment

Developing Critical Thinking

Incorporating critical thinking into your classroom will be another key component to preparing students for the future. It is important that students know how to formulate an answer with evidence as to why they came up with that answer.

Developing Critical Thinking

1. Start by giving students low level questions– Begin with a quiz that gets them thinking about

the material – Low level questions build up confidence

Developing Critical Thinking

– The low level questions helped build up confidence and now students are ready to move onto a question that requires them to think

– This means the answer will not be A, B, C, or D

– Students will struggle with justifying an open ended question

– Give positive comments, a little bit of direction, and encourage thinking to help students

2. Move on to a higher level question that requires students to do some deep thinking

Developing Critical Thinking

3. Small group discussion– Students have had time to come up with an answer

on their own, and now it’s time to collaborate with others on their answers

– Students will share what they have come up with it and decide together what is the best answer to share with the rest of the class

– Each person will have to share a part with the class– You will have students in each group that take on

different roles• This simulates real life groups that students will use in the

future• People take on specific roles then come together and

compile their things into one finished product

Developing Critical Thinking

4. Small group presentations– Students in each group share with the rest of the

class what answer they came up with and why– Each student in the group needs to share a piece

of information to prevent one student from taking on the entire presentation

– Shows the teacher and the rest of the class a possible answer

Developing Critical Thinking

5. Whole group discussion– As a whole group, students can share what went

well and what didn’t in this question and answer for themselves or their group

– Students can share which answer they feel was the best

– Time for feedback and see which groups addressed the questions with good critical thinking

Good Luck!

• These are a just a few helpful strategies for developing creativity and critical thinking

• As you teach, you will come across new methods that work and some that do not

• Remember to always be positive and keep in mind when composing a lesson: what do I want the students to learn from this lesson and how will I incorporate strategies that will prompt them for the future