Contexture is a three-part project that weaves together a central story – the future is creative. Centered in Barbados, this research focuses on the untapped potential of the creative economy. It recognizes the need to redesign education to better prepare the youth to engage creative thinking. It is an attempt to bridge the gap between the need for creativity in the economy and the lack of teaching adequate creative thinking methods in the school curriculum. Using a mixed methods approach, this work produces a model of How to Teach Creative Thinking in Classrooms and a final design prototype of a two-piece Teacher’s Toolkit which introduces a flexible and accessible way for teachers to explore implementing creative thinking methods in classrooms.
Role: Researcher & Designer
Category: human-centered program design, instructional design, critical theory
Methods: research design, survery, workshop facilitation, design thinking, data analysis
Publication: https://openresearch.ocadu.ca/id/eprint/3030/
Website: www.thisiscontexture.com
Category: human-centered program design, instructional design, critical theory
Methods: research design, survery, workshop facilitation, design thinking, data analysis
Publication: https://openresearch.ocadu.ca/id/eprint/3030/
Website: www.thisiscontexture.com
The Process:
Preliminary research showed that while creativity is basically everywhere in the region, it’s limited to arts and craft based education and teachers just don’t feel confident nurturing creative thinking. Simply put, they don’t know how to, so there was opportunity to provide a model to help teachers implement creative thinking into pedagogical practice.
Preliminary research showed that while creativity is basically everywhere in the region, it’s limited to arts and craft based education and teachers just don’t feel confident nurturing creative thinking. Simply put, they don’t know how to, so there was opportunity to provide a model to help teachers implement creative thinking into pedagogical practice.
Step 1: Partnered with a private school in Barbados to work with the local teachers as subject matter experts.
Step 2: Developed a workshop model based on a design thinking framework to help inform teachers how they could integrate more creative thinking into their classroom sessions.
Step 3: Facilitated the workshop with a cross-section of 8 experienced teachers. This was accompanied by a questionnaire (before and after) to measure the teachers’ understanding of creative thinking.
Step 4: Systematically organized and analyzed the data to find what was useful and what wasn’t.
Step 5: This data informed a model called “How to Teach Creative Thinking in Classrooms” which helped to inform the final design outcome.
The Design Outcome:
Part 1: A revised workshop model for future testing across other schools, Caribbean islands and beyond.
Part 2: A two-part creative thinking toolkit to accompany the workshop and/or classroom experimentation. This toolkit has a manual and activity cards that allow educators to practice design thinking in a personable and innovative way.
