Creativity and democracy, new perspectives in teacher training

Abstract

The next challenge for students is to develop the 21 century skills (Miller & Dumford, 2014; Tepper & Kuh, 2011). Being flexible and creative in continuing changing world and professional environment (OECD, 2014). This research engages a meta-creativity approach to develop the articulation between creativity and collaborative skills. Based on the values of democracy (Didier, Lequin & Leuba, 2017), this action research is implemented in the field of teacher education. According to Dewey (1916) democracy is a value to express someone’s point of view by valuing and sustaining is own opinion during collective debates in the classroom. This fundamental value is defined by different skills such as flexibility, openness, valuing and acting. This exploratory research observes 2 groups of 15 teacher students during the lesson planning, focused on creative tasks (Bonnardel & Didier, 2016). The condition of the creative evocation process during this task (Beghetto & Kaufman, 2014) has been observed. The first results showing new possibilities to enhance creative ideas embedded in democratic values, focused on teaching for creativity (Craft, Jeffrey & Leibling, 2001; Gibson, 2010; Jeffrey & Craft, 2004) will be presented.