Characterizes the telling and learning of political jokes as a powerful socializing tool for children to learn about the world. Maintains that this activity serves as a means of storing and transmitting social knowledge as well as information about the world of public affairs. Includes some representative examples. (MJP)

Nonlinear imagination-based thinking draws on intuition to allow insight into the unseen realms that govern everyday life. Largely abandoned by Western education in favor of materialist rationalism, this faculty is being promoted by a sustainability center in Montpelier (Vermont) that demonstrates methods of harmonizing thinking, learning, and…

Describes the development and growth of a program at a new York City public elementary school called Growing a Story: A Theatrical Exploration of Imagination for Literacy Enrichment. This arts educational program fosters students' pride of ownership, self-esteem, and interdependence through improvised creation and performance of original…

This article argues that any progress we have made in understanding creativity is being threatened by the increased emphasis on objective criteria of all aspects of learning. Indicators of creative potential are discussed, including originality and flexibility. Because creativity is often intrinsically motivated, the need for appropriate…

This two-part study examined aspects of family environments that are considered to be influential in the development of young children's creativity. Mothers of children ages 4 to 6 years were surveyed on their valuing of particular personality characteristics (The Ideal Child Checklist) and specific features of the home environment (The Creative…

This theme issue explores the development of memory and creativity in very young children. The first article, "The Guy Who Went Up the Steep Nicken: The Emergence of Story Telling during the First Three Years" (Susan Engel), describes the developmental stages of children's story telling. The reasons children tell stories and strategies for…

Does a drawing embody the form and focus of what the artist actually sees, or instead, is it only after seeing the finished drawing that the artist knows the true meaning of his or her visual experience? It is the knowledge of the visual experience that drives the representation of it. Knowledge of the visual experience is present in varying…

The paper examines the early development of a highly talented child artist in light of three theories of graphic development in children: (1) drawing development is a search for increasingly satisfying solutions to graphic problems that proceeds along a stage-like path; (2) gifted children aspiring to be artists carefully imitate their culture's…

This article discusses the nature of creativity and the theory surrounding psychological investigation of creativity. Evidence is presented that people have individual styles of thinking (e.g., convergent and divergent) that are common to particular types of education. Methods and conditions that foster creativity are described. (Author)

Adding to the benefits of using metaphors as tools, "analoguing" (a method of analysis that focuses on metaphors for meanings in use and meanings of metaphors in use) helps avoid excessive categorization and separation by looking for unities and patterns in phenomena rather than for divisions. Six months of observation of patterns of…

Literary gaps were identified by Wolfgang Iser in 1974 as "vacant pages" that invite the reader to reflect and enter into the text thereby motivating students to experience the text as reality. Arthur Applebee, in 1979, identified three categories to distinguish children's types of interaction with stories: (1) the complexity of literary…

This Pennsylvania state curriculum guide provides a rationale and plan for the inclusion and role of arts education in a K-12 curriculum. Part 1, "Actions of the Arts Process," describes concepts related to the terms art, artists, and the arts process and suggests that students need to experience perceiving, responding, understanding, creating,…

The internationally accepted definition of gifted children includes a range of factors that contribute to giftedness, but makes no mention of the child's motivation, capacity for self-initiation, or ability to work independently. Using the current definition, schools and teachers remain bound to gifted identification based on academic achievement…

A study tested the general proposition that, although professors of education courses possess knowledge concerning the concepts of creativity, little of that knowledge is passed on to undergraduate students. Ten colleges and universities in Washington and Idaho with teacher education programs were selected for the study. A total of 62 teacher…

How to deal with the absence of creativity and critical thinking in the educational setting is discussed. All efforts to improve education will be futile if we don't take into account the absence of relationship among the participants and between the participants and the content of education. Relationship--i.e., connecting with others and with…