Science is a complex process, and we must not teach our students overly simplified versions of "the" scientific method. We propose that students can uncover the complex realities of scientific thinking by exploring the similarities and differences between solving the familiar crossword puzzles and scientific "puzzles."…

Creative thinking skills are essential for today's workplace. Three faculty members from different professional schools (business, higher education administration, teacher education) examined student responses to the creative assignments in their courses. The assignments exemplify the following criteria: invited taking risks, encouraged innovative…

This study aims to understand students' constructs regarding mathematical problems. Fifty-one Taiwanese primary students' constructs are elicited using interviews with the repertory grid technique based on their responses to creative and non-creative problems. The results of qualitative data analysis show that students' initial constructs can be…

Introduction: Academic performance is usually generally explained by student's intelligence, although other factors such as personality and motivation also account for it. Factors associated with a more complex thought process in adolescence are also beginning to gain importance in the prediction of academic performance. Among these forms of…

Gifted students with visual impairments are twice exceptional learners and may not evidence their advanced science aptitudes without appropriate accommodations for learning science. However, effective tactile science teaching materials may be easily made. Recent research has shown that when tactile materials are used with "all" students…

The literature on the connection between psychopathology and creativity is vast and recent research has focused on the relationship between the schizophrenic spectrum and creativity. The schizophrenic spectrum includes genetically related disorders that share certain symptom features. It has been suggested that schizotypal personality disorder, a…

Divergent thinking (DT) tests are very often used in creativity studies. Certainly DT does not guarantee actual creative achievement, but tests of DT are reliable and reasonably valid predictors of certain performance criteria. The validity of DT is described as reasonable because validity is not an all-or-nothing attribute, but is, instead, a…

There is a general assumption that a more controlled or more focused attentional state is beneficial for most cognitive tasks. However, there has been a growing realization that creative problem solving tasks, such as the Remote Associates Task (RAT), may benefit from a less controlled solution approach. To test this hypothesis, in a 2x2 design,…

The ability to address complex technological, ecological, social, and ethical challenges in the 21st century depends on developing a citizenry capable of innovation and higher-order thinking. Early childhood educators have the opportunity to help children acquire these abilities right from the start. Central to this endeavor is a more reciprocal…

This paper starts from the premise that drawing can be a means of visualising thinking, with an emphasis on the process involved. A gap often seems to exist in the minds of students of visual/material creative fields in ideas-generative contexts, between thought and action. The thesis is that the gap between thinking and doing can be reduced to…

The best corporations know that innovative thinking is the only competitive advantage that cannot be outsourced. The best schools are those that create cultures of imagination. Now in paperback, "Imagination First" introduces a wide-variety of individuals who make a habit of imaginative thinking and creative action, offering a set of universal…

Creativity matters. A shared vocabulary and lens for creativity helps teachers and students know what it means to "be creative" and where to start. J. P. Guilford's FFOE model of divergent thinking from the 1950s offers four dimensions to describe creativity: (1) Fluency; (2) Flexibility; (3) Originality; and (4) Elaboration. FFOE makes time spent…

The present research examined the reliability of three types of divergent thinking tasks (unusual uses, instances, consequences/implications) and two types of subjective scoring (an average across all responses vs. the responses people chose as their top-two responses) within a latent variable framework, using the maximal-reliability "H"…

Fixation on established paradigms and practices can severely limit the capability of organizations to change, thereby jeopardizing the ability of organizations to keep up with changes in their environment and new technological developments. Overcoming organizational fixation is therefore a requirement for any organization that strives to achieve…

Cognitive learning styles are relatively fixed procedures using which individuals receive, process and organize information. This paper aims to examine academic achievement in English for both field dependence and field independence learning styles using educational multimedia. The sample of the study consisted of 40 second-grade female students…