Exploring the best tools to boost Creativity and Critical Thinking

In our pursue of preparing students for real world careers and challenges and equipping them with 21st-century skills, we often forget that as educators, we have a duty to dream and create spaces where everyone has the opportunity to be creative and bring out the best in themselves.

The new edition of the course “Creativity for the future: promoting Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving in the classroom” took place in Bologna from 14/07/2024 to 20/07/2024. The participants came from all across Europe, with António Fernando from Agrupamento de Escolas de Vilela in Portugal, Dina Isabel from Agrupamento de escolas de Arganil in Portugal also, Marketa and Frantisek both form VOS a SPSE Frantiska Krizika in Czech Republic, Maria from I.E.S. SIERRA DE GUADARRAMA in Spain, Anna from Zespół Szkół Ekonomicznych in Poland, Karen and Sue both from St Benedict College, Office of the Head College Network in Malta and Efthymia, Foteini and Evangelos all of them from General Lyceum of Litochoro in Greece.

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Talking about key competences for living in the 21st century, participants touched on the topic of learning and innovation skills, digital skills and also career and life skills, focusing their attention on the 4Cs: critical thinking, creativity, communication and collaboration. Most importantly, we learned through hands-on practice how differently our brain and thinking skills function when there’s a problem to solve.
 
Participants were presented with a series of challenges to help them reflect how common barriers to out of the box thinking can be easily overcome by applying specific strategies. For example, using the 6 Thinking Hats method, participants were able to put into practice “lateral thinking” and devise its concrete application to some existing content they are teaching. Through individual practice and peer review it became noticeable that this method can be used in any subject, from science to language learning, but also as a formative assessment tool, to encourage students thinking outside the box.

Moving to visual strategies, participants experienced new activities which could be used to stimulate students' creative expression and could be a basis for brainstorming or discussing their ideas. We challenged an “only-art” perception of what “visual thinking” encompasses, by proposing an innovative and digital perspective.
 
A reflection on the importance of training students’ critical thinking skills was needed in a world where most of the time they are passively exposed to loads of (dis)information. Participants engaged in reasoning, questioning and debating activities that could be adapted to different classroom situations to help students become active and aware agents of their own learning.

But to introduce a good dose of creativity and critical thinking in the classroom, not only we shall struggle to find new solutions, as innovation often comes from reframing traditional tools. Our participants enjoyed playing various games and had an opportunity to adapt them to their own subjects while building a stronger learning perspective on them.
Finishing the course, everyone had a chance to create a personalized display of their training and cultural journey in Bologna and, from a tour visiting some historic places of the city to solving problems as a team and where everyone had a handicap, we said goodbye to a week full of laughter, creativity and new experiences!

Discover more about this course here.