Think ‘Creativity’: What Is It?

Collected and analysed by Hanna Kryszewska, Poland

Menu

Background
The replies
Conclusions

Background

I have asked third year BA students who are pre-service teachers at the University of Gdańsk, Poland, with a reasonable amount of hands-on experience of teaching, about creativity. They could choose which of the following question/ or questions they wanted to answer:

• What is creativity in language teaching?
• What was your ‘creative language teaching’ experience as a learner or a pre-service teacher?
• What sort of creative teacher would you like to be?
• How can IT help foster creativity?

NB the replies have been slightly edited.

The replies

1
My experience with creative teaching hasn't been really great. Most of my teachers in primary, middle and high school were very boring and limited in terms of creativity. One of the most creative ones was my mentor during my teacher practice, as teaching very young learners cannot rely on books and exercises only. She always tries to implement elements of culture and current and fashionable issues that will attract students' attention. If I ever become a professional teacher I would like to do just the same, with the added element of technology, interactive whiteboards and digibooks. Luckily, the development and evolution of technology is very vast and rapid and in a few years teaching a foreign language may look totally different and I firmly believe that a creative teacher has to be ready for that and embrace the change.

Jakub Kardaś

2
I believe that creativity in language teaching is only a general description of the much more complex processes of generating affordable, effective and applicable solutions to increase learners’ language competences. Naturally, ad hoc solutions introduced by teachers may, even quite a few times, give positive results. However, new ideas should be put under test under strict, objective criteria with comparison among various groups.

Mikołaj Zieliński

3
Creativity is a crucial issue when it comes to getting students interested in the subject, especially in foreign languages. What is most important is the ability to make the teaching contextualized and meaningful in terms of productive skills. Students are supposed to gain not only "dry" knowledge of the language, but have the courage and confidence to use it without obstacles restraining them.

One of the most creative teachers we have encountered as students was an Integrated Skills teacher. He put a great emphasis on our ability to speak, sometimes pushing us out of our comfort zones and stimulating our thinking and reacting. He did not limit his classes to teaching only grammar and vocabulary, but such aspects as variation in pitch, intonation patterns as well. To achieve that he used various, unconventional materials, i.e. short stories, jokes, word games. While the lessons were extremely involving and entertaining, we subconsciously progressed into higher level of proficiency, which gave us enormous satisfaction.

Anna Wądołowska and Gabriela Piekarska

4
In our reply, we would like to focus our attention on a teacher who used to teach us in the past. We chose him because of his creativity and engagement in the process of foreign language teaching. First and foremost, none of his actions were random, everything was well-prepared and organised. For instance, he didn’t use a textbook. The activities he used to prepare were based mostly on group or pair work and required a great deal of engagement and creativity from the students. One of the examples of his ideas is an activity based on "investigation". Each student received a piece of paper with a description of a certain character. Students had to memorise their identities and during the next class teacher presented the story about the man who was killed. The students had to mingle and find out who the killer is. The success of the activity was based on the entertaining aspect of the task and also on the fact that the lesson wasn't focused strictly on reading and doing exercises but on more kinaesthetic exercises that not only thought something but also made the teaching/learning process more dynamic.

Karolina Reszkowska and Aleksandra Ruszczyńska

5
Creativity in language teaching is an indispensable factor to keep students interested in the lesson. However, there still exists a great, overwhelming gap between what the school looks like and what is desired. Only very few teachers manage to maintain their spirit and adapt creativity-driven tasks into their day to day basic routine and adjust to the constantly changing needs of their students.

Teachers should not only concentrate on assessing students in terms of data and comprehended information, but also they should ensure that the methods they use are versatile and complement some games, as well as tasks that would break the rigid routine of the classroom. We can only hope and keep our fingers crossed that situation is bound to improve with time. The term of quality teacher should be reintroduced and redefined as the dynamics of the field they are working in does not stay in the standstill.

Paweł Kozubek and Patrycja Paterska

6
Creativity in language teaching… These days, it's extremely important to be a creative teacher so as to make contemporary students involve in lesson which might be a difficult task because they are acquainted with technology. However, they not necessarily associated with learning which may be a good way to start. Creative use of technology may lead to a change in students' attitudes towards language learning and consequently to their teacher. Interestingly, not only us teachers should be creative but a truly creative approach would be to allow your students to be creative in learning themselves.

Sławina Breza and Agnieszka Szymczyk

7
In our opinion creativity can be found in teaching when the teacher is able to present the same issues in different ways to make them more inspiring and interesting. Being creative allows teachers to deal with not only students that are fond of learning the language, but also to make bored students interested in the subject. This feature is essential nowadays, because course books present exercises similar to each other. Therefore, teachers should use the books creatively letting their imagination run and looking at the books in a critical way. For example, when there is a reading comprehension task, teachers can use digibooks or interactive boards to make all the students in the class involved in the task together; teacher can also add some tasks to the main one, pre-tasks or follow-tasks.

Marta Rozkwitalska and Justyna Richert

8
I do not have much experience connected with creative language teachers, as the majority of my language teachers based their classes only on the coursebooks and additional materials added to them. However, I met one teacher in my high school who was incredibly involved in teaching. I, definitely, can name him a creative teacher because he used a lot of additional materials prepared by himself. Also he used various sources of knowledge or materials during the lesson, such as films, internet websites or interactive programs. Moreover, he was flexible and he could adjust his materials and classes to various needs of his students and their abilities. I would like to be a similar teacher, who can use various materials during the lesson. I would also like to make my lessons attractive and motivating for students.

Klaudia Jakubowska

9
Creative foreign language teachers are those who children want to work with and who make students love learning languages. For instance, they make use of technology during their lessons, put emphasis on interaction, fun component and students' motivation to learn. The activities prepared by them include various games, singing songs, role plays, watching and making movies, creating stories and preparing projects. They are characterised by positive attitude towards learners and passion for teaching. Being a perfect creative teacher seems to be a tough task. Nevertheless, during our teaching practice we did meet a few teachers who deserve to be called 'creative'. Not only did they inspire and motivate their students, but us as well.

Paulina Deptuła

10
When we think about the creative teacher, he or she should have the ability to include various resources and techniques into the lesson he or she conducts. In our experience as learners of English we were not provided with many interesting exercises; the lessons were very schematic, coursebook-based, and rarely included IT. However, due to our IT course we acquired some knowledge about using IT in TEFL classroom and it made us think more about creativity. Making English lesson inspiring and interesting is surely not complicated. During our teaching practice we had access to a digital whiteboard, but the pressure on fulfilling the lesson plan according to the coursebook material is so hard that there is not much time left for being creative. As teachers, we plan to include various resources and programs to present and consolidate knowledge creatively for our future students.

Magdalena Adranowicz, Kamila Bartosiewicz

11
I've experienced being taught by a creative teacher only once, in my language course. The classes were based on using a blog with movie extracts and many additional exercises. It didn't really involve much effort from the teacher throughout the course, the most essential thing was to find some additional sources. I would like not only to be a creative teacher but also inspirational and teach my students to think creatively. I once believed that becoming this kind of teacher would require hard work and long hours of research and preparation. Now I believe that the key to success is motivation and enthusiasm. It is not about the resources you have but how resourceful you are.

Ewa Baranowska and Katarzyna Grondys

12
Creative teachers we have met. There were not many examples of such teachers, however, we had a chance to come across at least one such a teacher during our practices at school as well as when we were students ourselves. For us, a creative teacher is a person who is not afraid of thinking innovatively, who works against standards and tries to make interesting and non-routine lessons. Using interactive whiteboards is a form of creative teaching.

Creative teachers we would like to be. In the future, we would like to be considered creative teachers. We would like to make an effort to prepare every lesson in a way which would grasp students' attention, make them interesting in the English language as well as expanding their knowledge. We would like to give our students the ability to think creatively by themselves, therefore not restrict them with limited kinds of boring exercises.

Marta Hirsz and Paulina Kordowska

13
Most of the teachers who taught us or even all of them strictly followed the course book, so in fact I haven't experienced much of their creativity. Nevertheless, I would love to be a creative teacher, not only follow instructions from the book, but also any other visual aids, IT or exercises created by me that would be appropriate for students’ needs and expectations I think that creativity is very important when it comes to teaching younger as well as older students, so they are interested in the subject, get inspired by the teacher and they simply are encouraged to take an active part during lessons as they don't have to follow the course book which sometimes can be boring.

K. Brozis

14
Creativity is a crucial feature of teachers; not only language teachers, but teachers in general. Children should be taught logical thinking and solving the problems in logical way. Creativity is a way of solving the problems better, faster and not as everybody does it. I had an experience with a creative teacher once, in my primary school. It was in 2004, when my teacher started to teach my class. Her lessons were the most interesting a valuable time in my primary school. She used a lot of IT. She was not only the teacher but also the head of the European Club. She engaged us in the programmes like exchanging e-mails with the student from other European countries and students' exchanges. I had an opportunity to go to Germany and be the host of the German student in my home. It was a great experience and she is my inspiration to be a creative teacher.

Anna Głuszek

15
Creativity is important for teaching all groups of students, especially young learners who need a whole variety of different exercises and tasks. During my teaching practice that I did a year ago and during my tutoring, which is my part-time job now, I try to be creative as much as possible. I teach a girl who is 6, so I use different flashcards, videos, movies, realia. I don't want our 'lessons' to be boring because I think that the more the lesson is entertaining and interesting, the more effective it becomes. Unfortunately, I did not have any teacher at my primary school and secondary school who was very creative. I attended extra classes and they had a great impact on me. We were doing some projects and performed short scenes. As I mention at the beginning, being creative should be a requirement for all teachers.

Agnieszka Gasińska

16
Creativity may be hard to define, especially if we are talking about creativity in language teaching. Nowadays students get bored when following a certain routine, thus there emerges the need for innovations. And those innovations are something that a creative teacher knows how to implement.

During our language studies we had some opportunities to work with such teachers. However, unfortunately, there were not too many of them, and they usually concerned private lessons in language schools. Such classes involved multisensory tasks in order to engage as many students as possible. Students were not restricted by the so called “answer key” but rather had to present their own opinions. Those classes were really inspiring and we hope that in the future we will be able to conduct our own lesson in a similar way – not to confine the students, but to respond to their needs.

Patrycja Ellwart, Marcelina Kowalkowska

17
As far as creativity is concerned, I truly believe that it is one of the most important features of a good teacher. During many years of education I had an opportunity to observe different types of tutors, and, without a doubt, I have to admit that teachers who followed one and only type of teaching methodology proved rather unsuccessful; simply speaking their way of conducting lessons was just boring and overwhelming. I was not an active participant during such lessons. I am deeply convinced that the best method of conducting classes is to come up with new ideas, interactive exercises and games every time. Nowadays, it is very hard for kids to focus, and on the other hand, for the tutor it is hard to grab their attention. Teacher's creativity makes him not only a good tutor, but also an interesting personality they may admire.

Paulina Bielec

Conclusions

1. Many mainstream teachers are not creative as they only follow the course book. However, there are some exceptions.
2. IT offers opportunities for creativity, especially for the young teacher who is a digital native.
3. Some respondents are not certain that creativity in language teaching really works.
4. A great variety of materials is crucial to foster creativity in class.
5. Creativity requires careful preparation and planning.
6. Learners appreciate creative teachers.
7. The teacher needs the right attitude and enthusiasm to be creative.
8. Time constraints in class are a serious limitation to creativity.
9. Creativity can be exercised through extra-curricular activities and programmes.
10. Creativity can be implemented through multisensory activities and tasks.

Please check the Creative Methodology for the Classroom course at Pilgrims website.
Please check the Methodology & Language for Primary Teachers course at Pilgrims website.
Please check the Methodology & Language for Secondary Teachers course at Pilgrims website.
Please check the Teaching Advanced Students course at Pilgrims website.
Please check the How to be a Teacher Trainer course at Pilgrims website.