Creative Experiences of Children

Creative Experiences for Children 2(1+1)

Lesson 9 : Planning Creative Activities for Children

Background Variables

Many studies have been conducted in recent years reflecting the relationship between the background variables & creativity amongst students. Some of the findings of such studies are reported below.

1. Sex: “Creativity, by its very nature, requires both sensitivity and independence. In our culture, sensitivity is feminine virtue, while independence is a masculine. Children sacrifice their creativity in order to maintain their masculinity or feminity. Yet there are important differences in the roles which the sexes must play in our society, differences which we would like to preserve. Studies showed that eight grade children significantly high creativity scores in favour of males over females in nine scores out of thirteen drawn from the battery of Torrance tests of creative thinking. Thus it indicated that boys to be superior in creativity than the girls. Girls showed to be superior in fluency, originality, elaboration and flexibility dimensions.
2. Socio-economic status (SES): Social class differences in creativity have also been explored in a number of studies but the evidence varied. Subjects from higher SES performed better on creativity than those from lower SES. Teacher rated creativity was positively related to socio-economic status in few studies.
3. Birth Order: Birth order did not find any significant relation to the creativity.
4. No. of siblings: As the child rearing practices are largely dependent on the no. of siblings in a family, this variable is likely to have some bearing on the fostering of creativity in the children.Srivastava (1977) showed that no of siblings has some bearing on creativity score in positive direction.
5. Type of Family: The child’s first associations are largely limited to family members. It is in the family context that the child first encounters problematic situations and the members see that he must learn problem solving behaviour. Parental practices that are associated with the production of original problem solutions, encourage children to search for alternatives when usual behaviours are ineffective in handling problematic situations.

All these factors combined together may deter him to perform creatively in the school.