Hi,
As background you may find it helps to look at what you, personally think is creative. What you feel that involves and what being creative ia all about within your setting.
Thread for K4D946 -
Links for creative research
Enhancing creativity can be building on the familiar, what's most regularly available, what you already know, naturally occuring, frequently accessible. To me it means adding things to play that individuals may find betters, challenges, adapts or changes their creative experience.
Relative values - what something could be worth when linked to a reason/theme/outcome
The value of an activity that's related to creativity asks the question does the activity support everything involved with a creative process -
a rather than
the to help focus on the individual child: the building, the assembling, fixing, connecting, moving, sourcing, identifying, problem solving, caring, safeguarding, risk analysis, musical, adaption, achieving, re-evaluating, re-examining, problem solving, solution finding, flexibility.
The value of equipment that supports creativity could have you asking if a piece of equipment/kit/tool/object/item lends itself to discovery, exploration or adaptation. What can a pair of scissors do, what can a garden chair do .. and if that is valuable/valued in the context of creativity.
Value of experience - will it be a worthwhile experience - creative or other. What may/can be learnt, discovered, what knowledge may/can be gained from an activity that's creative in purpose - where sticky tape will attach to dry paper it may not to wet paper. Where past experience is involved an objective viewpoint will help prevent prejudice towards any creative provision and individual's new experiences.
Value of materials for creativity - what can and can't be done with materials that enable creative use. How vaulable is a tower of tape cassettes used as building blocks only in comparrison to them being provided for building and unravelling.
I'm now wondering if the packaging materials in my delivery this morning are more valuable than the purchased contents when my almost 18 year old stops getting ready for college,
slots them on her arms plays dress up and box unpack .. I said snakes I think she just grinned, said 'cool' and tried not to rip them by bending her elbows
I do know I'd of paid more attention to the process of buying if I knew novel packaging was involved for us.
How and why you select from a range will depend on your aim, direction, focus, knowledge, experience, how you make judgements - selecting a resource in preference/over of another ..
K4D947 - processes enable the earliest opportunity to examine, explore, experiment, engage, observe and discover.
Online search for
process over product
This article introduction, on USA's Childcare exchange written by Sally Cartwirght is great
why promote process over product.
To challenge the negative appearance that end products can have this blog by Teacher Tom
process and product opens the door to show how an end result transforms to become a resource or material in its own right. End products provide sensory related resources that help adults and children plan activity ideas and environments for process exploration - the down side is that if an end product attracts greater worth or value than its process this can potentially overshadow the positive, creative engagement in the eagerness to finish and obtain.
For K4D950 can you use how you shop for resources - the frequency and items you buy. The setting's play areas or where creative activities/play happens in your setting, how engaging these places are - who visits and for how long. Any creative planning you organise, how you look at childrens creative involvement - the types of play enjoyed/avoided, how feedback is collected and used from adults and children involved in creative processes.
I hope this helps a little. xx