Chc50113 Early Childhood Education | Assessment Answers

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Creativity can be described as the freest form of the self-expression. Researchers are of the opinion to children that there is nothing more satisfying for the children than to be able to express themselves openly and without judgments. The capability of the children to be creative as well as to create something from personal feelings and experiences help in reflecting the and thereby nurturing the emotional health of the children (Bruce, 2011). It is indeed true that the experiences that the children gain during their first years of the life can significantly help in enhancing the development of their creativity. This assignment will mainly shed more light on the importance of creativity in the children, the different advantages and disadvantages associated with it along with the different ways by which creative curriculum help in developing the children for their future lives.

Researchers are of the opinion that various creative arts as well as crafts can pave the way for the children for encouraging the movement as well as developing fine motor skills, coordination and even control. During the times when children are seen manipulating tools as well as exploring constructions and assembling, they become unconsciously involved in the different types of physical interaction with that of the surrounding (Mayesky, 2015). They are seen to use different types of senses for learning about the surrounding as well as connecting with the things they already know.

It has been seen in the studies that younger kids can utilize different types of creative arts and various types of tools for expressing their internal thoughts that they are unable to share verbally. This can be considered as one of the best ways by which creative arts can be seen to be helpful for the children in releasing their feelings by mainly putting them in the method of the particular as well as specific piece of work (Barbot, Lubart & Besancon, 2016). Such kind of creative activities also make them feel proud that they have achieved a lot and helping them to get the mastery of their surrounding environment when they can successfully construct any particular interesting thing. This makes the children gain their confidence as well as raise self-esteem.

At the very basic level, it is seen that the children gradually tend to develop concentration and accordingly develop the abilities for measuring and sorting important things. They want to make sense of the world around them and while doing so the children are seen to ask themselves about different types of very basic questions. They are also seen to get involved in the activities which help in fostering the understanding of the very basic concepts. Researchers have seen that as children are seen to get older, they also tend to learn many new critical thinking and problem solving skills (Runco, 2014). In such a scenario, creative curriculum that should be developed by experienced and knowledgeable educators would be helpful in consideration of the alternatives. These would be also helping them to analyze and decide about the ways of applying them in the appropriate contexts.

When children stay together in the creative environment, children are seen to learn and thereby share and interact with each other. These become the basic aspects of social learning. Development of creative skills in dancing, singing as well as drama acting help in implying development of indispensable social skills like that of communication, sympathy as well as respects (Van Hoom, 2014).

Every children needs to be highly creative in gaining the freedom of committing themselves to the efforts completely and thereby making their activities entirely their own. The process of self-expression is extremely useful in their procedure of self-expression. Creative experiences are helping can help the children in the expressing as well as coping with their own feelings (Fuchs, 2017). The creative approach of the children may also help the teachers to develop the knowledge about what the children are feeling as well as thinking. Creativity also has the potential for fostering mental growth in the children mainly by providing opportunities for trying out new ideas as well as new ways thinking as well as problem solving. Creative activities are also seen to help in the acknowledging and celebrating the uniqueness of the children as well as their diversity. It also helps in offering the excellent opportunities for personalizing the teaching as well as focusing on each of the child individually.

Creativity helps in forming developmental skills. Children are seen to become more eager in learning about the world around them. Every types of new shape, color and even sound is a new experience for them. When teachers give new toys to the children that are educational and help in stimulating their senses, they become more curious and tend to venture them helping in developing their creativity. Brain-boosting and creative toys like that of puzzles as well as legos are not only enjoyable but also educational for the children (Sali et al., 2015). These help in developing their manual dexterity but also help them in learning their critical thinking skills solving creative puzzles helps in boosting the self-esteem and thereby gives them a sense of pride. Moreover, playing with the creative toys specially dolls can help the children to learn empathy. When the children are seen to play, they also learn about the ways of relating to that of the others, negotiate their roles and obey different rules. Creative playing helps in fulfilling the emotional needs of the child that helps them in developing a sense of accomplishment in the children. Developmental as well as emotional toys help in teaching children about the ways of expressing their emotional properly (Hashim et al., 2016).

Many of the researchers are of the opinion that creative activities also result in the developmental delay. Having too many creative actions and toys might make children attracted towards playing only hindering their abilities to concentrate on regularized studies and anything which have monotonous outlook to them. It also hampers attention-seeking ability where children spend more time in creative activities and do not get scope for attention development activities. Creative activities may take a large amount of time that might impede other actions important actions of daily life disrupting the child’s sense of development of disciplines and following every day activities for ensuring smooth flow of regular activities. Another negative disadvantage of creativity is that when children are full of too many creative ideas that are competing against each other (Stylianidou et al., 2018). This often makes it difficult for the children to discard one or more of their creative thinking and ideas and thereby pin their hopes for single one. They might try to mix up their ideas and might become impatient if they cannot carry out their creative thinking and activities completely. This might result in the loss of focus, impact and concentration which results in the dilution of their though process. Excessive creativity might help in development of evil thoughts in the children that if not controlled or discussed might result in harming the child himself as well as others in his surroundings (Sharma, 2016).

I believe that creativity should be supported in children as it helps in development of the different aspects of the children. I have gone through evidence-based studies that had shown that creative activities help in developing mathematics skills like measuring, sorting as well as determining size and shape. It helps in developing complex thinking skills in children. Moreover, creative activities like painting, drawing, cutting as well as pasting and all others help in developing fine motor skills in the children. It also acts as positive outlets for expressing their emotions. I have also seen from evidences that it also helps in development of communication skills as creativity provides a fun and supportive environment increasing interaction with other children as well as with the elders. Therefore, i would be supporting creativity as it helps in overall development of children.

Children are seen to enjoy different drama activities as a form of self-expression especially during the times when they reach the elementary school age. Researchers are of the opinion that during this stage, they have solid imaginative abilities and therefore they are seen to be excited to take part in the small drama plays. They are seen to use stories as well as songs as a cornerstone for their drama play (Spodec & Saracho, 2014). Studies have shown that children irrespective of whether they are active participants or whether they are spectators, performing arts are always seen to develop imagination and help them to make sense of the world as such. Children are also seen to enjoy being engaged in different pretend play activities that imply acting out the stories with the playful experimentation of the ideas and the emotions.

Music learning is seen to be an important part of the creative learning in the present day generation in the schools as children are seen to enjoy a lot because their love for music is intrinsic. Singing is seen to help the children in feeling the differences between slow and fast as well as loud and soft. During the times of music classes, they are seen to enjoy a lot to melodic music with different forms of repetition and rhythms (Johnson et al., 2015). They gradually get acquainted with the musical instruments and are therefore seen to develop understanding about the ways sound is produced and the ways it change depending upon the type of the instruments played. Researchers are of the opinion that with the help of the creative activities, young children get the scope to learn about self-control as well as concentration and helps in building a sense of teamwork.

Block area is one of the most significant ways that ensures children to get engaged in creative development in the construction play. Playing with blocks gives the scope of promoting better spatial reasoning in the children. Not only that, structured play also helps in developing and enhancing of the cognitive flexibility which is actually the ability of the children to quickly shift their focus from one of the most important stimulus to that of the another stimulus. It also helps in the development of language skills. Toy blocks also help in stimulating creative as well as divergent problem solving (Cook et al., 2017). Cooperative construction also helps in playing children in improvement of the social skills and such children are also seen to help the children to become better mathematicians.

Creative art is one of the most important activity areas that help the children in all the areas of development. Researchers are of the opinion that creative art areas help in supporting the large and small muscle development of the children and helps in developing their eye-hand coordination. Using of crayons, markers and paintbrushes help in developing fine motor skills (Black et al., 20170. It also helps in developing social aspects of the children helping them to learn and thereby interact with others for being responsible for cleaning up and putting materials away that are some of the positive and important changes helping in social learning. It also helps in emotional development. With the help of the creative art, they are able to represent experiences that they cannot verbalize. Moreover, when leaders value the creativity of the children, the children are seen to feel valued as people and this helps in developing their self-esteem. Children’s active imagination is also seen to take the form of art (Wyse & Ferrari, 2015).

Creativity is one of the most important aspects in the development of children. It helps children in four important domains like in physical, emotional, intellectual as well as social development. The positive aspects associated with creativity in the life of children are more in comparison to that of the negative aspects and hence they are seen to provide curriculum activities that need to be developed should have creative scopes for children. Children can enjoy creativity in different domains like during drama plays, creative art activities, and music sessions as well as during block playing. Professionals should therefore take strategies that help to induce creativity in children.

References:

Barbot, B., Lubart, T. I., & Besançon, M. (2016). “Peaks, slumps, and bumps”: Individual differences in the development of creativity in children and adolescents. New directions for child and adolescent development, 2016(151), 33-45.

Black, M. M., Walker, S. P., Fernald, L. C., Andersen, C. T., DiGirolamo, A. M., Lu, C., ... & Devercelli, A. E. (2017). Early childhood development coming of age: science through the life course. The Lancet, 389(10064), 77-90.

Bruce, T. (2011). Cultivating Creativity: For babies, toddlers and young children (2nd ed.). UK: Hodder Education 

Cook, A., Spinazzola, J., Ford, J., Lanktree, C., Blaustein, M., Cloitre, M., ... & Mallah, K. (2017). Complex trauma in children and adolescents. Psychiatric annals, 35(5), 390-398.

Fuchs, F. (2017). The Imaginative Child-Development of Creativity in Children. Diploma work.

Hashim, A. T., Ariffin, A., Razalli, A., Shukor, A. A., NizamNasrifan, M., & Yusof, A. B. (2016). Nominal Group Technique: a Brainstorming Tool for Identifying Learning Activities Using Musical Instruments to Enhance Creativity and Imagination of Young Children. European Journal of Language and Literature, 5(1), 46-53.

Johnson, J. E. (2015). Play development from ages four to eight years. Play from birth to twelve, 21-29.

Mayesky, M. (2015). Creative Activities and Curriculum for Young Children (11th ed.). USA: Wadsworth Cengage. 

Runco, M. A. (2014). Creativity: Theories and themes: Research, development, and practice. Elsevier.

Sali, G. (2015). A longitudinal study on the development of creativity in children. The Anthropologist, 20(1-2), 93-100.

Sharma, R. (2016). Effect of school and home environments on creativity of children. MIER Journal of Educational Studies, Trends and Practices, 1(2).

Spodek, B., & Saracho, O. N. (2014). Handbook of research on the education of young children. Routledge.

Stylianidou, F., Glauert, E., Rossis, D., Compton, A., Cremin, T., Craft, A., & Havu-Nuutinen, S. (2018). Fostering inquiry and creativity in early years STEM education: policy recommendations from the Creative Little Scientists Project. European Journal of STEM Education.

Van Hoorn, J. L., Monighan-Nourot, P., Scales, B., & Alward, K. R. (2014). Play at the center of the curriculum. Pearson.

Wyse, D., & Ferrari, A. (2015). Creativity and education: Comparing the national curricula of the states of the European Union and the United Kingdom. British Educational Research Journal, 41(1), 30-47.