How to Think Like a Child

Think like a child suggests that loosening up can benefit our lives and boost creativity.

Darya Zabelina and Michael Robinson, who carried out a US study into adult creativity have discovered that the more an adult acts and thinks like a child, the more imaginative he or she becomes. "Thinking like a child is entirely possible for adults," says Robinson. "And we found that doing so is beneficial for certain types of creative activities."

Here are some of the things the author suggests doing in order to lose those inhibitions that are holding you creativity back:

• Lose your cool
• Have a bad idea
• Learn to dawdle
• Be bored
• Break the rules
• Get yourself a babysitter
• Sit in the backseat of a car
• Get an imaginary friend

Try taking just one of those suggestions and doing something new today. Sometimes that's all it takes to break free from a rut.

Do schools kill creativity?

Sir Ken Robinson: Do schools kill creativity?

Are we educating the creativity out of our children? This fascinating presentation on the value of creativity is well worth the 20 minutes to check it out. Enjoy!

The Creativity Crisis

I recently read this article in Newsweek online. It states that for the first time, American creativity is decreasing. It’s time to take a proactive approach to include creativity in all of the disciplines.

Around the world, though, other countries are making creativity development a national priority. In 2008 British secondary-school curricula—from science to foreign language—was revamped to emphasize idea generation, and pilot programs have begun using Torrance’s test to assess their progress. The European Union designated 2009 as the European Year of Creativity and Innovation, holding conferences on the neuroscience of creativity, financing teacher training, and instituting problem-based learning programs—curricula driven by real-world inquiry—for both children and adults. In China there has been widespread education reform to extinguish the drill and-kill teaching style. Instead, Chinese schools are also adopting a problem-based learning approach.