1. Strategies for Enhancing Creativity
Joyce VanTassel-Baska, Ed.D
Jody and Layton Smith Professor in Education
Executive Director, Center for Gifted Education
The College of William & Mary

2. Key Strategies Creative Problem-Solving Metaphor development
Creative skill-building
(fluency, flexibility, elaboration and originality)
Synectics
Lateral thinking
Multiple perspective-taking and role playing
Insight processes

3. Creative Problem Solving (Parnes & Osborn, 1961)
Brainstorm
Restatement of the problem
Solution-finding
Develop a comprehensive solution
Create a plan of action to address the issue

4. Six Hats (De Bono, 1986) White: Research orientation
Green: Creative ideas to address the project
Yellow: Feasible approaches
Black: Downside considerations
Red: Gut reactions/hunches
Blue: Recap/status/synopsis

5. Divergent Production Skills
Fluency
Flexibility
Originality
Elaboration
Transformation

6. What is Metaphor?
A figure of speech in which a term is transferred from the object it ordinarily designates to an object it may designate only by comparison or analogy.
A relationship between two unlike objects, ideas, or situations.
A physical picture of an abstract condition
An interpretive construct to help us understand the world in new ways
A story form to link ideas and persuade others
“Our species thinks in metaphors and learns through stories”
– Mary Catherine Bateson, 1994

7. Examples of Metaphor
The universe as a mechanical system (e.g. the solar system as clockwork)
The human body as a machine (e.g. the heart is a pump)
The political machine
Modern capitalism as a cancer on the social immune system
Life is a roller coaster, full of ups and downs.
Life is a river and we make decisions about how to navigate it,
Gaia as the self-organizing, living web of life
The interconnected world as a whispering pond
Leaders as improvisational jazz musicians

8. Metaphoric Thinking Approaches
Using basic structural properties of an object to define a person
Creating analogies
(_______is to _______ as ______ is to _______)
Drawing bisociations (also visual puns and satire)
Building metaphor as a way to grasp an important yet difficult concept
(e.g. leadership, love, justice)

9. Ideas About Metaphors Lakoff & Johnson, 1980
Metaphors determine usage in our language and are routinely used in all forms of communication.
All language is metaphorical and all metaphors are ultimately based on our bodily experience. Metaphor is an intermediary between our conceptual representation of the world and our sensory experience of the world.
The human conceptual system is metaphorical in nature as most concepts are understood in terms of other concepts. Conceptual metaphors transport properties from structures of the physical world to non-physical structures.

10. Sample Metaphors TIME IS MONEY. ARGUMENT IS WAR. SOCIETY IS A PERSON.
LIFE IS A NIGHTMARE.
MY JOB IS A DREAM.

12. Synectics (Gordon, 1961) Problem: Reduce noise in the school cafeteria
Direct: How is noise muffled in nature?
Personal: How would you like to be captured if you were noise?
Symbol: How could noise be represented in the problem?
Fantasy: Create an ideal eating place.
Force-fit into solution

13. Remote Associations Test
Mednick & Mednick, 1967
RIVER NOTE BLOOD
BOARD DUCK DOLLAR
BOILED LID FLOWER

14. Environmental Context
Home
home library
variety of hobbies
Magazines
role models
Work
time to think
collaboration across groups
freedom over one’s work