Creative thinking: features and development techniques

“Requires a creative employee.” Such a requirement in the ad is not about you? Are you sure you are not capable of creative ideas? Maybe worth a try? It is possible what happens, because creative thinking can be learned.

Creativity is considered a rare quality, almost innate. Few people know that such a human ability, like most others, can develop. The ability to go beyond the generally accepted rules is the essence of creative thinking.

Never wanted to do something unusual? At least get an unusual present? If you want, then with creativity you are all right, at least some of its inclinations exist, you just need to develop them. It is possible that the desire to think outside the box was ruined in childhood. In Soviet pedagogy, few people took liberties. Step right, step left, jump in place ...

But in modern psychology a completely different interpretation. Creative inclinations are encouraged to develop from infancy. After all, such a turn of mind in the future will not only allow us to make unique decisions at work, and therefore, skip along the career ladder, but also solve everyday problems “with a twinkle”. Studying, personal life, relationships with their own children - those who approach these milestones of their life differently from everyone, more often than not turn out to be more successful than others.

A talented person is talented in everything. What talent do you have? It cannot be that there is no talent: even a song performed on a corporate party may well prove to be a sign of true talent. It is all about the stereotypes that life itself imposes on us or the people who have surrounded us since childhood.They are the ones who tell us what is “good” and what is “bad”. As a result, we, like persistent tin soldiers, carry out tasks clearly according to the instructions.

And now remember how in childhood you easily left any situation. You can’t remember yourself, look carefully at how your own child does it. The first thing that distinguishes a child from an adult is the ability to think imaginatively. Every word for a child is a whole picture, every event is a fairy tale. The kid himself can easily transform into any fairy-tale hero and for this he does not have to wait for a costume party. Outward resemblance to a famous character excites him a little, he has a creative (different from the generally accepted) approach to everything.

Over the years, we have lost this road. We learn the rules that we rarely want to break. All because it’s easier, more familiar. Such actions do not cause indignation (envy) of colleagues, do not lead to rabies (misunderstanding) of parents / husband / wife / and so on.

Most people agree to the game according to template rules. And then a person becomes bored with himself, with his family, with friends. Meanwhile, the “reckless” classmate Yulka has already headed a department in a large state corporation, her husband is a well-known and fashionable photo artist (he, by the way, is also “out of this world”). They are happy, and soon they will have their first and certainly talented child.

So you have something to strive for. Creativity is just the ability under ordinary conditions with all the known components to collect something that will make you, if you don’t turn the world upside down, at least look at things differently. Therefore, creative people are especially appreciated in advertising agencies. They are the ones who make us buy what we didn’t even want at all five minutes ago. It is they who make us swallow saliva with the appearance of “low-calorie” yogurt on the screen. This they know how to direct our standard thoughts in any way they need.

Creative abilities, like any other, need to develop and subsequently train. Perhaps the most striking example of how this can be done is the Warm Up contest in the popular television game KVN. Teams need to find an unusual answer to the question of rivals or the leader in a few seconds. Whoever came up with funnier is more creative.

By the way many techniques that are used to develop this ability involve working in a group. But first, you can start individual lessons. The best “engine” of creativity is creativity. Drawing, singing, dancing - any kind of art is suitable. Choose which is closer. Creative is also possible in the kitchen. Add some flavor to your favorite dish (meaning not dry grapes) - come up with an unusual serving, decorate with something unconventional.

The first step to the development of creative abilities, consider done. But it’s impossible to train any muscle in one workout, therefore the “muscle of creativity” is unlikely to flinch after a single appeal to it. It needs to be educated, constantly improved.

Creativity is now being paid attention already in kindergarten. Games with children of preschool age are aimed at teaching them to think and develop creativity. Although many of us also received similar lessons, the results are different. We were given a slightly different task. We had to do something in the image and likeness, modern children have more freedom in creativity. And the choice of materials in today's office supply stores is much richer.

And the rest is the same as ours:

• sculpting and drawing help to develop imagination;
• to learn to create something new will help puzzles and designers;
• puzzles will help to find a way out of difficult situations, they will also prompt non-standard solutions in the future;
• role-playing games (matinees with snowflakes, foxes, bunnies, masquerades) help to communicate, change your own image.

As soon as yesterday’s snowflakes, foxes and bunnies arrive at school, they have to change the costume. Most secondary schools now have a compulsory form. Someone thinks that under such conditions the children begin to “cut to the same comb” again, while others believe that this does not interfere with the development of the personality of modern younger schoolchildren. It’s easy to check what happens in the classroom where your child is studying, finding out exactly how classes in mathematics are conducted with him in elementary school. This science is literally given to one in a word or two, while others cannot spend hours solving a seemingly simple task.

What should a teacher do to not only instill in the student a love of arithmetic, but also to take care of his creative thinking:

• offer to think about alternative ways to solve the problem;
• invite the student to choose what task he will solve and what method to use to find the answer;
• invite the child to come up with his own task.

If the teacher cares about the development of the student, and not just requires the right decision from him in order to get an assessment, then he will find an approach to anyone. If not, then it is worth throwing all the effort to parents.

Approximately the same methods should be used to develop or awaken creative abilities in adults. Stop thinking “like everyone else”, try to come up with different ways out of this or that situation. Drop doubt. Fear of failure makes it impossible to create. Brilliant ideas are born only from desperate people.

If all of the above is about you, it remains only to improve your abilities and skills. Here are some simple exercises.

1. Take a book. Write out a few words from the pages and lines you previously defined. It should be some kind of abracadabra. Now combine these words into text. Make up a story.
2. Think of ways to expand the application of the most common subject. For example, a plastic bag. This is not only garbage packaging, but also a pool cap, wallet cover, raincoat. Having completed this task, you will develop your imagination and help ecologists.
3. Sketch dashes of different lengths and tilts, dots, dashes on a piece of paper. Now try to create an image from them. Perhaps this will not be an object, but an event or a natural phenomenon.
4. Use everything that surrounds you to create images. What does that cloud look like, but this puddle is under your feet, and the snowdrift is under the window?
5. Read backwards. Start with words, then go to whole sentences and pages from books. Imagine what comes from the text.

Unfortunately, adults often kill creativity in children in the bud. And uncles and aunts do this very creatively, not knowing what they are doing.

Teachers, coaches, parents and the rest of the cultural sector come up with various tournaments and contests, thinking that in this way they develop boys and girls. But it turns out the opposite. The guys strive to get the main prize with a proven method over the years. Their goal is a reward, not a new discovery.

Most adults are sure that they all know for sure better than the child and try to protect him from mistakes. As a result, they put before him an insurmountable barrier. The way to solve the problem, of course, is also known to them. They open for the child their own path of knowledge, not suspecting that the child can choose their own, and much more successful. Do not put blinders on his eyes. Let stumble, but go through the maze in your own way.

We make plans and try to squeeze the children into this schedule.In the modern world, we give birth to them according to a schedule previously agreed with the spouse. At the same time, we want them to feel free. At least sometimes, instead of gymnastics, take the child to the zoo, and instead of lesson at a music school, offer roller skating. He still has a lot of time ahead, which he has to “correctly” distribute. Give him the opportunity to fool around.

Creativity training may well take place with the help of business games. For example, the well-known “brainstorming” can be used not only to solve a specific business problem, but also as a training. Putting a group of several people together. By the way, age does not matter here. So the evening in the family circle can also be spent in a similar way.

The rules of the game are pretty simple.

• We clearly set the task. For example, how to cook dinner from what is in the refrigerator.
• We determine the time for reflection to each participant in the game.
• We write out all the options on a piece of paper and voice them.
• We complement the proposed options with new ideas.
• We bring the selected dish (if we are talking about dinner) to perfection.
• We start cooking.

Most likely, your culinary delights will not be included in the next book of Jamie Oliver (a cook from the UK, a successful restaurateur, a popular TV presenter who promotes healthy eating), but you will have fun with all your heart, not to mention giving a charge of positive energy to your creativity .

Don't like cooking? Build a house. For this, you and assistants are not needed. To begin, let's decide on building materials. We take a piece of paper and draw up an “estimate”. We write 10 any names of objects, vegetables, fruits, animals. We do it without thinking. Now we take another sheet and begin to create our own unique palace. What do we have there? Tomatoes - we draw windows in the form of tomatoes. Cucumbers - we arrange benches in the form of them around the entire perimeter of the structure. Dolphin - create a fountain in the image and likeness of this cute creature.

Is the idea clear? The main thing is that nothing should “disappear” from previously acquired materials. After all, they were presented to you by your own imagination.

About what exercises are necessary for the development of creative thinking, the video below will tell.