Fostering Creativity in Children
In our fast-paced and competitive world, teaching children practical skills is often given more importance than creativity. Learning to count, write your name, tie your shoelaces, and follow directions are all essential practical skills to master, but creativity is powerful and just as important.
In today’s evolving job landscape, where technology is increasingly replacing traditional roles, having a creative mindset and standing out from the crowd is crucial.
The Natural Creativity of Children
Children are creators, taking on the roles of artists, storytellers, inventors, actors, and engineers in their play. They have a curiosity and eagerness to explore and experiment, and a limitless imagination. Encouraging creative play allows a child to explore a range of scenarios and emotions that isn’t possible in their everyday life and gives them the opportunity to think about how they would deal with new, difficult, or unusual situations if they were confronted with them in real life. Creativity can also unlock hidden talents and interests; by supporting children to develop their creative side, they may find they excel in areas they never would have expected.
To support and strengthen your child’s natural creativity, try the following;
Encourage child-led free play
Creativity will naturally emerge by letting your child play freely. Be patient and don’t discourage them from exploring new ideas. Let them take the lead, within reason, and allow them to make choices about what activities they would like to do.
Ask open-ended questions
Encourage your child’s curiosity and ability to think beyond the obvious by asking open-ended questions. These are queries that don’t have a right or wrong answer and will inspire discussions and deepen your child’s understanding and imaginative thinking. You could ask, “if you could have a superpower, what would it be?” or “if you had a time machine and could visit any time in history, when would you choose and why?”.
Prioritise storytelling
Make storytime part of your child’s routine, taking pauses between pages to ask questions about what might happen next or to talk about details in the illustrations. These discussions will spark their imagination and encourage them to explore alternative storylines and perspectives.
Hands-on creativity
Offer your child a mixture of arts and crafts materials to create with. From finger painting to knitting, there are so many activities for children to choose from and something to keep all ages and abilities entertained. Try to incorporate an activity into their routine each day. Not only can it be relaxing and rewarding for children, it can also be a great way for them to express themselves.
Get outside
Encourage your child to play outside as often as possible. Being in natural surroundings doing unstructured activities such as building dens from tree branches, spotting wildlife, or playing pooh sticks, will give them diverse sensory experiences which is great for inspiring creativity. Playing outside is also really helpful for developing problem solving skills and resilience. Try to get outside with your child in all weathers; as long as they are appropriately dressed, there’s no such thing as the wrong weather.
Create in the kitchen
Your child may enjoy expressing themselves creatively through cooking and baking. Start by letting young children roleplay cooking with play food and utensils, then progress to cooking or baking together with real food as a family activity. As they get older, give them children’s cookbooks which will encourage them to be more independent in the kitchen.
Provide the right toys
Toys that encourage imaginative play are invaluable in nurturing creativity. Playtime where there are no predetermined rules encourages children to experiment and innovate.
Art and craft supplies – Paints, clay, coloured paper, chalks, glitter, glue etc. allow children to express themselves through their creations.
Dress-up and pretend play – Costumes, dolls, and pretend play sets let children step into different roles and create imaginative scenarios. This type of play fosters storytelling, social skills, and the ability to think outside the box.
Puzzle games – Puzzles, especially those with various shapes and patterns, challenge children’s problem solving skills and stimulate their cognitive development.
These toys also encourage creative thinking as children have to work out how to fit the pieces together.
Loose parts – Toys like LEGO, building blocks, buttons, curtain rings, boxes, cartons, yogurt pots, conkers, acorns etc, allow children to create anything they can imagine. The open-ended nature of these toys promotes spatial awareness, problem solving and creativity as children construct their own unique designs.
Musical instruments – Giving children the opportunity to play with instruments like drums, keyboards, or even simple shakers will help them nurture a love for music, and will also allow them to experiment and be creative with their own rhythms, sounds, and melodies.
Let them get their hands dirty
Sometimes, children need to get messy to uncover their inner creativity. Not only is digging around in the mud, or being elbow deep in slime great fun, it also sparks imagination by engaging the senses and encourages exploration and problem solving.
Not too much screen time
When we set boundaries on screen use, children are more likely to try out different activities to entertain themselves. They will have more opportunities to draw, paint, read, play games, do puzzles, be outside. Their creativity will grow as they have room to think, solve problems, and come up with new ideas. Also, spending less time on screens encourages more face-to-face interaction with others, which helps to develop communication and collaboration skills.
Give praise
Whether your child is painting, building, dancing, or cooking, it’s important to acknowledge and praise their creativity. This will boost their confidence, make them feel comfortable about expressing themselves, and encourage them to keep exploring new ideas and come up with ways to solve problems.
So embrace your own creative side and encourage your child to do things that will inspire their imaginative thinking. Remember that creativity is not only the spark that inspires art, it is the driving force behind innovation and outside-the-box thinking, so it is vitally important not only for children as individuals but also for society as a whole!