Children's play experiences have a profound impact on all areas of their growth, learning, and development. Play Today: A Guide for Families describes ideas and examples of quality play experiences that can be offered to preschool and school-age children by their families and caregivers. This guide puts a focus on play-based learning for children…

The experiences of children's play have a profound impact on all areas of their growth and development. Memories of play can be vivid and detailed. These memories often have a treasured place in our hearts and minds. Educators and parents have a special opportunity to ask themselves, "What kind of memories of play do I hope for the children…

Examines creative thinking in relation to modern instructional programs and information literacy and compares creative and critical thinking. Discusses teaching for thinking, techniques for sparking creativity, activities for creating a mental museum, synectics (a group creative process to create new insights), and creating meaning through story…

A set of "creative competencies" provides a framework for assessing the extent to which local school environments contribute to the production of creative citizens. Following an introduction to rationale and organization of the Vermont Creativity Task Force, material is divided into five substantive sections. Section 1 pinpoints the…

Parents are their child's first and most important teacher. This booklet introduces parents to techniques for helping their preschoolers learn to read. Included is a story about how one mother and father encourage their children to read, a sample reading activity, and a checklist for parents of preschoolers. This brochure is based on "A Child…

Designed to help parents meet the extra needs of preschool handicapped children, the booklet, written in Spanish, provides information and practical suggestions for dealing with self image, creativity, and discipline. Described are activities to develop basic communication, self help, physical, social, and academic skills. An additional chapter…

This paper discusses the dialectics of creativity, especially in group behavior; notes how stabilizing influences result in hard-programed behavior; outlines habits of thinking, learning, and behaving that help in developing creative potential; and presents exercises to encourage flexibility in the group creative process and counter inhibiting…

The newsletter for parents of handicapped children focuses on summer activities which provide fun and learning without undue expense or effort. Suggestions include encouraging reading activities (including visiting the library, reading out loud, selective television viewing, making a book, and writing letters). Activities to encourage the child's…

The study of creative movement, dramatic expression, and kinesthetic awareness can develop students' skills not only in movement but also in communication and leadership. Suggested kinesthetic activities follow the four phases of: physical movement, examining student responses, stimulating the imagination, and analyzing and sharing the experience.…

Five different perspectives on creativity in teaching are examined: (1) Creativity is developed by making teaching methods from almost nothing. (2) Creativity is fostered by idealizing without constraint. (3) Creativity can be developed through analogs. (4) Creativity can mean to reorganize or modify. (5) Creativity can be fostered using a forced…

Presents suggestions for making reading instruction exciting and creative both for students and teachers. Describes the creative reading environment, ways the teacher may foster creativity as a result of reading, and ideas for developing creativity based on reading. Lists 20 creative reading activities. (MG)

This article provides 20 principles to enable educators to identify meaningful creative activities for gifted students and avoid the superfluous "whistles". Activities should: value creative thinking, make children more sensitive to environmental stimuli, encourage manipulation of objects and ideas, develop tolerance for new ideas, and teach how…

Discusses how to integrate young children's interests into classroom learning activities. Emphasizes the need for early childhood educators to be creative and open-minded when encountering unexpected interests and classroom situations. (KB)

To enable college students to grapple with their own process of creating, students complete a project that involves collecting a variety of small objects, dividing the objects into two categories, telling a story using all the objects, describing their feelings about the categorization and story-telling activities, and writing about their creative…

This article discusses how creative thinking can be encouraged in students through such classic tools as brainstorming and the productive thinking elements of fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration. It describes how fairy tales can be used to foster these thinking skills and suggests classroom activities. (Contains two references.) (CR)