As the United States and other countries consider "educational reform," the discussion appears to be primarily about fostering basic skills and content knowledge. Our contention is that this approach is not sufficient. Instead, we argue that for twenty-first century success, we must also foster creativity to prepare today's children to excel and solve tomorrow's problems. In this chapter, we offer a thought experiment on how our educational system could achieve these dual goals. We propose that the answer might come from a clearer definition of what creativity actually is and from our attempts to infuse creativity into our classrooms through a pedagogical approach that we call "guided play." [For the complete volume, "Creative Contradictions in Education: Cross Disciplinary Paradoxes and Perspectives. Creativity Theory and Action in Education. Volume 1," see ED612145.]