CREATIVITY IN CHILDREN: 15 TIPS TO DEVELOP IT - ECONOMÍA - 2025

The creativity in children can develop attitudes, activities, habits and generally act by parents and schools. Creative skills are as necessary in children as academic ones, as they will help them acquire skills that will serve them well throughout their lives.

Children's creativity is the tendency to generate or recognize ideas, alternatives, or possibilities that could be useful in solving problems, communicating with others, and entertaining oneself or others. To be creative, a child needs to be able to see things from a different perspective than the conventional one.

Creativity involves the development of ideas and products that are original, that is, that do not exist previously. Also, these ideas and products must have some value; It is not valid, for example, to write a book that no one has written before but that is simply made up of random sentences.

Childhood personality and creativity

Creativity is closely linked to the personality of the individual and his emotional life; it involves much more than just "thinking skills." Personality traits, such as self-confidence, the ability to tolerate ambiguity, curiosity, and motivation, facilitate creative expression, just as other traits can inhibit it.

Emotional processes, such as tolerance for anxiety and involvement in tasks also have to do with the development of creative abilities. Finally, cognitive skills such as divergent thinking, breadth of knowledge, and judgment are also related to these processes.

For children to express creativity, they need a combination of all of these attributes. While some children have all the necessary components, others may need help, encouragement, and the development of some skills to participate in creative activities.

For example, a child might not want to engage in creative thinking because he lacks self-confidence and believes that he has nothing of value to offer. You may feel anxious when given an open-ended question or task with several possible solutions.

Through observation and discussion with the child, an adult can find out what is causing the child to have difficulties and encourage him to fix it.

Ways to develop creativity in children

1- Encourage children to solve problems creatively

This involves asking children open-ended questions that cannot be answered with a simple “yes” or “no” and that do not have a correct or incorrect answer.

2- Give them time to explore all the possibilities, to move from popular ideas to more original ideas

With these questions, children are invited to think of different possibilities and imagine situations. For example "What if dogs could talk?" or "What would you do if you could fly?"

3- Provide a wide variety of different experiences to children

In this way, the necessary knowledge base will be established to compose new ideas. For example, visiting museums, libraries, new places, different cities…

4- Invite the children to create

Using recyclable materials to make creative crafts, for example, helps children see that new objects can be made out of things that seemed useless and would otherwise have gone to waste. Present unconventional craft or drawing materials to the child and invite them to narrate the creation process.

5- Encourage children to read and participate in artistic activities for pleasure

If, without even knowing how to read, children have a good time when their parents read them a story, they will soon want to learn to read for themselves.

It is convenient to limit the time they spend in front of the television or the computer to give them time to participate in other more creative activities such as rehearsing a play, learning to draw…

6- Allow children spontaneous artistic explorations

Stepping and directed crafts are fine in moderation, but most crafts should be spontaneous. Making a collage with all the materials the child can think of is a good idea.

Creating an artistic corner at home or in the classroom is useful when the child comes up with new ideas and wants to put them into practice.

7- Break the rules

Invite the children to do things in different ways than usual. For example, instead of following the rules of a game, ask her if she can make up her own rules.

Ask him how many different uses he can find for an everyday object, not counting the conventional use. All this will make the child see that they have the freedom to do things in a different way than established. Accept unusual ideas that children may have without judgment and make them see that, in art, there is no right or wrong way to do things.

8- Allow clutter

Artistic and creative activities are, most of the time, messy. The more permission, the more room to explore and the more room to experiment a child has, the more free they will feel to create.

9- Encourage inventive storytelling

Invite the child to draw pictures to accompany the story you are reading to imagine the scenes. Change the characters in the books or the places where the story takes place and invite her to do the same.

10- Allow children to get bored

If we provide entertainment and activities for children every time they find themselves with nothing to do, they will not be able to develop games and activities that entertain them on their own.

11- Present the unique point of view that each child has

Try giving the children an old camera or a mobile with a camera and encourage them to take original photos of things they like. Then ask them what they see in each photo, why they took it, and what they like about them.

12- Apply the “brainstorming” technique with the children

The “brainstorming” consists of contributing ideas in relation to a problem without criticizing them and then, when you have a list, choosing the best solution.

During this technique, the trial is suspended, the children are allowed to think freely, even if they have impossible or crazy ideas, and a large number of ideas are generated that will later be reviewed.

13- Stay out of the creative process

To some extent, it is important to allow children enough space to play, explore and create for themselves, without parental intervention. If we always guide them in their activities, they will not be able to develop their own ideas.

This does not mean that we cannot play with them; just let them guide their own activities and avoid the temptation to correct them, unless there is some kind of danger to them.

14- Be aware of your own behavior regarding children's creative activities

Emphasize the process, not the product. The results of a child's work are not as important as the exploration and experimentation that occurred during creation.

Products often have more value to adults, and once children know that they can explore and discover for themselves, they often stop worrying about what they create should look like. Ask the child about her creation: how she did it, what steps she took, what materials she used, what things she discovered…

15- Show appreciation for children's creativity

There is no better way to show that you value children's creations than by displaying them in a room at home or in a school classroom. Let the child decide what drawings or crafts he wants to put on the wall or on the shelf.

conclusion

Creativity is a very important human characteristic. The best interpretation of creativity is to think of it as a process that requires a mix of ingredients, including personality traits, skills and abilities.

The people who accompany children in their first years of life can help them develop their creativity by providing a creative environment, helping them to build and develop their skills through play, behaving themselves creatively and complimenting the efforts of children.

Parents and teachers who respect children's ideas help them solve problems on their own. Children who feel free to make mistakes and experiment will also feel free to invent, create and find new ways of doing things, skills that are useful throughout our lives.