A creative industries perspective on creativity and culture

The chapter considers changing definitions of creativity in relation to UK cultural policy and practice in the creative industries. Three perspectives are introduced, beginning with the notion of creativity as a product of individual creativity and talent, popularised by the UK government’s 1998 Creative Industries Mapping Document. This perspective is contrasted with an older model of creativity as a collective expression of shared values, as emphasised in earlier cultural industries policies of the 1970s and 1980s. Finally, the chapter considers contemporary views of creativity in the creative industries as participatory, user-generated, remixed and ‘democratized’. The chapter concludes that there is value in all three perspectives—the challenge for policy makers, managers and practitioners in the creative industries is connecting together individual self-expression with collective cultural values

Problem solving in a middle school robotics design classroom

Little research has been conducted on how students work when they are required to plan, build and evaluate artefacts in technology rich learning environments such as those supported by tools including flow charts, Labview programming and Lego construction. In this study, activity theory was used as an analytic tool to examine the social construction of meaning. There was a focus on the effect of teachers’ goals and the rules they enacted upon student use of the flow chart planning tool, and the tools of the programming language Labview and Lego construction. It was found that the articulation of a teacher’s goals via rules and divisions of labour helped to form distinct communities of learning and influenced the development of different problem solving strategies. The use of the planning tool flow charting was associated with continuity of approach, integration of problem solutions including appreciation of the nexus between construction and programming, and greater educational transformation. Students who flow charted defined problems in a more holistic way and demonstrated more methodical, insightful and integrated approaches to their use of tools. The findings have implications for teaching in design dominated learning environments