Statement of Intent
Social creativity was initially categorized as “social inclusion”, but we have found that “social creativity” was a more appropriate term to encapsulate art, science, and inclusion as an approach for knowledge creation.
We envision the social creativity toolkit to be able to be used by teachers, educators, facilitators, or anyone who wants to be cognizant of social creativity when planning a learning activity.
In SENSE., we set out to design a social creativity toolkit for a variety of users that want to run any Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) activity aligned with the SENSE. ambition and with the aim to enhance social inclusion in their activities.
At the crux, the toolkit is a guide to help users navigate learning activities, whether drawing upon examples within SENSE., or strategies to help reflect/build upon their own activities. This is a resource that can be used to facilitate self-reflective questions to consider throughout the planning, implementation, and post activity. This will hopefully improve the user’s own activities in a way that augments inclusion.
Ultimately, the toolkit encourages users to think and rethink about useful strategies to enhance social creativity relevant to their own context.
Architecture and Goal of the Social Creativity Toolkit
In SENSE., a social creativity toolkit facilitates understanding STEM education in a way that the expertise of those involved is a shared, diverse, and inclusive experience. This framework goes beyond the context of the conventional classroom atmosphere to include the incorporation of artistic processes, a prioritization of sensory experiences, and the empowerment of individual identities.
This toolkit offers a self-reflective structure, examples, first-hand experiences, and recommendations for educators, community leaders, students, and others aiming to integrate social creativity into their learning activities. Designed to cultivate environments where diverse perspectives and identities are valued, it features an open-ended framework that adapts to various contexts. By encouraging contributions from individuals across all backgrounds, the toolkit fosters an inclusive culture, making it a valuable resource for anyone striving to create equitable learning spaces.
Our approach to social creativity doesn’t include rigid steps or a recipe to follow, but instead provides recommendations to supplement the learning companion and roadmap of SENSE.STEAM.
This toolkit can be used as an accessory to envision social creativity in STEAM education through the lens of citizen science, gender and participatory art. The digital version of the toolkit will be further enriched with personal and first-hand experiences from the SENSE. consortium to increase usability and provide a more vivid experience. A selection of these materials is available in the Supplementary Section of D6.3 (linked below).
A journey through the social creativity toolkit
Centering on social creativity, the toolkit comprises three sections: approaches, asking yourself questions, and guidelines.
Social creativity allows people to maintain or achieve a positive social identity through re-interpreting intergroup relations. Social creativity can combine different approaches and can follow different guidelines, while centering the identities and experiences of individuals to maintain positive distinctiveness in their approach to knowledge processes (van Bezouw et al. 2021).
These efforts can be most effectively pursued when we consider three interconnected approaches towards social creativity: citizen science, gender, and participatory art. Each of these approaches offers unique perspectives and methods for working towards inclusive and creative social environments, emphasizing collaboration, equity, and active engagement. By integrating these approaches, or at least giving them equal importance, we aim to cultivate spaces for collective growth, where diverse voices and experiences shape the process of learning and creativity.
Figure 1: A journey through the social creativity toolkit
Social inclusion and social creativity are not fixed achievements; rather, they represent ongoing efforts that require continual reflection and adaptation. This is why the core of the toolkit is self-reflective; to encourage users to think and rethink about what they are creating, and to see themselves within the activity throughout the process. In the ‘Asking yourself questions’ section, we frame how to approach the self-reflection exercise, where you first Consider. Reflect. and Sense. to ask yourself four questions “Why, Who, What, Where” across three societal levels (individual, community, society).
When this self-reflection exercise is applied across levels of society, a few things can happen. It allows to frame contextual nuances and orients the users to ask themselves questions and reflect on different environmental and spatial contexts, such as a neighborhood, a city, a country, a culture or any other conditions in which a learning activity is situated. Simply, asking these questions at the different levels of society can provide a perspective that reveals scalability and applicability of the activity reflective of a multiplicity of contexts and situations.
In considering the three approaches citizen science, gender, and participatory art, and completing the self-reflection exercise by asking yourself the four W questions, we also include five guidelines as recommendations on how to increase social creativity within activities. The five categories (Co-Create, Involve & Share, Experience & Explore, Future Making, and Be Diversive & Inclusive) were found most relevant through our evaluation of SENSE.STEAM labs (D6.2), and are also linked to different parts of the SENSE. Manifesto from D3.4.
Questions to the IAB
- What additional support or resources should be included to improve the usability of the toolkit in a digital format? (e.g., micro-training video, case studies)
- Are there any features/elements of the toolkit that you would like to see highlighted?
- Who do you envision as the primary users of the toolkit?