A synthesis of research concerning creative teachers in a Canadian context

Effective teachers are often creative ones, yet an examination of creative teaching is largely invisible in the North American creativity literature. Even within education there is little about teachers’ own creative practice. Nonetheless, there are benefits to studying creative teachers: in education it can explicate ways of enhancing teachers’ creativity and enriching praxis; and in psychology it can extend our understanding of social and interpersonal creativity, as well as everyday creativity. This paper reviews 12 Canadian case studies of creative teaching conducted by a creative teaching research group. An in-depth elaboration of two themes, creative person and community, is presented.

Research highlights► Creative teaching is necessary to meet the complex needs of students and society. ► Canadian creative teachers share many characteristics with their UK counterparts. ► They are distinctive using intrapersonal awareness in service of their teaching. ► They base creative instructional choices on their values, emphasizing community. ► They build networks for themselves and students that extended beyond the classroom.