Digital creativity in STEM education: the impact of digital tools and pedagogical learning models on the students’ creative thinking skills development

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates the impact of digital creativity educational practices on the improvement of academic performance and creative thinking development of Chinese high school students. The study defined the importance of the concept of STEM learning in the development of modern skills needed to live and work in a digital socio-economic change caused by the development of Industry 4.0. An educational experiment involving 60 9th grade Chinese students evaluated the impact of digital creativity learning practices on the development of students’ creative thinking on such indicators as fluency, flexibility, originality, detailing, and metaphoricity. The impact of digital creative learning practices on the performance of students in the control group and the experimental group was assessed. The analysis of the results of practical research on the impact of digital tools and pedagogical models of learning on the acquisition of students’ creative thinking skills was conducted, which proved that the digital environment is the optimal place for students’ creative manifestations and provides opportunities to improve creative thinking skills by implementing learning practical activities using innovative tools for the manifestation of digital creative skills.

KEYWORDS:

• AR tools
• concept of STEM learning
• creative group learning tasks
• creative thinking skills
• digital creativity
• pedagogical learning models

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

Data will be available on request.

Additional information

Funding

A study on the interlining of folk songs of ethnic minorities in western Hunan [Hunan Province 2018 Social Science Fund project (18YBA101)]. General Project of Social Science Foundation of Hunan Province: Investigation and research on the introduction of traditional culture into the campus of Hunan lake-taking the education and inheritance of traditional music in normal universities as an example (19YBA100).

Notes on contributors

Bin Wang

Bin Wang is a Master at the Department of Music and Dance of the Hunan First Normal University in Changsha, Hunan, China. Research interests: music, dance, STEM education, creativity, digital creativity, creative thinking skills, and online learning.

Ping-ping Li

Ping-ping Li is a Master at the Department of Music and Dance of the Hunan First Normal University in Changsha, Hunan, China. Research interests: music, dance, STEM education, creativity, digital creativity, creative thinking skills, and online learning.