In Praise of Clark Kent: Creative Metacognition and the Importance of Teaching Kids When (Not) to Be Creative

Abstract

Despite creativity's many benefits and positive outcomes, there are still both explicit and implicit teacher biases against creative students. We argue that teachers do not dislike creativity but rather dislike inappropriate creativity that can come from students at poorly chosen times. After reviewing the literature on metacognition and creativity, we propose the adapted construct of creative metacognition (CMC), a combination of self-knowledge (knowing one's own creative strengths and limitations) and contextual knowledge (knowing when, where, how, and why to be creative). We end with ways that teachers can raise students’ CMC.

Keywords:

• creative development
• creativity
• implicit biases
• metacognition

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The authors thank Eunsook Hong, Aaron Kozbelt, and Alex McKay for their assistance in the development of this article.

Notes

1. Thank you to an anonymous reviewer for this last concept.

2. In this instance, it would be the interpretation of the song that could be novel and appropriate, not the song itself. Even a singer who imitates the original song could be considered creative; as Sternberg, Kaufman, and Pretz (2002) argued, a replication of a great work is still a (small) contribution in its own right.