Teacher as bricoleur: A grounded phenomenological case study of creativity in secondary school science education

This research investigated creativity in secondary school science education and identified the essences of pedagogical strategies that promote opportunities for secondary school students to engage in creative thinking in science. Science policy documents linked secondary school science with the development of student creativity. Indeed, science education literature was laden with the expectation to develop creativity and it was a recurring theme in science curriculum documents for secondary schools in Australia.

Whilst science is implicitly understood to be a creative endeavour, and touted as a creative enterprise, it is doubtful whether secondary school science nurtures creativity. Research suggests students are turned off science by transmissive teaching and focus on canonical abstract content. Contemporary science teachers face conflicting demands to teach established scientific knowledge whilst representing science as practised by scientists. How to nurture student creativity is not explicit in science education literature. The research objective was to make explicit pedagogies secondary science teachers use to engage students in thinking creatively.

A qualitative methodological approach was designed amalgamating grounded theory, phenomenology and case study to form a blended strategy, 'grounded, phenomenological case study', with which to explore creativity in secondary school science. A researcher-as-bricoleur stance was adopted to take advantage of serendipitous opportunities to further the research goals.

The study found that these secondary science teachers drew on their pedagogical creativity and a bricoleur stance to enact creativity -focused science lessons. The teacher emphasis on the creative process rather than the end creative product provided opportunities for students to engage in creative thinking. The creative thinking process was characterised by spontaneity, difference, and both individual and collaborate input, risk, failure, fun, high quality questioning and had a natural energy sustained by student interest, ownership, and talk. The study also found there was no one-way to nurture creativity in school science. The notion of teacher-as-bricoleur was central to the enactment of opportunities for student creativity in secondary school science. The ability to recognise and take advantage of serendipitous opportunities to further student creativity was a key element, and dependent on teacher experience and teacher pedagogical creativity.