Constructing a classroom observation instrument of creative potential for primary school students

Creativity has long been recognised as an essential 21st-century skill and a critical goal of compulsory education around the world. In practice, students demonstrate creative potential, which is the potential to successfully invent innovative products in future, during the learning process. Few instruments, however, use full-scale dimensions for accurately assessing students’ creative potential. Therefore, the theoretical framework of creative potential needs to be reconstructed, and an appropriate observation instrument for assessing creative potential needs to be developed. This study details the stages of developing a classroom observation instrument that is used to measure students’ creative potential. We first reviewed the literature to propose a theoretical framework of creative potential that included eight indicators of creative personality and creative thinking: curiosity, risk-taking, challenge enjoyment, high energy, fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration. Then, by interviewing four primary school teachers, we identified students’ observable classroom behaviours that related to the eight indicators of creative potential. These eight indicators were then confirmed through observations of 18 elementary school students in classrooms in China. Finally, correlational analyses were conducted to demonstrate the validity and reliability of the observation tool. The observation instrument can be used by education researchers and practitioners to identify students’ creative potential, recognise their classroom behaviours, and realise the key situations and learning opportunities in the classroom that inspire students’ potential creativity.