Creative use of technology
One of the critical skills associated with digital competencies is creativity and creative approaches to digital technologies. This topic can have different levels, some of which we would like to suggest.
DigComp uses a creative approach to problem-solving in situations that some standardized procedures cannot solve. Such issues require a specific, more comprehensive insight, such as the ability to monitor a given problem or phenomenon in a new way and find a suitable solution. If this solution is of a technological type, then - according to the authors of DigComp - it falls into the area of the competence model. What distinguishes this part, for example, from the first or second, is the emphasis on the complexity of the problem and also its involvement in social structures. Technologies can have a significant impact on different societal sectors and help address various social challenges.
The second area is the identification of creativity and creative thinking as a distinguishing feature between man and machine. It is precisely creativity and innovative thinking that are very difficult to algorithmize, which results in its long-term applicability (therefore, its development is appropriate to include informal education). Artificial intelligence and machines, in general, will not compete against a person. Here it is also necessary to emphasize that there may be a successful model of machine-human collaboration. An adequately set up information system provides a person with information and overall cognitive substrate, and one can work creatively with them.
Another area is the use of technology as a means to implement creative techniques. The tablet makes it easy to create mind maps, sketchnotes, keep a creative diary, or take photos. Although there are quite a few people who see creativity mainly in pencil and paper, also about the number of tools and their number of downloads, it can be said that they are popular and functional tools.
This topic is followed by a specific group of applications that allow you to work with creative techniques in a new way or use digital technologies. This is probably most clearly seen on mind maps, where you can create 3D mind maps, for example, or on a tool such as Realtimeboard to create mind maps from photos, videos, or online documents, which cannot be arranged in the usual way.
It should be emphasized that most creative techniques lead to some phase or the whole concept of problem-solving, so it is not primarily about creating new content or innovative objects, involving technology in the problem-solving process, whether we think about it individually or in groups.
A specific area is digital technologies for their creative work - movies are animated on a computer, there are algorithms for generating poems, painting images, or creating rhymes. Computer electronic music is then a separate genre (or a whole family of different genres). The use of technology not for solving a problem in general but for an adequate expression of a person's inner state undoubtedly also belongs to the competence framework of digital competencies, emphasizing their anthropological and social dimension.
The level of society is also essential for our considerations - technologies enable the involvement of more people in the creation and creative activities and the standard solution of problems and support their interaction in real-time. Although it is sometimes said that technologies support individualization and isolation of users. They can just as well serve to deepen and strengthen mutual sharing and interaction, even in such communities that do not have the opportunity to meet physically or do not even know each other at all.
Finally, creativity is probably the most frequently mentioned part of competency models for the 21st century, creating a specific space for a critical hit in the digital environment. Suppose creativity is to be one of the key themes in education and also in the labor market. In that case, it is natural to ask what it really is and how it could be adequately linked to digital competencies
The word creativity comes from the Latin “creo“, which can be translated into English as “I create", into German “Ich erschaffe”, or in Czech “Tvořím”. Creativity is not, which must be emphasized, a permanent disposition of man. It is not easy to say that one person is and the other is not creative. Creativity is a state of mind or process rather than a permanent disposition. However, there are people who can induce such a state and, conversely, others who persistently avoid it.
English writer Ian McEwan states that “the opposite of nihilism is creativity. A mood for change, a hunger for individual freedom.” He is followed by Robert Green, who claims that “creativity is a combination of discipline and a child's spirit.” Certain roots of an adequate definition of creativity can therefore be found in art or artists.
If we relate this concept to digital competencies, it is possible to conclude that technology should contribute to creative freedom in the broadest possible sense. If they are to help solve problems or be creative in general, they must ensure a dimension of a safe, free and open environment. Green's remark on discipline is also essential because it emphasizes a certain degree of self-discipline and self-control. An online environment can be treacherous in that you can spend a lot of time in it, which is consumed entirely unnecessarily. Thus, technologies without self-discipline can lead a person from creation rather than bring him to it.
To define creativity it is necessary to mention the creative problems. These are those whose solution corresponds to creative thinking. They can be characterized, for example, by the following four points:
1. They are new - their solution does not exist yet. These are not necessarily some vast problems, but often small everyday situations.
3. They are open - they are often broadly and vaguely defined problems that need to be narrowed down appropriately or a suitable source of information identified for them that is not easily accessible.
2. They are socially critical - creative thinking, in general, cannot be combined with inventing absurd and unnecessary things, such as a square circle, which may be an excellent creative warm-up, but it is not a creative problem. The problem needs to be socially recognized, at least in potency (for example, no one needs to see it yet).
4. They have more correct answers or ways to get them.
At this point, it is already explicitly clear how the problem of solving is related to creativity - the key issues are those that require some creative effort to overcome. It is certainly possible to use various techniques and non-technical means, depending on which of the proposed approaches will seem to be the best.
Defining creativity itself is complex and ambiguous, so it is a typical creative problem. Marie König states that it is “the ability to create new cultural, technical, spiritual and material values in all fields of human activity. Creativity is an activity that brings hitherto unknown and at the same time social creations.“
Teresa Amabile then states that “work or solution to a problem is considered creative to the extent that it is a new, useful, correct and beneficial solution to a given task and at the same time the extent to which the task is heuristic (discovery, original, original, assuming a new solution) than an algorithmic one (a well-known task with a routine solution).” We can also perceive it as “the ability to overcome traditional ideas, rules, patterns, relationships, and the like; to create meaningful new ideas, forms, methods, interpretations, etc., using originality, progressivity or imagination.“
If we wanted to relate creativity to purely digital competencies, it would be enough to add “using technology" after each definition. It should be emphasized that evolving technologies offer more and more opportunities to enter into a variety of processes or problems, so their knowledge (availability of digital competencies) is often a prerequisite for finding a genuinely current functional solution.
At this point, we would like to dwell on the combination of creativity and problem-solving. Both can be described as tools that serve to understand the world better or solve problems. It is possible to find more by a methodology of a similar kind. Here we will mention Design thinking.
Neil Stevenson, CEO of IDEO, one of the most prominent promoters of design thinking, says that design thinking is about assigning a task and finding a solution and supporting and developing the whole process of finding the best option without worrying that it will be unsuccessful. It is precisely the fear of failure that hinders a person from looking for truly suitable and optimal forms of solution. According to IDEO, Design Thinking has three primary phases - inspiration, idea, and iteration. As part of the inspiration, the challenge (i.e. the problem) is defined, and new perspectives are discovered. There should be as many ideas as possible during the concept on how the challenge can be met. The last step - iteration - is associated with creating a prototype that can be tested and evaluated.
Design thinking is associated with the existence of phases. It is cyclical, based on a specific positivist framework, in which it is not possible to find an ideal solution just to approach the ideal. Therefore, repeated testing and the search for better approaches are specific accompanying phenomena of this methodology.
Similarly, Graham Wallas names four primary phases of the creative process or the innovative approach to problem-solving. Understanding the mechanism and meaning of the individual phases is very important for creative thinking because it allows you to improve the process of finding thoughts and ideas.
The first phase is preparation, which corresponds well to the inspiration phase at IDEO - it's actually about gathering all the available information that a person needs to solve a particular clearly defined problem. The second phase is incubation, during which an inevitable maturation of ideas takes place. At this stage, it is recommended to change the activity, go for a walk, or give the whole creative process only enough time. The third phase is connected with inspiration (it cannot be confused with inspiration at IDEO) and represents a particular peak of the creative process, certain enlightenment, or the so-called aha effect. There is insight and an idea of how to solve the problem. In this phase, the creation itself takes place, a new solution or approach is created. The last phase is the verification, during which the extent to which the idea is functional is verified.
Wallas's approach to creativity is not strictly linear - it represents the approach of a scientist or innovator, who can spend a long time in the first two phases. However, at the moment of inspiration, the whole process passes into a linear structure, fundamentally different from Design thinking, which is cyclical.
There are more thought frameworks to describe problem-solving as a process. Some are more linear, others cyclic or semi-cyclic. These are specific thought patterns that are useful to have mastered if one approaches the solution of any problem. Technologies can enter different phases in different processes. For example, in Wallas, they are typical in the first step, where they are used to obtain information, test hypotheses or assumptions, and call for an “ordinary scientific operation", regarding Thomas Kuhn and his conception of science. They can also be of great importance in the field of evaluation or inspiration if the given class of phenomena requires it (which could be an example of programming and other areas).
However, it should be noted that these frameworks, which work with a different thought pattern based on problem-solving, may not be the only possible approach to solving the problem. For example, Paul Karl Feyerabend emphasizes the aspect of a radically new solution in the field of creativity, which abandons all previous approaches and offers an entirely new original view of the world. The already mentioned Thomas Kuhn then distinguishes between the cumulative process associated with the so-called normal science and paradigmatic breaks, which have a unique new to the ingenious character.
