PISA - Program for International Student Assessment Innovative Domain: Creative Thinking Questions and Answers — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A group of students is tasked with developing a campaign to reduce plastic waste in their school. The first step involves brainstorming as many different types of solutions as possible, such as creating posters, organizing a school-wide competition, proposing a new recycling system, and starting a social media challenge. According to the PISA 2022 Creative Thinking Framework, this initial brainstorming phase primarily assesses which cognitive process?
- Evaluating and improving ideas
- Scientific problem solving
- Generating diverse ideas (Correct answer)
- Visual expression
Correct answer: Generating diverse ideas
The PISA framework identifies 'generating diverse ideas' as the capacity to think flexibly and produce a variety of distinct ideas. The scenario describes students coming up with multiple, different approaches to a problem, which directly aligns with this cognitive process. Evaluating ideas would happen later, and while it's a social problem, the specific process being assessed is idea generation, not the entire problem-solving cycle.
Question 2: Which of the following best encapsulates the PISA 2022 definition of creative thinking?
- The ability to produce aesthetically pleasing artistic works.
- The competence to engage productively in generating, evaluating, and improving ideas. (Correct answer)
- The capacity for rapid, spontaneous thought and unconventional problem-solving.
- A fixed, innate talent for innovation that is primarily domain-specific.
Correct answer: The competence to engage productively in generating, evaluating, and improving ideas.
The PISA 2022 framework defines creative thinking as 'the competence to engage productively in the generation, evaluation and improvement of ideas, that can result in original and effective solutions, advances in knowledge and impactful expressions of imagination.' This definition emphasizes a cyclical and malleable process rather than focusing solely on artistic output, speed of thought, or the idea of it being an innate talent.
Question 3: A student is given a short, simple story about a character who finds a lost key. The student is then asked to rewrite the ending to make it more original and surprising. This task is primarily designed to assess which facet of creative thinking?
- Generating creative ideas in a social context
- Ideational fluency in scientific problem solving
- Generating diverse ideas for visual expression
- Evaluating and improving ideas in written expression (Correct answer)
Correct answer: Evaluating and improving ideas in written expression
This task requires the student to take an existing idea (the original ending) and improve upon it to make it more original. This directly measures the cognitive process of 'evaluating and improving ideas' within the domain of 'written expression'. The other options are incorrect as the domain is written, not social, scientific or visual, and the focus is on improving an existing idea, not just generating many new ones.
Question 4: The PISA 2022 creative thinking assessment is structured around four content domains. Which of the following is NOT one of these domains?
- Written Expression
- Social Problem Solving
- Digital and Media Literacy (Correct answer)
- Scientific Problem Solving
Correct answer: Digital and Media Literacy
The PISA 2022 Creative Thinking assessment includes four domains: written expression, visual expression, social problem solving, and scientific problem solving. Digital and Media Literacy, while an important 21st-century skill, is not one of the four specific domains used to contextualize the creative thinking tasks in this PISA framework.
Question 5: A student is presented with a scenario about a new community garden that is struggling with a pest problem without using chemical pesticides. The student is asked to propose one highly original and effective solution. This task primarily assesses the student's ability to:
- Generate a creative idea. (Correct answer)
- Demonstrate scientific literacy.
- Evaluate diverse solutions.
- Engage in visual expression.
Correct answer: Generate a creative idea.
This task asks for a single solution that is both original (novel) and effective (valuable). According to the PISA framework, this directly assesses the cognitive process of 'generating creative ideas.' While it is in a scientific context, the primary skill being measured is the creativity of the idea itself, not the student's formal scientific knowledge. Evaluating ideas would involve assessing a pre-existing list of solutions.
Question 6: According to the PISA 2022 framework, creative thinking is viewed as a malleable skill that can be developed through practice. This aligns with the concept of:
- Domain-specific expertise
- 'Big-C' creativity
- Ideational fluency
- 'little-c' creativity (Correct answer)
Correct answer: 'little-c' creativity
The PISA framework explicitly aligns its definition with 'little-c' creativity, which refers to the everyday creative thinking that all individuals can demonstrate and develop. This contrasts with 'Big-C' creativity, which is associated with eminent, genius-level contributions. The focus on creative thinking as a malleable skill accessible to all is a core principle of the assessment.
PISA - Program for International Student Assessment Innovative Domain: Creative Thinking Questions and Answers
A group of students is tasked with developing a campaign to reduce plastic waste in their school.
The first step involves brainstorming as many different types of solutions as possible, such as creating posters, organizing a school-wide competition, proposing a new recycling system, and starting a social media challenge.
According to the PISA 2022 Creative Thinking Framework, this initial brainstorming phase primarily assesses which cognitive process?