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"Since creativity is individualized and it expresses itself in each person differently, it becomes difficult for educational systems entrenched in testing and standards to figure out how to unlock creativity in students. Unfortunately, there is no ideal top down solution. Creative classrooms start and end with creative teachers. Luckily, creative teachers can be cultivated. Here are three ingredients to cultivate creative teachers."

"I have been slowly working through a number of different tools and processes to nail down a productivity workflow on my iPad that would actually make me more productive, organized and wouldn't add any additional steps.  I think I have finally found the solution and it is working perfectly.  To make the process even more worthwhile, the entire workflow process transfers and syncs seamlessly with my MacBook which is a basic requirement of any workflow process."

"Design thinking is a powerful tool to really get your students thinking about and tackling a problem or topic at a much deeper level. It is a structured task that focuses on giving considerable time to thinking about and empathising with the people within the situation (Target audience or client), designing and prototyping a possible solution that is immediately challenged in order to improve it. It is used much in business and the design industry but can be used as a general classroom task within any subject area. It also gets students to work quickly without much introduction."

"Although Evernote already is a fairly well-known app, very few educators realize its potential building and sharing student portfolios. Having a well-organized e-portfolio is important: It can follow students from one grade to the next and prepare them to record their future accomplishments. There are plenty of ways to create an e-portfolio, and we feel Evernote is the best. Not only is it a feature-rich platform, but its free price tag also makes it a cost-effective solution for even the most frugal classrooms."

"Bookmarks are one way to save your websites in Safari on your mobile devices. However, for those sites you visit frequently, there's a better solution. You can get speedy access to your favorite URLs by saving them as web clips. Web clips resemble app icons on the home screen of your iPad or iPhone, but instead of launching an application, a web clip takes you directly to a website. Here's how to create a Safari web clip in iOS 7 or iOS 8."

"Reading through the solution to Dr. Russell's search challenge, which is a very advanced one that I wouldn't expect most high school students to employ, got me thinking about a search strategy and tools that I haven't employed before. That prompted me into thinking about creating a list of accessible search tools and strategies that middle school and high school students often overlook. Here's my short list of tools and strategies that are often overlooked."

"Everyone has a pet theory on how to improve public education: better professional development for teachers, more money, better curriculum, testing for accountability, teacher incentives, technology, streamlined bureaucracy. Policymakers have been trying these solutions for years with mixed results. But those who study the brain have their own ideas for improving how kids learn: focus on teaching kids how to learn."

"For years, Canadian parents and educators have engaged in passionate debate over how kids learn math. The math wars, especially contentious in Alberta, have pitted "old" math versus "new," or "discovery," math. But Daniel Ansari, of the University of Western Ontario, says it's time to end the wars. The researcher says the evidence shows that the best way to teach math is with elements from both methods. He refers to the two schools as  "procedural learning" and "conceptual learning," and says they can complement each other when taught together. Ansari says he understands why the topic is so contentious, but adds that it doesn't need to be that way. He offers his solutions for educators, and for parents too. "

"As many of you are aware, I am a big advocate for integrating coding into classrooms of any age. Coding makes students think critically, look beyond the surface, solve problems, debug, collaborate and share. Coding is like solving a giant puzzle, where some answers are more efficient than others, but every kid gets an opportunity to create a solution. It's a student-centred environment which provides immediate feedback and let's kids take risks without fear or judgement."

"I had the pleasure once again to work together with Richard Wells from New Zealand. He recently reworked his website from iPadwells.com to eduwells.com. Give it a look if you haven't checked it out lately! 2016 has arrived and iPad pedagogy has moved a long way in 6 years. Having iPads in your classroom is no longer about which exciting apps you can all use but more about empowering your students to discover and share their own iPad solutions for every situation. This requires collaboration between peers and a flexible mindset held by all in the room, including the teacher. It's about building on new habits held by young people to connect, create and share their learning. It's also about keeping in-touch with new developments to ensure our young people are ready for a rapidly changing world. Think less about teaching delivery or a "one-app-fits-all" model, and more about 21st century habits, and the development of an innovative mindset. (See this book for more details on this) We hope these help! Richard & Steve"

"Despite all its making potential, desktop 3D printers have a reputation of being nothing more than toys. Only suitable for creating desktop clutter. To be fair, that reputation isn't completely undeserved, as many users create little more than pot planters and smartphone cases. That's exactly why Ding Zhou, a Chinese industrial design lecturer at the Nanjing University of the Arts, recently hosted a workshop that seeks to inspire users and find handy solutions for everyday problems through 3D printing. And the results are very impressive; from plug removal aids to wire clips that prevent entanglement, this workshop is an excellent reminder of how much simpler our lives can become with a few clever 3D prints."

"omputational thinking is one of the core objectives that runs through the computing program of study in England from Key Stage 1 to Key Stage 4. Before computers can be used to solve a problem, computational thinking refers to understanding the problem itself and the ways in which it could be resolved. Software engineers and computer scientists for example, routinely engage in computational thinking. As a higher order thinking skill, computational thinking has applications both across and beyond the school curriculum. There are four key techniques to computational thinking: Abstraction - focusing on the important information only, ignoring irrelevant details Algorithms - developing a step-by-step solution to the problem Decomposition - breaking down the problem into smaller, more manageable parts Logic - looking for similarities among and within problems Learning to program is one of the best ways to develop computational thinking, as it uses each one of these techniques. My intention here is to show an example of a lesson in which computational thinking is taught at Key Stage 1 (5 to 7 years) through programming. I took the lesson plan (attached above) from The Barefoot Computing Project and I taught it to my 1st grade class last week.  It required the children to work in pairs to create step-by-step instructions through pictures.  The pairs then swapped each other's instructions, which they used to draw the 'crazy character' that the other child had in mind."

"If you would like to capture and record the screen of an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, you can easily do so thanks to QuickTime, the video app that comes with every Mac. This offers a simple solution for recording the screen of an iOS device for demos, presentations, tutorials, and much more, and it's remarkably simple to use. To get started capturing a video of an iPhone or iPad screen with QuickTime, you'll need a USB cable, and want to be running a modern version of OS X on the Mac, and a modern version of iOS on the iPhone or iPad. Specific requirements and an alternative approach for older versions are discussed further below. But since most users already have all that is necessary on their Mac and iPhones right now, let's jump right into recording the devices screen."

"The term design thinking gets bandied around a lot these days, but what does it really mean? For many people, it can almost seem meaningless, a buzzword that helps mystify meaning rather than help sharpen it. Ironically, that's the opposite of what design thinking should be. Design thinking is about simplicity in the middle of chaos. It's about creating as much value as possible for your customers. It's about serving your users in an intelligent and empathetic method. Most importantly, it's the idea that innovation has a structure and a rhythm to it, a discipline that can be managed to deliver great results for every stakeholder involved. Creating new solutions to enduring problems can be difficult, especially if you don't know where to start. Design thinking gives you the tools and processes you need to focus your efforts where they will add the most value."

"Teaching kids to code is arguably as important to today's youth as numeracy and literacy. In many ways code is numeracy and literacy. More so, it is also a way of looking at problems, breaking them down, thinking about solutions and being creative. From an industry standpoint, there will be more jobs than coders in the next few years and I expect to see a Chief Robotics Officer position any day now. By now many have heard of the Hour of Code movement. It has become an annual event during Computer Science Education Week in an effort to introduce a new skill set to people of all ages. But what exactly is coding?"

"Design thinking is a powerful tool to really get your students thinking about and tackling a problem or topic at a much deeper level. It is a structured task that focuses on giving considerable time to thinking about and empathising with the people within the situation (Target audience or client), designing and prototyping a possible solution that is immediately challenged in order to improve it. It is used much in business and the design industry but can be used as a general classroom task within any subject area. It also gets students to work quickly without much introduction."

""The best camera, is the one you have with you." Chase Jarvis It's a classic photographic mantra, a call to action for image-makers everywhere. And these days, the camera you are most likely to have with you is the one embedded in your smart phone. But do you know how to use it? What about your students? There are many great features built into our mobile devices for photography, and a myriad of apps to produce exciting visual imagery. While some teachers and students are experienced users creating highly original work using complex workflows and inventive techniques, in my workshops I am constantly amazed that it's some of the most basic tips and tricks that get the most cheers, the practical solutions that are big wins for our classroom context. So, here are six foundational tools built into the iPhone and iPad camera that all teachers and students should know."

" In our hyper-connected, 24/7 world, many of us are losing sleep - literally. Our own survey of more than 180 business leaders found that four out of 10 (43%) say they do not get enough sleep at least four nights a week. Such sleep deficiencies can undermine important forms of leadership behavior and eventually hurt financial performance. This article will explore the link between sleep and leadership before discussing solutions that can improve both individual well-being and organizational efficiency and effectiveness."

The difficulty with creativity is it is not easy and perhaps thanks to our experience of schooling not a natural attribute of many adults. What creativity needs is a process and/or a structure that allows us to bring our intellect to the development of creative solutions.