21st century inventive thinking skills among primary students in Malaysia and Brunei

Abstract

Our current 21st century workplace requires workers to master the skills that are essential in a knowledge-based society as well as the new skills necessary to move beyond the information age into the conceptual age. Therefore, in order to succeed in this present economic scenario, students need to be equipped with digital age proficiencies. Analysis of current literature on this issue revealed that elements of the 21st century learning outcomes are the skills, knowledge and expertise students should master to succeed in work and later in life within the compound of the 21st century environment. As a social agent, educational systems of every nation need to transform their objectives, curriculum, pedagogies, and as well as assessments to help the younger generation achieve the outcomes required for a prosperous, attractive lifestyle based on effective contributions in work and citizenship. Essentially, the main purposes of this study are to profile the inventive thinking skills among primary school students in Malaysia and Brunei and to compare the inventive thinking skills among the students with regards to gender. The dimension of inventive thinking skills comprised of adaptability and managing complexity, self direction, curiosity, creativity, risk taking and higher order thinking and sound reasoning. This study, which employed cross sectional survey method, involved 1037 Primary school students from both countries. The results of the findings revealed that there are statistically significant differences in student's inventive thinking skills from both countries in term of gender.