Developing Creativity in the Higher Education on the Relationship between Community Art and Whole Child Approach

Abstract

Under the umbrella of the VUCA-world and growing international competition creativity plays a more important role in higher education. In this context, divergent thinking, fluency, flexibility, problem-sensitiveness and originality are key factors for work, life, and literacy. In the first part of the article we will discuss the philosophical phenomena of this process, which comes from John Dewey’s ’learning by doing’ principle. In fact, rethinking higher education comes to the front in the 21st century, changing teaching education in order to develop creativity with various innovative ways. In the second part of the article Visual Arts, especially Community Art, will be in focus. This promotes communication, collaboration, critical thinking and problem-solving, creativity and innovation, especially project-based learning via Totem Project, which was implemented at J. Selye University from November to December 2022. The aim of the project was community building and creativity development. Building a community is based on collaboration amongst students and teachers (the project had 50 members in total and consisted of 100 working hours) in order to develop creativity, team-building, and collaborative professionalism via sharing aims and expectations, building community and trust, respect and listening. The Totem Project started to map prior knowledge on community in order to develop engagement and creativity at three levels: individual, team, and organizational levels. Finally, at the end of the paper, conclusions will underline some open dilemmas and questions.