“They have always Supported my Choices.” Creative Catalysts in University Students’ Learning Environments

Abstract

The aim of this comparative study is to discover and describe the most important learning environment catalysts of Estonian and Finnish university students that have or now contribute to the development of their artistic giftedness and their creative products or presentations.The purpose of this study is to determine which are the most effective and valuable learning experiences and learning environments according to students’ own experiences. In the learning environment, we focus on Gagné’s (2003) environmental catalysts of the DMGT model and Piirto's (2002) pyramid of talent development and its environmental suns: home, school, culture, community, hobbies, gender and chance.The approach of this research was qualitative and the research method used was a qualitative content analysis. The data was collected from the writings of Estonian (59) and Finnish (56) university students.The results of the analysis of students’ self-evaluations give relevant information that shows that different catalysts in a learning environment have an important role in the development of giftedness and encouragement of creativity. In addition to the home and school environments, cultural communities and informal learning opportunities were essential for the development of their giftedness. There were more similarities than differences found between the students from the two neighbour countries.When developing effective learning methods and the education of children it is essential to focus on both formal and informal aspects and all the environmental catalysts which may be connected to intrinsic motivation and the development of giftedness and creativity.