1st Edition

Practice Problems for Creative Problem Solving Grades 3-8

By Donald J. Treffinger Copyright 2000
    78 Pages
    by Prufrock Press

    This book includes 50 situations that present interesting opportunities and challenges to stimulate students' creative and critical thinking. The brief, practical, everyday situations provide motivating starting points for practicing Creative Problem Solving with groups of many ages.

    These problems were designed to represent a variety of different tasks or challenges in an open-ended, invitational format that we describe informally as a "Messy Situation." These Messy Situations, like many of life's everyday opportunities and challenges, take a variety of forms, sizes, and shapes. They might concern a variety of situations in which people find themselves day in and day out. Thus, some of the Messy Situations in this book are people tasks (that is, situations involving the interactions or relationships among people). Others are planning tasks (that is, concerning more effective ways of organizing or managing a situation), and yet others are product tasks (that is, challenges that call for designing, inventing, or producing a new product of some kind).

    Each of these one-page problems can help students learn and apply CPS components, stages, and tools in an engaging and enjoyable way. Choose the problems that are best suited to your group's interests and needs. The challenges in Practice Problems for Creative Problem Solving and several helpful worksheets are reproducible for classroom use.

    Grades 3-8

    List of Figures Acknowledgements Section I: Introduction Section II: How to Use the CPS Practice Problems Important Group Roles When Applying CPS Supplementary Pages Some Specific “Tips” After Practicing CPS: What Comes Next? Section III: The CPS Practice Problems Always Starting Baby-Sitting Brats Bored Bowling Broken Egg Bus Ride Business Sense But I Didn’t Chew Stop Chores Food, Food, Food Fort Gone Fishing Gourmet Hockey Sticks Homesick Homework Helper Jars Keep It Cool Leaves Messy Lockers A MONOPOLY® More $$$ New Bike New Club New Games New Holidays Nursery Rhymes Old Toys Paint Paper Party! Pet Exerciser Playground The Popular Vote Privacy! Responsible Sitcom Sleepy Smoke Out Snow Something Special Super Popular Toy Time Conflict TV Executive Twins Uniquely You! We’re Musical! Will it Fly? The Winner References

    Biography

    Donald J. Treffinger, Ph.D., was the president of the Center for Creative Learning in Sarasota, FL. He earned a master's degree and a doctoral degree in educational psychology from Cornell University. Treffinger previously has been a member of the faculty at Purdue University, the University of Kansas, and Buffalo State College. He now is a member of the Gifted Child Quarterly Advisory Board and has served as editor of that journal and as editor-in-chief of Parenting for High Potential, NAGC's quarterly magazine for parents.

    Treffinger is the author of more than 350 articles, chapters, and books. He has written and conducted research on the nature, assessment, and nurture of creativity and Creative Problem Solving, as well as problem-solving styles, gifted education, and talent development. He has given presentations and workshops worldwide, and served as a consultant to numerous local, state, national, and international organizations. He has received the Distinguished Service Award and the E. Paul Torrance Creativity Award from the National Association for Gifted Children, the Creativity Research Award from the World Council on the Gifted and Talented, and the Risorgimenti Creativity Award from the Destination ImagiNation program.