Creativity in Early Childhood

Creativity in Early Childhood

Fred (Mr.) Rogers was creative and had the ability to be original and imaginative. He possessed many creative skills such as fluency, sensitivity, use of imagination, and using self as a resource. Mr. Rogers’ fluency skill enabled him to produce many ideas to constantly reinforce children’s positive images of self-worth and reminding them that they are special individuals who are well loved (answers.com). His ever-positive yet insightful lyrics of songs such as "You Can't Go Down the Drain" and "Everybody's Fancy" showed sensitivity unaddressed by previous artists (Swift, 2009). He used puppets and guest to deal with real life events such as going to the doctor, going to school, and death. Mr. Rogers was able to get children to use their imagination with the daily journey by trolley to the "Neighborhood of Make-Believe" where he used puppets to deal with the day’s issue (answers.com). Mr. Rogers used himself as a resource. He produced children’s songs, wrote books, and was executive producer and host of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. Mister Rogers would have made an excellent early childhood teacher due to his creative ability and his ability to make children feel liked just for being themselves.

The challenge for early childhood teachers is to provide activities in a program that are developmentally appropriate and that can be integrated throughout the curriculum. Children need an environment that has natural light, balanced colors, comfortable child-sized areas, and inviting materials. Without spending large amounts of money, teachers can organize wonderful collections of resource materials that might be bought or recycled. These materials can include paper goods of all kinds; writing and drawing instruments, materials for collages, such as buttons, stones, shells, beads, and seeds; and sculpting materials, such as play dough, clay, and shaving cream. “These materials are used most productively and imaginatively by children when...