Creative Thinking as a Predictor of Teacher Effectiveness in Higher Education

Abstract ABSTRACT: Creative thinking, defined as the quantity and quality of ideational fluency, was investigated as a predictor of teacher effectiveness in 58 college-level instructors. The correlation between creative thinking and teacher effectiveness defined as real-life problem solving was r = .64, p < .0001. The absence of a relation between creative thinking and student evaluations was attributed to the fact that student evaluations did not include their opinion of their teachers' creativity. The findings suggest the potential benefits in sponsoring pre-service and in-service workshops to enhance teachers' creative thinking ability and including creativity in the evaluations of faculty.