| Unit name | Creativity and Innovation |
|---|---|
| Unit code | INOVM0011 |
| Credit points | 10 |
| Level of study | M/7 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24) |
| Unit director | Dr. Beckett |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | Centre for Innovation |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
In order to develop new ideas and successfully innovate students need to be able to think creatively, imagining new products, services and service systems that enable individual’s to change how they perform the practices of daily life. However, thinking creatively without some form of overarching structure which focuses thinking and reflection is extremely difficult. Hence the central role of practices within this unit. The activities of everyday life are located in and structured by practices and the forms of ‘value’ we use in our daily lives, products and services, gain their use and meaning through their location within practices. Understanding practices therefore, is a key building block for thinking about the ‘value’ existing products and services and how innovation and creativity can transform those products, services and service systems so they generate new forms of ‘value’. By using the concept of practices to ‘frame’ or structure creative thinking, attention is focused on the current performance of practices and how those practices can be changed or transformed by innovation.
The unit aims to:
• Develop knowledge and understanding of creativity and creative thinking
• Develop the ability to think creatively both individually and in groups
• Enable students to apply creativity and creative thinking methods and tools
• Develop understanding and application of the principles for judging/evaluating creative ideas.
• Develop the knowledge and understanding of practice thinking
• Develop the ability to use creative thinking to create innovations
• Enable students to engage with and reflect on the role of creativity and creative thinking in successful innovation
On completing the unit students will be able to:
1. Define Innovation and Creativity and the links to practice thinking;
2. Discuss the links between individual, group, organisational and societal innovation and creativity and the links with practice thinking;
3. The capacity to use practice thinking to analyse existing examples of innovation and creativity;
4. An ability to use practice thinking in innovate and creative ways;
5. To differentiate between incremental, radical and disruptive forms of innovation
6. The ability to use visual literacy and articulacy to explain innovation and creative choices;
7. The capacity to reflect critically on innovation and creative development processes and the individual’s role in that process.
This will be a highly interactive unit and will consist of a combination of group work, case studies and lectures, including sessions with guest speakers.
Assessment on this unit is based on 100% course work and comprises of two elements:
1. A student lead, research based group project using practice approach to value creation and innovation. Group presentations supplemented by a group portfolio.
ILO 1, 2, 3, 4 & 5
2. An individual reflexive critique.
Individual reflection on the processes and outcomes of the group research project.
ILO 6
• The Other Side of Innovation: Solving the Execution Challenge, 2010, Govindarajan & Trimble, ISBN:978-1-4221-66963.
• 101 Activities for Teaching Creativity and Problem Solving, 2004, Van Gundy, ISBN13:9780787974022
• Getting to Innovation, 2007, Van Gundy, ISBN13:9780814408988
• THINKERTOYS – A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques, 2006, Michalko, ISBN: 1-58008-773-6
• The Dynamics of Social Practice: Everyday Life and how it Changes, 2012, Shove, Panzar & Watson ISBN:9780857020437
• The Design of Everyday Life, 2007, Shove et al., ISBN:9781845206833
