What can research tell us about creativity in 3- to 5-year-old children? This chapter reviews the last 50 years of research to address this question. Several themes emerge. First, creativity has been notoriously difficult to define and measure, and is often studied in the context of children’s play and temperament. Second, the methods for studying creativity have been limited – largely relying on divergent-thinking measures. Third, there is interest in interventions that aim to foster creativity in young children. While the field has amassed a lot of data, strong studies are hard to find. Here, we boldly suggest that it is time to move beyond the traditional literature. Looking at more narrowly construed fields like curiosity, exploration, and innovation can offer a toehold into a better understanding of this broad field and holds the promise of helping researchers develop a more coherent model of how creativity plays out in the lives of young children.

Children’s museums attract millions of families every year, providing opportunities for learning through play and for developing children’s creativity. Many of these museums actively collaborate with local communities, educators, and researchers to help improve the experiences of visitors. What makes such informal learning environments unique is how the facilitators, and the exhibits themselves, are mostly designed to provide children with an experience of guided discovery. Children actively engage with the exhibits by tinkering with materials and testing hypotheses about what will happen next, and develop creativity by interpreting novel experiences and solving discovered problems. Some museums go so far as to develop curricula and programs that explicitly promote the creativity of children. Collaborations with academic researchers influence approaches to encouraging creativity, while also evaluating the impacts of museum exhibits and programs.