Calling Creativity by its Name: A Qualitative Analysis of the German and Austrian School Curricula on the Use of Creativity

Over the last two decades, the importance of creativity has increased with in the educational landscape. Meanwhile, the understanding of creativity in international curricula differs significantly depending on region and school subject, with a ever, no holistic study of the German and Austrian education systems has taken place so far. The present study therefore used qualitative content analysis to examine the contextualisation of German and Austrian curricula of all school types for the subject English (n = 188) and the visual arts (n = 138). The results show that although creativity is mentioned in both fields, it is defined or contextualised only rarely and thus corresponds to the scientific standard to a limited extent. In addition, the curricula show existing misconceptions, such as the arts bias, which leads to the assumption that this lack of understanding can reinforce a limited promotion of creativity in the school context.