A comparison of creativity of students in anthroposophical and public schools in Israel

In our research we aimed to find out whether students in anthroposophic schools in the Israeli educational system show statistically different levels of creativity compared to students in regular public schools. We assumed that students in anthroposophic schools would receive higher scores in general creativity compared to the creativity scores of public school students. We also expected to find differences on five clearly defined domains: students in anthroposophic schools were expected to demonstrate a higher level of creativity in the domains of Self/Everyday activities, Performance (encompassing writing and music) and Artistic activities, while public school students were expected to demonstrated higher levels of creativity in Mechanical/Scientific and Scholarly activities. We sampled 63 anthroposophic school students and 57 public school students to take part in the research. They completed KDOCS questionnaires to measures general and specific creativity. Results indicate that the general creativity level of antroposophic students is higher than that of public school students. Anthroposophic students achieved higher creativity scores in the domain of arts, and such differences were statistically significant. The results of the research highlight the important contribution of anthroposophic schools to the development students’ creativity. The need to strengthen creativity in public schools is also discussed.