Marie-Laurence Caron-Fasan, Grenoble IAE Graduate School of Management and Guy Parmentier, Grenoble IAE Graduate School of Management
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In response to the growing need for innovation in businesses and society at large, the socio-economic world is rediscovering the value of creativity. In fact, the World Economic Forum, in its report on human capital, ranks it among the skills that will be most in demand in the future.
Upon reading these opening lines, many of us may have doubts, thinking to ourselves, “Yes, but that’s just it—I’m not creative!” This is a misconception—and, unfortunately, one that’s far too common! Every individual possesses creative abilities to a greater or lesser degree, as Gérard Puccio’s work demonstrates.
We all have our preferences, but there are no uncreative individuals, contrary to what is sometimes suggested or believed. Everyone can, at one time or another, apply skills or develop attitudes that are useful for individual—and, above all, collective—creativity.
As university professors, we strive to convey this message to our undergraduate and graduate students. However, we have observed that they often do not allow themselves to step outside their usual patterns of thinking.
Furthermore, they tend to stop their research as soon as one or two ideas take shape. Yet, as Linus Pauling, a two-time Nobel laureate in chemistry, said: “The best way to get a good idea is to have lots of ideas!”
So how can we help our students develop this potential and, above all, build their self-confidence? Given that creativity is learned through practice: the more a student practices generating ideas, the more high-quality ideas they will generate in the future (Baruah and Paulus, 2008).
A Creative Toolkit
For a year, our group of faculty members from a variety of academic disciplines (management and innovation support, design, information and communication, modern literature, and linguistics) sought to identify mechanisms that could encourage students to generate a large number of creative ideas.
This work led to the development of a game in the form of a toolkit. According to Hélène Michel, games have great potential as educational tools, and gamification makes the creative process accessible to non-experts.
Called “The Upside-Down Bus,” this game encourages players to consider a given situation from multiple perspectives, to come up with a wide range of solutions to a single problem, to think outside the box, and to draw connections between seemingly unrelated elements.
Consisting of eight types of cards, this 48-card deck allows students, on the one hand, to transfer information from one field to another to find connections and, on the other hand, to shift their perspective and think in reverse.
The diversity of the cards multiplies the ways of thinking—whether written, visual (through concrete or abstract images), conceptual, narrative, or argumentative. The game allows players to flexibly engage various intellectual mechanisms—combinatorial, exploratory, associative, or disruptive.
Think Outside the Box
"The Upside-Down Bus" thus offers a variety of ways to explore the issue by varying the ways in which participants are engaged, as illustrated by the example below.
The problem to be solved is this: How can we encourage 12- to 16-year-olds to visit museums and art exhibitions?
If the teacher wants to generate a lot of ideas using matching activities, they can start with the “five senses” card type, which is based on the five human senses (smell, taste, touch, hearing, and sight)
Let's say the participant draws the "spicy" card.
- First step: Let yourself be swept away by the sensations and express the feelings evoked by the word “spicy.” Naturally and effortlessly, the following words may come to mind: tangy, burning, a journey to the East, chili, peppery, exotic, red…
- Second step: Link one or more of the listed feelings to the problem you need to solve.
This leads to the following ideas: we should make the visit more “fun” by spicing it up with puzzles, pique the young visitors’ curiosity with stories to complete based on the paintings on display, and choose the most intriguing work of art…
If the teacher wants to encourage students to think from a different perspective and change their point of view, they can start with the “360°” map.
Let's imagine that the participant draws the card that says “radically different from when.”
- First tip: Take the new time constraints into account—before school, when I don’t have time, after the visit, before the visit, whenever I want, in ten installments with no extra charges…
- Second step: Turn the stated constraints into new ideas for solving the problem.
This is why we’re considering split tours with a single ticket, remote storytelling tours, and even sports tours combined with gym classes…
Play and Learning
We have tested the various “upside-down bus” cards in our classes, during creative workshops, and in creativity sessions. The cards that students found easiest to use were those based on the five senses and the VIP cards, with participants showing a preference for the latter. The VIP cards ask participants to shift their perspective by stepping into the world of a well-known person. The visual cards, which are used to construct a story—whether real or imaginary—also have strong evocative potential for generating ideas. On the other hand, abstract visual cards remain difficult to use and require significant guidance from the teacher or facilitator leading the creativity session.
Ultimately, the game “The Upside-Down Bus” is very effective at generating ideas (sometimes disruptive, but not always), even though it requires some effort on the part of the teacher and the participants in the creative session to get the hang of it.
In this sense, this game aligns with research on gamification, which shows that play is important and an integral part of the learning process. Through play, it is easier to learn and acquire knowledge, particularly that related to the mechanisms of creativity (Michel, 2017).
Educational Innovations
"Le Bus à l’envers" is thus part of the movement toward gamification in education. Among the existing games are the card game “Ludostorming,” developed at ESC Chambéry as part of the Serious Lab for Innovation project, and “Tech it,” developed at Grenoble Ecole de Management as part of the IRT Nanoelec project.
Beyond board games, the gamification of higher education also involves the implementation of innovative teaching methods that place play and creativity at the heart of the learning process. The Promising teacher training program has sparked numerous pedagogical innovations, such as “La Bête du Gevaudan,” which combines participatory theater and creative storytelling to teach English, and “Be Human in the Chaos, ” an indoor game designed to help students learn how to manage workplace relationships.
Thus, through play, it is easier to adopt different perspectives and embrace innovative ways of thinking (Brown, 2008). It is also easier to actively engage students in their learning processes (Dehaene, 2018) and thereby create a climate of trust.
The game “The Upside-Down Bus” was designed by Marie-Laurence Caron-Fasan, Marie-Claire Greiner, Jean-François Hugues, Guy Parmentier, Céline Péréa, Bruno Poyard, and Morgane Roche, with material and financial support from Promising and with the support of the game publisher Kaperly.
Marie-Laurence Caron-Fasan, University Professor of Management Sciences, Grenoble IAE Graduate School of Management and Guy Parmentier, Senior Lecturer (HDR) at Grenoble IAE, Grenoble IAE Graduate School of Management
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