Achievement emotions within formative assessment

The importance of creativity at school

Abstract

Emotions are everywhere in our daily lives and school is not an exception. In this research, we are interested in achievement emotions that pupils feel during assessments. More specifically, we introduce a device designed to encourage creativity. We hypothesize that such device may favor positive emotions when compared to a “standard” device. In this study, we set up a creative (vs. standard) device to teach reading in a class of pupils from 7 to 8 years old. We measured achievement emotions felt by the pupils after the assessment of their reading skills at the end of the course. Our results reveal 1) that positive emotions are more intense than negative emotions and 2) that the creative device is related to enhanced positive emotions when compared to standard device. Results are discussed in terms of creativity theory and emotions.