A Need Analysis on Development of Creative Thinking Skills: A Phenomenological Study

Creative thinking Teaching EFL Perceptions of teachers This study adopts a qualitative research design aiming at investigating the perceptions of English language teachers about creative thinking skills in their courses. Six teachers working at the School of Foreign Languages at a state university participated in this study. They had similar educational backgrounds and different years of experience. In terms of teaching English, participants were interviewed in-depth about the conceptualization of creative thinking skills. The purpose of the study was to identify teachers’ perspectives and their ways of implementing sub-dimensions of creative thinking in both face-to-face and online lessons. Semi-structured interview questions were used to collect data in the study and the data were analysed through content analysis method using NVivo 12. The findings of the research are grouped under the following headings: Barriers to Creating a Thinking Class Environment, Existing Supporters, and Defining the Concept. Results revealed that the teachers have defined the ability to think creatively considering the basic perception they had about the concept which is mainly creating new products. It is also understood that they evaluated the concept and associated the sub-dimensions accordingly. It can be inferred that a deeper understanding and well-organized teaching of creative thinking skills are required to be blended into the foreign language education. Article Info: Received Accepted Published : 24-08-2021 : 26-05-2022 : 18-06-2022


Introduction
The emphasis on the "system or technology" in the design of teaching is used in the sense that refers to a set of rules and the educational integration of these rules. The system encompasses 2 many sensitive elements related to learning: from learning outcomes analysis to communication, testing, and evaluation of the taught materials. Generally, educators who want to be acknowledged with technology in their own research areas are concerned with all these aspects. Instructional design, which includes creative thinking, continues to be a neglected field of research due to its inclusion of many sub-skills in foreign language education like other fields. Especially measuring and evaluating creative thinking are seen as challenging. On the grounds of its complex nature and the difficulty of measuring and evaluating it empirically, researchers consider that creative thinking is only suitable for advanced and/or successful students (Gürsoy & Bağ 2019;Cornelius-White, 2007). Similarly, Zohar and Dori (2003) state that the ability to think creatively is successfully applied only by students who have high levels of achievement. Jauk, Benedek, Dunst, and Neubauer (2013) emphasize the relevance of the common view that high creativity requires high intelligence. As these misconceptions continue, the change in learning environments has further increased the complexity of the subject due to the Covid 19 pandemic. This study is expected to offer an opportunity to rethink the development of creative thinking in the current chaotic order. Torrance (1965Torrance ( , 1972, who has long-established experience in creative thinking, has examined the concept by considering the verbal and modal forms that it contains. Haladyna (1997) has analysed the lower dimensions of creative thinking in terms of scientific and aesthetic perspectives. This knowledge about the dimensions of creative thinking provides certain opportunities for the integration of creative thinking into many disciplines, especially language education, and for the teaching environment that promotes thinking. However, one of the problems of in foreign language education in Turkey is focusing mainly on grammar and vocabulary teaching instead of creating an environment that enables students to participate in an active way in the teaching process required by the creative thinking environment (Kaya, Ayaz & Dundar, 2017;Solak, 2015). Today, the use of 21st-century skills and related problems have been discussed along with the teaching of four basic language skills (listening, speaking, reading, and writing) (Akyildiz & Celik, 2020;Şahin & Han, 2020). Bedir (2019) states that teacher candidates in foreign language teaching are also aware of the importance of 21stcentury skills such as creative and critical thinking, but they also recognize that they have shortcomings in the application phase of these skills. On the other hand, for language learners, it is important to think critically and creatively to communicate with people in order to improve global understanding (Gürsoy & Bağ, 2019). Furthermore, students think about creative thinking, they use it in innovative ways, or add intriguing ideas (Eragamreddy, 2013). With the aim of developing the creative abilities of students, a teacher needs to think creatively and create favourable pedagogical conditions for the enhancement of the creative mind of a student (Borodina, Sibgatullina & Gizatullina, 2019).
Creativity in the context of learning begins with the process of detecting, observing problems, hypothesizing, evaluating problems, and testing hypotheses (Yustina, Syafii & Vebrianto, 2020). For these reasons, it is important to support the creative thinking environment that supports language teaching. In this study, topics that promote and hinder the thinking atmosphere in the classroom environment were aimed to be discovered through teacher perceptions. The relevant literature provides some studies that emphasize the importance of creative thinking while learning a foreign language; however, some teachers still neglect this skill in the language acquisition process (Borodina et al., 2019;Gürsoy & Bağ, 2019;Karpova, Marcketti & Barker, 2011;Singh, Singh & Ja'afar et al. 2020). Additionally, several studies show that specific learning methods and techniques should be regulated with the aim of teaching creative thinking skills in educational contexts (Eragamreddy, 2013;Tsai, 2013;Yang, Chen & Hung, 2020). There are also studies that emphasize the need for learning environments that support creative thinking in university education (Al-Zahrani, 2015;Lin, 2016). However, it is important to determine the need for the integration of creative thinking skills while learning a foreign language. Another emphasis is put on the development of creative thinking skills of students at the university level which elaborates on the importance of turning the use of web-based or technology-based teaching tools into opportunities to develop this specific skill (Kuo, Chen & Hwang, 2014;Mohammed, Ali & Aldalan, 2020;Tabieh, Hileh & Al-Shakea, 2020). However, there is no detailed research that focuses on and explains the reasons for the complexity in this regard. Today, technology-based education is highly needed, and it is expected that this study will provide a certain level of explanation of the current gap in examining the problems that exist within the technology-based instructional design.
Since the period of this study is the Covid 19 pandemic period, teachers' perspectives on both face-to-face and online education processes have been revealed in this study. Meanwhile, it is important to consider both the use of web-based tools and the need for language learning in a way that supports creative thinking skills, especially during the online education period. Universities must always look for possible innovative ways to enrich the students' learning environment and their educational experiences. The School of Foreign Languages offers a year period of preparatory education in English for the university students, who will study in a variety of English majors. In this study, the needs for creative thinking development were determined in detail in terms of teaching English during the preparatory education. Gürsoy and Bağ (2019) identified that developing students' creative thinking skills and enhancing it with visual or auditory stimuli is significant and it can be activated through proper education. They have also emphasized that creative thinking should be a part of the curriculum of teaching English as foreign language. Furthernore, the importance of creative thinking skills is frequenlty ignored by teachers and researchers in the language acquisition process (Gürsoy & Bağ, 2019). The techniques to develop awareness about learning techniques to improve creative thinking are seen as requirements (Eragamreddy, 2013). There indeed is a need to identify existing problems in language education and to prepare a realistic basis for the discovery and use of learning techniques. Tsai (2013) states that the development of critical and creative thinking should be encouraged and for its development, an instructional design that supports critical and creative thinking skills is required at all levels of language education. According to Cesar (2013), the curriculum should be compatible with a project-based, openended, and configurative learning atmosphere. It is offered that the students should be given sufficient opportunities to explore the content and game design which may be critical for students without creativity and innovative learning experiences. According to Yang, Chen, and Hung (2020), enabling students to create content-based digital stories in the target language can help them learn to think creatively or critically. In addition, creating a creative space and environment in universities, and focusing on innovative learning environments and active teaching environments are significant factors that require the multi-teaching environments where differences are respected and creativity is appreciated (Lin, 2016).

Problems with Creative Thinking in Language Education
Supporting thinking skills at the university level is a difficult process and requires more consolidation of the units of universities (Al-Zahrani, 2015). Consequentlly, it is important for every department and university to start with a detailed needs analysis.
Besides, the need for using creative thinking skills to support university students is also related to distance education problems. Analysing studies on the technology-based development of creative thinking due to the Covid 19 pandemic reveals that it is important to use various technology-based teaching strategies that encourage students' interests, motivate them to learn better, and offer them experiences that would improve their thinking and innovation skills (Tabieh, Hileh & Al-Shakea, 2020). The advanced web-based creative thinking learning setting can be utilized by making students more likely to find a potential solution by means of different and convergent thinking processes than in their traditional classroom environment. In addition, in a web-assisted creative thinking environment, educators may have the chance to analyse the changes in students that they go through during the problem-solving process with the help of pre-and post-exam tests. It also demonstrates the effectiveness of the approach that helps students with different cognitive learning styles via individual web-based problem-solving dimensions (Mohammed, Ali & Aldalan, 2020). Kuo et al. (2014) highlight the need to enrich the learning environment in universities, emphasizing the wide availability of the mobile learning tools through accessible learning. It is seen that this need is increased by the environment because of the ongoing pandemic. This study examines the needs of the learning environment for creative thinking based on teacher perceptions in the current chaotic environment. The answers to the following questions are sought in the study: 1. What do teachers think about the needs for the development of creative thinking in a learning environment? 2. What is the definition of creative thinking for foreign language teachers?

Research Design
In this study, phenomenology as a qualitative approach has been adopted. Phenomenology, focusing on the experience means that those who experience it more specifically express their thoughts about the dimensions in which they can discuss and define facts (Asworth & Lucas, 1998). In phenomenological studies, researchers focus on a specific topic without making assumptions, while preparing the basis for further research and reflection on the existing question or problem (Moustakas, 1994).
In-depth investigation of the concepts that are problematic is dealt with the phenomenological design. Accordingly, in this study, the problem is discussed in detail on the basis of creative thinking skills and English teaching is discussed in detail. In this study, the opinions of the English language teachers who teach at the School of Foreign Languages at a state university were gathered regarding the meaning of creative thinking and the necessity of teaching it. After conducting the interviews with the teachers, detailed analyses were carried out based on their current opinions and suggestions about creative thinking skills.

Participants
This study aimed to evaluate the perceptions of the six teachers, who are working at the School of Foreign Languages in a state university, about creativity as a notion and creative thinking as a 21st-century skill. Since the education was held through distance education because of Covid-19, teachers' opinions on creative thinking in both face-to-face and online lessons have been investigated respectively. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 6 faculty members working in the same department. Participant 1; has 18 years of experience and has completed MA and Ph.D. in the English Language Teaching department. Participant 2; has 8 years of experience and has their MA degree in English Language Education. Participant 3; has 15 years of experience and has an MA degree in teaching Turkish as a foreign language. Participant 4; has 8 years of experience and has an MA degree in English Language Education. Participant 5; has 5 years of experience and has an MA degree in English Language and Literature department. Participant 6; has 8-year seniority and an MA degree in English Language and Literature. In addition, all participants carry out reading, listening, writing, speaking, and main course lessons in the preparatory classes within the School of Foreign Languages.

Instruments
In this research study, detailed information was collected by conducting in-depth interviews. Based on the literature review, 5 questions were developed in the following categories "perceptions, the definition of creative thinking by teachers, teaching and importance of creative thinking in the foreign language teaching environment, problems, and suggestions". Interview questions were prepared by a team of experts in the field of Educational Sciences. Upon gathering the opinions of different experts in the same field, necessary arrangements were carried out and a pilot interview was conducted. After the pilot interview, there was no change in the number of questions for the main study, there have only been changes in the wording of the questions. The interview questions were: 3. Do you think students can be given a creative perspective in learning a foreign language? 4. Which skills can be taught in foreign language education with creative thinking techniques? How do you feel about that? 5. What are the problems of creative thinking in language learning and what are your suggestions for these situations?

Data Collection and Analysis
The data obtained from the interviews were evaluated through the content analysis method using the NVivo 12 software. Researchers in this study had online sessions to create the code association in a virtual environment (Microsoft Teams). As a result of the discussions, light difference was detected in the codes. For example, instead of using "practical limitations of the method", "the theory-practice application boundary" has been approved to be used. "Language skills as a priority" has been changed to "a priority for developing language skills". The encoder reliability The encoder reliability equation "P (Consensus Percentage%) = [Na(Consensus) / Na(Consensus)+Nd (Disagreement)]X100" recommended by Miles and Huberman (1994) was calculated and 96% was maintained. Direct quotes were used to show teacher perceptions as they are. It is shown as "Participant 1-6" in order to convey the statements of teachers about the subject of research.

Results
The findings are presented in a two-dimension diagram: Firstly themes and related codes that explain each theme have been identified based on faculty members' perceptions and elements that support them.

Figure 1. Perceptions of Teachers on Integrating Creative Thinking Skills During Distance Education.
When the teachers' perceptions of creative thinking skills in the learning process carried out through distance education within the scope of the Covid-19 pandemic were analysed, three groups of themes emerged: (1) Barriers of Creating a Thinking Classroom Environment; (2) Existing Supporters; and (3) Defining the Concept. It has been revealed that perception of the meaning of creative thinking is the main determinant of the existing methods and limitations.

Barriers of Creating a Thinking Class Environment
Data analysis revealed that the most important result is that there are great obstacles that preventing the creation of a classroom environment that supports the development of the thinking process of learners. None of these obstacles is the need for professional development, none of the teachers have been trained in teaching or supporting creative thinking skills: Accepting the importance of creative thinking for learning English (6:12) Methods-techniques supporting online education (6:13) Supporting institution culture 3(+)/2(-):5 No, I didn't actually receive any training on this notion, I have only covered the topic referred to as 21st-century skills when I was studying for my Ph.D. (Participant,6). I didn't have any training, especially on this topic, we only talked about how we can develop creative thinking skills in our courses. English language educators, in particular, need to be trained in this subject (Participant,1) Another important finding is that more than the half of the participants state that teaching language skills are more important than developing creative thinking skills: Creative thinking skills always come second for us; language skills come first. Creative thinking skills are of course important, but our primary goal is to improve the language skills of the students, it makes no sense in case the student has not developed any language skills but he/she wants to be as creative as they want (Participant,1 In contrast, two other teachers claimed that they thought creative thinking skills were more important: Students learn better if they focus on different things ... that is, language educators may disagree, but creative thinking skills are just as important as language skills (Participant, 2).

... a student with creative thinking also succeeds in language, he succeeds in mathematics, he succeeds in his courses in the department, and he succeeds in life because he is already open to finding a solution in his/her life (Participant, 3).
Participation of students in classroom activities is an important element of creative thinking skills. Nearly all of the participant teachers stated that the students had problems with the enthusiasm to participate in the course and explained this problem with distance education, lack of vocabulary, and learners' habits and attitudes towards lessons: Unfortunately, they prefer to write down other people's opinions, they do not prefer to produce themselves, so we need to change their perspective (Participant 1).
One of the things that I have difficulty with during the distance education process is that students' participation is less than in face-to-face education. Therefore, the students are less interactive, I have been aiming to overcome this by using new tools (Participant 4).
Yes, they might not want to state their opinions, or I think they're afraid they'll get it wrong and be criticized. I sense it, and it's something I often observe. I see the lack of vocabulary as the reason for this situation (Participant 2).
All the participants stated that there are limitations of time, methodological-technical knowledge, and teachers' attitudes when it comes to using methods and techniques to support creative thinking for the development of students in classroom activities:

Existing Supporters
Believing in the importance of foreign language learning, supporting methods-techniques during the online education process, supportive institution culture codes have emerged as the supporting concepts of creative thinking. All teachers have expressed their beliefs in the importance of creative thinking for language learning: I think that it should be one of the goals of the teachers. When teaching a foreign language, we also need to contribute to them (students) in developing creative thinking skills, I think we should guide them (Participant 1).
Creative thinking will enable them to learn language faster and an issue that will also increase their motivation. This will develop faster as they produce more and more. If they acquire the ability to think creatively, they will achieve as a result (Participant 2 Since all teachers define the meaning of creative thinking skills as presenting new ideas, they believe that some of the methods and techniques they use in the classroom can support creative thinking skills. Two of them have stated that they use the inquiry technique in the course, three of them have claimed that they are using the flipped learning model in the department for creating a creative learning environment; one of them has been using Kahoot and Newsela tools to support creativity during the lessons; another participant has mentioned that the breakout rooms in Teams and group works are mainly used in lessons as well as applications and tools called Whiteboard, Quizzizz, Brightful.me to support the development of creative thinking skills. They have stated that the learners always have the opportunity to "come up with new ideas". I do group or pair-work using the Teams as a learning management system. I think it is working because we were doing "flipped learning" which means upside-down teaching. First, the students have the subject of the course offline, last year there was no such application, we had to do everything in the class, and it was not catching up. I can use a lot of applications right now. We play games using websites such as Quizziz.com, Kahoot, and Brightful.me

. I can have different tasks done because I have time for them (Participant 2).
Indirectly, yes, I'm not saying I should devote a course entirely to creative thinking, but I can direct students with questions, for example. I think Kahoot is increasing the participation of students in the course because they perceive it as a game. As for Newsela, I think it's something that can improve creative thinking more because, students have difficulty mostly in expressing themselves, especially in a foreign language, or yielding products (Participant 4).

Right now, we're actually doing flipped learning, which can actually make our job easier at some point because students can watch it on video, and then we can study these communicative skills that we just really need to focus on (Participant 3).
The collaborative environment in which teachers support one another is important for the teaching of thinking skills. Having a corporate culture with these characteristics can be seen as an advantage. Half of the teachers have stated that the corporate culture is in line with these characteristics, while two of them stated that the corporate culture is partially sufficient for this:

Perceptions of Teachers Related to Definition of the Concept
There are many sub-dimensions and indicators of creative thinking. We can also interpret these sub-dimensions in the codes of the previous themes that teachers' thoughts on meaning have a direct effect on regulating their activities in the classroom. All teachers perceive creative thinking as "generating new ideas" as a subdimension of creativity and for the two of them, creative thinking is related to "problem-solving" which is also another sub-dimension of the concept.
When I think of creative thinking, I actually think of students going beyond the usual stereotypes. So, it means creative thinking for me that they can look at themselves from a different point of view instead of accepting the ideas they see from their surroundings (Participant 3).

Discussion and Conclusion
The results of the study revealed that the teacher's perceptions about the meaning of creative thinking are significant. Teachers perceive creative thinking as a dimension of "generating new ideas", thus they interpret related problems, and deliver creativity as a concept accordingly. However, it is important that teachers recognize and implement all aspects of creative thinking. This result is also consistent with the finding that teachers need in-service training in creative thinking. Most of the teachers in the study group feel that they have not received any form of education on the teaching, and the importance of creative thinking; hence, they need in-service training for professional development. Within the framework of creative thinking, it has been stated that it may be useful for teachers to receive training in implementing creative thinking in a course design in order to provide a classroom environment for language education courses (Ali, 2019). Many methods or techniques are designed to help individuals who come up with original ideas. In any case, the awareness that comes with the techniques designed to improve creative thinking provides individuals with a number of tools they can use in exploration-related behaviours (Eragamreddy, 2013).
Another finding in the theme of "Barriers of Creating a Thinking Classroom Environment" emerged as a state of participation of students in the courses. Teachers have stated that the participation rate of the students was poor due to attitude, lack of vocabulary, or problems caused by distance education. Another finding is the limitation related to methodological and technical knowledge and skills of teachers. Teachers emphasize that there is an important need for students to increase their participation in the course by paying attention to their own speaking times and regulating the use of specific techniques. Teachers can help students achieve the best and most appropriate strategies that improve their proficiency levels (Nematollahi, Behjat & Kargar, 2017). On the other hand, they can support student participation by completing their vocabulary deficiencies. One of the most important requirements for academic progress is word acquisition. Students need to know certain vocabulary to succeed in primary skills and learn related content materials (Mehrabian & Salehi, 2019). When it comes to English vocabulary learning, the choice of learning strategy determines their achievements in English vocabulary, which affects their communication skills (Putri & Wahyuni, 2019). They can also use a variety of strategies to plan and deliver the learning materials in the best way (Putri & Wahyuni, 2019). Strategies of students' such as taking notes, practicing, analysing, summarizing, highlighting, imitating the teacher, and finding difficult words in the dictionary, can help them to develop English skills such as reading, writing, speaking, and listening (Putri & Wahyuni, 2019). These strategies are seen as beneficial to use within the classroom as they will create a classroom environment that supports the development of creative thinking skills. Creative thinking skills have a field that supports all these basic skills (Gürsoy & Bağ, 2019;Read, 2015;Tomlinson, 2015) and an interdisciplinary perspective (Dolapçıoğlu & Gürkan, 2020).
According to the findings, teachers believe in the importance of creative thinking for foreign language learning and suggest several methods in this regard; however, when compared to language skills, it is observed that the teachers are uncertain about which one to prioritize. The majority of teachers think that language skills should be taught before creative thinking skills. The most important consequence related to this finding is that teachers should be supported for the role of creative thinking skills in supporting language skills and guided about what techniques they can use to support the learning environment. Creative thinking skills are important to develop their skills based on language education as well as in all fields. Gürsoy and Bağ (2019) have concluded that students' creative thinking skills have improved with visual or auditory stimulation tools in foreign language education, and this can be achieved through the help of teachers. Similarly, teachers and researchers emphasized that the importance of creative thinking skills in the language acquisition process was ignored (Borodina et al. 2020). In their study on the creative thinking levels of preservice teachers, Borodina et al. (2020) have found that creative thinking and effective work within the framework of pedagogical activity is required for the professional development of teachers. Considering that the professional competence of a teacher or a university faculty member consists of three components (knowledge, skills, and attitudes), the need to improve the methodical aspect of the teaching process can be mentioned, since usage of various methods and technologies allows teachers to think and create creatively for their students.
As this study took place during the online education process due to the Covid 19 pandemic, it has been concluded that some existing web-based in-class activities can improve students' creative thinking skills. Applications such as breakout rooms for group work, flipped learning, web-based applications such as Newsela and Kahoot can be listed in terms of web-based tools and websites. This provides significant information in the dimension of the discovery of web tools to support creative thinking skills. There are several studies that support this conclusion. It was demonstrated that foreign language learning through smartphones is especially effective in improving the performance of university students (Klimova, 2019). Another study concluded that mobile applications may be a more effective tool in vocabulary teaching than traditional paper-pen activities (Basal, Yilmaz, Tanriverdi & Sari, 2016). These applications are important for supporting creative thinking skills. Tabieh et al. (2020) stated that both blended and flipped education improve creative thinking more than traditional methods. Mohammed et al. (2020), who found that mobile learning tools through U (ubiquitous) learning have a role to play in supporting the creative thinking skills of university students, concluded that mobile learning tools should be provided by universities. Such methods should be blended into teaching programs and information technologies and higher education ministries should be involved in this process together. Considering the preferred learning styles of students and the originality of creative thinking may suggest that students could be provided with a rich range of tasks aimed at a variety of learning styles that improve their creative thinking skills. Tsai (2013) focused on developing creative thinking by providing teachers with an investigative-driven activity to investigate facts or issues and then provide possible solutions. This can be explained in detail as in the first stage, a teacher should ask students to qualitatively observe events and interpret what they perceive. Students should then be expected to write using free writing techniques with the help of the questions posed. In doing so, it has been suggested that they will generate ideas with the free association by activating their preliminary knowledge and experience and ignoring problems such as spelling and punctuation.
In this way, it has been concluded that it can simultaneously influence the creative and critical thoughts of the students in a positive way. Similarly, Eragamreddy (2013) emphasized the need of detailed learning techniques to improve creative thinking in his study on the training of creative thinking skills. Likewise, Tsai (2013) concluded that as an educator, it is necessary to maintain the balance of instructional design, which includes both the necessary tools and learning techniques, in order to improve critical and creative thinking. In his research on the development of creative thinking skills, Cesar (2013) found that students have the opportunity to present creative ideas when they are presented with techniques that are compatible with project-based, constructive learning environments. Yang, Chen, and Hung (2020) demonstrates the positive effects of digital storytelling on both the language skills and creative thinking skills of students. Sadykova and Shelestova (2016) examined the effects of university students' creative thinking skills on foreign language learning and concluded that students are developing in terms of finding creative solutions to existing problems as well as coming up with new and original ideas. In his study in English education, which focuses on specific subjects and is taught for the purposes of teaching these subjects, Wang (2015) examined the language learning skills of university students through online forums using collaborative techniques as the sub-skill of creative thinking. According to the research, it was concluded that the students who received education in this way, were more successful in presenting new products and ideas. Such applications can be used during and after distance education to support students' thinking skills.
It can be concluded that teachers' perceptions about creative thinking skills play a prominent role that enlightens the current process and further actions. It can be referred that language teachers are mostly aware of the significance of creative thinking skills as well as obstacles that they have. Teaching of creative thinking skills to foreign language students has limitations from the perspectives of both students and teachers. Even though there are some problems related to students, they can be motivated by using different activities during lessons. Especially, considering teachers' perceptions about creative thinking revealed the necessary circumstances that enhances creativity in class activities. It can be inferred that teachers' opinions, actions and understandings foster and/or hinder creativity and creative thinking in language education.