Thecreativecollectionece

Threads are a passage to understanding the experience of creativity in The Creative Collection.

Whilst there are many threads for thinking about creativity, we have identified 5 as a starting point for practice, including enjoying.

Has this piqued interest? You can find the full insight on our website via the link in our bio.

We are so delighted to be heading to Newcastle- who might join us to have an immersive day exploring the value of creativity through arts practice?

Creativity isn’t an “extra” - it’s essential.

BOOK NOW - crowdcatcher.com/e/ignite-creativity-2026-tickets-gCsiWo93vH

Join us in Newcastle for Ignite Creativity… Artful Teaching for Young Minds, a hands-on professional learning experience designed especially for Early Childhood Education and Care professionals.

🗓 Saturday 16th May 2026
📍 Wallsend Diggers, 5 Tyrrell St, Wallsend NSW 2287
⏰ 8:30am arrival | 9am–3pm
💲 $175 per person or $1,200 for a table of 8.

Featuring guest presenter Kirsty Liljegren, co-author of The Creative Collection, respected Educator and mentor. Kirsty is widely recognised for her work supporting Educators to move beyond product-driven art activities and instead foster meaningful, open-ended creative experiences that honour children’s voice, curiosity and capability.

✔ Clay & Wire workshop
✔ Practical, inspiring strategies
✔ Morning tea & light lunch included

Walk away refreshed, inspired, and ready to create meaningful art experiences with children.

Newcastle Community Preschool Thecreativecollectionece

CLAY MANUAL, REGGIO CHILDREN | NOW AVAILABLE ON THE REAIE BOOKSHOP! 📕

TAKE 2! Pre-sale completely sold out, but we are so excited to share this new release from Reggio Children ✨

A beautiful, thought-provoking manual exploring the language of clay through the eyes and experiences of children and educators in Reggio Emilia.

Even more special? We’re the only Australian bookshop stocking this incredible clay resource - an inspiring blend of practice, creativity, and pedagogy.

A must-have for anyone passionate about learning, making, and the expressive power of materials 🤍

Purchase here: https://reggioaustralia.org.au/shop/clay-manual

We’re excited to offer a range of opportunities to think together in the coming months, will you join us?

We are so drawn to the experiences made visible in this video here at Nido Scuola Jacarandà

Open-ended materials hold a certain openness about them.
Inclusive. Suggestive. Full of possibility.

At The Creative Collection, we think of materials as companions in the learning process
meeting children in relationship, offering cues, textures, tensions, invitations.

A cylinder hints at rolling.
A surface offers resistance.
A collection invites connection.

Children take up these invitations in their own ways
testing, revisiting, refining.
Ideas begin to gather momentum
about movement, weight, rhythm, collaboration.

And alongside this, the teacher listens with curiosity.

Staying in dialogue with what is unfolding.
Attentive to the nuance of children’s actions
to the theories forming through repetition and variation
to the possibilities within the materials themselves.

There is a kind of pedagogical attentiveness here
where materials, children, and educator are in constant exchange.

A shift in placement
an introduction of a new element
a pause that allows an idea to linger a little longer

All of this shapes the inquiry.

Playful inquiring lives in this relational space
where materials suggest, children respond,
and teachers listen closely in order to have a sense of how to sustain the thinking.

Such an important message from Sir Ken Robinson- creating space for the possible!

“You can be creative at anything.” In this clip, Sir Ken Robinson reminds us that creativity isn’t limited to the arts - it’s a feature of human intelligence. It’s not about how creative are you, but rather: how are you creative? Creativity isn’t a rare gift. It’s a capacity we all share.