The use of inquiry-based questions with the treatment groups and their eventual success with
the challenge supports the findings of Ge and Land (2003) that questioning can serve as a
scaffold to support students through ill-structured problems. The questioning also served to
direct the treatment groups to important information that they might have missed (Osman and
Hannafin 1994; Wong 1985). We also found that the questioning scaffolds were greatly
assisted by the use of the Weebles. This dynamic scaffold may have served to further engage
students and assist them in making connections despite their lack of prior knowledge (Ge and
Land 2004). The inquiry questioning also served as the cueing mechanism for the facilitator to
744 Res Sci Educ (2015) 45:727–748
assist students in turning their mini-c creative ideas into little-c creative products that appropriately
responded to the task (Beghetto 2007). One possible reason for the treatment group’s
success may have been that the scaffolds, both inquiry-based questioning and the Weebles,
served to ease the cognitive demands associated with the task, which may, in turn, have
allowed for more creative (i.e., novel and appropriate) solutions to emerge.
The purpose of case study is to produce analytical generalization by using previously
developed theory as a model to compare with the empirical results of the case study (Yin
2009). As such, the results provide meaningful insights that inform broader understandings of
the constructs studied and are not meant to be generalized in the same manner as larger scale
studies. While the small sample size of the study could be viewed as a limitation, the case
study design allowed for an in-depth look at each group, including the differential rates at
which the case study groups proceeded through the Build-A-Buoy Challenge and the various
creative products demonstrated. This study adds to the literature by targeting explicit ways to
increase creativity within the classroom. Conceptualizing creativity within levels of magnitude
makes it possible for teachers to envision creative work within their daily classroom experiences.
The framework of Beghetto (2007) for translating mini-c creative ideas into little-c
creative products allows for a practical guide to facilitating creativity within the classroom.
Using inquiry-based questioning strategies with ill-structured tasks may assist teachers in
scaffolding student success, both in terms of solving the task as well as cueing students toward
translating their creative ideas into creative products.