Creativity in the Digital Forensics Curriculum
Tom Drange
1,2
, Alastair Irons
2
and Kari Drange
1
1
Noroff University College, Elvegt 2A, 4608 Kristiansand, Norway
2
University of Sunderland, St Peters Campus, Sunderland, SR6 ODD, U.K.
Keywords: Teaching Creativity, Higher Education, Digital Creativity.
Abstract: Creativity is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as "The use of imagination or original ideas to create
something". This definition is easy for students studying topics commonly recognised as creative, such as
animation, drawing, photography and design, to put in context and understand. However, when studying
topics commonly recognised as technical, such as computer science and digital forensics, it's not as easy for
students to relate to this definition. One of the affiliated universities offers bachelor programs in several
disciplines and through the first course, the university is trying to establish a common ground of studying for
all students regardless of the program they are attending. One of the modules in this first course is called
“What is Creativity?” but the digital forensic students do not seem to relate creativity to the topics contained
in their own study program, and it has been challenging to get these students to see the relationship between
creativity and the work situation they might find themselves in after they graduate. This paper will discuss
the challenges of teaching creativity to students in perceived technical programs and try to highlight the
challenges experienced from both students and staffs point of views.
1 INTRODUCTION
There is a general conception that creativity is now a
necessary part of learning outcomes in higher
education, not just as part of “artistic” subjects, but
as a general attribute expected to be included in any
higher education degree (Pollard, 2012). It has been
claimed that one of the reasons for this eager
approach to implementing creativity in education is
driven by an increased capitalism across the globe
(Craft, 2006), a view also supported by Pollard (2012)
who states that "…creativity has become central to
the effort to increase economic productivity…" Other
reasons are the fact that for instance technology is
being developed at such high rate that what we buy
today, might very well be totally outdated tomorrow
(Csikszentmihalyi, 2006) and the best diet of today
might be claimed unhealthy tomorrow
(Csikszentmihalyi, 2006). In addition, Amabile
(1988) suggest that there is a strong correlation
between creativity and innovation.
This paper will discuss the challenges
experienced when teaching creativity to Digital
Forensics students. Students in Interactive Media and
other perceived artistic study programs, of course,
find it easy to grasp the concept of creativity as they
are studying subjects that most people perceive as
creative. The situation is very different with the
Digital Forensics students and other perceived
technical study programs, who seems to fail to see the
need for creativity in the very technical industry they
will be entering after graduation. It will also consider
the reasons and explanations for this difference.
2 THE FIVE FUNDAMENTAL
INSIGHTS
The basis for the discussion in this paper will be the
five fundamental insights that Ronald A. Beghetto
and James C. Kaufman published in February 2013 in
order to help educators incorporate creativity in
academic learning (Beghetto and Kaufman, 2013).
2.1 Creativity Takes More than
Originality
In order to teach creativity, educators must know
what creativity actually is. Beghetto and Kaufman
(2013) states that there is a general agreement that
creativity is a “combination of Originality and task
Drange, T., Irons, A. and Drange, K.
Creativity in the Digital Forensics Curriculum.
DOI: 10.5220/0006294101030108
In Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Computer Supported Education (CSEDU 2017) - Volume 2, pages 103-108
ISBN: 978-989-758-240-0
Copyright © 2017 by SCITEPRESS Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved
103
appropriateness.” This definition is supported by the
National Advisory Committee on Creative and
Cultural Education, led by Professor Ken Robinson,
who provided the following definition of creativity:
Creativity is an imaginative activity fashioned so
as to produce outcomes that are both original and of
value.” (National Advisory Committee on Creative
and Cultural Education, 1999)
Plucker et al (2004) provide an interesting
definition, suggesting that creativity is “the
interaction among aptitude, process, and
environment by which an individual or group
produces a perceptible product that is both novel and
useful as defined within a social context. Others such
as Salgian et al (2103) consider that “creativity in
Computer Science is different from creativity in the
arts”.
One challenge with this is the obvious
contradiction that something must be original but at
the same time fulfil requirements to be deemed of
value or appropriate (Beghetto and Kaufman, 2013).
A more specific challenge in our case is the different
perceptions an animation artist and a digital
investigator have on the word creativity, and
therefore the different attitudes they have towards a
learning journey involving creativity. The value and
appropriateness of the learning activities and lectures
is of the utmost importance to engage both cohorts of
students, primarily make the digital forensics students
see the importance of creativity without losing the
interest from for instance interactive media students.
2.2 There are Different Levels of
Creativity
Beghetto and Kaufman (2013) describes different
levels of creativity, from everyday creativity to life-
changing creativity, and this is perhaps the first thing
that we need students to realise. Creativity does not
have to involve becoming the next Picasso or Da
Vinci, in fact, it does not have to do with art at all.
Kaufman and Beghetto (2009) divides creativity into
the four levels mini-c, little-c, Pro-C and Big-C and
describes them as:
Mini-c: interpretive creativity (for example a
Digital Forensic student discovery of how to use an
acquisition tool)
Little-c: everyday creativity (for example Digital
Forensics class doing a project that combines learning
about interpreting traffic in a network analysing tool
by collecting network traffic from the local network)
Pro-C: expert creativity (for example Digital
Forensics students creating a new tool for data
acquisition)
Big-C: legendary creativity (for example teachers
revolutionising the implementation of learning
creativity in all study programs in higher education)
Getting the Digital Forensics students to see the
relationship between what they do as forensic
investigators and interpretive and everyday creativity
is essential to get them motivated enough to
participate and engage in the creative learning.
Motivation has been shown to play a major role in
students’ willingness to learn technical subjects such
as programming (Jenkins, 2001), but it would be
equally important for us to create academic emotions
(Pekrun et al, 2002) that promote motivation among
several cohorts of students.
2.3 Context Matters
Earlier research has shown that creativity will not be
at its best when under pressure. Rewards, conditions,
competitive circumstances or personal stress
(Amabile and Pillemer, 2011) are all elements to
create pressure. Personal experience of the authors
indicates that tasks and assignments given in
educational settings are often set in order to achieve
the learning outcomes of a course. The prize, in the
end, could be a good grade, and it may also involve
criticism and social comparisons among the students.
Even so, it is possible for the students to look at
assignments and tasks from a point of view that does
incorporate their own interest and engagement,
making the assignments meaningful and joyful for
each individual student, since this is the situations
where people are most creative (Hennessey and
Amabile, 2010). This is also in line with Beghetto and
Kaufman (2013) who states that “teachers should
help students focus on the more intrinsically
motivating and personally meaningful aspects of the
work by discussing how students might incorporate
their personal interests into the tasks”.
2.4 Creativity Comes at a Cost
If you do a search on Google for creativity (Figure 1)
you will get a lot of pictures with colours and playful
images.
CSEDU 2017 - 9th International Conference on Computer Supported Education
104
Figure 1: A google search for pictures of creativity.
However, academics in a survey spanning three
countries and thirty participants claimed that they
aimed for students to go beyond their own
boundaries, taking risks and experiment (Morgan,
2012). This is also the experience one of the authors
has had undertaking a BSc program in Product
Design, where the students throughout the three years
of study were pushed outside their comfort zone by
sharing their project results for peer assessments and
critiques. The risk of having something one have
worked on and developed a personal ownership for,
be assessed, evaluated and possibly dismissed,
misunderstood and ridiculed by peers and teachers,
can be devastating to a student. This is, therefore,
something the students must be made aware of
(Beghetto and Kaufman, 2013). Getting the students
in both perceived artistic study programs and
perceived technical study programs to feel the
necessary comfort to allow themselves to step out on
a limb, take some risks and experiment, is important.
It certainly also complies with the earlier mentioned
survey, where stimulating motivation and enthusiasm
among the students so they become willing to take
risks and to know it is looked upon as positive to fail
as long as one learns from it (Morgan, 2012).
2.5 There is a Time and a Place for
Creativity
In this always available, always online world where
things happen with increased speed followed by an
increased need for “quick fixes”, governments have a
mobilised interest (McWilliam and Haukka, 2008)
and teachers perhaps feel the pressure to include
creativity in all aspects of teaching (Beghetto and
Kaufman, 2013). Even so, do we want creativity in all
situations? The authors would rather that pilots flying
us to holiday destinations follow all common
procedures for that task than trying out some new
creative moves. If something goes wrong, however,
creativity to get us safely on the ground would be
much appreciated. In addition to teaching creativity
to digital forensics students, we should also teach
them when creative solutions are appropriate,
although it is difficult to justify including more
elements in an already heavy curriculum when
professional bodies such as BCS/CSOFS do not
include standards covering creativity in their
accreditation schemes (csofs, 2016).
3 TEACHING CREATIVITY TO
DIGITAL FORENSICS
STUDENTS
The easy part in teaching creativity is to make
students in perceived artistic study programs
understand the importance of creativity. They already
perceive what they do as creative topics. The
challenging thing is to clarify for the students in
perceived technical study programs that it is equally
important for them to be creative. Creativity has in
fact been mentioned as a "necessary requirement for
United States prosperity and security" by the National
Science Foundation (Karpova et al, 2011) (Schunn et
al, 2006).
Again, there are different levels of creativity, and
it does not all have to be life-changing events or even
industry-changing events. But it does promote the
opportunity of challenging two different type of
student cohorts at different levels. In one of the
courses focusing on creativity, two cohorts of
students from an interactive media study program and
a digital forensics study program are assessed through
the same assignments:
Reflective Journal: A blog (or similar) that
describes their individual learning journey,
interaction with other students, reflective
thinking and progression.
Mind Map: Showing an understanding of
any chosen subject related to their field of
study. The Mind Map is to be presented
before fellow students (Figure 2 and 3).
Research Article: Producing a professional-
level article based on the Mind Map
This allows us to promote the motivation needed for
both cohorts of students, interactive media students
are given the opportunity to use colours and shapes to
suit their perception of creativity, and the digital
forensics students are given the opportunity to
explore things they feel are appropriate to their field
of study.
The pressure to achieve good grades, and perhaps
also being compared with the other students during
the presentation of the Mind Map (Figure 2 and 3)
will, of course, be present, but the students are
Creativity in the Digital Forensics Curriculum
105
encouraged to choose a topic of interest to maintain
motivation throughout the process.
Figure 2: Mind Map from a Digital Forensics student.
Figure 3: Mind Map from an Interactive Media student.
In another course that is also delivered to both cohorts
of students, we focus on creating an environment in
which the students feel comfortable enough to take
the necessary risks to explore things in a manner they
might not do otherwise. In groups, they are to choose
a project of their interest regardless of their study
program, and this project is carried out throughout the
whole semester. Presentations of project proposals
and work in progress are carried out at appropriate
stages in the project period, in addition to the final
result. The focus, however, is on the process along the
way. With the knowledge that one can get a good
grade in spite of a failed final result, will hopefully
create the necessary "safety net" the digital forensics
students perhaps feel they need in order to dare to take
risks and put themselves "out there". Another way of
comforting the students to believe in the projects is to
point out that even the ideas not used is an important
building block towards the end-product. When
several experiments had failed in Thomas Edison's
quest to develop a commercially viable light bulb
he is said to have claimed that “I have not failed
10,000 times. I have not failed once. I have succeeded
in proving that those 10,000 ways will not work.
When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I
will find the way that will work.” (Furr, 2011)
In another effort to expand creativity skills, a
special event was developed for the students in the
Advanced Cybersecurity module at the University of
Sunderland. They were given access to the FabLab
and the time and space to be creative and create a
Cybersecurity “artefact”. Students were given a very
open brief asking them to use their knowledge of
cybersecurity and their imagination to be as creative
as they liked. Students were given the task a week in
advance of going to the FabLab. At the FabLab
students had three hours to develop their ideas into an
artefact.
FabLab is based on the outreach project from
Center for Bits and Atoms at MIT and incorporates
the same core capabilities such as CAD tools, 3D
printers, sign cutters and laser cutting equipment
(FabLab, 2016). Students were able to work
individually or in teams and were supported by
module tutors and FabLab staff.
Students came up with a variety of creative ideas
ranging from devices to protect IT equipment
including webcam covers and locks for USB ports to
environmental control systems such as Wi-Fi
blocking signal devices. They were able to start 2-d
and 3-d drawings and use the facilities to “make”
prototypes.
Feedback from the students was mixed and almost
bi-polar in distribution. 46% of the students really
enjoyed the opportunity to be creative and be in a
different environment and make an artefact, whilst
42% didn't like the activity at all and didn't see the
point in trying to be creative and make something for
cybersecurity. The remainder were non-committal
and did not have strong opinions one way or the other.
From a teaching perspective, it was an interesting
way to introduce creativity into the cybersecurity
curriculum and the activity will be run again in the
future. However, on reflection, we should perhaps
have done more in terms of discussing creativity with
the students, given them more time to prepare their
ideas and longer in the FabLab to bring their ideas to
fruition and perhaps affect the negative attitude
towards the activity among the 42% that did not see
the point.
The fact that there is a time and a place for
creativity need to be emphasised in both the
preparations for a specific course or module and in
the assessments in these type of modules and courses.
We do not want the students to be creative in their
effort to minimise the necessary workload, so a
thorough specification as to what is expected of them
need to be included in any course descriptors and/or
assessment cover sheets.
CSEDU 2017 - 9th International Conference on Computer Supported Education
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4 CHANGES
Technology is rapidly changing in terms of both data
storage, performance, shape and form. We see
implementations of smart TVs, smart cars, smart
homes, smart cities and a whole range of other smart
devices, but for IT security and digital forensics
students these things also present themselves as new
challenges, as many of these so-called smart devices
are not smart enough to stop cyber-attacks (Gail,
2016). Different organisations are trying to
accommodate these changes by providing guidelines
for educational programs within these fields, such as
the National Security Agency (NSA, 2016) and the
National Institute of Standards and Technology
(NIST, 2016) in US, the Government
Communications Headquarters (GCHQ, 2016) in UK
and the Norwegian Agency for Quality Assurance in
Education (NOKUT, 2016) in Norway. Although
these are good initiatives, it seems that IT security and
digital forensics related education is becoming the
dog that is trying to catch its tail. When a new thing
becomes an issue, guidelines are changed, but by the
time the educational institutions have implemented
the new guidelines, the new thing is something
entirely different. So, what to do when fridges and
such are attacking us (BBC, 2016)? The authors of
this paper are sure that it will come down to the
creativity of some sort.
5 CONCLUSIONS
Both governments and academics have realised that if
we are to base how we handle challenges on what we
already know, the future tasks may well be
overwhelming (Marquis and Henderson, 2015).
Teaching creativity to digital forensics student is an
important aspect of our universities’ philosophy as
the world is changing so rapidly that the technical
expertise students train for today might not be sought
after in near future (Csikszentmihalyi, 2006). We
have to take into account that the kind of creativity
that leads to life-changing innovations is more likely
to be a result of someone putting together already
existing thoughts and inventions in a new way rather
than a completely unthought-of idea that appears out
of nothing (McWilliam, 2007), and that we are
“moving away from isolated geniuses” as Pollard
(2012) put it. We feel that teaching the digital
forensics students to see the relevance in everyday
creativity, and to acknowledge that sometimes they
need to take the risk of thinking differently about
technical challenges in order to figure out new ideas
that have value to the digital forensics community
(Pollard, 2012) and that this will be a solid
competence to have after graduating. Lessig (2005)
called it digital creativity and claimed that technology
is “changing the way we remix culture, changing the
creative potential of that culture, changing the
democratic potential of that culture, changing the
freedom to speak, by transforming the power to speak
making it different.” We feel that the only way of
teaching creativity to technical students in general,
digital forensics students in particular, is to create an
environment and learning activities where it is safe to
use the freedom and power to speak and think
different.
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