Enhancing Creative Thinking Through Coding: Preliminary Evidence from an Experimental Study in Primary and Lower-Secondary Education

Coding and educational robotics are increasingly promoted in schools as catalysts for creative thinking, yet recent reviews suggest that this link is not automatic and depends critically on pedagogical design. Empirical evidence from Italian compulsory education remains scarce. We report preliminary findings from the Coding&Learning project, a quasiexperimental study involving 291 enrolled students (138 primary, 153 lower secondary) and 23 trainers across four Italian schools. Verbal divergent thinking was assessed preand post-intervention with the Divergent Association Task (DAT); complete pre–post data were available for 217 students. All four groups improved between pre- and post-test, and within-group gains were statistically significant in both experimental groups (primary: +3.27 points, p = 0.031; lower-secondary: +2.61 points, p = 0.007) and in the lower secondary control group. When experimental and control classes were compared directly—through gain-score t-tests and ANCOVA controlling for pre-test—the between-condition differences did not reach significance, and effect sizes were small (primary g = 0.18; lower-secondary g ≈ 0), as is not unexpected for a brief, statistically underpowered preliminary study. At the primary level, a larger share of experimental students improved (66.7% vs. 52.3%). Trainers reported coherent perceived gains in dispositions adjacent to verbal divergent thinking. Findings are specific to verbal divergent thinking and should not be generalised to creativity as a broader construct.