Contribution: This study represents the first systematic attempt to develop Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics (STEAM) integrated project-based learning (PBL) as a transdisciplinary teaching method for fostering students’ creativity and computational thinking (CT) skills. Background: With the growing importance of creativity and CT skills in the modern world, there is a need for innovative teaching methods that can effectively nurture these abilities in students. This study explores the potential of integrating STEAM into PBL as a transdisciplinary teaching approach to address this need. Intended Outcomes: The outcomes of this approach include significant improvements in various dimensions of students’ creativity (fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration) and enhanced CT skills, particularly in medium and hard tasks. Application Design: The study involved 54 junior high school seventh-graders, with 28 students in the experimental group and 26 students in the comparison group. The experimental group was exposed to a semester of STEAM PBL, while the comparison group followed the regular curriculum. Findings: After a semester of STEAM PBL, the experimental group demonstrated significant improvements in creativity dimensions, while the comparison group showed no significant changes. In terms of CT skills, the experimental group exhibited significant improvements in medium and hard tasks, whereas the comparison group did not. These results highlight the potential benefits of integrating STEAM into PBL as a transdisciplinary teaching approach for enhancing students’ creativity and CT skills. The implications for educational practice and future research are discussed in depth.

The nurturing of a student’s core competencies and creativity has been promoted and prioritized as one of the main axes in education worldwide, which has also been emphasized in Taiwan’s new curriculum guidelines. This study aims to develop a new creative teaching and learning approach—“Self-designed Board Games” (SdBG), in which the students work in groups to design and play their self-designed board games in high school citizenship studies. The study further investigates the impact of SdBG on the students’ citizenship competencies and creativity. A quasi-experimental design was employed throughout one semester; 76 high school students were randomly assigned to either the experimental group (SdBG) or the comparison group (traditional lecturing teaching). The experimental group was asked to develop board games based on their interests and the learning contents of the 18- week semester. Later, all of the experimental group students played the board games developed by themselves and other fellow students. The main findings are as follows: (a) Citizenship competencies: the experimental group experienced a significant improvement in citizenship competencies, whereas no significant difference was found in the control group. (b) Creativity: the experimental group witnessed great improvements in all four facets of creativity, including fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration, whereas the control group experienced significant regression in all four facets in the pretest and post-test. To our knowledge, this is the first study that creates a so-called “Playful Space”, enabling students to play their self-designed board games and simultaneously investigates its impact on citizenship competencies and creativity. Evidence revealed that the SdBG is an effective approach in Citizenship studies, which offers the warrant for the study to make theoretical and practical contributions to the field and knowledge.