TABLE 2.

A list of extended, simplified CREATE applications. Using the CREATE pedagogy and its principles, innovations in application are numerous. This list is not meant to be exhaustive, but it does provide examples of mechanisms to leverage creative, critical thinking principles associated with reading and dissecting peer‐reviewed publications used as readings in science courses such as ecology and evolution. The CREATE application is a simple term to capture the concept. Instructions are one instance of the many mechanisms to communicate the application to students, and the teaching strategies column provides suggested approaches to apply a given tool in ecology and evolution lectures. All of these tools are variations on the initial pedagogy proposed and subsequent examples published describing its success including the most example published here in Ecology and Evolution. For instance, concept maps are commonly used in CREATE courses, but this tool can be explored by students and instructors in other formats such as Venn diagrams or flowcharts. Cartoon summaries are also common, but herein, this tool is advanced by proposing that a selected, common theme such as humor will resonate with students and further engagement

Example	CREATE application	Instructions	Teaching strategies
1	New title and abstract	Write a catchy, compelling alternative title to the reading and a very short 250 word abstract in your own words	Redact sections of paper, collectively ideate, encourage risk and catchy alternatives
2	Concept map	Draw a Venn diagram, flowchart, or any type of visual that summarizes how the big ideas from the reading connect to one another	Provide an example from your discipline or recent paper concept mapped out that you or your team have grappled with, or provide a conventional concept map for the reading and task students with transforming to Venn diagram or flowchart
3	Cartoon summary	Draw a fun cartoon summarizing the reading, infographics are also powerful heuristics and synthesis summary tools of salient points, choose a theme	Numerous resources online for inspiration including https://phdcomics.com/ or xkcd.com and infographics are common in ecology, evolution, and the environmental sciences, if needed, many ten simple rules papers describing effective scientific communication principles
4	Novel questions	A good reading or paper should generate as many new questions as the ones it answers, list a few for the reading	Ideate collectively, discuss a typology for scientific questions
5	Made‐up data and predictive plotting	Sketch a plot of data or relationship you would like to see supporting the main idea or hypothesis proposed in paper	Discuss illustrative data and ideal scenarios as a starting point for support for hypotheses, sketch out specific predictions as stepping stones to support
6	Experimental cartoon	Sketch the experiment, schematic of methods described in paper	Provide a sketch of the methods of a paper, how the work was done, not the outcomes
7	Visual workflow	Propose a next experiment to a paper as a simple workflow with logical steps connecting one another	Query visual workflows online and explore images that inspire and link to the specific topic
8	Pros‐cons table	Make a short table summarizing the strengths and weaknesses of a paper	Apply this approach to methods, results, and implications, encourage the view that there is no perfect experiment and reminders learners that science is a process
9	Figure‐legend improv	Provide a figure legend for data visualization from a paper, redacted or provided	Provide only the figure, curate a small collection of examples for the topic, provide actual figure legends post hoc and discuss consilience
10	Best‐sentence competition	From a paper, select a single sentence that resonated with a reader or was novel and profound as a next step for the discipline	Provide examples of sentences that shifted your view on a topic from papers, it can be funny, honest, transparent, transformative, profound, incorrect, or an implication
11	Shark tank	Run a debate or shark tank of a published paper, use a weighted Likert Scale list of evidence from a paper	Split readers into groups, assign them to rank evidence on a Likert Scale in the strengths and weaknesses, consider a brief debate or tallying of scores to informally rank papers that would successfully secure funding for a next experiment
12	KISS principle	Keep it simple scientists, propose a simple, one‐factor, multilevel follow‐up experiment to confirm or replicate a key finding from a paper	Science needs replication, including ecology and evolution, identify a main finding, then get creative and design simple experiments that can replicate the key finding