Background information to help K-12 teachers use objects found in the Smithsonian Institution or in other museums to stimulate students' creative thinking is provided. To encourage creative thinking, teachers must provide students with divergent problems, i.e., problems that are expansive, allow for a variety of responses, and have no fixed answers. Teachers must cultivate a classroom environment that encourages creativity. The understanding must be developed among students that there are times when free thinking is appropriate. The creative climate fosters an openness and respect for unusual questions and ideas, an understanding that all ideas have value, and an opportunity to learn and perform without constant threat of evaluation. Almost any museum object--from an ordinary light bulb to an African tribal mask--can be used in divergent activities. Slides and/or reproductions may serve as substitutes for the actual object. Divergent activities using museum objects can help students develop many kinds of thinking, including thinking that is fluent, flexible, original, and elaborative. (RM)