Learning how to think

One of my favourite books about education is “The Big Picture – Education is Everyone’s Business” by Dennis Littky (2004). Littky’s passion for education, developing young minds, and the kids themselves – serves to remind me again and again why I want to become a teacher. So many of his values and educational philosophies align with my own ideals of what education should be, and every time I read his words I feel energised and ready to do what I can, and learn what I can, to be the best teacher I can possibly be.

On the topic of learning, Littky succinctly sums up his thoughts – “Learning is about learning how to think” (p.9). As I pondered this statement, it occurred to me that throughout my entire schooling, the focus was upon memorizing facts, rote and repetition, and striving to get good marks in every test. There was little, if any, focus upon learning critical thinking skills. There was no real guidance on how to even apply the knowledge gained from classroom activities to real-world situations. When I compare my own schooling to Littky’s philosophy of learning, it becomes evident just how much of my own education was based upon abstract concepts that, sadly, failed to ever materialise into concrete, useable knowledge.

One of my aspirations as a future teacher is to have the ability to teach children how to view problems from multiple perspectives, to brainstorm ideas, to ask questions and find creative answers (AITSL Professional Standard 3: Plan for and implement effective teaching and learning – Australian Institute for teaching and School Leadership, 2012). In support of Littky’s statement, I believe that learning how to really think is one of the fundamental goals of education that has the potential to develop a generation of lifelong learners, proactive in their approach in seeking to know more.

The paper “When ‘Good’ is Bad” (Frangenheim, 2012) offers a number of strategies aimed at promoting thinking in learning. One of them in particular – the PMI (Plus, Minus and Interesting) strategy stood out for me as a simple but effective way to encourage lateral thinking in a junior primary context, and is a strategy that I will aim to familiarise myself with for my own professional development. A useful brainstorming tool, the PMI strategy requires students to list the positive and negative points of an idea, and their interesting observations and questions. The “Interesting” questions raised from the activity (what if…? I wonder…? It would be interesting to know…) allows students the opportunity to view an idea from multiple perspectives, ask questions, and brainstorm alternatives which may then lead to further ideas or possibilities.

What a fabulously simple strategy to encourage creative thinking? I can certainly see a use for it in my own future practice and I will be definitely adding the PMI strategy to my “teacher’s toolkit”. How I wish I could have learned skills like these in my own schooling!

For more information on Dennis Littky and his publications, visit:

http://www.bigpicture.org/dennis/

For more information on the PMI strategy for developing thinking skills, visit:

http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTED_05.htm

REFERENCES:

Littky, D. (2004). The Big Picture: Education is Everybody’s Business. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD).

Frangenheim, E. (2012). When 'good' is bad (analysis and evaluation strategies). In E. Frangenheim (Ed.) Reflections on classroom thinking strategies: practical strategies to encourage thinking in your classroom: Including reflections from other classroom teachers (pp 37-71). Loganholme, QLD.:Rodin Educational Consultancy, 2012