THINKING

AND ANALYSIS
Chapter outlines

THINKING AND ANALYSIS

1. Patterns of thought
2. Creative Thinking Skills
 By the end of this section, you will be able to:
• Identify different patterns of thought, such
as those found in Bloom’s taxonomy
LEARNING • Discuss the relationship of each thought
pattern to education
OBJECTIVES
• Define creative thinking
• Identify the value of creative thinking in
education
• Describe the impact of limitations (such as
rules) on creative thinking
1. Patterns of
thought
What Is Thought?
“We exist, and we are aware
that we exist, because we think.
Without thought or the ability
to think, we don’t exist.”
What Is Thought?
• Thinking is the mental process you use
to form associations and models of the
world. When you think, you manipulate
information to form concepts, to
engage in problem-solving, to reason,
and to make decisions.
• Thought can be described as the act of
thinking that produces thoughts, which
arise as ideas, images, sounds, or even
emotions.
“Cogito ergo sum.” = “I think, therefore I am.”
(philosopher René Descartes, French, the early 1600s)
What Are Learning Objectives?
Learning
objectives are goals that
specify what someone will
know, care about, or be able
to do as a result of a
The learning skills can be
learning experience.
divided into three main
categories or “domains”:
• Cognitive domain (what you should know),
• Affective domain (what you should care
about)
• Psychomotor domain (what you should be
able to do)
 The
Cognitive
Domain of
Learning

The New Version of Bloom’s Taxonomy

DESCRIPTIONS OF THE BLOOM’S TAXONOMY - THE COGNITIVE DOMAIN

MAIN SKILL LEVELS DESCRIPTION

When you are skilled in remembering, you can recognize or

Remembering recall knowledge you’ve already gained, and you can use it
to produce or retrieve or recite definitions, facts, and lists.

Understanding is the ability to grasp or construct meaning

Understanding from oral, written, and graphic messages.

When you apply, you use learned material (or you

Applying implement the material) in new and concrete situations.
DESCRIPTIONS OF THE BLOOM’S TAXONOMY - THE COGNITIVE DOMAIN

MAIN SKILL LEVELS DESCRIPTION

When you analyze, you have the ability to break down or

Analyzing distinguish the parts of material into its components, so that
its organizational structure may be better understood.

With skills in evaluating, you are able to judge, check, and

Evaluating even critique the value of material for a given purpose.

With skills in creating, you are able to put parts together to

form a coherent or unique new whole. You can reorganize
Creating elements into a new pattern or structure through generating,
planning, or producing.
 2. Creative
Thinking Skills
“Everybody has a creative
potential and from the
moment you can express this
creative potential, you can
start changing the world.”
Paulo Coelho, author and lyricist
 Creative Thinking
• Everyone has creative abilities. It’s true of
everyone who fully expresses creative
abilities as well as those who express them
very little or not at all.
• All humans are innately creative, especially
if creativity is understood as a problem-
solving skill.
• Creativity is inspired when there is a
problem to solve. As a creative thinker, you
are curious, optimistic, and imaginative.

Creativity is inspired when there is a problem to

solve. Considered as an act of problem-solving,
creativity can be understood as a skill—as
opposed to an inborn talent or natural “gift”—
that can be taught as well as learned.
ACTIVITY: ASSESS YOUR CREATIVE PROBLEM-SOLVING SKILLS

Objective
• Evaluate your attitude toward problem-solving in the context of cultivating creative thinking.

Directions:
• Access Psychology Today’s Creative Problem-Solving Test at the Psychology Today Web site.
• Read the introductory text, which explains how creativity is linked to fundamental qualities of
thinking, such as flexibility and tolerance of ambiguity.
• Then advance to the questions by clicking on the “Take The Test” button. The test has 20
questions and will take roughly 10 minutes.
• After finishing the test, you will receive a Snapshot Report with an introduction, a graph, and
a personalized interpretation for one of your test scores.
• Complete any further steps by following your instructor’s directions.
Creative Thinking in
Education • Design sample exam questions to test
your knowledge as you study for a final.
• Devise a social media strategy for a club
on campus.
• Propose an education plan for a major
you are designing for yourself.
College is great • Prepare a speech that you will give in a
ground for debate in your course.
enhancing creative • Develop a pattern for a costume in a
thinking skills. theatrical production.
These are some
• Arrange audience seats in your classroom
college activities
that can stimulate to maximize attention during your
creative thinking. presentation.
Are any familiar • Arrange an eye-catching holiday display
Creative Thinking in
Education
• Participate in a brainstorming session
with your fellow musicians on how you
will collaborate to write a musical
composition.
• Draft a script for a video production that
College is great will be shown to several college
ground for administrators.
enhancing creative • Compose a set of requests and
thinking skills. recommendations for a campus office to
These are some improve its customer service.
college activities
that can stimulate • Develop a marketing pitch for a mock
creative thinking. business you are developing.
Are any familiar • Develop a comprehensive energy-
How to Stimulate Creative Thinking
1. Sleep on it. Over the years, researchers
have found that the REM sleep cycle boosts
our creativity and problem-solving abilities,
providing us with innovative ideas or
answers to vexing dilemmas when we
awaken. Keep a pen and paper by the bed so
you can write down your nocturnal insights
if they wake you up.

2. Go for a run or hit the gym.

Studies indicate that exercise stimulates
creative thinking, and the brainpower boost
lasts for a few hours.

3. Allow your mind to wander a

few times every day. Far from being
a waste of time, daydreaming has been
found to be an essential part of
How to Stimulate Creative Thinking
4. Keep learning. Studying
something far removed from your area
of expertise is especially effective in
helping you think in new ways.

5. Put yourself in nerve-

racking situations once in a
while to fire up your brain. Fear and
frustration can trigger innovative
thinking.

6. Keep a notebook with

you so you always have a way to
record fleeting thoughts. They’re
sometimes the best ideas of all.
 A Brainstorm of Tips for
Creative Thinking

—Linus Pauling, double Nobel Laureate,

chemist, biochemist, and peace campaigner
 A Brainstorm of Tips for
Creative Thinking
• Use all your senses - see, taste, smell, touch, hear, think,
speak.
• Be a good observer of people, nature, and events around you.

• Engage thinking on the right side of your brain (intuition,

open-mindedness, visual perception, rhythm . . .).
• Change your interpretation of an event, situation, behavior,
person, or object.
• Allow ideas to incubate.
• Be open to insight as ideas pop into your mind.
 A Brainstorm of Tips for
Creative Thinking
IMAGINING
• Brainstorm by generating ideas with a group of
people.
• Ask, “What would happen if . . .”
• Ask, “In how many different ways . . .”
• Develop ideas and expand their possibilities.
• Envision the future.
 A Brainstorm of Tips for
Creative Thinking
SPEAKING AND WRITING
• Use your words and your “voice” when conveying
your original ideas.
• Avoid using clichés or overly familiar responses to
questions or problems.
• Explain how your ideas move beyond the status
quo and contribute to a discussion.
• Take notes.
 A Brainstorm of Tips for
Creative Thinking
DRAWING
• Use mind-mapping to capture ideas; start with a
key concept and write it in the center of your
page; use connecting lines, radiating from the
central concept, and write down any connected
or related ideas that come to you.
• Create pictures or drawings of situations (“rich
pictures”) to show them in a different way.
 A Brainstorm of Tips for
Creative Thinking
LEARNING
Find ways to demonstrate your personal investment
in projects.
Gather knowledge and conduct research.
Have more fun learning!
MOVING
Do physical activities to engage the creative areas of
your brain and think differently.
RESTING
Take breaks.
Creative Thinking

Fiction and Facts

 Creative Thinking - Fiction and Facts

FICTION FACTS
• Most problems can be solved
in any number of ways.
• Every problem has only • If you discover a solution that
one solution (or one works, it’s a good solution.
right answer).
• Other people may think up
solutions that differ from
yours, but that doesn’t make
your solution wrong or
unimportant.
 Creative Thinking - Fiction and Facts

FICTION FACTS
• Look at the history of any
solution and you’ll see that
• The best answer or improvements, new solutions,
solution or method has and new right answers are
already been discovered. always being found.
• The ox or horse, the cart, the
wagon, the train, the car, the
airplane, the jet, the space
shuttle? What is the best and
last?
 Creative Thinking - Fiction and Facts

FICTION FACTS

• Only a few problems require

complex technological solutions.
• Creative answers are • Most problems you’ll
encounter need only a
technologically complex. thoughtful solution
involving personal action and
perhaps a few simple tools.
• Even many problems that seem
to require technology can be
addressed in other ways.
 Creative Thinking - Fiction and Facts

FICTION FACTS

• There are many successful

techniques for generating ideas.
• Ideas either come or they One important technique is to
don’t. Nothing will help - include structure.
certainly not structure. • Create guidelines, limiting
parameters, and concrete goals for
yourself that stimulate and shape
your creativity.
THINKING AND
ANALYSIS
(cont.)
Chapter outlines

THINKING AND ANALYSIS

2. Creative Thinking Skills (cont.)

LEARNING OBJECTIVES
By the end of this section, you will be able to:
• Describe the role of creative thinking skills in
problem-solving
• Identify technology tools that enhance our learning
• Explain how technology skills relate to
critical/creative thinking skills
• Examine online learning in the context of organizing,
communicating, reading, and researching online
• Assess our readiness to use technology
 • Creative problem-solving is a type of
problem-solving. It involves searching
for new and novel solutions to problems.
• Unlike critical thinking, which scrutinizes
assumptions and uses reasoning,
creative thinking is about generating
alternative ideas - practices and
solutions that are unique and effective.
• It’s about facing sometimes muddy and
Problem- unclear problems and seeing how
Solving with “things” can be done differently - how
new solutions can be imagined.
Creative
Thinking
Activity
Brainstorming

Project start up "Social initiative":

Discuss in small groups, propose a creative social
initiative, to solve any problem our society.
Brainstorming technique