effective problem-solving requires us to
use
critical, creative
and practical thinking skills
what is thinking?
well thinking is what happens when you ask
questions
and you try to find an answer to those
questions. Asking questions therefore
requires us to think and thinking
leads to learning. So
true learning means we need to ask
questions
kids learn remarkably fast
why is that? well they're asking
questions all the time
these are actual questions that my kids
about me: why is the sky blue?
Why is the the ocean blue but water from the
tap is clear?
when lightning strikes the ocean
why don't all the fish die? What do
clouds feel like?
Why do sharks
only live in salt water? Why do dogs chase
cats?
Why doesn't McDonalds sell hot dogs?
If ghosts can walk around
and if they can go through doors why don't
they fall through the floor?
Why does the Easter Bunny carry eggs?
rabbits don't lay eggs. Why is poop brown?
Why is bird poop white?
Why don't animals talk?
Do plants talk?
Why are people different colours?
Do butterflies remember being
caterpillars?
Why does a boat made out
of steal float? These are the types of
questions
that my kids are constantly asking me. No
wonder they learn so much, so fast -
it makes my head hurt. Well
if effective problem-solving uses critical
created for practical thinking skills
let's take a closer look. critical
thinking:
critical thinking involves identifying a
problem,
it involves gathering information that we
think
will be useful in solving that problem.
Sorting through the information
and getting great information that's not
helpful and keeping the information that
we think will be helpful
and then determining: What have I
discovered by looking at all this
information
that I thinks going to be helpful?
Creative thinking:
Creative thinking involves
coming up with new ideas and these new
ideas
lead to unique solutions. Kids
are very creative, again, one of the
reasons
they learn so much and they're such excellent
problem solvers
here's my son: Adam says to me one day
let's build a robot pirate dinosaur
with a rocket launcher, heat vision and
he's got to be able to shoot cotton candy out of
his mouth
now it's pretty creative. Well,
here's the plan.
Here's reality, but you gotta be impressed by the
creativity
Practical thinking:
this involves common sense
it's a real world focus
and asking ourselves: is this solution
going to work?
and then apply what we learned from our
past experiences
so that we can solve a new problem. So
to make good decisions, we need to use
all three kinds thinking skills. We
need analytical thinking so that we can
properly identify a problem
We need creative thinking so that we can
come up with imaginative possible
solutions
we need to once again use our
analytical thinking so that we can evaluate
all the creative ideas that we came
up with
Some of them may not be practical
and finally we need practical thinking to
plan and
implement our solution. So
creativity acts like a bridge that
connects critical
and practical thinking. This is my
daughter
and she asked me if she can have a dog
so this is the dog that I gave her. Now
the problem that we have with this dog
is that it has plastic feet and we have a
hardwood,
slippery floor. He couldn't move - he was
slipping on the floor
every time you called him - he's supposed to
be able to come to you
so the dogs not happy. So I spend the day
using my critical and creative practical
thinking skills
trying to figure out what to do. Well I've
spent
over 15 years in postsecondary education
and in that time I definitely honed my
analytical thinking skills
so identified the problem: the dog won't
come
why? well it's slippery. One type of thinking
skills that I have not developed too much,
perhaps, is my creative thinking. So
naturally I jumped straight to the most
complicated solution
I'm thinking about stopping by Home
Depot and picking up some rubber pads and
somehow gluing them onto the bottom of the
dog's feet so that it could move
well I get home from work and what do I find?
Techno has rubber slippers made from
balloons
my daughter put balloons on Technos feet.
Problem solved: he's now got traction so
we can come when your call him
a very very creative solution, much simpler
when I had planned
and it works, and she likes the way
Techno looks with
his slippers. Another problem: my son's
airplane lands on the roof and gets stuck
how do we solve this problem? well my
superior analytical skills are at work
and I determine that the problem is, we need
to get the plane down
well my son who's also six-years-old
also
identified the problem correctly. My
suggested solution is
we don't have a ladder that is long enough -
let's wait for a windy day
and wait for the plane to come blowing down
and then we will retrieve it
the problem that we have though is
that that's not necessarily the best
solution
it's certainly not a creative solution.
We may not be able to retrieve the
airplane. It might blow away
or it might get destroyed in the landing
What does my son come up with?
you may be familiar with a golf ball
retriever
this is a extendable pole with a cup on
the end of it
and if your golf ball goes into the
water, you can pluck it out with this
long pole. He goes into the garage,
gets the golf ball retriever, we reach up
and
grab the airplane. He gets his airplane back.
Problem solved.
A much better solution then the solution
that I came up with waiting for the wind
to blow it down.
it was immediate, it was effective, it was
certainly creative
and it solved the practical problem.
so effective problem-solving uses
critical, creative,
and practical thinking skills
creativity is extremely important
it forms the bridge between critical
and practical thinking
that allows us to find new solutions
that work
