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Thinking is a perpetual process which lays the groundwork for life circumstances. Our minds provide us with the capability to think about simple as well as complex situations. Humans think in visual images we call thoughts. Although exceptionally capable, minds are no greater than the thoughts they sustain.
Our minds possess the capacity to entertain diverse thoughts, which are the key to liberating unlimited mental creativity. This creativity allows us to flourish in our ever-changing technologically oriented environment. In the evolution of humankind there are numerous examples of people succeeding in overcoming difficult external circumstances time and time again using the potential in their minds. This success can be attained partly to well-developed thinking skills including questioning, analyzing, comparing, contrasting, and evaluating information, which they are exposed to from the outside world. We have the ability to realize the power in our mind to change our reality. We are able to achieve this using knowledge as well as effective thinking strategies. “Perhaps most importantly in today’s information age, thinking skills are viewed as crucial for educated persons to cope with a rapidly changing world. Many educators believe that specific knowledge will not be as important to tomorrow’s workers and citizens as the ability to learn and make sense of new information.” (D. Gough, 1991)
Knowledge is only one component in this formula for success, what’s more important is the way we use that knowledge. In our current educational system, teachers spend he majority of time requiring students to merely memorize information. In 1956 an Educational Psychologist named Benjamin Bloom headed a group who developed a classification system outlining intellectual behavior important in learning. The group reported that over 95 % of the test questions students repeatedly encounter in schools require them to think only at what they defined as the lowest possible level…the mere recall of information. He went on to develop his prominent instructional model, which categorizes thinking skills ranging from the concrete to the abstract.

Bloom’s Taxonomy of Thinking Skills
Category Knowledge
Information Gathering Comprehension
Confirming Application Making Use of Knowledge Analysis (Higher Order) Taking Apart
Synthesis (Higher Order) Putting Together
Evaluation (Higher Order) Judging the Outcome
Description
The skills demonstrated at this level are those of: observation and recall of information;
knowledge of dates, events, places;
knowledge of major ideas;
mastery of subject matter. understanding information;
grasping meaning;
translating knowledge into new context;
interpreting facts, comparing, contrasting;
ordering, grouping, inferring causes;
predicting consequences using information;
using methods, concepts, theories in new situations;
solving problems using required skills or knowledge seeing patterns;
organization of parts;
recognition of hidden meanings;
identification of components using old ideas to create new ones;
generalizing from given facts;
relating knowledge from several areas;
predicting, drawing conclusions comparing and discriminating between ideas;
assessing value of theories, presentations;
making choices based on reasoned argument;
verifying value of evidence;
recognizing subjectivity
What the Student Does Student recalls or recognizes information, ideas, and principles in the approximate form in which they were learned Student translates, comprehends, or interprets information based on prior learning. Student selects, transfers, and uses data and principles to complete a problem or task. Student distinguishes, classifies, and relates the assumptions, hypotheses, evidence, or structure of a statement or question. Student originates, integrates, and combines ideas into a product, plan or proposal that is new to him or her. Student appraises, assesses, or critiques on a basis of specific standards and criteria.
Sample Trigger Words - define
- list
- label
- name
- identify
- repeat
- who
- what
- when
- where
- tell
- describe
- collect
- examine
- tabulate
- quote - predict
- associate
- estimate
- differentiate
- extend
- summarize
- describe
- interpret
- discuss
- extend
- contrast
- distinguish
- explain
- paraphrase
- illustrate
- compare - apply
- demonstrate
- complete
- illustrate
- show
- examine
- modify
- relate
- change
- classify
- experiment
- discover
- use
- compute
- solve
- construct
- calculate - separate
- order
- explain
- connect
- divide
- compare
- select
- explain
- infer
- arrange
- classify
- analyze
- categorize
- compare
- contrast
- separate - combine
- integrate
- rearrange
- substitute
- plan
- create
- design
- invent
- what it?
- Prepare
- generalize
- compose
- modify
- create
- design
- hypothesize
- invent
- develop
- formulate
- rewrite - decide
- grade
- test
- measure
- recommend
- judge
- explain
- compare
- summarize
- assess
- judge
- recommend
- critique
- justify
- discriminate
- support
- convince
- conclude
- select
- rank
- predict
- argue
Sample Task(s) Name the food groups and at least two items of food in each group Make an acrostic poem about healthy food. Write a simple menu for breakfast, lunch or dinner using the food guide chart. What would you ask shoppers in a supermarket if you were doing a survey of what food they eat? (10 questions) Prepare a report about what the people in this class eat for breakfast Create a song and dance to sell bananas. Make a booklet about 10 important eating habits that would be suitable for the whole school to follow in order to eat correctly.

Example outcome list: (Products which can be used to demonstrate application of Thinking Skills Framework)
Advertisement
Annotated bibliography
Art gallery
Biography
Blueprint
Board game
Book Cover
Bulletin board
Card game
Chart
Collage
Collection with illustration
Collection with narrative
Comic Strip
Computer program
Crossword puzzle Debate
Detailed illustration
Diary
Diorama
Display
Drama
Dramatic monologue
Editorial
Essay
Experiment
Experiment Log
Fable
Fact file
Fairy tale
Family tree
Glossary Graph
Graphic design
Greeting card
Illustrated story
Journal
Labeled diagram
Large scale drawing
Lecture
Letter
Letter to the editor
Lesson
Line drawing
Magazine article
Map
Map with legend
Mobile Monograph
Museum exhibit
Musical composition
News report
Pamphlet
Pattern with instructions
Photo essay
Picture dictionary
Poem
Poster
Reference file
PowerPoint Presentation
Survey
Transparency of overhead
Vocabulary List
Written report

The graph demonstrates each level of the six levels as well as giving examples of possible outcomes.
To empower future success, teachers should be focusing much more time on strategies that students can use to utilize existing knowledge. Even encyclopedias, which are filled with informational facts and figures, are useless if we aren’t taught the strategies to read, interpret, combine, and assess the knowledge they contain. It’s not enough to merely recall information. Research has shown that students in general don’t have a well-developed thinking-skill ability.
The ability to think determines what students believe, achieve, and contribute to the world. Limitations come from within the minds as thoughts function as the creative cause of all experiences. There are five different areas which affect the ability to think: external influences-sensory information coming in from our 5 senses; external output- our words, gestures, and body position; mindset- our outlook on life, past experiences- providing the filter which we use to perceive the world; and our emotions and feelings. One of the most important gifts teachers can teach students is the ability to control and regulate the quality of their thoughts in these five areas.
Throughout history philosophers, politicians, and educators alike have pondered the art and science of astute thinking. Is it a programmed process defined by our genetic predispositions, or can our brains be manipulated by stimulating, academic environments to create an increased ability to promote more complex and creative thoughts than seen in previous generations? Educators now agree that it is in fact possible to increase student’s creative and critical thinking capacities through instruction and practice. This new commonality has led to the call for improved thinking skill instruction.
Our thinking potential is immense. People by far surpass the thinking capacity of all other Earth-inhabiting creatures. Evolution has granted us the powers of discovery and creativity for coping with and manipulating our environment while other species have developed greater speed, abundant fur, camouflage, or an increased sense of smell to help them adapt to an ever-changing environment. Our powers of intellect by far surpass other species even though we are not the only thinkers in the animal kingdom. Let’s explore what the scientific world has learned about human thinking and then apply that knowledge to the educational realm of the classroom.
Scientists who study thinking, called cognitive psychologists, believe that people are endowed with a number of basic thinking processes, which, although closely related, can be separated and studied individually. These processes include: sensation and perception, learning, memory retrieval, and thinking. The thinking process has been identified as the greatest potential of the human individual. How and what we think is everything.
The psychology of thinking has held a mainstream position in the field of educational psychology ever since William James, the famous Psychologist, included a chapter in his world-renowned scientific text in 1890. Several different theories have emerged giving us unique approaches to begin pondering the idea of human thinking. Some of these approaches include: the Information Processing Approach, Semantic Memory Representation, the Gestalt Approach to Problem-solving, the Study of Concept Learning, the Idea of Learning by Reinforcement, and also work achieved by American Psychologists in cognitive development rooted in the works of Jean Piaget. The following diagram is one interpretation of how the human brain functions in the thinking process. The model is based upon a computer prototype, and is referred to as the Information Processing Approach. It exemplifies just one idea of how people think.

The earliest study of thinking can be traced back hundreds of years to the Golden Age of ancient Greece. The Greeks developed the belief that what happens in the brain can be explained in terms of two basic components: ideas and the associations between those ideas. They called this perspective associationism. This field of mental philosophical study further expanded and developed three laws of learning and memory, which are attributed to the Greek Philosopher Aristotle:
1. Doctrine of Association by Contiguity- events or objects that occur in the same time or space are associated in memory, so that thinking of one will cause thinking of the other.
2. Doctrine of Association by Similarity- events or objects that are similar tend to be associated in memory.
3. Doctrine of Association by Contrast- events or objects that are opposites tend to be associated in memory.

In another perspective, the Swiss Psychologist Jean Piaget further developed the current view on the ability of children to think and learn based upon prior thinking about thinking, as well as his own research. In his theory of intelligence, Piaget postulated that children in the concrete operational stage (approximately 7 to 11 years) are able to acquire problem-solving skills; however, they are not yet able to reflect upon the content of their thinking to arrive at new insights. Concrete-operational staged children gain knowledge from the outside world, but subsequently cannot learn anything new by contemplating what they already know. In contrast, children in the formal operational stage (approximately 11 to 16 years) can acquire new information as a result of internal reflection. Piaget utilized the term reflective abstraction to refer to this process and defined it as the ability to think about one’s own thinking. It describes the ability to use bits of knowledge that a child already possesses to rearrange, compile, reflect, combine, and refigure those pieces into previously unknown bits of knowledge, like rearranging your existing furniture in order to give your living room a new perspective. This capability allows children to oversee the effectiveness of their own thinking. Some researchers refer to this as metacognition.

You’re unique just like everyone else. There has never been, nor ever be, anyone quite like us. It is you, and the character you create, that determines how your life goes. Not everyone is the same; neither are their thoughts and it is thinking, and how you feel about what you think, that makes all the difference. After a long day, the only things you’re left with are your thoughts.

Thoughts are everything because they manifest into feelings. Thoughts visit temporarily, but feelings linger indefinitely. A feeling is what is left over from the presence of a thought. Even after a thought leaves our mind, you are left to decipher its byproducts. Thinking always precedes feelings, even if we’re not aware of it, and it is these feelings that validate our mindset and navigate our perception of reality. Feelings can make us buoyant or submerge us in a life that is neither rewarding nor fulfilling. They determine whether we go with the flow, succeed, and find paths of possibilities, or whether we remain stagnant in our ways and travel the same useless roads. How we think determines how we navigate this life. Sink or swim, the choice resides within us. The remarkable thing about thoughts is that regardless of how powerful they are, we still control them.

We have the power to make every day, every week, and every year a fine one. The ability resides within us and always has. Our experiences in life are determined by what happens inside our mind. The continual voice in our head controls everything in our experience, and we are in command of this voice. Our internal monologue creates images that we identify as thoughts. This is an exclusive human condition. Our ability to think is our greatest strength, as well as, our greatest weakness. It can cause us to succeed or to fail in each and every situation we encounter.

It’s the same with our recollections of the past. The past is only a thought, and it, too, determines how we think and what we believe. Each new encounter breeds a reflection on past experiences. We cannot help but to remember. Like a recipe book, we look for the ingredients used in the past to recreate the familiar, even if we have the motivation to change. We look for similarities and find sameness even if it requires a stretch. Empowering thoughts fill our heads when we view a memory as positive.  “I can do it,” we say. “I’ve done it before and I can do it again.” Disheartening thoughts fill our heads and we search for the similarities in that as well when we view a memory as negative. “Who am I kidding? I can’t do this. I have never been able to do anything like this ever before.” Negative thinking is analogous to throwing in the towel before we get a chance to evaluate the other boxer, while positive thinking is analogous to adorning the medal before us step up to the starting line. We can reap the rewards or suffer the consequences before the situation transpires, all inside our head.

The majority of the cause of everything that transpires in our lives-success, wealth, kindness, intelligence, humility- is not found in the environment. Everyone with common circumstances would experience similar realities if this were the case. Instead, two individuals growing up in the same home, sharing the same mother and father, eating the same meals and attending the same schools create realities of varying degrees of success, wealth, kindness, intelligence and humility. Our neighborhood doesn’t so much determine our reality as do our thoughts. What is happening on the inside is a better determiner of a person’s future success than what is happening on the outside. This is the basic knowledge of each and every hero.

It is in daily acts that the hero’s journey is undertaken. When we do the little things with great love and attention, then the things we think of as big we will happen upon. These big things are the capability of the hero that lies within each and every one of us.