Thought & Problem Solving Tell a partner: What are you thinking about?

Thinking The mental activity that is involved in the understanding, processing, and communicating of information. Three kinds of thinking: – Convergent: thought is limited to available facts – Divergent: allows the mind to associate freely with elements of a problem – Metacognition: planning & evaluating mental activities (thinking about thinking)

Problem Solving Algorithms – specific procedure that will always lead to the solution of a problem – EX: C L __ FF Algorithms are often time-consuming Heuristics – rules of thumb, shortcuts for finding answers Heuristics don’t always work – EX: C __ __ CH

A man owns a wolf, a donkey and a cabbage. He needs to transport his possessions across a river in a rowing boat, which is only large enough to hold himself and one of his possessions (the cabbage is very large). The cabbage cannot be left with the donkey, otherwise it will be eaten and for the same reason the donkey cannot be left with the wolf. How can the man get all his belongings safely across the river? You will be given approximately 3 minutes in your group to solve the following problem. We will then discuss how you came to a solution.

Strategies to Problem Solving Means-End Analysis: Keep the final goal in mind while setting subgoals – EX: Getting one possession across the boat at a time

Imagine that you are a doctor. One of your patients has a brain tumor that must be destroyed if the patient is to survive. Certain rays will destroy the tumor if they are intense enough. To reach the tumor, however, the rays need to pass through the healthy tissue that surrounds it, and at the intensity needed to destroy the tumor, the rays will also destroy the healthy tissue. How can you use the rays to destroy the tumor without damaging healthy tissue?

Strategies to Problem Solving Analogies: A similarity between two or more items, events, or situations. When people have successfully solved one problem, they may try to use the same approach in solving another problem. – EX: tumor & terrorists

Copy this dot formation exactly as it appears onto a sheet of paper. Then connect all four dots with only two straight lines without lifting your pencil from the paper.

Blocks to Thinking Mental set – a tendency to respond to something in a fixed way – EX: thinking that the lines could not go beyond the dots

Imagine that you are in a room with a candle, a box of matches, and some thumbtacks. Your task is to use these objects to attach the candle to the wall. How do you do it?

Imagine that you are in a room in which two strings are hanging from the ceiling. Your task is to tie the two strings together, but they are so far apart that you cannot reach both of them at the same time. The only other object in the room is a pair of safety scissors. How can you tie the strings together?

To solve this problem, tie the scissors to one of the strings and set the string swinging. Then catch the swinging string and tie together.

Blocks to Thinking Functional Fixedness: The tendency to think of an object as being useful only for the function that the object is usually used for – EX: match box, scissors