1. Fun in the GT Classroom Meredith Austin austinm@pearlandisd.org www.austinGTfun.weebly.com

2. Today’s Goals Creativity and relationship building exercise Teaching kids to think! Six Thinking Hats Method for Problem Solving Game

3. Your life + a dot You have been given a sheet of paper with a dot. Find a way to incorporate the dot and represent something about you and your life on the rest of paper. Try to use the dot in a way that no one else will think of. Fill up the paper… no white space!

4. Why Life+Dot Works? Do this at the beginning of the year You get to see early on where the students creativity lies When the students present their life+dot, you get to know more about them Relationship building

5. Multiple Perspectives develops students’ critical thinking skills "If everyone is thinking alike, someone isn't thinking." —George Patton “Those who know how to think need no teachers.” —Mahatma Gandhi

6. How Can We Teach Thinking? Six Thinking Hats Method ▫Developed by Edward DeBono for use in the business world. Can be used in many situations. Six colors of hats for six types of thinking ▫Each hat identifies a type of thinking ▫Hats are directions of thinking Hats help a group use parallel thinking ▫You can “put on” and “take off” a hat

7. Hints Direction, not description ▫Set out to think in a certain direction ▫“Let’s have some black hat thinking…” Not categories of people ▫Not: “He’s a black hat thinker.” ▫Everyone can and should use all the hats A constructive form of showing off ▫Show off by being a better thinker ▫Not destructive right vs. wrong argument Use in whole or in part

8. Six Colors for Thinking White: objective facts & figures Red: emotions & feelings Black: cautious & careful Yellow: hope, positive & speculative Green: creativity, ideas & lateral thinking Blue: control & organization of thinking

9. Six Colors for Thinking

10. The blue hat Thinking about thinking Instructions for thinking The organization of thinking Control of the other hats Discipline and focus

11. The blue hat role Control of thinking & the process Begin & end session with blue hat Facilitator, session leader’s role Choreography ▫open, sequence, close ▫Focus: what should we be thinking about ▫Asking the right questions ▫Defining & clarifying the problem ▫Setting the thinking tasks

12. Open with the blue hat… Why we are here what we are thinking about definition of the situation or problem alternative definitions what we want to achieve where we want to end up the background to the thinking a plan for the sequence of hats

13. …and close with the blue hat What we have achieved Outcome Conclusion Design Solution Next steps

14. White Hat Thinking Neutral, objective information Facts & figures Questions: what do we know, what don’t we know, what do we need to know Excludes opinions, hunches, judgements Removes feelings & impressions Two tiers of facts ▫Believed Facts ▫Checked Facts

15. Red Hat Thinking Emotions & feelings Hunches, intuitions, impressions Doesn’t have to be logical or consistent No justifications, reasons or basis All decisions are emotional in the end

16. Yellow Hat Thinking Positive & speculative Positive thinking, optimism, opportunity Benefits Best-case scenarios Exploration

17. Green Hat Thinking New ideas, concepts, perceptions Deliberate creation of new ideas Alternatives and more alternatives New approaches to problems Creative & lateral thinking

18. Black Hat Thinking Cautious and careful Logical negative – why it won’t work Critical judgement, pessimistic view Separates logical negative from emotional Focus on errors, evidence, conclusions Logical & truthful, but not necessarily fair

19. Six hats summary Blue: control & organization of thinking White: objective facts & figures Red: emotions & feelings Yellow: hope, positive & speculative Green: creativity, ideas & lateral thinking Black: cautious & careful

20. How can you use it? Groups of six ▫Each student “wearing” a different hat solving the same problem Small Groups ▫“Draw” a hat and ask questions from that perspective Individually ▫Everyone thinks about a problem using just a single hat

21. Example Students Talking While Others Are Talking Or Teaching

22. Let’s Play a Game

23. Want to learn more? Paul Reali ▫www.cyberskills.com or www.omniskills.com ▫preali@cyberskills.com Lateral Thinking, deBono’s Thinking Course, and other books by Edward deBono