Lesson 1 – New Learning Skills 2

Introduction to Problem Solving in the Information Age

This chapter contains some general background that lays foundations for the rest of the book.
Keep in mind that this is a scholarly, “academic” book. This means that you need to read it while
you are mentally alert and your mind is in gear. It means that after you read a paragraph, you
should stop and reflect about what the paragraph means to you. Learning comes from the
concentrated, alert mind reading process and from careful reflection about what you are reading.
Learning comes from using what you are learning and from seeking possible uses of what you are
learning.

Improving Education

This book focuses on improving education by helping preservice and inservice teachers, and
their students, to get better at problem solving. Problem solving is certainly core to a good education.
Thus, better curriculum, instruction, and assessment in this area can lead to improvements in our
overall educational system.
However, there are some still larger issues than can be addressed our educational system.
From time to time over the years, have attempted to make a short list of Big Ideas that help me as I
work to improve our educational system. Here is the current list:
1. Empower and enable the learner and those who directly help learners to learn.
2. Help students learn to sell-assess and to take a steadily increasing level of responsibility
for their own learning.
3. Help students get better at asking researchable question and in learning to do the various
types of research that are used to answer such questions. The Web plays a significant role
in this endeavor, since a literature search is an important component of trying to answer a
researchable question.
4. Help all people to get better at being both teachers of themselves and others, and learners.

Academic Disciplines
This book is intended for students who are studying many different disciplines. You might
wonder why we have so many different academic disciplines. Indeed, you may wonder what
distinguishes one discipline from another, or the extent to which the various disciplines one can
study in precollege and higher education overlap each other.
Each academic discipline can be defined by a combination of:
 The types of problems, tasks, and activities it addresses.
 Its accumulated accomplishments, such as its results, achievements, products, performances,
scope, power, uses, impacts on the societies of the world, and so on.
 Its history, culture, methods of communication, and language (including notation and special
vocabulary).
  Its methods of teaching, learning, assessment, and thinking, and what it does to preserve and
sustain its work and pass it on to future generations.
 Its tools, methodologies, and types of evidence and arguments used in solving problems,
accomplishing tasks, and recording and sharing accumulated results.
 The knowledge and skills that separate and distinguish among (a) a novice, (b) a person who
has a personally useful level of competence, (c) a reasonably competent person, (d) an expert,
and (e) a world-class expert. Each discipline has its own ideas as to what constitutes a high
level of expertise within the discipline and its subdisciplines.
Subconscious Thinking and Problem Solving
Your brain and body are highly skilled in solving the problems of keeping you alive. Most of
this goes on at a subconscious level. You do not have to consciously think about telling your heart
to beat regularly, your lungs to keep breathing regularly and to oxygenate blood, or your digestive
system to digest the food that you eat. You do not have to consciously tell your immune system do
deal with infections.
You are also highly skilled at solving problems at a conscious level. When you carry on a
conversation or read a book, you are solving complex communications problems. Interestingly,
much of what you are doing as you carry on a conversation or read a book occurs at a subconscious
level. For example, you think a thought and your brain somehow puts together the sequence of
muscle, vocal cord, and other physical activities needed to deliver sentences about the idea. You
look at small squiggly drawings on a page (that is, at letters, words, and sentences) and your brain
turns these into silent sounds, pictures, and meaning in your head.
The conscious and subconscious processes of talking, listening, reading, and writing give us
considerable insight into teaching and learning for problem, solving. You learned speaking and
listening from our informal education system. You have an innate ability to learn oral
communication—it is built into your genes. (Of course, some people’s genes don’t work correctly
or physically injuries damage parts of their body that are necessary to oral speaking and listening.)

What is Problem Solving?

The term problem solving to include all of the following activities:

• posing, recognizing, clarifying, and answering questions
• posing, recognizing, clarifying, and solving problems
• posing, recognizing, clarifying, and accomplishing tasks
• posing, recognizing, clarifying, and making decisions
• using higher-order, critical, and wise thinking to do all of the above.
This broad definition is intended to encompass the critical thinking and higher-order thinking
activities in every discipline. An artist, mathematician, musician, scientist, and poet all do
problem solving.
Problem Solving vs. Critical Thinking
Problem solving and critical thinking are closely connected fields of study.
“The term critical thinking is the use of those cognitive skills or strategies that increases the
probability of a desirable outcome. It is purposeful, reasoned, and goal directed. It is the kind of
thinking involved in solving problems, formulating inferences, calculating likelihood, and
making decisions. Critical thinkers use these skills appropriately, without prompting, and
usually with conscious intent, in a variety of settings. That is, they are predisposed to think
critically. When we think critically, we are evaluating the outcomes of our thought processes—
how good a decision is or how well a problem is solved. Critical thinking also involves
evaluating the thinking processes—the reasoning that went into the conclusion we have arrived
at or the kinds of factors considered in making a decision.”
Critical thinking is also the ability of students to analyze information and ideas carefully and
logically from multiple perspectives. This skill is demonstrated by the ability of students to:
• analyze complex issues and make informed decisions;
• synthesize information in order to arrive at reasoned conclusions;
• evaluate the logic, validity, and relevance of data;
• use knowledge and understanding in order to generate and explore new questions.
Higher-Order Thinking
Critical thinking is a higher-order thinking skill. Higher-order thinking skills go beyond
basic observation of facts and memorization. They are what we are talking about when we want our
students to be evaluative, creative and innovative.
When most people think of critical thinking, they think that their words (or the words of
others) are supposed to get “criticized” and torn apart in argument, when in fact all it means is that
they are criteria-based. These criteria require that we distinguish fact from fiction; synthesize and
evaluate information; and clearly communicate, solve problems and discover truths.
Using Bloom’s Taxonomy of thinking skills, the goal is to move students from lower- to higher-
order thinking:
 from knowledge (information gathering) to comprehension (confirming)
 from application (making use of knowledge) to analysis (taking information apart)
 from evaluation (judging the outcome) to synthesis (putting information together) and creative
generation
The term “higher-order” thinking is often used in discussing critical thinking and problem
solving. Based on research, it states that higher order thinking:

 Is nonalgorithmic—the path of action is not fully specified in advance;

 Is complex—with the total path not visible from any single vantage point;
 Often yields multiple solutions, each with costs and benefits;
 Involves nuanced judgment and interpretation;
 Involves the application of multiple criteria, which sometimes conflict with one another;
 Often involves uncertainty, because not everything that bears on the task is known;
 Involves self-regulation of the thinking process, rather than coaching at every step;
 Involves imposing meaning, finding structure in apparent disorder;
 Is effortful, with considerable mental work involved.
Probably you have heard about Benjamin Bloom's six-part taxonomy of cognitive learning.
This was developed in 1956, and its focus was mainly on college education. However, it is applicable
to education at all levels.
 Knowledge: Recall data or information.
 Comprehension: Understand the meaning, translation, interpolation, and interpretation
of instructions and problems. State a problem in one's own words.
 Application: Use a concept in a new situation or unprompted use of an abstraction.
Applies what was learned in the classroom into novel situations in the work place.
 Analysis: Separates material or concepts into component parts so that its organizational
structure may be understood. Distinguishes between facts and inferences.
 Synthesis: Builds a structure or pattern from diverse elements. Put parts together to form
a whole, with emphasis on creating a new meaning or structure.
 Evaluation: Make judgments about the value of ideas or materials.

Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives is a classification of the different objectives

and skills that educators set for students (learning objectives). Bloom divided educational objectives
into three "domains" Affective, Psychomotor, and Cognitive. This taxonomy is hierarchical,
meaning that learning at the higher levels is dependent on having attained prerequisite knowledge and
skills at lower. Bloom intended that the Taxonomy motivate educators to focus on all three domains,
creating a more holistic form of education.
Bloom's taxonomy is designed to help differentiate between the lowest order (knowledge;
recall data and information) and the highest order (evaluation) of human cognitive activity. One way
to think about the scale is that it starts at rote memory of data and information with little or no
understanding, and it ends at the highest level of understanding and critical thinking.
 Affective
Skills in the affective domain describe the way people react emotionally and their ability to
feel another living thing's pain or joy. Affective objectives typically target the awareness and growth
in attitudes, emotion, and feelings. There are five levels in the affective domain moving through the
lowest order processes to the highest:
 Receiving
The lowest level; the student passively pays attention. Without this level no learning can
occur.
 Responding
The student actively participates in the learning process, not only attends to a stimulus, the
student also reacts in some way.
 Valuing
The student attaches a value to an object, phenomenon, or piece of information.
 Organizing
The student can put together different values, information, and ideas and accommodate them
within his/her own schema; comparing, relating, and elaborating on what has been learned.
 Characterizing
The student has held a particular value or belief that now exerts influence on his/her behavior
so that it becomes a characteristic.
Psychomotor
Skills in the psychomotor domain describe the ability to physically manipulate a tool or
instrument like a hand or a hammer. Psychomotor objectives usually focus on change and/or
development in behavior and/or skills. Bloom and his colleagues never created subcategories for
skills in the psychomotor domain, but since then other educators have created their own psychomotor
taxonomies:
 Reflex movements
Reactions that are not learned.
 Fundamental movements
Basic movements such as walking, or grasping.
 Perception
Response to stimuli such as visual, auditory, kinesthetic, or tactile discrimination.
 Physical abilities
Stamina that must be developed for further development such as strength and agility.
 Skilled movements
Advanced learned movements as one would find in sports or acting.
 No discursive communication
Effective body language, such as gestures and facial expressions

Cognitive
Skills in the cognitive domain revolve around knowledge, comprehension, and "thinking
through" a particular topic. Traditional education tends to emphasize the skills in this domain,
particularly the lower-order objectives. There are six levels in the taxonomy, moving through the
lowest order processes to the highest:
  Knowledge
Exhibit memory of previously-learned materials by recalling facts, terms, basic concepts and answers
a. Knowledge of specifics—terminology, specific facts
b. Knowledge of ways and means of dealing with specifics—conventions, trends and
sequences, classifications and categories, criteria, methodology
c. Knowledge of the universals and abstractions in a field—principles and generalizations,
theories and structures
 Comprehension
Demonstrative understanding of facts and ideas by organizing, comparing, translating,
interpreting, giving descriptions, and stating main ideas.
a. Translation
b. Interpretation
c. Extrapolation
 Application
Using new knowledge. Solve problems to new situations by applying acquired knowledge,
facts, techniques, and rules in a different way.
 Analysis
Examine and break information into parts by identifying motives or causes. Make inferences
and find evidence to support generalizations.
a. Analysis of elements
b. Analysis of relationships
c. Analysis of organizational principles
 Synthesis
Compile information together in a different way by combining elements in a new pattern or
proposing alternative solutions.
a. Production of a unique communication
b. Production of a plan, or proposed set of operations
c. Derivation of a set of abstract relations
 Evaluation
Present and defend opinions by making judgments about information, validity of ideas or
quality of work based on a set of criteria.
a. Judgments in terms of internal evidence
b. Judgments in terms of external criteria
Why is Critical Thinking important in teaching?
According to Paul and Elder (2007), “Much of our thinking, left to itself, is biased, distorted,
partial, uninformed or down-right prejudiced.  Yet the quality of our life and that of which we
produce, make, or build depends precisely on the quality of our thought.”  Critical thinking is
therefore the foundation of a strong education.
Using Bloom’s Taxonomy of thinking skills, the goal is to move students from lower- to
higher-order thinking:
 from knowledge (information gathering) to comprehension (confirming)
 from application (making use of knowledge) to analysis (taking information apart)
 from evaluation (judging the outcome) to synthesis (putting information together) and
creative generation
Some Important Aspects of Problem Solving
Often the thinking and problem solving that we want students to do is to recognize, pose,
clarify, and solve complex, challenging problems that they have not previously encountered. For
example, consider the teaching of writing. You may consider good penmanship and correct spelling
to be important, but most people would consider these lower-order goals. Learning to write in a
manner that communicates effectively is a higher-order, critical thinking goal. In some sense, each
writing task is a new problem to be solved.
Moreover, writing is a powerful aid to the brain. George Miller (1956) discusses the magic
number 7 ± 2. He and many others have observed that a typical person’s short term memory is limited
to about 7 ± 2 pieces or chunks of information. Thus, probably you can read a seven-digit phone
number and remember it long enough to key it into a telephone pad. Your short-term memory is
easily overwhelmed by a problem that contains a large number of components that need to be
considered all at one time. Skill in using reading and writing extends the capabilities of your brain to
deal with complex, multi-component problems. That is, reading and writing are brain tools that
significantly increase your problem-solving abilities.

The Magical Number Seven experiment purports that the number of objects an average human
can hold in working memory is 7 ± 2. What this means is that the human memory capacity typically
includes strings of words or concepts ranging from 5–9. This information on the limits to the capacity
for processing information became one of the most highly cited papers in psychology.
 Introduction to Problem Solving in the Information Age

This book places particular emphasis on several important problem-solving ideas:

• Posing, recognizing, clarifying, representing, and solving problems are intrinsic to every
academic discipline or domain. Indeed, each discipline is defined by the specific nature of the
types of problems that it addresses and the methodologies that it uses in trying to solve the
discipline’s problems.
• Some traditional tools (for example, reading and writing) are useful in addressing the
problems in all disciplines. Information and Communication Technology provides us with
some new and powerful tools that are useful aids to problem solving in every discipline.
• Much of the knowledge, techniques, and strategies for posing, recognizing, clarifying,
representing, and solving problems in a specific domain requires a lot of knowledge of that
domain and may be quite specific to that domain. However, there are also a number of aspects
of posing recognizing, clarifying, representing, and solving problems that cut across many or
all domains, and so there can be considerable transfer of learning among domains.