Critical and creative thinking
I have written before about educational “buzz words” - and there is a real liability with their use. One is that educational theorists enamored with neologisms can tend to co-opt already well defined concepts, redefine them and subject them to a certain species of what I call “educational lock-in”. Lock-in is where, unintentionally, a designed feature has some negative effect upon future potentials for growth. The polymath philosopher, scientist and technologist Jaron Lanier uses the example of the London Underground train system which lacks air-conditioning. Built at a time when air-conditioning was not possible on trains, now that it is the tubes are simply not large enough for the exhaust required to accommodate air-conditioning systems on the trains and so, for now at least, passengers are locked-in to a hot and uncomfortable system most months of the year. In education, sometimes we can define into being some terminology that defines future directions in teaching and this constrains options for what might be learned, and how. For example: does calling certain activities "critical and creative thinking" techniques lock-in how we might think (clearly!) about these ideas? I am concerned we're headed down the wrong track and before we get to far, I want to pull the breaks and consider whether - metaphorically speaking - we might not want to widen the tunnel to accommodate some better ideas about what these terms mean.
Critical and creative thinking are ways to generate knowledge. And how knowledge is generated is the domain of a particular area of philosophy called "epistemology; one of the most interesting areas and yet least well understood subjects within philosophy. People who know little about philosophy (and have little interest in it) often are dismissive of the whole project because they think it is largely concerned with moral philosophy (or ethics), or metaphysics and ontology (concerns about what "really" exists or what ultimately there is to know) and that everything there is little more than some matter of opinion. But this is false. My own interests in philosophy have not generally been about ethics or metaphysics but rather more about: how can we come to have reliable knowledge of the world? And this is what epistemology is: it's literally "the theory of knowledge" (as it is defined in analytical philosophy). And in this area of philosophy there really is a best theory that we should strive to understand. (Not all of what is called "philosophy" is interesting - I agree and will admit as much later on. But much is worth preserving and trying to learn more about. Not least of which is epistemology as it's relevant to learning - the subject of this present piece and epistemology as it is currently best understood and how it applies to having an optimistic view of humanity and life. Oh, and the philosophy of science is absolutely crucial if you want to understand how scientific knowledge in particular grows. But I begin to digress...)
Returning to our definition of epistemology as "the theory of knowledge" we can rephrase it without any loss of meaning whatever to: epistemology is the explanation of the growth of knowledge. And this "growth of knowledge" can happen as a civilisation or is can happen inside a single mind of a learner. The processes, it turns out, are the same. Let me explain. There are two absolutely crucial aspects to the growth of knowledge: creativity and criticism.
In educational circles the terms “critical and creative thinking” have migrated away from how they have largely, and precisely, been used in the more rarefied spheres where they have been genuine domains of study, controversy and progress over the decades. The terms now are synonymous not with thinking as such but rather certain teaching strategies that are more or less fashionable among some educators and educational theorists. I wish to quickly state that there is a world of difference between a teaching strategy and a learning strategy. It is safe to say that almost all strategies used by teachers to teach students are the former - not the latter. Teaching strategies: ways of organising schoolwork, or ideas on paper - ways of having students respond to questions or complete tasks - whether they move around a class, speak or not speak, draw pictures or write words - indeed the very behaviours typically promoted by theorists and cultivated in classes by teachers - these are teaching strategies. Almost everything ever covered in any “professional development” course or a university-level teacher training course completed by teachers and ostensibly labelled a learning strategy is a teaching strategy. Learning strategies are, I will come to later, very difficult to come by. And that is because learning happens best in a free environment where coercion just is not part of the picture.
So it happens to be the case that one can deploy every teaching strategy in the countless teaching handbooks and websites and seminars ever deployed and learning can still be elusive. Why? Because simply naming something (say) “Nine Hats for better Thinking” does not mean it is genuinely about Thinking. Labeling something does not make it so. Thinking is always a creative process constrained by careful criticism.
But educational theorists love neologisms. Educational theorists think that if they come up with a neologism that they have actually invented a new idea. Typically what they have done is either just label common sense, or some older idea, or adapted some pre-existing set of ideas for the purpose of naming it a (teaching/learning) "strategy". And the theorist will always give these a name. One might for example want to encourage students to be a physics BRAIN (Copyright) - an idea I came up with some years ago. Think of something about a given topic that "Bugs" you. Then also something that you can "Reflect" on and "Another" idea related to the one under study. Find something "Interesting" and something "Negative". Make up your own acronym. (I was kidding about the Copyright, by the way). On my own "Reflection" I realised: this scheme, far from organising thoughts, restricted them. What we really needed was true criticism and creativity. Criticise: what don't you understand? What is wrong? Get to the heart of it. Create: can you improve on this? And so - I have tended to avoid ways of organising thoughts. Minds just don't operate that way. And nor should they. There are exceptions to this: wanting to pass exams. And yes - if that is your goal - those many mneumonics, tricks and techniques can seem to work for some. But we must be careful to separate: passing exams is not the same as critical and creative thinking. Passing exams is about adhering as closely as possible to someone else's ideas of what is the correct way to think. It is anti-critical. It is not good objecting to questions in exams - taking issue with the premise of a question. Sure - take a risk. Most will not. Why would they? Certainly examinations and assessment tasks in education generally are antithetical to anything but adhering to, or rising to meet, defined outcomes. Things already thought through. It is thus not only anti-critical it is anti-creativity. It is not about new ideas. It is about showing that you have grasped old ideas. Taught ideas.
See the problem?
So let us, right now, return to basics. Let us consider what is meant by “Critical and Creative Thinking” and see if these can help us learn.
First: yes - critical and creative thinking - true critical and creative thinking are the very means by which we learn. Indeed they are the only means. They are the whole story. But do we understand that whole story? No - far from it, it would seem. So do we understand anything? Yes, of course - quite a bit. We have some very good, some very true ideas - and indeed I can put a number on it: we understand something less than around 50% of that story. We understand a lot about critical thinking. We just understand very little about creative thinking.
So let us begin with what we know. (Onto page 2)
Critical and creative thinking are ways to generate knowledge. And how knowledge is generated is the domain of a particular area of philosophy called "epistemology; one of the most interesting areas and yet least well understood subjects within philosophy. People who know little about philosophy (and have little interest in it) often are dismissive of the whole project because they think it is largely concerned with moral philosophy (or ethics), or metaphysics and ontology (concerns about what "really" exists or what ultimately there is to know) and that everything there is little more than some matter of opinion. But this is false. My own interests in philosophy have not generally been about ethics or metaphysics but rather more about: how can we come to have reliable knowledge of the world? And this is what epistemology is: it's literally "the theory of knowledge" (as it is defined in analytical philosophy). And in this area of philosophy there really is a best theory that we should strive to understand. (Not all of what is called "philosophy" is interesting - I agree and will admit as much later on. But much is worth preserving and trying to learn more about. Not least of which is epistemology as it's relevant to learning - the subject of this present piece and epistemology as it is currently best understood and how it applies to having an optimistic view of humanity and life. Oh, and the philosophy of science is absolutely crucial if you want to understand how scientific knowledge in particular grows. But I begin to digress...)
Returning to our definition of epistemology as "the theory of knowledge" we can rephrase it without any loss of meaning whatever to: epistemology is the explanation of the growth of knowledge. And this "growth of knowledge" can happen as a civilisation or is can happen inside a single mind of a learner. The processes, it turns out, are the same. Let me explain. There are two absolutely crucial aspects to the growth of knowledge: creativity and criticism.
In educational circles the terms “critical and creative thinking” have migrated away from how they have largely, and precisely, been used in the more rarefied spheres where they have been genuine domains of study, controversy and progress over the decades. The terms now are synonymous not with thinking as such but rather certain teaching strategies that are more or less fashionable among some educators and educational theorists. I wish to quickly state that there is a world of difference between a teaching strategy and a learning strategy. It is safe to say that almost all strategies used by teachers to teach students are the former - not the latter. Teaching strategies: ways of organising schoolwork, or ideas on paper - ways of having students respond to questions or complete tasks - whether they move around a class, speak or not speak, draw pictures or write words - indeed the very behaviours typically promoted by theorists and cultivated in classes by teachers - these are teaching strategies. Almost everything ever covered in any “professional development” course or a university-level teacher training course completed by teachers and ostensibly labelled a learning strategy is a teaching strategy. Learning strategies are, I will come to later, very difficult to come by. And that is because learning happens best in a free environment where coercion just is not part of the picture.
So it happens to be the case that one can deploy every teaching strategy in the countless teaching handbooks and websites and seminars ever deployed and learning can still be elusive. Why? Because simply naming something (say) “Nine Hats for better Thinking” does not mean it is genuinely about Thinking. Labeling something does not make it so. Thinking is always a creative process constrained by careful criticism.
But educational theorists love neologisms. Educational theorists think that if they come up with a neologism that they have actually invented a new idea. Typically what they have done is either just label common sense, or some older idea, or adapted some pre-existing set of ideas for the purpose of naming it a (teaching/learning) "strategy". And the theorist will always give these a name. One might for example want to encourage students to be a physics BRAIN (Copyright) - an idea I came up with some years ago. Think of something about a given topic that "Bugs" you. Then also something that you can "Reflect" on and "Another" idea related to the one under study. Find something "Interesting" and something "Negative". Make up your own acronym. (I was kidding about the Copyright, by the way). On my own "Reflection" I realised: this scheme, far from organising thoughts, restricted them. What we really needed was true criticism and creativity. Criticise: what don't you understand? What is wrong? Get to the heart of it. Create: can you improve on this? And so - I have tended to avoid ways of organising thoughts. Minds just don't operate that way. And nor should they. There are exceptions to this: wanting to pass exams. And yes - if that is your goal - those many mneumonics, tricks and techniques can seem to work for some. But we must be careful to separate: passing exams is not the same as critical and creative thinking. Passing exams is about adhering as closely as possible to someone else's ideas of what is the correct way to think. It is anti-critical. It is not good objecting to questions in exams - taking issue with the premise of a question. Sure - take a risk. Most will not. Why would they? Certainly examinations and assessment tasks in education generally are antithetical to anything but adhering to, or rising to meet, defined outcomes. Things already thought through. It is thus not only anti-critical it is anti-creativity. It is not about new ideas. It is about showing that you have grasped old ideas. Taught ideas.
See the problem?
So let us, right now, return to basics. Let us consider what is meant by “Critical and Creative Thinking” and see if these can help us learn.
First: yes - critical and creative thinking - true critical and creative thinking are the very means by which we learn. Indeed they are the only means. They are the whole story. But do we understand that whole story? No - far from it, it would seem. So do we understand anything? Yes, of course - quite a bit. We have some very good, some very true ideas - and indeed I can put a number on it: we understand something less than around 50% of that story. We understand a lot about critical thinking. We just understand very little about creative thinking.
So let us begin with what we know. (Onto page 2)