One day in class the teacher brought a bag full of fruit. "Now class, I'm going to reach into the bag and describe a piece of fruit, and you tell what fruit I'm talking about. Okay, first: it's round, plump and red." Of course, Johnny raised his hand high, but the teacher, wisely ignored him and picked Deborah, who promptly answered "An apple." The teacher replied, "No Deborah, it's a beetroot, but I like your thinking." Now for the second. It's soft, fuzzy,and colored red and brownish." Well, Johnny is hopping up and down in his seat trying to get the teacher to call on him. But she skips him again and calls on Billy. "Is it a peach?" Billy asks. "No, Billy, I'm afraid it's a potato. But I like your thinking," the teacher replys. Here's another: it's long, yellow, and fairly hard." By now Johnny is about to explode as he waves his hand frantically. The teacher skips him again and calls on Sally. "A banana," she says. "No," the teacher replies, "it's a squash, but I like your thinking." Johnny is kind of irritated now, so he speaks up loudly. "Hey, I've got one for you teacher; let me put my hand in my pocket. Okay, I've got it: it's round, hard, and it’s got a head on it." "Johnny!" she cries. "That's disgusting!" "Nope," answers Johnny, "it's a 10 pence, but I like your thinking!"

Conscious mental processes that you use to do things like: classify, evaluate, sort, question, analyse, sequence, solve problems, create, explore, enquire, decide, and ask questions.

Researchers at Newcastle University, UK found well over 50 different classifications of thinking skills.

They made a really useful summary of them though:

Information Gathering Skills include:

• Sensing – seeing, hearing, touching
• Retrieving – memory skills

Basic Understanding Skills include:

• Organising gathered information
• Forming concepts
• Linking ideas together

Productive Thinking Skills include:

• Using gathered information and basic understanding
• Applying, solving problems, making decisions, creating, analyzing, evaluating

This is simply thinking about thinking - Planning, monitoring and evaluating your use of the cognitive skills above.

Here’s an interesting questionnaire. It links two broad types of thinking - analytic (left brain) and holistic (right brain) - with learning styles.

Just click and follow the instructions.

Click here for your personalised Learning Styles Resources.

Click here for your personalised Learning Styles Resources.

Click here for your personalised Learning Styles Resources.

Click here for your personalised Learning Styles Resources.