Thinking!

“Tell me the facts and I’ll learn. Tell me the truth and I’ll believe. But tell me a story and it will live in my heart forever.”

– An old Native American proverb

A major part of education is to do with THINKING! Another major aspect is to work out how you think and how to improve it. Imagination of what your goal is like gives you a key to working out a desired outcome. Handling an essay needs a strategy. Handling yourself as a student needs thinking through.

1. First we think about which essay to do. In the old days, a piece of paper with the choices of assignment was handed out. Now? It's all online. Choice? Which one? It needs discernment.

Then we have to consider what it will involve -the resources - to get the facts, ideas, concepts, what others have thought and written about on it, and how we can assess those ideas and adapt them while critiquing their ideas. That is a lot to do. How would you go about it?

Finding the information is the first step. The Library? Looking in a book is a logical start but which book? Which author has anything good to say on it? There may be 1001 books on the subject. But we can't go into a library nowadays. (Jan 2021). There are many sites online now for finding information but how do you know that information is quality material? Most colleges have had to provide online resources, libraries through EBSCO and Perlego, Academia.edu.... freebie libraries and yes good old Google Books. Old? Anyway it does provide some books, and some sections of books; not always the parts we need! Don't use Wikipedia or even Theopedia -except to get a gist of a topic; never actually copy or cite it. Authors are not responsible often for all the articles on the wiki sites, which get input from a variety of unknown sources; hence it is not always reliable. Some might deliberately put their view as if it is the only view. Watch out for WHO writes and google them. See if they are bonafide scholars! Discernment!

2. Discerning the information that is relevant is the next task. Part of a book is all you may need while taking in the whole purpose of the whole book so as to consider what angle the author[s] are coming from and for what purpose. That is called critical thinking. Then comparing to a dozen other authors' books and articles on the topic will be needed.

Getting a grasp on what information is 'out there' on the topics is hard enough to begin with without discerning the arguments proposed and what might be missing: that is called evaluation, weighing up the information. Work on getting that in order is quite a task. Then we realise that there may be a whole list of variations on the theme, each with proponents of a particular argument. So no 'fact' is actually a proven 'fact'; there is always somebody who questions it- as with landing on the moon- some say it is all make-believe! That idea of a fact not being a fact, phases a lot of students in the initial stages of their course work. They want the 'facts' just to list and describe, and organising that is a big enough task. In British education that is really a level 2 ability [GCSE]. Level 3 [A-levels] goes up a notch as discerning what the apparent 'facts' are and might mean and if there are alternative 'facts', are all important factors to learn. By level 4 finding the facts for yourself should be a default ability but a mature student who left school at 16 or 18 might find this a steep enough learning curve at first. Regaining thinking skills starts there.

3. So now I have told you about the first phrase in our thinking skills. Discovering the information.

Next blog I hope to go on to the second phrase of the Native American Proverb. but how about a story to keep us going?

A Story? Once upon a time, there was a student who started her course full of enthusiasm. Oh it was a lifetime dream fulfilled! Not an early starter but a mature student, Mirabel decided to do everything her tutor asked of her. But the tutor asked her questions and how would she possibly answer? Surely the tutor knows everything. Why ask her? She didn't know the answers; how could she? She had only just started the course. So many assumptions were made of her. What could she do? Read a study skills book; yes of course. But which one? Look at the module list's book list! Lists of everything... but no time to actually read them? Placement duties called. Family issues arose. Lectures went online. Oh my how would she possibly conquer this Zoom thing!?

As for answering the tutor's questions, the zoom mode made her even more loathe to ask anything. Then she found the chat button. Ah other students were conversing there. What? about cricket? Attention spans were wearing thin. She wrote her question... but then lost the thread of the lecture. Concentrate. Next time have a question in mind to ask and put it up before the others even settled down. So she tried that. Did the tutor notice? Having to handle the lecture notes, admitting to zoom, noting a host of empty video pictures, how could the tutor manage to enable group activities too. Everything was new to everyone.

Mirabel waited for a gap in the proceedings. Did one come? No everyone else got there before and made her feel her question was irrelevant. Forget it. Depressed, she left the zoom thinking, I'll look at the recording later. She went to get some lunch. Munching slowly through her salad sandwich, she wondered if she could find the recorded lecture.

Going onto the Moodle made her think of doodling but no, concentrate. Focus. Find that link. What was my password? Isn't it default yet? how to make it work? How to remember it? Frustration rose within her. How can Mirabel keep going on this course? Technology was never in her skill box. She thought she was studying Theology for ministry in future. Now she had so many other skills to learn... and when? The baby was crying. Go see to her and come back later!

More story next time!