Week 2 Activity

 

De Bons Six Thinking Hats Reflection

 

 

This week’s task had us participating in an online wikki activity based around De Bons Six Thinking Hats. This task required us to collaborate online with our fellow educators and express our personal opinions on whether or not we believe mobile phones should be introduced in the classroom. The purpose of the wikki activity was to introduce us to an effective teaching tool to keep under our belts for future reference.

De Bons six thinking hats are a positive and creative teaching tool that ensures a higher order of thinking. It is an effective technique that facilitates productive critical thinking, collaboration, communication and creativity skills. The six thinking hats are an effective learning tool that helps learners analyse information or a given situation from a variety of perspectives. It enables collaborative thinking and ensures each person’s point of views and opinions are included and considered which avoids arguments and infinite discussions. It provides a framework to help people think critically, creatively and clearly by separating their thinking into six distinct categories, each with their own metaphorical coloured thinking hat – Black hat cautions, yellow hat benefits, white hat facts, green hat creativity, red hat feelings, and blue hat process.

I found the De Bons wiki activity to be an extremely effective tool to analysis various sides of the great mobile phone debate. It not only allowed me to express my own personal view points and opinions, but helped me recognize and understand my college’s views and opinions which forced me to question mine, opening my mind to a different level of thinking. Initially I had a very strong reaction to the question ‘should mobile phones be introduced in the classroom’ and the answer was ‘NO’.  However after breaking down my thoughts and being forced to look at the different sides of the matter it resulted in a slight shift in my perspective.  

A lot of the time I think we make judgements and assumptions about things without really looking at the broader picture. I think the six thinking hats are a great way to explore the different angles of a topic, the positives and the negatives, and make a decision knowing you’ve looked at all the contributing factors. On top of this new way of thinking and learning, when you add collaborative thinking and learning, you can create new and excited perspectives and idea that enable an even higher order of thinking.

In reflection to the activity my final answer to the topic still happened to be a no. I do not think mobile phones should be introduced in the classroom, however it did force me to open my mind and explore not only my own perspectives but other people’s perspectives also. I think De Bons Six Thinking Hats are a very effective learning tool and not just in the classroom, but in everyday life. Instead of making judgements and assumptions, we should open our minds to exploring different perspectives.  The De Bons tool incorporates ‘social constructivism’ in the classroom whilst enhancing critical thinking, collaboration, communication and creative skills. It demonstrates an example of good pedagogy and creates not only a new tool for teaching but a new tool for learning. The De Bons tool is definitely a teaching tool I have added to my ‘bag of tricks’ which will assist me on my teaching journey.