?Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth ? more than ruin, more even than death.?

Bertrand Russell ? Education: Selected Papers)

Great philosophers, psychologists and educationists have been and are still investigating into the mysterious process of thinking. Many have come up with several broad definitions of thinking, as it is such a complex activity of the human mind and this process is said to involve several cognitive, physical, social and physiological factors.

The following are a few definitions of thinking:

● ?The mental derivation of mental elements (thoughts) from perceptions and the mental manipulation/combination of these thoughts.?

● ?The mental manipulation of sensory input to formulate thoughts, reason about, or judge.?

● ?The extension of evidence in accord with the evidence to fill up gaps in the evidence: and this is done by moving through a succession of interconnected steps which may be stated at the time, or left till later to be stated.?

Nickerson (1981) suggests that no taxonomy exists for the teaching of essential skills of thinking. It would be wise for educators and teachers, he advises, to decide on what we want students to be able to do and incorporate these particular skills into our curricula, school programmes and lesson plans. For this purpose, we can consider the various categories of skills or taxonomies suggested by researchers, such as Bloom and others, which most effectively spell out a variety of thinking skills and indicate the kind of behaviour students are to perform as the objectives or goals of specific learning tasks.

These taxonomies also spell out tasks that generally move from simple to more complex operations, from observable and concrete to abstract dimensions, and from an emphasis on working with known materials towards an emphasis on creating or inventing new, previously unknown approaches or materials.

In this view, the thinking skills that the taxonomies spell out move from Basic thinking skills, such as, qualifying, classifying, finding relationships, transforming and drawing conclusions to more Complex thinking skills, such as problem-solving, decision-making, critical thinking and creative thinking.

● Problem solving refers to using basic thinking processes to resolve a known or defined difficulty; assembling facts about the difficulty and determining additional information needed; inferring or suggesting alternate solutions and testing them for appropriateness, potentially reducing or simpler level of explanation and eliminating discrepancies; providing solution checks for generalisable value.

● Critical thinking refers to using basic thinking processes to analyse arguments and generate insights into particular meaning and interpretations; developing cohesive logical reasoning patterns and understanding assumptions and biases underlying particular positions; attaining a credible, concise, and convincing style of presentation or arguments.

● Creative thinking refers to using basic thinking processes to develop or invent novel, aesthetic, constructive ideas or products from percepts as well as concepts. It stresses the initiative aspects of thinking as much as the rational. The emphasis is on using known information or material to generate the possible, as well as, to elaborate on the thinker?s original perspective or design.

Thus teachers, while planning their lessons, should take into consideration these thinking taxonomies together with the developmental level of their learners, the mode of presenting the information to them, the subjects involved, and the testing programme for their teaching of thinking skills to be more effective.

<B>By Shardha SANDAPEN</B>