REFLECTION 1, WEEK 2
         This weeks reflection is all about De bono's six thinking hats. To help me I have invited a person we all know and love but were wondering what he looked like without the mask on. Here he is for a brief (2 minute) overview of the six hats and the unmasking.
 
 by Ian Leaver retrieved March 2015 : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbheGvB590U

Thank you Anonymous. Now that we have an understanding of the six hats. Lets consider them and how well they function in practise.

 

 image by Karen Whistler retrieved on March 2015 : http://www.karenwhistler.com/six-thinking-hats/

By analysing a position from each prospective you get a better overall understanding of the pros and cons of they idea. 

During our exercise this was done by the entire class as a wiki. Everyone gave a prospective from each point of view on an idea relevant to teachers (cell phones in class). In the class there are opinion on both sides for and against. This allows everyone to put there ideas in one place and then the fun really starts.

      Now that all the ideas are in one place and digital. You can collate, prioritize, and orGANize the ideas presented. Because many people were involved many different kinds of thinking were presented. Not merely different ideas being presented. People who are simply utterly practical get to present there best ideas next to people who will always think emotionally first. Allowing a true hearing of all the ideas. 

    There are problems with the media that we used however, that would really need to be worked out if this system were to be used for distilling real ideas and not just teaching. 

1.     People can have there ideas erased! That is right people who did not like the look of a certain idea could simply go online after you posted it and just delete it. For this idea to work everyone needs there own space and at the same time to be posting visually next to the last guy.
2.  People were requested not to be anonymous. It is bad to make people feel that they must use there own name on a public forum that will exist forever. What if years later there ideas change and they hate those ideas then? What if a future employer does not like those ideas? As long as there is fear of reprisal you will never get an honest exchange.
3.  It would take a lot of time post event. Even if you just cut and past without any real priority. It would be a time consuming process for a teacher, or helper students, to assemble the ideas onto a second media for presentation in some organised fashion. Surly in the modern age we can come up with better software to support this excellent model of critical thinking online. This software would have a individual hat export and compile function.  

This learning platform would be an excellent teaching style for student to student learning. It provides a high volume of student exchange. It could be very successful getting students involved with topics they care about. (why not ask them who developed an online spell checker that does not recognize the word online. Hint they were over 20. Just saying.) 

  That's all for this week,

                   See you next time,
 

(retrieved march 2015 : http://timirwin.blogspot.com.au/2008/11/same-bat-time-same-bat-channel.html