Development of creative thinking
Using Multimedia Technology
Educational computer programs for developing students' creative abilities
Psychological components of creative activity
:
Three stages of creative thinking development
Complex of multimedia computer programs "Move the Brain"
First level
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development of visual and effective thinking.
The second level is aimed at developing causal thinking.
The third level is aimed at developing heuristic thinking.
Types of History Assignments
Types of language tasks
Diagnosis of creative thinking
Test of development of logical operations
Literature
Usage multimedia technologies
allows you to include in the training course at the same time video, sound, photos, drawings, paintings, diagrams, text.
A variety of information sources creates a situation of novelty and diversity and, despite the great information richness, such an activity is perceived with interest by students and leaves them with a good impression.
The use of new computer multimedia technology opens up wide opportunities for the development of a fundamentally new type of independent learning, which in these conditions becomes managed, controlled and adapted to the individual characteristics of the student. Automated learning systems can help students who miss classes for any reason fill the learning gap. Their use can contribute to the reorganization of distance learning and significantly increase its effectiveness. With the help of these systems, it is possible to provide successfully working students with additional or optional material, to purposefully manage the competitive element present in students’ activities, individualizing and differentiating learning.
To develop a computer course, the teacher selects educational material that best suits the style of problem-based learning. The educational text is divided into separate components, each of which can be presented in the form of a problem. Next, each component of the problematic question is formulated so that students can understand this text by hearing only the question. Having broken the educational text into fragments, the teacher composes a series of sequential questions for each component of the text, or a question about a picture or drawing, or a question about a video fragment. A diagram, sound accompaniment of a question, or a drawing can be used as a hint to the question.
For each controlled topic, several questions are drawn up that reveal its essence. For each question you must write either one correct answer, or answer options, of which only one is correct. The question is formulated in such a way that it does not give the correct answer. To prepare educational material and questions, you can involve the students themselves by dividing the students into two teams with captains and choosing a jury.
Each team must prepare several entertaining, tricky questions on the topic being studied. The collected questions are checked by the teacher and divided into three categories: simple, medium and difficult. The teacher evaluates the results of the teams’ competition in preparing questions, identifying which questions are particularly difficult and the most interesting, and what most of what students have prepared helps them better assimilate the proposed text.
Instrumental system "Multimedia-BRIG"
Developed by us instrumental system "Multimedia-BRIG"
has several modes:
- training mode,
control mode with recording of results in the database for each student,
training mode.
The learning mode involves the accompaniment of the educational text with background music, illustrations, photographic materials, bright imprinted images and dynamic video pictures, which will follow the studied text frame by frame; the mode of walking through cities, art galleries and exhibitions of new technology, the “karaoke” mode and other.
The Multimedia-BRIG system can be used for distance learning and monitoring the knowledge of distance learners. The teacher prepares diverse educational texts on the computer and invites distant students to study excerpts of texts, trying to generalize them according to a variety of characteristics.
Each distance learner thinks through his own version of the generalization of the proposed text and types his own version of the text generalization on the computer. The generalization can be the most unexpected, including not very real or even implausible. It is important that it is original and interesting. Next, the teacher invites distance students to write down the essence of educational texts. Usually, the essence is very simple and can be expressed in just a few words. Then it is proposed to continue the statement by generalizing or concretizing the essence of the passage already expressed, i.e. development, continuation, deepening, generalization of what has been said.
For a given topic, a distance learner needs to search for basic concepts, questions and problems in the WWW system, in virtual libraries and other sources of information. Using Internet search information tools, he must select interesting information, drawings, and photos on the topic being studied. The student can use the database of graphic and sound fragments of the Multimedia-BRIG system. The teacher can include the material selected by the students into the system database if this material helps to better assimilate and remember educational texts. Further on this topic, distance learners prepare questions of three types of complexity: simple, medium and difficult. Students post their work on the educational Web server.
The teacher provides the opportunity for distance students to interact with each other and with specialists in the field being studied using collective telecommunications. The teacher organizes a conference, Olympiad, brainstorming or competition between distance learners.
This could be a competition for the best cheat sheet on a given topic. The purpose of such a competition is to teach the art of concise, imaginative and intelligible display of educational information so that it is understandable to everyone. The task is given to compose not just a cheat sheet on a certain topic, but a work of art. In the center of the cheat sheet you can depict several of the most important key concepts. It is suggested to write them in different fonts and circle them. Draw arrows and lines to the sides. Reflect what concepts the keywords relate to. You can draw pictograms. It is suggested to create, invent, try. There is only one condition: the cheat sheet itself must be understandable to anyone. You can organize a competition for the best aphorism, riddle, quiz, joke, anecdote, pun on a given topic. The teacher evaluates whose humor and jokes had the most beneficial effect on the learning of educational material. Each distance learner creates his own educational product, which is published on the educational Web site.
The teacher’s responsibilities include preparing problem assignments, developing teaching materials and tests, providing access to the information space, organizing telecommunications between students, consulting, reviewing and evaluating educational products created by students.
Educational computer programs for developing students' creative abilities
We have developed educational computer programs for developing students’ creative abilities,
which can be used for distance learning.
Psychological components of creative activity:
Research by psychologists has revealed psychological components of creative activity:
- mental flexibility;
- systematic and consistent thinking;
- dialecticity;
- willingness to take risks and take responsibility for the decisions made.
Flexibility of mind includes the ability to identify significant features from many random ones and the ability to quickly change from one idea to another. People with flexible minds usually offer many solutions at once, combining and varying individual elements of a problem situation.
Systematicity and consistency allow people to control the creative process. Without them, flexibility can turn into “idea racing”, where the solution is not fully thought through. In this case, a person who has many ideas cannot choose among them. He is indecisive and dependent on the people around him. Thanks to systematicity, all ideas are brought into a certain system and analyzed sequentially. Very often, with such an analysis, a seemingly absurd idea is transformed and opens the way to solving the problem.
Often, a discovery was born from the connection of the seemingly incompatible. This feature was called dialectical thinking. For example, for a long time such phenomena as wireless transmission of speech at a distance, flight on heavier-than-air aircraft, recording and storing sound seemed insoluble. A dialectically thinking person can clearly formulate a contradiction and find a way to resolve it. Remember the possibilities of the Internet.
A creative thinker also needs the ability take risks and not be afraid of responsibility for your decision. This is because often the old and familiar ways of thinking are more understandable to most people.
It is known, for example, that the laws of heredity were discovered and published by Georg Mendel in 1865. But until 1900, all biologists ignored Mendel's discovery. Only 35 years later, after three different groups of scientists had rediscovered the laws of heredity, Mendel's discovery was remembered and accepted.
Three stages of development of creative thinking:
The psychological components of creativity identified by scientists are properties of adult thinking. Students develop their ability to be creative gradually, going through several stages of development. These stages occur sequentially. Studies of student creativity make it possible to identify at least three stages of development of creative thinking:
- visually - effective;
- causal;
- heuristic.
Visual - actionable thinking
allows the student to understand spatial and temporal relationships. Thinking is born from action. Very important for the development of thinking are tasks to study the image-conception and to develop fantasy. We can name several psychological qualities underlying fantasy:
- clear and precise representation of images of objects;
- good visual and auditory memory, allowing you to retain an image-representation in your mind for a long time;
- the ability to mentally compare two or more objects and compare them by color, shape, size and number of parts;
-the ability to combine parts of different objects and create objects with new properties.
One of the directions for the development of creativity at the stage of visual-effective thinking is going beyond the usual thought patterns. This quality of creative thinking is called originality, and it depends on the ability to mentally connect distant images of objects that are not usually connected in life.
Causal thinking
associated with going beyond the presented image of the situation and considering it in a broader theoretical context. The research activity of students at the stage of causal thinking is characterized by two qualities: the growth of independence of mental activity and the growth of critical thinking (Shardakov M.N. Essays on the psychology of a schoolchild. - M., 1955. P. 126-139). The ability to manage one’s thinking, set research goals, put forward hypotheses of cause-and-effect relationships, and consider known facts from the standpoint of put forward hypotheses are the main prerequisites for creativity at the stage of causal thinking. Evaluating one's own and others' activities from the point of view of the laws and rules of nature and society is critical thinking. On the one hand, thanks to an awareness of the rules and laws, students’ creativity becomes more meaningful, logical, and believable. On the other hand, criticality can interfere with creativity, since at the stage of putting forward a hypothesis, they may seem stupid, unrealistic and will be discarded. Such self-restrictions narrow the possibilities for the emergence of new, original ideas.
To stimulate creativity and eliminate the negative impact of criticality, various methods and techniques are used.
Thinking, which, based on the criteria of selective search, allows solving complex, uncertain, problematic situations, is called heuristic
.
Complex of multimedia computer programs "Move the Brain"
Developed by us complex of multimedia computer programs "Move the Brain"
consists of three levels. Each level is named according to the stages of development of creative thinking.
- First level
includes computer programs related to the development of visual and effective thinking.
The second level is aimed at developing causal thinking.
Third level aimed at developing heuristic thinking.
To select tasks, we were guided by two principles: the principle of dissociation and the principle of openness of tasks. The principle of dissociation means that each mental skill can be broken down into separate abilities. These abilities are associated either with the nature of the developmental material (graphic, speech, subject, mathematical), or with the internal logic of the formation of thinking skills. The principle of openness of tasks means that most exercises involve not one, but several solution options.
The first level is the development of visual and effective thinking
The first level of the program complex includes programs for analyzing the visual image, working with the properties of objects, recognizing objects based on the description of individual characteristics (guess riddles), combining the characteristics of different objects (focal object method), finding common and different characteristics of an object (Program "Extra Word" ", "Name the difference", "Search for commonalities", "Grouping words"), recognizing an object by describing possible actions with it (development of mental actions), searching for alternative methods of action, comparison tasks, the ability to make logical conclusions (Program "Inference" ), the ability to find actions that are opposite in meaning.
The second level is the development of causal thinking.
The development of causal thinking begins with awareness of the consequences of one's actions. Foresight and planning underlie creativity at the stage of cause-and-effect thinking. An important direction at the stage of causal thinking is the development of the following abilities:
- identifying one main one from several probable causes,
etc.................
Let's move on to consider the first cognitive style: analytical, positive, deductive thinking. Let's call it cause-and-effect. Its carriers are socionic types IL (ILE), LF (LSI), FR (SEE), RI (EII). As statics, they are stable and clear in their mental activity, as evolutionists, they think procedurally, without missing details and intermediate links, and as positivists, they strictly move towards one, the only correct decision.
Cause-and-effect intelligence is known synonymously as formal-logical or deterministic thinking. In both cases, his tough character is emphasized. Speech with this kind of thinking is formed using connectives (conjunctions of reason) “since”, “because”, “therefore”. The mental process itself consists of constructing chains of cause and effect. They reduce explanation to pointing to producing causes. If we use the example of Aristotle, who first pointed out four ways of explaining phenomena, then the reason for the existence of a sculpture is the sculptor who directly sculpted it. In the scientific sphere, IL (ILE) thinks this way, in the technical and managerial sphere - the methodical LF (LSI), in the social sphere he calculates the chains of material interests FR (SEE), in the humanitarian sphere he is subordinated to the categorical imperative RI (EII).
Aristotle is considered the discoverer of this thinking technique. The basic laws of formal thinking were outlined by him in the theory of syllogism. However, the first who consistently put it into practice was Euclid, who constructed the famous geometry. In modern times, its principles were substantiated by the rationalist Descartes in his Discourse on Method (1637). Then it finally took shape in mathematical logic. Cause-and-effect thinking reached its apogee in logical positivism, then its importance began to decline more and more towards the end of the 20th century. However, as a mass stereotype of evidence, it still prevails today. Let me touch on its advantages. Firstly, it is perceived in society as the most authoritative, convincing, and the only correct one. In mathematics it is formalized as a deductive-axiomatic method. Mastering it requires great intellectual endurance. Secondly, this style of thinking is characterized by greater clarity and concentration. The LF type is particularly concentrated. However, the irrational FR (SEE) also reasons quite sensibly, deducing one consequence from another, which involves focusing on a chain of steps. If at least one link drops out for some reason, then determinists lose the sense of reasonable explanation and find it difficult to take actions, since they see no reason for them. But at the same time, cause-and-effect thinking also has its drawbacks. Firstly, it is the most artificial, far from the laws of functioning of living things. Its effectiveness extends to the “logical” design of existing results, the design of working mechanisms, but not to fundamentally new discoveries. The first dead end into which formalization risks leading is scholasticism, that is, pointless, albeit logically impeccable reasoning. Secondly, consistent determinists, deducing the whole from its parts, fall into yet another intellectual dead end - the trap of reductionism. This shortcoming was noticed by ancient skeptics, and in modern times by Hume, who doubted that any event is dictated by a strict cause. Indeed, when constructing long chains of cause and effect, it is difficult to avoid the danger of cycling, the risk of falling into the circulus vitiosus - a vicious circle in proof. In the theorem on the incompleteness of formal systems, K. Gödel states that any sufficiently complex system of rules is either contradictory or contains conclusions that can neither be proven nor disproved by means of this system. This sets the limits of applicability of formal logic. Using the formal deductive method, medieval scholastics, in particular, tried to strictly prove the existence of God. As a result of closing cause and effect in a circle, they came to the definition of God as a thought that thinks itself.
Cause-and-effect thinking gives rise to a psyche that is poorly protected from training or, in extreme cases, even zombification. By skillfully combining words and memorable actions, you can achieve control over the behavior of specific people. Intellectual determinists, in particular, are characterized by a strong dependence on childhood events, which, as S. Freud once discovered, are poorly understood in full. The habits of pronounced determinists are comparable in their rigidity to conditioned reflexes. Standard military interrogation techniques are designed taking into account guaranteed cause-and-effect effects on the psyche. It includes such measures as sleep deprivation, changes in temperature and/or humidity in the chamber, deprivation of food with its subsequent distribution as a reward, etc. Isolating the arrested person and gradually imposing his instructions on him sooner or later bears fruit, since over time an unstable-thinking person develops dependence on the investigator conducting the interrogation. It is significant that in extreme, extremely compressed situations, people who think in a cause-and-effect way experience a “slow motion” effect. Thinking becomes especially clear, but stretched out over time. Seconds subjectively lengthen to minutes. For the same reason, sudden mental shocks and sudden stress greatly inhibit their brain activity until deep sleep. This model of the psyche is used by the psychological school of behaviorism. Its supporters believe that learning any behavior is carried out through training - encouraging adherence to the rule and punishment for violating it. B.F. Skinner formulated the principle of operant conditioning, according to which the behavior of living organisms is completely determined by the consequences to which it leads. He proposed a method of successive approximations, in which the learner receives positive reinforcement when his behavior becomes similar to the desired one.
The concept of programmed learning, developed by behaviorists, also bases its actions on a strictly step-by-step method of moving towards a goal.
Formal logical thinking at one time gave rise to a cause-and-effect picture of the world. This is a picture of the world of classical physics, the cornerstone of which is Newtonian mechanics. As a paradigm, it dominated until the beginning of the 20th century. Rigid systems—mechanisms, organisms—function according to these rules. However, where multifactorial processes occur (psyche, society), reductionism, explaining complex phenomena through their simple components, loses its explanatory power. In addition, the classical paradigm is too susceptible to the influence of the positive idea of progress, while in history there are many examples of negative-regressive tendencies, rollbacks, repetitions of what has already been done, etc.
A full-scale model of cause-and-effect thinking is a representation of information in the form of a drawing or realistic drawing. They are produced using direct perspective. Closely located objects in this technique are depicted larger, and distant ones, respectively, on a smaller scale, in proportion to their distance from the observer. According to such a drawing, following strict instructions, any product can be easily manufactured.
Human beings are consummate masters of cause-and-effect reasoning. We can predict what will happen if we strike a match on a rough surface, or if we go out in the rain without an umbrella, or if we say something offensive to a sensitive colleague. All this is managed by causal (cause-and-effect) logic. In each case, we model a certain situation, and then the action of some mechanism that changes this situation. In the first case, we imagine a match and a rough surface, and then the process of rubbing one against the other. We have sufficient knowledge about the mechanism of this action and understand that sparks must appear that will act on the flammable substances of the match and it will light up. In the second case, we imagine ourselves inside a dry room, and outside it is raining. Next, we imagine many drops of water falling on us. We know very well that some of them will be absorbed into our clothes and hair, while the rest will flow down the skin or remain on it. That is, we will get wet. It would seem that making such predictions based on knowledge about the operation of these mechanisms is not a difficult task, but it requires familiarity with the operation of many other mechanisms: namely, what happens when a person strikes a match on a rough surface, becomes covered in drops of water, or covers a freezing body with a thick blanket , yelling at a small child, pressing the power button on an electronic device, hitting a baseball through a window, watering plants, pressing the accelerator pedal in a car - the list goes on and on. We know a huge number of mechanisms and the results of their action.
And we are not just familiar with them, we even understand how they work. We know that a spark will not occur if the friction surface is wet or if the match is pressed too lightly or too hard.
We know that we will not get wet in the rain if we are wearing a raincoat or if the rain is light, so that the water, touching us, will immediately evaporate. We know all these connections, we imagine how they work, sufficiently to be able to predict for sure the result of this influence (the child will cry if he understands that they shouted angrily and not jokingly) and the factors that can prevent this mechanism from causing expected effect (the child will not cry if you scream from afar and he simply does not hear you).
There are other types of logical constructs that most people find equally understandable and natural. Not everyone can take the cube root of 8.743; not everyone understands quantum mechanics; and it's very difficult to predict who will win the next game in Reno, Nevada. It’s not easy to even figure out whether this Reno is east or west of Los Angeles (try looking on a map - the result will surprise you!). Not everyone is equally successful in everything. But this is where we are all great experts - in reasoning about the structure of the world. We are endowed with the ability to analyze cause-and-effect relationships (and rats, to some extent, too). What would be most useful to you if you were an animal that evolved to adapt your actions to changes in the world around you?
In the previous chapter, we established that the purpose of the thought process is to choose the most effective actions in a particular situation. To do this, you need to be able to isolate certain deep properties that remain unchanged when the situation changes. It is precisely this ability to grasp the deep invariant properties of situations that distinguishes people. A person's mind allows him to identify these key properties and understand that the victim has a concussion, or an infectious disease, or that it is time to pump up the car tires.
All the examples we have discussed so far have been fairly simple. We are not suggesting that people can correctly predict the outcome of a war, the results of a new health care program, or even the quality of a toilet. We may be more successful in analyzing cause-and-effect relationships than in any other area, but the sheer illusory depth of our explanations of situations shows that even in this respect our individual achievements are not that great.
With the help of logical thinking, we try to use our ideas about cause-and-effect mechanisms to understand the changes that occur. It helps us predict what will happen in the future by tracking the mechanisms of transformation of causes into effects. Here are some examples of common logical reasoning. Consider the following situation.
A lobbyist once told a senator, “If you support my bill, you won’t have to think about where to get the money for a whole year.” And over the next few months of debate, the senator vigorously defended the bill. How much time do you think our senator spent making money this year?
The question is not difficult: it is unlikely that the senator was running wild in search of money; most likely, he simply sat, sipping luxurious whiskey and interspersing it from time to time with an expensive cigar. Why is this question so simple? Because we draw logical conclusions automatically. We ourselves draw conclusions regarding everything that has not been explicitly said and which we ourselves cannot directly observe. The lobbyist example is a simple case of a logic circuit called modus ponens(33), or separation rule. In its most abstract form it looks like this:
If A, then B.
If A, then so is B.
Who could argue with that! If A follows from B, then as soon as A appears, B must also appear. It sounds as if we are repeating the same thing twice. But in fact it is not at all obvious that this is the case. After all, it could be that the senator supported the bill, but refused the lobbyist’s money. And the lobbyist could simply be lying. And the expected results were not predetermined. Logic circuit modus ponens in its most abstract form it looks natural, but as it becomes filled with content it looks less and less natural, because causal considerations come into play.
Many logic circuits don't look that simple at all, and some seemingly logical arguments actually aren't. For example: if my underwear is blue, then my socks are necessarily green.
My socks are really green. Therefore, I am wearing blue underwear.
Is this conclusion justified? Most people believe yes, but from a textbook logic perspective (called propositional logic) the answer is no. This logical error is called a consequential statement (proving the truth of a reason by reversing the consequence).
Now consider a statement that not only declares the reliability of certain facts, but also examines causes and consequences:
If I fall into a sewer, I will inevitably have to take a shower.
I had a shower.
Consequently, I fell into the sewer.
In this case, people for the most part are not mistaken. The fact that a person has taken a shower does not mean that he has fallen into a sewer, because there are many other reasons for taking a shower. In this example, the first statement refers to a cause: falling into a dirty pit is the reason why I took a shower. If we reason in terms of cause and effect, we take into account many more circumstances, which allows us to draw correct conclusions. This requires a lot of mental investment. We must realize that falling into a dirty pit can be the reason for taking a shower; any other outcome is almost impossible. But it should be clear that there are other reasons for taking a shower. We must evaluate the plausibility of these reasons, and also translate these considerations into the form of an answer to the question. We do all this in a matter of seconds. Logical reasoning is commonplace for us.
But people are not logical machines in the sense that computers are. We constantly make conclusions, but they are based not on provisions from logic textbooks, but on the logic of cause-and-effect relationships.
Just as people do not only think associatively (as Pavlov believed), they also rarely use logical deduction. When reasoning, we use cause and effect analysis. People make inferences by thinking about how the world works. We talk about how causes lead to given effects, what factors cancel or prevent those effects, and what factors must be in effect for a particular cause to actually initiate a particular effect. Instead of reasoning in terms of propositional logic, which tells us whether a statement is true or false, people think in terms of cause-and-effect logic, which takes into account information about what events happen in reality and then draws conclusions.
The ability to reason logically allows us to solve many real-life problems. Building a bridge to cross an abyss or body of water is the result of cause-and-effect thinking. To build a safe bridge, designers must calculate the load-bearing capacity of structures that can support heavy loads such as railroad cars or trucks. Attaching wheels to a car to allow it to roll also requires many different cause-and-effect considerations. To build real bridges and mount real wheels, which eventually allowed humanity to expand habitable territories, avoid predatory animals and ultimately emerge victorious in the evolutionary competition for limited resources, it was necessary to acquire the ability to construct a bridge or a wheel mount.
Our ability to make plans for the distant future is also a type of cause-and-effect thinking. It includes ideas about the mechanisms that influence the state of the world in the long term. This kind of long-term planning is necessary to motivate us to spend many years of our lives studying. Learning is the mechanism by which we develop skills whose meaning may only become apparent over time. Learning the fine art of building Eskimo boats (kayak) takes several years. But no one in the community that uses such boats would take the time to do this unless they realized that this art will be used for years and years after the current generation of kayak builders has passed from the scene, as the community will continue to will continue to fish and move through the water in the usual way. Spending a long time on learning any practical skills or art makes sense only if you, using cause-and-effect relationships, draw yourself a long-term perspective, taking into account possible social changes, including death.
We have made advances in cause-and-effect analysis not only in relation to physical objects and social changes, but also in the psychological sphere. Imagine that someone, say your spouse, refuses to talk to you. This problem needs to be solved somehow. You must use cause-and-effect reasoning to determine what the problem is and decide what to do about it.
To frame the problem correctly, you need to think logically about human reactions and emotions. What would cause a person to have a negative reaction towards you? Maybe you offended this person? Perhaps you reminded him or her of some past misstep? Or offended his/her moral feelings? As with physical objects, complex cause-and-effect analysis will be required. This requires an understanding of human thought and motivation, as well as knowledge of the mechanisms by which they are transformed into action. To understand what offends a person so much, you need to imagine his/her views, or attitudes. For example, what does this person know about your past? What are his or her own moral values? You should also have some idea of the person's desires and intentions and his/her pain points. What does he or she want to achieve by remaining silent? In other words, your job is to understand the intentions behind that person's actions and the consequences he or she expects from those actions. This is the kind of cause-and-effect analysis we perform (34) in every social interaction, and most people do it well.
Finding a way to solve a problem also requires cause-and-effect reasoning: you need to determine the consequences of different courses of action. You may want to comfort the person so he or she can feel better, but this may be perceived as an admission of guilt, which will give that person an advantage. If you intend to start a fight, you may not give your partner an advantage, but you may ruin the relationship, at least for a while. Sometimes it can be difficult to unambiguously predict other people's reactions to our actions, but we still do it all the time and mostly successfully. It is enough to ask something nicely and affably - and this usually leads to happy agreement, and a successful joke evokes (as our experience shows) an approving half-smile. Humans are very good at logical reasoning, not only about physical objects, but also about human behavior.
- 48.
1. Generalization and specification
Unity of generalization and specification in teaching
In the process of cognition, individual specific phenomena, processes and facts are studied. At the same time, their common properties, qualities, connections and patterns are established and studied, which leads to the definition of rules, laws, and general patterns. Thus, in the process of cognition, generalization processes occur.
In schools, simple visualization in the form of showing individual things, reporting specific facts, demonstrating individual processes and the like without indicating particular and general relationships between them, without stimulating mental activity in the form of generalization processes in order to establish and assimilate common properties, general connections and relationships, laws or generalized conclusions and provisions is poor teaching. Correct training is when students from the study of individual concrete phenomena constantly systematically rise to the study of the general, abstract, when their simple interest, say, in machines, is formed into an interest in the study of the laws of mechanics and geometry. Or when their immediate interest, for example, in observing the growth of plants in an experimental school corner of nature develops into an interest in studying the general laws of life and plant growth. To structure teaching this way means to constantly transfer students from studying the concrete to studying the abstract.
Knowledge of general concepts and laws, rules and regulations ensures the assimilation of more and more individual things, facts and processes related to them in their qualitative features and patterns. If general laws, rules or regulations are not revealed in their concrete diversity, are not comprehended in the form of processes of concretization, knowledge takes on a meaningless scholastic character.
The processes of generalization and concretization represent the movement of thought from the general through the particular to the specific and back. This unity of the processes of generalization and specification ensures the successful promotion and assimilation of both specific knowledge and general rules, laws and regulations. Knowledge of general laws, rules and conclusions leads, through mental processes of concretization, to a meaningful study of new individual facts, things and processes. This further study of individual phenomena in their characteristics reveals some new properties or processes common to them and thus, in further processes of generalization, leads to a richer and deeper knowledge of general concepts and rules, laws and regulations in their general properties or patterns. And a richer and deeper knowledge of general concepts and rules, laws or regulations facilitates and at the same time raises to a higher level the study of the further diversity of specific phenomena.
In cognition, the processes of generalizing thinking occur and develop in unity with the processes of concretization. In the study of individual things and phenomena, something common to all of them is always discovered. For the sake of obtaining and assimilating generalized knowledge, specific knowledge is always studied. The process of concretization is cognition of the individual and at the same time comprehensive cognition of the general.
2. Formation of concepts
Processes of generalization in the form of reduction to one species and genus and generalization of connections and relationships, together with the process of concretization, lead to the content of concepts or to the formation of concepts.
A concept is knowledge of essential and general moments and phenomena. The essential qualities and patterns of things or phenomena and their concepts are those that distinguish these things or phenomena of one kind or type from things or phenomena of another kind or type. The actual content of a concept is those essential and general moments or features of it that serve to understand the phenomenon as a whole and at the same time understand something else in our experience or further teaching. Thus, concepts become an effective force of cognition.
The concept reflects only some part of the qualities and patterns of phenomena. Each time we know something about a given phenomenon, but something remains unknown. But humanity, in its practical and scientific activities, is becoming more and more aware of reality. Thus, there is an expansion, deepening and change in the content of concepts. The concepts of “metal”, “atom”, etc. a hundred years ago had the same content. But over the past hundred years, in connection with the development of science and technology in connection with the development of the doctrine of metals and the atom, these concepts in their content have expanded, deepened and changed. Consequently, concepts develop and change.
At the same time, the disclosure of the content of individual concepts or the process of formation of concepts in the process of cognition occurs in conjunction with the formation of many other concepts. “...Human concepts,” noted V.I. Lenin, “are mobile, forever moving, transforming into each other, flowing into one another, without this they do not reflect living life.” Analysis of concepts, study of them, the art of operating with them always requires studying the movement of concepts, their connections, their mutual transitions. Each concept is in a certain relationship in a certain connection with all the others.
Concepts are a unique process of reflecting things and processes of material reality in our thinking. Concepts are what live in the things and processes themselves. “...The concept is the essence of the subject,” wrote V.I. Lenin.
There are concepts of objects, qualities of feelings and relationships (connections).
It was indicated above that the process of concept formation proceeds through the unity of the processes of concretization and generalization in the form of reduction to one type or genus and generalization of relations. In this regard, concepts in their content contain not only non-visual general and essential aspects of phenomena, but to some extent each time representations of individual things and processes. Thus, the concept of Archimedes’ law is not visual in its content, since we cannot clearly have in our minds in the form of ideas all the cases of the action of this law when bodies are immersed in water anywhere and everywhere in time and space, although this law is known to us.
In general, the process of concept formation in the course of cognition is a multifaceted and multi-act path of an increasingly wider and deeper disclosure of the content of concepts and the assimilation of this content. Being the result of the processes of generalization and concretization in unity, it is at the same time accomplished through such operations of thinking as abstractions, analysis, comparison, analogies, synthesis, induction and deduction. Through abstraction, certain signs and features are abstracted from specific individual phenomena, which are then subjected to analytical study. Comparison ensures the finding of similar and common or different features of individuals. Some similar features or characteristics are synthesized into new common features of many individuals. A guess by analogy or an inference by induction provides the process of generalization and determination of the general and essential aspects of a phenomenon. Then, inference by deduction allows, in the process of concretization, to attribute new units to a certain general concept.
3. Finding cause-and-effect relationships and concepts
Everything essential is in some kind of relationship to each other. All the diversity of phenomena exists only because there are relationships between them.
One and very significant form of connections, relationships and conditionality of the phenomena of the world among themselves is causality, the causal form of connections and relationships.
Cause-and-effect thinking combines the processes of generalization and specification, as well as the processes of concept formation.
However, cause-and-effect thinking in its functions is not limited to this. At the same time, it has an independent character in the processes of thinking, since it also serves a different and special mental activity. This mental activity represents the disclosure of causal connections and relationships not only between individual concepts of the same kind, but also between concepts of different types, as well as between different sections of knowledge.
Multilateral cause-and-effect thinking is characterized by the fact that a given cause can cause a number of consequences, or a given consequence is determined by a number of causes.
Logical cause-and-effect thinking is either single-valued or polysemous in its nature and scope. Unambiguous logical cause-and-effect thinking explains a given single phenomenon or proves (sums up) a certain general law or rule.
In contrast, multivalued logical cause-and-effect thinking explains a given phenomenon not with one, but with a number of general laws, rules or regulations, and the thought process of a cause-and-effect nature is carried out through a whole chain of mental operations in the form of induction, deduction, classification, analogy, etc. d.
Logical cause-and-effect thinking reveals such connections and relationships between the phenomena of reality that are, firstly, permanent in nature, that is, when the corresponding causes always and everywhere cause the same consequences, or when certain consequences are found always and everywhere due to the action of certain causes .
Secondly, logical cause-and-effect thinking is of a generalized nature, since when explaining a single phenomenon, a certain general law or rule is meant, or as a result of observing a number of individual phenomena, a certain general law or rule is discovered. Third, logical cause-and-effect thinking is reversible. So, “if one of the terms is increased by a certain number, then the sum will increase by the same number.” And vice versa - “the amount increased by a certain number due to the fact that one of the terms increased by the same number.”
The farmer prepares and improves the field, sows on time and patiently waits for shoots and harvest. He will protect the field from animals so that they do not trample the seedlings. Every farmer knows causes and effects. But this is not the case in human relationships: people do not want to know either causes or consequences. They do not care about seedlings and want everything to be done according to their will. People, despite all the examples, will doubt the Cosmic Law. They are very willing to sow causes, but will not think that weeds will be the only harvest.
Discussions about cause and effect should be introduced in schools. Let the leader know the reason, and the students come up with the consequences. During such conversations, the qualities of the students will also be revealed. One can imagine many effects from one cause. Only an expanded consciousness will sense what consequences will correspond to all the surrounding circumstances. One should not be consoled by the fact that even a simple farmer can take into account the harvest. The phenomenon of cosmic currents and mental battles is much more complex. Let young people from childhood get used to complex consequences and to dependence on spatial thoughts. It should not be assumed that children should be protected from thinking.
The development of causal thinking occurs in the course of solving various kinds of problems, in the process of mastering knowledge in mathematics, physics, chemistry, natural science and other sciences.
Typically, finding causal connections and relationships in the course of solving a problem begins with an analytical consideration of a given problem situation or task in order to isolate and define its components or elements.
Then, as a result of comparison, through comparison and analogy of the components of the problem, as well as the connections and relationships between them with the corresponding general principles, rules or laws for solving this kind of problem, hypotheses for solving this problem or task are outlined.
In this case, hypotheses can arise: a) by association by analogy with past experience in solving similar problems or problems, or b) by transferring what was previously known to the solution of a given problem, or, finally, c) they can be built again as a result of mental activity to solve a given problem. problems or tasks. The hypotheses put forward are evaluated. After a causal justification of the value and suitability of the hypotheses put forward to solve a given problem or task. The most diverse and rich variation in solutions to a problem or task makes the accepted hypothesis the most probable. And systematic exercises in solving many other problems or tasks of the same kind provide further development and discipline of students’ causal thinking.
The development of causal thinking also occurs in solving behavioral problems. After all, in order to correctly solve any behavioral problem, a person must, through a causal consideration of the situation, evaluate the motives for and against a given action. Next, he must take into account the possible consequences after committing this act. And only after such a cause-and-effect consideration of the situation does a person make one or another cause-based decision.
In the course of multilateral mental activity, critical thinking is formed. Critical thinking is realized in the critical examination of individual explanations and evidence of phenomena within the scope of study and assimilation. But any critical consideration is a cause-and-effect consideration, there is a special moment of causal thinking. And the development of the latter is, to a certain extent, a consequence of the development of critical thinking in students when considering and studying individual elements of school knowledge.
However, critical examination becomes possible only if there is a sufficient supply of knowledge and experience in the relevant field of knowledge and a high level of development of the processes and operations of mental activity and students.
At the same time, critical thinking is an evaluative thinking of facts, rules, laws, etc. in their causal relationships and justification, since their critical consideration is always built from some angle, from the point of view of some positions. The ability, from a certain angle of view, in the light of some theory, to critically examine given facts and phenomena, their cause-and-effect evidence and explanations, is the highest stage in students’ assimilation of knowledge, as well as in the development of their causal thinking and thinking in general.