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Do Now. List non-traditional uses for a spoon, a wad a gum, and a paper clip. Unit 7B Cognition : Thinking, Problem Solving, Creativity, & Language. Thinking, Problem Solving, & Creativity – Part 1. Cognition. Cognition
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Do Now • List non-traditional uses for a spoon, a wad a gum, and a paper clip.
Unit 7B Cognition : Thinking, Problem Solving, Creativity, & Language Thinking, Problem Solving, & Creativity – Part 1
Cognition • Cognition • The mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating • Cognitive Psychologists • Study these activities • How we create concepts • How we solve problems • How we make decisions • How we form judgements
Concepts • Concepts • mental groupings of objects, events or people that are similar • Allow us to classify newly encountered objects on the basis of our past experience • We create categories/hierarchies so we can use the info in there efficiently • Prototypes: • typical, highly representative example of a concept… usually a mental image or best example of the concept • EX: Bird = small, feathery, flying creature • Concepts speed up and guide our thinking
Solving Problems • Strategies • Trial and Error • Algorithms: step by step procedure • A rule • Usually guarantees success • EX: Shoe un-tied= make a tree, chase bunny around tree, into the whole, pull tight • Heuristic • a cognitive shortcut that MIGHT lead to a solution • More error prone • Faster • EX: mental math rather than writing it out • Insight • sudden awareness of how items are related and seeing the solution to the problem • You often need some prior experience and initial trial-and-error to gain insight
Solving Problems - Creativity • Creativity • Ability to produce novel and valuable ideas • If you are creativity you may be able to arrive at a conclusion in a different manner • Intelligence requires convergent thinking, creativity requires divergent thinking • 5 Components • Expertise • having a well developed knowledge base helps build ideas , images and phrases that we would normally block out, in essence the more we have to build the better we can put it all together • Imaginative thinking skills • the ability to see things in novel ways, this helps you make connects and see unnoticed patterns • A vertursome personality • having the desire to seek new experiences, being able to tolerate the unknown, overcome obstacles • Intrinsic motivation • Self driven/ driven by your own interests • A creative environment • A place that supports curiosity and exploration
Obstacles to Problem Solving • Confirmation Bias • the want to confirm rather than refute the ideas that we already have • Fixation • inability to see a problem from a new perspective • Mental Set: • tendency for old patterns of problem solving to persist • make it impossible for us to see new ways to solve the problem • EX: the only way to start a fire is with a match • Functional Fixedness • tendency to think of an object only in terms of its typical use • EX: a shoe can only be used to protect the feet while walking as opposed to using it as a hammer
Today • Creative Thinking Activity • HW Quiz (Maybe next class.. Time permitting) • Begin HW • HW= none