Pillars of EfSD: Critical Thinking & Reflection

'Would you tell me, please, 
which way I ought to go from here?'

`That depends a good deal on 
where you want to get to,' said the Cat.

`I don't much care where--' said Alice.

`Then it doesn't matter 
which way you go,' said the Cat.

Critical Thinking

What is it?

Critical thinking is a means to challenging information. It can be a tool to “examine and question underlying assumptions that ‘shape’ our world, knowledge and opinions (ARIES 2009)” in order to understand our surroundings more deeply.

Why is it important?

If you’ve ever questioned anything seemingly silly and developed your own perception, you have experienced the importance of critical thinking. When we exercise this ability we can better understand complex problems and make better choices.

Tilbury et al (2005) say that it is “an essential part of learning for sustainability approaches to environmental education.” Thanks Tilbury et al!   Completely changing our societal and education systems in order to adopt responsibilities towards the global society and our home plant will take a lot of critical thinking from a lot of people.

Again:

Problems cannot be solved by the level of awareness that created them. – Albert Einstein

…and again, I believe all human beings and society as a whole has the capacity to come closer to self-realization, but it will take a lot of gradual work that pervades our entire social system. This is why education for sustainable development (EfSD) is important, because it will affect everyone from all sectors and all levels of society.

Aries (2009) gives three great reasons that critical thinking will support the efforts for Education for Sustainable Development (EfSD); by critically observing the sources of unsustainable practices individuals will:

• Develop the ability to participate in change.
• Create new perspectives.
• Promote alternative ways of thinking.

Critical Reflection
What is it?
Critical Reflection is the learning process after having asked questions and gotten answers during critical thinking. It is a way to make the critical thinking useful by applying meaning to the new found information (Tilbury and Ross 2006).

Why is it important?
Once meaning is found the information becomes knowledge. It would be difficult for individuals to  engage in sustainability if they challenged the foundations for all that they knew, then never made sense of it and lived in an abyss of eternal confusion; a rut of critical thoughts with no reassessment of how someone may make sense of their world. Ever heard of an existential crisis? 
The thing is that, the little bits of challenging-and-answering that we do is usually automatically made sense of, ...to some extent, by categorizing information into appropriate slots in the mind. However, this is not Critical Reflection. Critical Reflection delves deeper after having skimmed the surface and absorbs knowledge more holistically than not. 

Real Life

RSA (the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce) is an organization working towards spreading enlightenment for the 21^st century. Below is a description of their organization from their website:

“The RSA: an enlightenment organisation committed to finding innovative practical solutions to today’s social challenges. Through its ideas, research and 27,000-strong Fellowship, it seeks to understand and enhance human capability so we can close the gap between today’s reality and people’s hopes for a better world (RSA 2011).”

Their mission and public debates surround prospects for the future of the human race and seek to answer: ‘Can we go on like this?’ and ‘Will the ideas and values which transformed our world in the past two centuries be sufficient to find solutions to the challenges we now face or do we need new ways of thinking?’. They provide many public resources derived from cutting edge research and development projects, then expose their avant-guarde ideas to a global audience to ignite critical thinking. As such they are a socially sustainable organization because they exist for the advancement of life quality. 
(hit the jump to learn more about RSA)  Give me the Elixir!

Below is a video from RSA on Education Paradigms. It addresses the purpose of this entire journal/ blog and is a fine example of how this organization is a great tool for critical thinking. Apart from this, the animation further supports the value that art has in spreading meaningful messages. The images bring life to the story being told and serve as a cognitive reinforcement to the educational experience.

Changing Education Paradigms

Highlight - Divergent Thinking (00:07:44). 
“an essential capacity for creativity,

 the ability to see lots of ways to answer a question,

 and lots of ways of interpreting a question.”

I recall that Divergent Thinking was a common exercise during my times at art school. It was a means to bring about critical thinking, to find many answers to one thing. From my experience, I felt that divergent thinking did affect my long term creativity; I noticed that I was able to come up with more and more ideas about any given concept or thing. A study by Wakefield (1985) indicated that the primary condition of fostering creative performance was  freedom to discover and solve problems. 
(Hit the jump for another RSA mental elixir)
The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us



Activities

Analyzing Ads
Since Critical Thinking and Reflection will help analyze advertisements, such would be a purposeful exercise in order to help people associate critical thinking and reflection with deciphering advert messages to make better consumer decisions... 
The class would be divided into groups and adverts would be distributed amongst them accompanied by a series of questions. 
Tilbury and Wartman (2004) list questions to consider for this exercise.

• What qualities is it seeking to attribute to the product?

• What social, cultural or natural images is it using?

• Is it seeking to exploit nature or a cultural or social issue?

• What is really being sold?

• How might the advert affect the way we think about culture, nature, or social issues?

• What are the key sustainable development issues associated with the advert?

Divergent and Convergent Thinking Exercise.

•      WritingPoetry? *
  Listing (too easy,  a joke? maybe there should be something more challenging if this is chosen or assigned)*

•      Sketching - If this is part of an art class design techniques might be part of evaluation. This would also help with holistic learning.
  -  A series of repeated shapes on two pages. Participant must draw images that fit in the circular/square/triangular/etc. shape. On one page they should practice Divergent Thinking, each solution should be completely different to the next. On the other page participants should practice Convergent Thinking, each solution should have a relation to the one before.Reflection. - Perhaps a self and class critique session(art class mode) or sharing with a     neighbor.
  
  -  Draw a scene of a series of whatever that relates to either convergent or divergent thinking. Might need some constraints. *
  Reflection. - A self and class critique session or sharing with a neighbor + aesthetics. Yes, yes, I could be more creative here...Ill get back to it. 

•      Puzzles
  Aims Education Foundation Puzzles
  Reflection - needs*

•      Mind Mapping
  Mind mapping is another exercise an art professor swore by and Im glad he did.
  A post on mind mapping is coming soon to explain its madness!

___Resources___
Stimulating Creativity Through Divergent Thinking
Aims Education Foundation Puzzles
Mind Mapping

___Cite___

ARIES 2009,  Education for Sustainability - the role of education in engaging and equipping people for change, ARIES, Macquarie University, Australian Government - Department of the Environment, Water,  Heritage, and the Arts, Australia

Gladwin, T.N., Kennelly, J.J., Krause, T. 1995, ‘Shifting Paradigms for Sustainable Development: Implications for Management Theory and Research’, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 20, No. 4, pg 874 - 907

Tilbury, D., Keogh, A., Leighton, A. and Kent, J. 2005,  A National Review of Environmental Education and its Contribution to Sustainability in Australia: Further and Higher Education, Canberra: Australian Government Department of the Environment and Heritage and Australian Research Institute in Education for Sustainability (ARIES).

Tilbury, D. and Ross, K. 2006, Living Change: Documenting good practice in Education for Sustainability in NSW. Macquarie University, Sydney, and Nature Conservation Council, NSW.

Tilbury, D. and Wortman, D. 2004, Engaging People in Sustainability, IUCN Commission on Education and Communication, Gland and Cambridge

Mind Mapping 2011, Mind Mapping, 01/09/11,<http://www.mindmapping.com/>
Wakefield, J.F. 1985, ‘Towards Creativity: Problem Finding in a Divergent-Thinking Exercise’, Child Study Journal, Vol.15, No.4, Pg. 265-270

...Futures Thinking

Casper David Friedrich's Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog.
This artists works from the German Romanticist era are well known
for simultaneously portraying a sense of human dominion over a landscape,
yet the belittlement of individuals in nature.

What is Futures Thinking?

Futures Thinking is an exercise that engages people from their own perceptions and ideas on the topic of sustainability.

Purpose.

The Future's Thinking process asks participants to envision their ideal future guided by key questions (see "Questions for Participants" below).  These futures can be drawn, written about, or expressed in other manners. By doing this they are instantly immersed in creating what their sustainable world would be like. 

Outcome.
Giving them the opportunity of  having time, alternatives, motivation, choice & using holism results in personal ownership of that world and the process of getting there (ARIES 2009; & Tilbury and Wartman 2004). See more about this in the previous post. The process explores how to achieve change, offers direction for taking action (ARIES 2009) as well as  empowers participants to "realize the stake they hold in the future with a positive framework that motivates them toward taking action on those visions (Tilbury and Wartman 2004)."

Do not direct all your energies towards seeking pleasure but rather towards a sublime ideal. Your energies will then serve you and contribute to the realization of your goal or ideal. - Omraam Aivanhov

Planning an Activity.
Though I'm a fan of stream of consciousness art and believe it has value beyond aesthetics, maybe entering into psycho-analytics, "going with the flow" might not be a good start when doing a Futures Thinking activity. Educators should generally always enter educational activities with a plan knowing what are their outputs, short-term desired outcomes, and long-term desired outcomes. See more about that here.
       Questions and Considerations for Planners...
Tilbury et al (2005) use the following questions and considerations sort of as checkpoints for a complete Futures Thinking, Envisioning process for the participant, I thought they'd look nice on a chart 

An entering script for the 'futures thinking'  envisioning process.
(Tilbury and Wartman 2004)

Facilitating Futures Thinking.
The image to the right depicts a possible entering script for the Futures Thinking, Envisioning process, but there are many ways Futures Thinking can be done. 
Be as creative as you want. 
There are key questions towards participants that will help guide a Futures Thinking activity while exercising core education for sustainable development (EfSD) principals.
Questions for Participants...

Draw your vision… think of five key [sustainability] words that you associate with it… take time to reflect…what assuptions  influenced and informed your vision?...Do any assumptions underpin it?… What elements would need to be present to create this vision?… What implications does this vision have for what you or your community does now?…. What are the implications of this vision for your life, work , and future action?... How does your  neighbors vision differ from yours? (Tilbury & Wartman 2004). I came up with, Why might your neighbors vision differ from yours? What do your vision and your neighbor's have in common? Why might this be? 

Guinea Pig Myself.
I was part of this Futures Thinking activity in a class. The prof. asked the class to close their eyes and clear our mind. Then asked us many questions similar to those above. I envisioned my world and what I wanted for the future. When that part of the "trance like" exercise was done the prof. eased us back into the room and asked us to grab a paper and go somewhere in the room to express ourselves on the page for 15 mins. (more or less). Afterwards, when that time was sadly over the class was asked to walk about the room and look at everyones expressed visions while we reflected on some more questions. Then we chose the closest partners and explained our work and our vision. When we sat down and got back into class-mode the prof. guided a reflection on what just happened; what the purpose of the activity was and about the what we learned.

I envision...

   
   


My Short Reflection.
Like all activities that allow you to explore yourself internally, this felt like precious free time, even despite being guided by someone else through the imagery I created in my mind it. It was very relaxing. I can see how this exercise gives the imagineer a feeling of motivation and ownership of the future world and the path to get there.  To be honest, I wanted to keep drawing and coloring for the rest of the class... ¬  ¬ , not possible.

The five words that have to do with sustainability that I related this to were:

Ecologically Sound.

Integration. 

Local-ism.

Energy Smarts. 

& Pristine.

Okay I know they aren't just words, but it counts. These words helped me give my vision some direction, if it weren't for them, I would have never come close to finishing any specific idea at all in 15 mins. 

Time to reflect on my work afterwards and the way that it compared to others got me thinking. There were many assumptions in my vision. I assumed we'd leave fossil fuels and become a solar powered world. I assumed that everyone would be down with changing the structures of their entire communities anndddd ...would willingly grow trees that would engulf their homes. 

I suppose what influenced these crazy thoughts was that...at my very core I feel close to the earth, I'm a green-y, and I wish everyone else could be to, or at least understand why they should go along with green-y or sustainability efforts.  I've taken many environmental  courses so I understand these things that aren't the norm of knowledge...I cannot assume that others would understand the immanence. Moreover, I grew up being exposed to raw nature, so I have experienced the power of its aesthetics overcoming me ...so I love it even more. 

Others who have grown up never knowing this might not have this appreciation of the natural world, thus creating even more of an obstacle to understand why its important that we change. 

To create this vision there needs to be more education on the matter, its urgency and what can be done, there should be an effort to expose more young people to the wonders of nature, accompanied by legitimate policies, and stronger global agreements.  This means, the community has to change and I have to change too.  

___Cite___
ARIES 2009,  Education for Sustainability - the role of education in engaging and equipping people for change, ARIES, Macquarie University, Australian Government - Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage, and the Arts, Australia            <http://www.aries.mq.edu.au/publications/aries/efs_brochure/pdf/efs_brochure.pdf

Tilbury, D., Keogh, A., Leighton, A. and Kent, J. 2005,  A National Review of Environmental Education and its Contribution to Sustainability in Australia: Further and Higher Education, Canberra: Australian  Government Department of the Environment and Heritage and Australian Research Institute in Education for Sustainability (ARIES).

Tilbury, D. and Wortman, D. 2004, Engaging People in Sustainability, IUCN Commission on Education and Communication, Gland and Cambridge