Three techniques you can use to help learners open their minds and start thinking critically about strategies and strategy selection

Narrating Problem-Solving Strategies

Problem-solving strategies are the ways of thinking we employ when faced with challenges.

For example, when I am faced with the challenge of writing a book, the first problem-solving strategy I employ is this set of questions:

What is the topic?
How can that topic be subdivided into chapters?
Do I have chapters covering the most important elements of the topic?
How can I divide each chapter into a series of subsections?
Does each subsection in each chapter cover something different?
Are there enough practical strategies?
How should I order the subsections in each chapter?
How should I order the chapters?

This strategy takes a challenge – writing a book – and breaks it down into a series of separate tasks.

It allows me to create a framework for the book that both ensures coverage and provides a set of individual tasks I need to complete to make the book a reality.

It also allows me to focus on one thing at a time, safe in the knowledge that there will always be a clear connection to the wider whole (because of the initial work in constructing the framework).

A couple of things follow.

First, we have an example of what a problem-solving strategy looks like.

Second, we have an example of what narrating a problem-solving strategy does.

It gives the audience – in this case you, the reader – an insight into the thought processes applied in pursuit of a given goal.

Translate this to the classroom and we see that we have a specific example of modelling thinking.

Specific because our interest here is solely in narrating, for the benefit of our learners, the thought processes we would employ to deal with a specific problem.

Where modelling thinking involves all examples of you giving learners access to your expertise, narrating problem-solving strategies is a specific technique in which you talk learners through the story of how a strategy works, or how you might apply it if you were them.

Here are some examples of how to use the technique:

To introduce learners to a new way of thinking.
To help learners understand why a particular strategy works.
To suggest an alternative method to learners – which they might then employ or choose to critique.
To show learners that thinking is malleable and can be changed in light of other people’s ideas.
To illustrate how to deal with a problem in a particular way, with the learner going on to copy this or finding an alternative that works for them.
To provide the basis for learner efforts, in that they will take the strategy as a starting point, with this giving them direction where previously there might have been none.
To give learners an insight into how to think about their own thinking. For example, by mimicking the process of narration demonstrated by the teacher.

Past Work Analysis

The work that learners produce – whether this is written, verbal, physical or material – is the function of the thinking in which they have engaged.

Sometimes this thinking is conscious, sometimes not.

Sometimes it is highly specific, sometimes it is general.

In some instances, it could be described as instinctual – such as when a footballer strikes a ball, though even this is likely to be the result of prior learning (and, therefore, muscle memory).

Past work analysis means any situation in which learners are asked to analyse what they have created or done, considering the thinking that preceded it – or which can be divined from an examination of the thing in question.

It is for this reason that it promotes metacognition.

We are asking learners to look back at what they have done.

But, instead of seeing the final product as the end point, we ask them to see that as the starting point for an analysis of the processes that led to its formulation.

Through this, learners are reminded that thinking is open to change and that processes are of central importance.

It helps learners understand that they can shape, edit, and refine their thinking.

Here are two examples, from different areas of the curriculum, that illustrate the point:

Example 1: Year 5 Science

In the previous lesson, learners conducted an experiment.

They did this in groups but wrote up their findings individually.

The teacher asks learners to work in pairs.

Learners’ goal is to examine their partner’s work and to ask questions about it. Their questions should get to the bottom of why their partner did what they did.

To help, the teacher first models the process and then displays a set of exemplar questions on the board.

They circulate during the activity, prompting and suggesting where necessary.

At the end, they lead the class in a shared discussion.

This culminates in a set of key points everyone can learn from, concerning how to think scientifically and how to avoid common mistakes.

Example 2: Year 11 Dance

In the previous lesson, learners performed pieces they had been developing over several weeks.

The teacher filmed these pieces and created a set of videos, one per learner.

The lesson takes place in a computer room.

The teacher chooses one video, plays it on the main screen, and walks learners through an exemplar analysis.

The teacher focuses on five areas, all of which are relevant to the final exam.

They draw attention to any discrepancies between what the learner intended and what resulted.

They ask learners to think about what advice they would give to the learner, based on this.

Then, the teacher asks learners to work in pairs.

Each pair must analyse their own videos, following the teacher’s example.

Rehearsing Strategy Selection

We want learners to persist in the face of obstacles.

We want them to keep going when things get tough. And we want them to understand that targeted effort is a path to mastery.

Rehearsing strategy selection is one metacognitive technique we can use to help achieve this.

It works as follows:

Identify a problem that learners are likely to encounter.

This could be a recurring problem such as how to reconcile a design brief with the constraints of materials, time, and resources.

Or it could be a one-off problem such as how to measure the area of a non-uniform shape (though, of course, this problem may re-occur in other guises).

Next, think through the obstacles learners will encounter when trying to solve this problem.

Then, make a note of the possible strategies they could use to overcome these.

You now have everything you need: a problem, a set of obstacles connected to that problem, and a collection of strategies for reconciling all of this.

The final step is to plan an activity in which you take learners through this, step-by-step.

First, you introduce the problem.

Then, you talk learners through the various obstacles that may arise when trying to solve it.

As you do, you can invite learners to suggest ways to resolve these.

Finally, you start to feed in the strategies you previously identified, on each occasion encouraging learners to try them out, play around with them, and assess how helpful they are.

Conclude the activity with a review of what happened.

Focus learners’ attention on the relationship between strategy selection and outcome.

Ask questions like:

Which strategies proved most effective and why?
How did the different strategies lead you to think differently?
What impact did the strategies have on how you perceived the task?

This process gives learners an extended experience of selecting strategies and applying them to a specific problem.

In so doing, it achieves three things.

First, it shows learners how to apply strategies to a problem and why this is a good approach.

Second, it demonstrates that persistence is key to overcoming obstacles.

Third, it reinforces the fact that learners are in control of their thinking, and that this extends to them changing and adapting their thinking to overcome any problems they face.