Off-the Wall-Thinking

“It’s not what you know; it’s how you think!”

The greatest failure in our education system is that students are not taught to think creatively. That’s uderstandable because very few students really use their education. Though the bulk of the graduates are in the liberal and social sciences, only a small percentage become history teachers, sociology instructors, psychologists or philosophers. Most find jobs in government or private industry that have no link with their educational background. They develop an institutional memory for the office or industry in which they work and rarely try anything new – even if they could develop a new concept.

Most people have a difficult time ‘thinking outside of the box’ because the very basis of government and business is NOT to think unconventionally. ‘There’s the right way, the wrong way and our way’ is a standard and every government and company has its unique way to doing business. The employee who cannot learn this basic pattern of behavior does not advance.

But how do you get people who are not creative to “think outside the box?”

By using this educational software. This software is based on the work of Steven C. Levi. Based in Anchorage, Alaska, Levi has been developing creative thinking techniques for more than a decade.

Levi’s book “MAKING A PAIR OF GLOVES,” CREATIVE THINKING FOR THE NEW MILLENNIUM is the text for this software.

The term “a pair of gloves” is critical to the understanding of this software. Making “a pair of gloves” means that the creative thinking solution is useable in the real world.

This software is meant to be a here-and-now tool. The techniques you will be taught in this software can be put to immediate use. This is open-entry/open-exit education software tutorial to teach you how to ‘Think Outside of the Box.’

Generally speaking, people learn new tasks in one of four ways.

They learn from reading a text.
They learn from reading a manual.
Or they watch a master at work.
Or they read anecdotal clips and apply the lessons learned.

This software offers all four — at the same time! This software offers a dozen “creative avenues,” (the manual), ten U SOLVE IT! stories, (the ‘master at work’), more than 100 anecdotes of people solving problems creatively and samples of some the available texts.

Overall there is enough contact time for a six-credit college class, 15-contact hours per credit. There will also be encrypted midterms for each of the 6-credits and pop quizzes.

For more information, contact Steven Levi.

See of you can solve this REAL WORLD PROBLEM!!

Room One: Statement of the Problem

François Rabelais, the great French writer of the 1500s, was a master of creative thinking. He had an unconventional view of the world and was thus able to wring fortunate outcomes from adverse circumstances. Once, for instance, far from his home in Paris, he found himself without cash and stranded in the countryside. Not one to let such trifles stand in his way, the clever French humorist booked himself into a convenient roadhouse and asked for the best room in the house.

Room Two: Setting for the Problem

This room would give a background to the setting of the problem. In the Rabelais example, there would photographs of painting of Francis I, the king of France at that time, some biographical information on Francis I, the politics of the era, a description of court life and some examples of why Rabelais was so popular at court.

Room Three: Options

Now that the student has been presented with the problem and the background to the era, he/she is given the opportunity to see if he/she can figure out what Rabelais actually did. In this case, the student will be offered five options:

To restate the situation, Rabelais is broke and far from Paris. Nevertheless, he checks into a roadhouse and asks for the best room in the house. How is he going to pay for the room? The student is then given five options:

Give the landlady of the roadhouse an IOU or check,
Send a telegraph to the King for money,
Steal a horse and ride as fast as he could back to Paris,
Thumb a ride on coach heading to Paris, or
Admit poverty and allow himself to be sent to jail, from where he would send a letter to the King for money.

Though logical, none of these is the correct answer. But each is a good answer. As the student chooses any of the five, he/she will be informed that “No, this is not the correct answer because . . .” The reasons that none of the five would work are, in the order listed above:

IOUs and checks did not exist in those days. Everyone was on the gold standard and it was a cash-and-carry world.
Telegrams did not exist in those days. Messages were either sent by courier or by wigwag. (Wigwag was the fastest yet most expensive way to send a message. The message was sent via a chain of line-of-sight towers each with movable arms. The operator would move the arms like a message is sent by semaphore today. Messages were sent letter-by-letter faster than a horse could run; but not much faster.)
Stealing a horse was a very dangerous thing to do. It carried the death penalty. If caught Rabelais could have been immediately executed.
Hitching a ride was not possible because there were few carriages and even if a carriage was available, you had to have money to get onboard.
Admitting poverty would have sent Rabelais to debtor’s prison where he could have languished for years.

After the student has guessed and failed five times, he/she enters the next room.