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 Types of thinking

Thinking is the cognitive activities you use to process information, solve problems, make decisions, and create new ideas. You use your thinking skills when you try to make sense of experiences, organize information, make connections, ask questions, make plans, or decide what to do.

There are several different types of thinking or ways to think. In class, special attention was paid to the following:

Divergent Thinking: refers to the ability to generate creative ideas by exploring many possible solutions to find one that works. It involves bringing facts and data together from various sources and then applying logic and knowledge to solve problems or make decisions. It starts from a common point and moves outward in diverging directions to involve a variety of aspects or perspectives.

Convergent thinking: refers to the ability to put several different pieces or perspectives of a topic together in some organized, logical manner to find a single answer. It involves focusing on a finite number of solutions rather than proposing multiple solutions.

Convergent thinking vs. Divergent thinking

Convergent thinking involves bringing facts and data together from various sources and then applying logic and knowledge to solve problems or to make informed decisions. Convergent thinking involves putting several different pieces or perspectives of a topic back together in some organized, logical manner to find a single answer.

Divergent thinking, on the other hand, involves breaking a topic apart to explore its various component parts and then generating new ideas and solutions. Divergent thinking is thinking outwards instead of inward. It is a creative process of developing original and unique ideas and then coming up with a new idea or a solution to a problem.

Benjamin Bloom developed a classification of thinking skills that is still helpful today; it is known as Bloom’s taxonomy. He lists six types of thinking skills, ranked in order of complexity: knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. but I will talk more about these thinking skills in the following pages.