This handbook is about thinking. More specifically, it is about theoretical frameworks and classificatory systems developed since the Second World War to help educators understand the processes and products of thinking and learning. By setting out the ideas and beliefs of various system builders it raises questions about human nature and the nature of knowledge. However, it is far from comprehensive in its treatment of philosophical issues, since the starting point for our work was a brief from the Learning and Skills Research Centre (LSRC), based in London, to evaluate thinking skills taxonomies which may be relevant in post-16 education and training. Our main purpose is practical, so we are more interested in how frameworks can be used than in theoretical elegance.

Everyone involved in education and training needs to talk about thinking and learning. Frameworks for thinking can provide shared understandings which can help improve the quality of instructional design, course and lesson planning, teaching, learning and assessment. We therefore believe that this handbook will be useful for practitioners, students and academics as well as for policy-makers and others wanting to find out more about certain frameworks.

Here, as in the published report of our work for the LSRC (Moseley et al., 2004), we include frameworks and models as well as taxonomies, and are just as interested in school education as the post-16 sector.

Overview

This chapter reviews the potential contribution of the various frameworks, models and taxonomies presented in the book and summarises a number of issues which have arisen. It examines how various taxonomies can inform and support differing aspects and areas of education. It will summarise some problems inherent in classification and theoretical models of thinking. We highlight evidence from meta-analysis to show that thinking skills approaches can be very effective, especially those targeted at the skills of metacognition and self-regulation. Turning to matters of theory, we note a degree of rapprochement between cognitive, constructivist and some recent behaviourist formulations. However, we do not believe that it has been established that meaningful learning can take place only when there is a low level of teacher direction (Hattie, 2002). We point out that a great deal of educational practice is based on sets of widely accepted but usually untested beliefs, values and assumptions. Finally, we outline the value of a practical four-category framework (information gathering; building understanding; productive thinking; strategic management/reflective thinking) that has arisen from our work in this field.

Thinking, learning and teaching

Everyone who is involved in learning needs to have some understanding of its nature and purpose. A framework for understanding thinking and learning can be used at different levels; for example, as a general guide to the formulation of a mission statement or in formulating specific learning objectives and precise assessment items.

Perspectives on thinking

The aim of this book is to summarise and evaluate a number of systematic approaches to describing thinking and its relation to learning and teaching which have been developed over the last 50 years or so. We believe that each of these frameworks and taxonomies have value in attempting to describe aspects of thinking. The purpose of this collection is therefore to provide a resource for teachers, learners and researchers in order to make explicit a vocabulary with which to describe aspects of thinking which are relevant across a range of situations and contexts. Without a vocabulary to describe aspects of thinking that we believe to be teachable it is hard to develop teaching approaches or pedagogies that are effective. As a learner it is difficult to understand and make connections with what we have learned at different times and to plan how to take more control of our learning in the future without the language to describe our thinking and learning. For educational researchers it is impossible to describe aspects of the educational experience without developing concepts and terminology that can be identified with some reliability (or at least agreed regularity) across teaching and learning situations.