Discussing the Cultivation of Problem Solving Ability and Creativity

Problem Solving Ability and Creativity Cultivation

I. Contemporary Basic Theories on Ability

Before the 1980s, the field of intelligence research was basically dominated by traditional theories of intelligence. Traditional theories of intelligence, based on psychometrics, hold that intelligence consists of factors, which can be explored through factor analysis, leading to an understanding of the kernel of intelligence. Many influential theories of intelligence, such as Spearman's two-factor theory, Thurston's group factor theory, Guilford's multifactor theory of three-dimensional structure, and Cattell's three-tiered theory of intelligence, are subordinate to this theoretical camp.

(I) Traditional Theory of Intelligence

1. Dual Factor Theory of Intelligence That is, human intelligence consists of two kinds of factors, the general factor and the special factor, and it is believed that the individual differences of human intelligence are manifested both in the general factor and in the special factor. The relationship between the two factors is not necessarily the same.

Cartell categorized intelligence into fluid and crystalline intelligence. American psychologist Cattell and others, based on the different functions of intelligence, divided intelligence into two kinds: fluid intelligence and crystalline intelligence. Fluid intelligence refers to a person's ability to learn new things independently of cultural and intellectual background, such as attention, knowledge integration, and agility of thought. Crystalline intelligence, on the other hand, refers to a person's acquired ability, which is related to the accumulation of cultural knowledge and experience, such as breadth of knowledge and judgment. From a temporal point of view, fluid intelligence reaches its peak in human adulthood and then gradually declines with age, while crystalline intelligence not only does not decline but rises since adulthood.

British psychologist Spielman put forward the two-factor theory, he divided human intelligence into two factors: one is the universal factor, also known as the G factor, is in the different intellectual activities **** have the factor; the other is the special factor, also known as the S factor, is in a special intellectual activities necessary factors. The two are interrelated, and a combination of G and S factors is required to accomplish any assignment.

2. Intellectual Group Causation Theory Seston believes that intelligence is a combination of some basic mental abilities. It is believed that human intelligence consists of a combination of seven basic abilities. According to him, intelligence consists of seven mental abilities independent of each other, namely, verbal comprehension (V), verbal fluency (W), reasoning ability (R), counting ability (N), mechanical memory ability (M), spatial ability (S) and perceptual speed (P). Thurston designed intelligence tests to measure these seven factors, and the results were positively correlated with the factors, contrary to his original assumption that the factors were unrelated to each other.

3. Intellectual Structure Theory Bulford believes that the intellectual structure includes three types of events: ① the material that causes thinking, determining the content of thinking; ② the mental activity of thinking, determining the functioning of thinking; ③ the results of organizing the thinking, access to the product of thinking. According to him, the structure of intelligence should be considered in three dimensions: operation, content and product. The first dimension of intelligence is operation, i.e., the process of intellectual activity, including 5 factors of cognition, memory, scattered thinking, aggregated thinking, and evaluation; the second dimension is content, i.e., the content of intellectual activity, including 4 factors of graphics, symbols, semantics, and behaviors; and the third dimension is product, i.e., the result of intellectual activity, including 6 factors of units, categories, relations, systems, transformations, and implicit. Combining these 3 variables gives 4 x 5 x 6 = 120 different intellectual factors. Guilford designed these ideas as a cube model,*** with 120 three-dimensional cubes, each representing a unique intellectual factor.

(ii) Multiple Intelligence Theory

Howard. Gardner believed that intelligence consists of seven (later developed into nine) separate components or modules: linguistic, logical-mathematical, musical, spatial, bodily-motor, interpersonal, introspective, (naturalist, spiritualist/existentialist). Gardner emphasizes that these nine are all separate and distinct types of intelligence, rather than different components of the same intelligence, and that each represents a module of brain-based abilities, a fundamental difference between Gardner and traditional theories of intelligence.

Gardner believed that intelligence, traditionally defined on the basis of intelligence tests, was conceptually only officialized to the learning ability suitable for book knowledge, and he believed that it consisted of at least seven different kinds of intelligence: linguistic, mathematical, spatial, musical, physical, social, and self-knowledge intelligence. The innovation of Gardner's theory of intelligence is that it breaks through the traditional category of intelligence and puts forward the concept of multidimensional intelligence, and accordingly triggers people's thinking about education, talent, intellectual development, and educational evaluation; in addition, it focuses on neurophysiological evidence without neglecting the role of social culture, which also makes its theory more persuasive. Therefore, its theory has great influence on education theory and practice in the world.

(C) Theory of Successful Intelligence

The triadic theory of intelligence proposed by Sternberg, who sees intelligence as the mental abilities needed to adapt to, select, and shape environmental contexts. The theory consists of three sub-theories: the contextual sub-theory, the experiential sub-theory, and the adult sub-theory. Stenberg believed that the triadic intelligence was still insufficient to explain human intelligence in the real world, so in 1996 Stenberg proposed a more pragmatic and realistically oriented theory of successful intelligence (also known as the triadic theory of successful intelligence) based on the triadic theory of intelligence, emphasizing that intelligence should not be concerned with academics alone, but should be directed toward success in the real world.

He believes that there are four key elements of successful intelligence: (1) intelligence should be defined within one's socio-cultural context and according to one's own personal standards, based on the ability to succeed in life; (2) an individual's ability to succeed relies on utilizing his or her own strengths to correct or make up for one's own inadequacies; (3) success is achieved through a balance of analytical, creative, and practical intelligence, with analytical intelligence being the ability to conduct analysis, evaluation, and practice; and (4) success is achieved through a balance of analytical, creative, and practical intelligence, with analytical intelligence being the ability to conduct analysis, evaluation, and practice. intelligence is the ability to make analyses, evaluations, judgments, or comparisons and contrasts, and is the ability measured by traditional intelligence tests, creative intelligence is the ability to generate new ideas in the face of new tasks and situations, and practical intelligence is the ability to apply experience to the adaptation, shaping, and choosing of environments; and (4) the balance of intellects is designed to achieve the goal of adapting to, shaping, and choosing of environments, and not just to adapt to the environment, which is emphasized by traditional intelligence. of adaptation. Stenberg also emphasizes that successful intelligence is based on intellectual processing that is universal across cultures.

II. The Substance and Process of Problem Solving

(I) Problems and Their Problem Solving

A problem is a situation in which an individual wants to do something but does not immediately know the set of actions required to do it. It contains four parts ① WT situation ② pre-existing knowledge and skills ③ obstacles ④ methods WT solution is the formation of a new answer or solution to a WT. This answer is not simply an application of rules that have already been learned, but a reorganization of existing knowledge, skills and concepts or principles to form a solution that is adapted to the requirements of the problem.

Problem solving is a cognitive process of goal-directed search of the problem space. In it, the components of the original knowledge and experience and the current problem must be reorganized, transformed, or combined in order to achieve the stated goal.

This definition contains four key points: 1. Problem solving is goal-oriented, goalless fantasy does not count as problem solving;

2. Problem solving is carried out within the mind or cognitive system, only through the behavior of the solver can be presumed to exist, such as tying knots in a rope does not count as problem solving, but only as a skill;

3. Solving activities include a series of Psychomotor activity counts, e.g. recalling a friend's phone number is too simple to be problem solving;

4. Problem solving is personalized, what is not a problem for this person may be for another.

(ii) The basic process of problem solving

Understanding and characterizing the problem, seeking a solution to the answer executing a plan or trying some solution testing the results.

1. Understanding and Characterizing the Problem Stage

The first step in solving a problem is to determine what the problem actually is, that is, to identify the information relevant to the problem.

2. Answer-seeking phase

There are two such general paths that may be taken in seeking an answer: algorithmic and heuristic.

(1) Algorithmic

An algorithmic formula is a step-by-step procedure taken to achieve a certain goal or solve a certain problem. As in the case of jigsaw puzzles, there exists a fixed procedure that, if you find it, solves the problem quickly.

(2) Heuristics

The so-called heuristics are the use of a general strategy to try to solve a problem. This general strategy may lead to a correct answer. Commonly used heuristics are:

Means-ends analysis: dividing the goal into multiple sub-goals, dividing the problem into many self-problems looking for a solution to each word problem.

Reverse backward method: start with the goal and fall back to the unsolved initial problem, this method is again very effective for solving geometric proof problems.

Climbing method: the basic idea is to set a goal, then pick any unvisited point neighboring the starting point and move towards the goal, gradually approaching it.

Analogical thinking: when you are faced with a certain problem scenario, you can use analogical thinking to first seek an answer to a situation that is somewhat similar to this one.

3. Stage of executing the plan or trying some kind of solution

4. Stage of evaluating the results

Third, the influencing factors of problem solving

There are a lot of factors influencing the problem solving, which can be summarized as the following:

(1) Relevant knowledge and experience

Relevant knowledge and experience is the personal factor that influences the problem solving. Factors, if the individual has background knowledge related to the problem, it can facilitate the characterization and answer the question, only based on the relevant knowledge can determine the direction, choose ways and methods for the solution of the problem.

(ii) Individual's intelligence and motivation

The level of intelligence of an individual is an extremely important factor affecting problem solving. This is because the components of intelligence such as reasoning, comprehension, memory, information processing, and analytical skills all affect problem solving and the methods of problem solving. Motivation is the driving factor that motivates a person to problem solving and has a significant impact on problem solving thinking activities. The nature of motivation and the strength of motivation affects the process of problem solving

(III) Problem Situation and Representation Mode

Problem situation is the objective situation (stimulus model) in which the problem is presented. The problem situation has a significant impact on problem solving.

1. Different spatial arrangements of objects and things in the situation affect problem solving;

2. The closer the stimulus pattern in the problem situation is to the individual's knowledge structure, the easier the problem can be solved;

3. Too few or too many objects or facts included in the problem situation are detrimental to problem solving.

Representation is a central aspect of problem solving that describes how the problem is represented in the mind. Problem representation reflects the level of understanding of the problem and involves how the relevant information is extracted in the problem situation, including what the goal is, how the goal relates to the current state, and what operators might be used. Different problem characterizations lead to different solutions, which directly affects problem solving. Failure to properly characterize the problem and searching in a wrong problem space can lead to failure of problem solving.

(IV) Thinking Stereotypes and Functional Fixation

Stereotypes are a state of mental readiness formed by previous activities and influencing the trend of subsequent activities. It is manifested in thinking activities as a tendency to solve problems in a habitual way. Stereotypes have both positive and negative effects in problem solving. When the problem situation remains unchanged, stereotypes have a positive effect on problem solving, in favor of problem solving; when the problem situation has changed, stereotypes have a negative impact on problem solving, not conducive to problem solving.

Functional fixation refers to the tendency of individuals to see only the usual function of something when solving a problem, but not the function it may have in other aspects. It is a fixed view of how something functions or is used that people have developed over time. For example, for the hairdryer, the general public only think that it is for blowing the head, in fact, it has a variety of functions, it can be a clothes, ink, etc., dryer; bricks, its main function is used for construction, however, we can also use it as a weapon, sitting stools and so on.

Functions solidly affect human thinking and are not conducive to the formulation of new hypotheses and problem solving. Experiment: e.g., subjects are asked to fix three lighted candles to a wood paneled wall in a direction parallel to the wall. The materials given to the subjects are three candles, three cardboard boxes, a few matches, and a few pegs. All the materials issued to the first group were put into each of the three cartons, while all the materials issued to the second group were placed outside the three cartons. The result: 86% of the subjects in the second group solved the problem on time; only 41% of the subjects in the first group solved the problem on time. Why did the first group not do as well as the second group? The reason is that the first group of subjects fixed the function of the cardboard box as a container for things at the beginning, and did not see that the cardboard box could also be used as a candlestick, so they did not solve the problem successfully. The second group of subjects did not see the carton as a container for things at the beginning, but thought of using it as a candlestick in solving the actual problem, so they solved the problem successfully.

(E) Prototype Inspiration and Brewing Effect

Prototype inspiration refers to the inspiration of information obtained in other things or phenomena for solving the current problem. One of the things or phenomena that have the role of inspiration is called the prototype. The things or phenomena that serve as archetypes are diverse and exist in nature, human society, and daily life.

When a person is committed to a long time to solve a problem and can not be solved, if his thinking about the problem temporarily stopped to do other things, hours, days or weeks later, he may suddenly think of a solution this is the brewing effect.

Four, the cultivation of problem-solving ability

(a) Make full use of the existing experience, the formation of the knowledge structure system

Solid professional knowledge, good knowledge structure is one of the most important conditions for the effective solution of problems in a particular field. Therefore, cultivating students' problem-solving ability should first prompt students to master specialized knowledge as soon as possible and improve their knowledge structure. In knowledge transfer, not only the explanation of declarative knowledge should be emphasized, but more importantly, the learning of procedural knowledge should be emphasized. Procedural knowledge plays a very important role in improving students' problem-solving ability. While telling students "what", the key is to teach students "why" and "how to do", so that they can obtain a large number of solid "if --Then" generative system.

(2) analyze the composition of the problem, grasp the law of problem solving

Problem solving requires a process, mastering the basic procedures of problem solving is conducive to problem solving. Teaching students some general problem-solving methods and thinking strategies in teaching will effectively improve their problem-solving ability.

(3) Carrying out research study, giving full play to students' initiative

In teaching activities, teachers should pay attention to the training of students' ability to identify problems, guiding students to carry out research study, launching a comprehensive analysis of the problem, and enabling them to figure out the ins and outs of the problem and the connection with other knowledge points, in order to achieve the purpose of profoundly identifying the problem. Through this kind of student-directed inquiry, students' positive initiative is brought into play in problem solving.

(D) Allow students to make bold guesses and encourage practical verification

Helping students acquire a variety of problem-solving strategies is an effective way to cultivate students' problem-solving ability, among which heuristic strategies are most effective in improving the efficiency of problem solving because general heuristic strategies can be applied to a wider range and field and can be translated into discipline-specific thinking methods. Frequently used heuristic strategies are: means-ends analysis, backward-looking, associative, simplified plan and so on.

V. Creativity and Its Cultivation

(1) The Basic Concept of Creativity

refers to the ability to produce some kind of novel, unique, and socially or individually valuable product based on a certain purpose and using known information. It has two ways of understanding: one, it refers to the mental process of transcending existing experience and breaking through the limitations of habit to form a brand-new product in a problematic situation; the other, it refers to the extraordinary ability to solve problems flexibly by utilizing knowledge and experience without the limitations of stereotypes. These two understandings of **** the same point is to regard creativity as a kind of problem-solving mental activities, the difference is that the former regard creativity as a thinking process, the latter regarded as a kind of thinking ability. Therefore, the two aspects of psychology have their own focus, one focuses on the study of creative thinking, in order to understand how the process of creation, and the other focuses on the study of creativity, in order to understand what exactly the ability to create.

(2) The basic structure of creativity

Includes two parts, creativity and creative personality, the former refers to a person's creativity manifested in the ability of the characteristics, while the creative personality refers to a person's creativity manifested in the temperament and character of the characteristics of the two factors are essential to the completion of creative activities. According to the content of creativity, the basic structure of creativity can be said to contain the following aspects: creative consciousness, creative personality, creative thinking, creative methods.

1. Creative consciousness and its cultivation measures

Creative consciousness means whether a person wants to create or not, which will not only affect the strength of his creative motivation, but also affect the play of his creative ability. Generally speaking, without a strong sense of creativity, creation is unlikely to succeed. Therefore, it is vital to cultivate the consciousness of creation.

2. Cultivation of Creative Personality

Creative personality is a necessary and sufficient condition for the development of individual creative ability. The training of creative personality lies in the cultivation of various personality qualities conducive to creativity, including strong creative motivation, strong interest in creativity, positive creative emotions and strong creative will, so as to become a person with high creativity.

The cultivation of students' interest in creation includes cultivating a wide range of lasting and centered interest in all kinds of things; cultivating curiosity, inquisitiveness, and the psychology of inquiry; and cultivating an interest in research and innovation.

The cultivation of students' creative emotions includes cultivating enthusiasm for life and creation and maintaining pleasant emotions; cultivating a sincere feeling for the beauty of creation and letting the emotions sublimate in creation; cultivating self-confidence and a sense of humor in creation, and not giving up on creation or being disappointed in creation easily.

The cultivation of students' will to create, including the need to establish a lofty ideology of dedication to science; to cultivate the courage to know the difficulties; to cultivate the ability to withstand setbacks in the creation, and so on.

3. Cultivation of creative thinking

Creative thinking training is the most used method in cultivating students' creativity, which is also a most important content. Mainly includes thinking fluency, adaptability, uniqueness and dialectical training. More representative training methods are:

(1) brainstorming method, also known as the intellectual stimulation method, put forward by Osborne in 1945, it is often a collective discussion or a group of people using a meeting way to encourage participants as much as possible as soon as possible to put forward a variety of whimsical ideas or views, mutual enlightenment, stimulate the inspiration, thus causing a chain of creative thinking reflective

(2) Intuitive thinking training and mental gymnastics. Intuitive thinking is also a kind of creative thinking, is a kind of jumping thinking, without going through the obvious intermediate reasoning process, can come to a conclusion. "Mind gymnastics" is an effective method of training intuitive thinking. Brain gymnastics, that is, when the problem comes out, immediately by intuition to think of a correct answer. At this time, the problem solver may also be "know it and not know why".

4. Creative method refers to people in the process of creative activities to create a specific method of thinking and creative skills, creative method of training can be induced by the individual's potential creativity. At present, people commonly used methods of creation are analogical simulation method, focus on invention method, questioning method, enumeration method, transplantation method, reverse search method and so on.

(1) analog simulation method

Analogy is the object of invention and creation of a thing for analogical comparison, so as to obtain useful inspiration, provide clues to solve the problem.

(2)Focused Invention Method Training

Focused invention method is to take a certain thing or problem as the central focus, and then analyze the surrounding environment of this thing or problem, and thus get inspired to carry out forced association - as far as possible to link the surrounding things with the problem to be solved, and create a new things.

(3)Questioning and probing method

Questioning and probing method is a method of raising questions in written or verbal form and arousing people's creative sparks and capturing good ideas. It is extremely important for identifying and solving problems.

(4) enumeration method

Enumeration method is a method of listing the characteristics, shortcomings, and points of hope of the object of study, discovering the law, and proposing improvement measures to form a certain originality.

(5) Transplantation Method

The transplantation method is a method of applying the theories and concepts of a certain discipline, or technological inventions and methods in a certain field to other disciplines and fields with a view to achieving new inventions and creations.

(6)Reverse Search Method

Reverse Search Method is a specific application of reverse thinking, which is a method of reverse thinking and innovation by reversing habitual thoughts from the opposite functions, states, positions, directions, modes, and sequences of existing things and phenomena.

(3) Creative cultivation measures

1. create a democratic, open learning and teaching environment;

2. cultivate curiosity, stimulate the desire for knowledge;

3. encourage young people's ingenuity;

4. train students' divergent thinking;

5. actively carry out creative activities;

6. . cultivate creative personalities;

7. encourage emancipation in practice