Before you begin,
meet your tools.
You will explore the situation below through De Bono's six thinking hats. Each hat asks you to think in a different way. Together they will take you somewhere you could not reach alone. Here is what each hat does.
You will receive a full set of these cards to keep when you finish. They are yours to use in any classroom, staffroom, or conversation.
can look like.
This is a success criteria that Lu uses with learners through PK-1 to build independence. They are often used to set personal goals for social development.
prior knowledge.
You already know Head, Heart, and Hands. You have used it as a lens for understanding how we learn. Now watch what happens when you bring it into contact with something unfamiliar, the six thinking hats.
We will use six questions to move through Head, Heart, and Hands. We will focus on feeling the situation first, thinking it through honestly, then deciding what to do with what we know. This sequence is not accidental. It is the same process we want learners to experience every time they meet something new, whether in a classroom, at home, or in the world beyond.
This is what transfer looks like. A framework you trust, applied somewhere it has never been before.
How will you capture your thinking?
When we model learning, we allow our learners to demonstrate agency while still scaffolding the process, so those who are not quite ready have the support they need to be independent. If this sounds like you, here are some ways others have captured their thinking. They are not the only tools, but they get your thinking started. If you already have a tool or process in mind, have fun with it. I cannot wait to see what you post on the Padlet.
No need to commit. This is your process.
Read this.
Let it land.
This is a real situation. You may have lived inside it. You may be living inside it now.
They used to have ideas.
Big ones. The kind that spill out before you can stop them. The kind that make the people around them uncomfortable because they go somewhere unexpected.
At some point the ideas stopped coming. Not because they ran out. Because every time they arrived, they were redirected. Managed. Politely ignored.
Now they sit quietly and do what is asked.
Everyone agrees they are doing much better.
You have the tools.
Now try them.
You have done the thinking. Now it is time to try it on your own.
This is exactly what we do with our learners. We set up the conditions. We show them the tools. Then we step back and let them find their own way through.
You do not have to answer all six questions, because they are a choice menu. Put together the Head, Heart, and Hands combination that makes sense to you right now. Under each big question, there are smaller questions to choose from. Pick one or two that you want to answer. We scaffold choice so learners have multiple ways to approach the same task.
Try. Adjust. Try again. This is not failure. This is the process of mistake-making for understanding. It is exactly what we want our learners to do.
When you finish, you will have something entirely your own. A differentiated product that speaks to who you are, ready to share with the community.
Head
Thinking it through
This hat helps us focus on what is actually true, not what we assume or hope.
What changed, and when did this young person go quiet?
Not what you worry about. Not what you hope for. What is observable? What changed and when? Who noticed first? What does the evidence say about the conditions that existed before they went quiet and the conditions that exist now?
This hat helps us make honest decisions and see what could genuinely go wrong.
What happens to a young person if the system keeps rewarding silence?
If the system continues to reward compliance and manage independent thinking, what does this young person become in five years? What are the risks of intervening? What are the far greater risks of not intervening? Be honest about both sides.
Heart
Feeling it honestly
This hat helps us notice the relationships between people and between ideas.
What does it feel like to stop trusting that your thinking is welcome?
When you imagine a young person deciding it is safer not to think out loud anymore, what happens in you? Notice the relationships in the room. Between the adults who meant well and the young person who learned to disappear. Between the system that rewarded compliance and the person who was most damaged by it.
This hat helps us see what is already working and worth building from.
Where do you still see flickers of the thinking that used to spill out?
What is already working in this young person, even quietly? Where do you see flickers of the thinking that used to spill out? What conditions, even small ones, seem to open them up? Look for what is still alive before you think about what has been lost.
Hands
Making something from it
This hat helps us reach for creative thinking and ideas that do not exist yet.
What one structural change would make it safer to think out loud again?
If you could redesign one thing about the conditions this young person moves through every day, what would it be? Not a programme. Not an intervention. One structural change that would make it safer to think out loud again. What would that look like?
This hat helps us step back, organise our thinking, and name what we have learned.
What is the pattern this young person represents, and what would change it?
Now step back. What is the real problem here? Not this one young person. The pattern they represent. What is the one shift in thinking that would change the conditions for every young person like them?
that is yours.
Your product holds your thinking and it is yours to keep. Before you post, sit with these questions.
Which lens helped you see something new?
What do you now want your learners to experience?
What changes need to happen in your school now?
paper tools?
Enter your name and email to unlock three tools you can print and use tomorrow. These are designed to live on walls, in journals, and in conversations, not just on screens.
You worked through a real situation. You looked at it through six lenses. Now take a moment to mark what that means before moving on.
I am ready to move forward →