Thinking For A Change is dedicated to providing educational services in thinking skills, deep learning and positive engagement for schools and children's services throughout Merseyside. Its mission is to engage, enliven and enlighten Merseyside minds through a variety of thinking programmes.
What is distinctive about the Thinking For A Change approach?
1. Core Thinking: we concentrate our work on Thinking as a core life-skill at the heart of lifelong learning, applicable across the curriculum and transferable across contexts. Good thinking is at the heart of who we are as educationists and what we do as learners, teachers and lead learners.
2.Eclectic Range: we offer a pick'n'mix approach to Thinking Programmes, selecting from amongst de Bono's Six Thinking Hats to P4C, from MInd-Mapping to Action Learning and from Cooperative Learning Structures to Appreciative Inquiry. Being eclectic, and helping schools tailor their own integrated approach, has the benefit of suiting different schools for different purposes and we have found that variety and versatility is often better than specializing in one thinking approach to the exclusion of others.
3.Taste and See: we find that schools often want to try out a Thinking Programme in situ before investing in whole school or departmental development. This can take the form of trial workshops with pupils in classrooms or twilight seminars with teachers to taste it for themselves. Thinking For A Change does this free of charge on a pro bono basis.
4. Open Source: we believe in sharing thinking skills openly, that schools should be able to access Thinking Programmes without having to buy into expensive packages provided by accredited trainers and branded consultants. The main advantage we bring to you is the substantial experience of actually using and applying these thinking skills ourselves. And whilst we always acknowledge the ingenuity of programme creators and never infringe copyright, we nevertheless deliberately aim to democratize and liberate their ideas for schools to use freely in living and learning.
5. Common Sense Training Materials: Take training materials and manuals for example, they are already out there! If someone has published a readable book on how to think, they rightly assume you can do most of the learning yourself. Hence our list of recommended books for our Thinking Programmes, which we encourage you to read as we support you in practising and applying them in the ways most suitable for you.
6. Local Benefits: whilst we do operate extensively throughout the UK, being local offers two benefits for schools near Liverpool. Firstly it enables a 30% discount on fees exclusively to Merseyside schools. Secondly, it facilitates the fostering of a professional learning community based on existing networks and enhancing real-world learning and teaching. This is crucial to ensuring that any investment in CPD and school development has optimal impact.