Fredric Lozo - Sequential Problem Solving
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Fredric Lozo >> Sequential Problem Solving
Copyright (C) 1998 by F. B. Lozo
Introductory Note:
Sequential Problem Solving is written for those with a whole brain
thinking style. It is for those who seek to validate the propriety of
when and under what circumstances they utilize each aspect of their
intellect. Sequential Problem Solving helps those with a logical
nature to develop creative right brain intuitive processes in a way
that can be efficiently utilized by the orderly left brain to develop
new solutions to both old and everyday problems. Included are basic
study skills for high school and college students.
* * * * *
Sequential Problem Solving:
A STUDENT HANDBOOK
With
Checklists for Successful Critical Thinking.
By
Fredric B. Lozo
Mathis, Texas
Copyright 1998 F.B. Lozo
ISBN 0-9674166-2-0
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
Problem solving checklist flowchart
RESEARCH SKILLS
Rapid Reading
Memorization
PRACTICAL PROBLEM SOLVING
Learning
Stream Of Consciousness
PROBLEM SOLVING STEPS
Problem Identification as the first step of problem solving
Fact Gathering in problem solving
Logic Fallacies
Emotional Fallacies
Credibility Fallacies
Fact And Opinion
Deductive Reasoning
Developing a Solution
Time
Material
Manpower
Trying the Solution
Manpower Management
Leadership Styles
Dealing With Interpersonal Conflict
INTERPERSONAL PROBLEM SOLVING
External Conflicts
Internal Conflicts
Dealing with the "Unattached" Person
Interpersonal relationships -- Values
PROBLEM SOLVING EVASIONS
APPENDIX 1 -- OUTLINE STYLES
APPENDIX 2 -- PERSUASIVE ARGUMENT FORM
APPENDIX 3 -- ARGUMENTATIVE FALLACIES
REFERENCES
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX
Introduction
We are constantly trying to make some sense of our world and the way
people treat each other. The purpose of this book is to provide a
systematic way of analyzing situations and planning actions.
Sequential Problem Solving is written for those who want to reassure
themselves that their thinking is logically correct rather than
emotionally or impulsively misguided. It provides step by step
procedures for applying computer-like decision making to daily living.
Many ordinary problems involve not only physical, concrete parts but
also interpersonal elements. Thus problem solving involves both the
physical world and the interpersonal world. For instance, when
solutions to physical problems are implemented, the job manager must
decide which of several leadership-managerial styles is appropriate.
Are the workers mature enough and knowledgeable enough to work
together as a team without supervision, or are the workers so immature
and unruly that an authoritarian task master leadership style will be
required, or will the workers need a teacher-leader for some period of
time before they become a team?
The underlying principle, throughout Sequential Problem Solving, is an
obligation to help each other as citizens of a world community, and an
acknowledgement that our real enemy is often ourselves. Our common
problem is understanding ourselves in order to be a friend to others.
Sequential Problem Solving provides us with a way of checking for the
kindness factor in problem solving, with the goal of helping others
and being a good citizen in the world community.
A separate section, Dealing with Unattached People, is devoted to
the problem of neighbors in the world community who are untrustworthy
for some period of time, from the view point that today's enemies are
tomorrow's friends.
Some neighbors in the world community are, from time to time,
untrustworthy. Since opportunities for misunderstanding are greater in
a climate of mistrust, later sections are included that deal with
mistrust and ways that we can gauge interpersonal situations and
select an appropriate leadership style to match it.
Sequential Problem Solving begins with the mechanics of learning and
the role of memorization in learning. The techniques of effective
memorization follow, as well as other important learning skills.
This book contains many step by step checklists, much like pilots use
to make certain that things of importance are not overlooked. These
individual checklists are tied together in a broad flowchart that
provides a sequential decision making pathway. The contents of the
checklists are things that many adults utilize instinctively, without
conscious thought. However these checklist can provide adults with a
more positive way of checking their own thinking, in times of stress,
and a way for students to become instinctive users of sound logic
practices. Teachers may find that students instantaneously begin to
act more mature because of the realization that their peers have a
common body of knowledge about values and character traits and
checklists to evaluate the behavior of others. For teachers, the
sequence of presentation here can be readily altered to suit the
teachable moment, that moment when a unique, high interest situation
arises that lends itself to discussion of a particular topic. The
sequence presented here is merely one way in which the various
interlocking subjects can be presented.
This presentation is intentionally concise to provide the reader with
a composite picture of the use of checklists in logical thinking,
without burdening the reader with statistical findings or repetitious
historical background information.
The ideas presented here are referenced to credible academic research
wherever possible. Endnotes are used extensively to direct the reader
to in-depth authoritative resources, and additional references are
provided for each section at the back of the book.
In this book I have used the pronoun "he" for humanity in general,
rather than using he/she or similar conventions. This usage was
selected to enhance the flow of the written word and should not be
taken literally. The word "he" is used here to include both women and
men and applies to them with equality.
Solving problems is a daily, if not hourly, part of our lives. It is
therefore useful to put the mechanics of problem solving and human
interpersonal relationships into flowchart form, so that when stress
is intense we have some way of making more certain that we are
thinking flawlessly. (A comprehensive flowchart is included in the
HTML version.)
* * * * *
Research Skills.
Rapid Reading.
Effective learners use certain reading techniques[1] that greatly
increase both their comprehension and the time required to learn new
subjects.
One useful method of reducing new material learning time is the SQ3R
method[2]:
Scan.
Question.
Read.
Review.
Recite.
Scanning provides a rapid overview. Many well written books follow
logical outlines that can orient the reader to the subject matter.
The outline might follow this pattern:
Title.
Table of Contents.
Main Introduction and conclusion.
Chapter 1.
Introduction.
Conclusion.
Chapter 2.
Chapter 3.
Conclusion.
Definitions.
Questioning is a natural, instinctive, second step that most learners
follow. In the scanning process, certain questions naturally arise.
These should be noted in a short list of questions to be answered
through reading. The questioning procedure helps the reader stay
focused.
Reading occurs very rapidly if a systematic plan is followed:
First, determine the main idea from the title, the first paragraph,
and the last paragraph.
Second, determine if a large subject is divided into smaller subjects
with some outlining scheme.
Next, follow the title, introduction, body, conclusion rule to find
the main idea of each smaller section. Each smaller section can then
be scanned for keywords. Keyword recognition signals the reader to pay
closer attention for critical definitions and ideas that follow.
Finally, review as often as necessary to keep focused. Outlining and
note taking often help.
Reviewing new material on a strict schedule is necessary to solidify
new material in the memory, and to transfer it from short term memory
to long term memory.
Forgetfulness is a matter of periodic review. Memorization through
repetition and forgetfulness follow a similar pattern. Each is gained
or lost by halves for the same time period. The following graph
illustrates the phenomenon.
The memory loss/recall increase with review phenomenon has been
verified many times.[3]
Generally memory is lost by one-half for each doubled time increment.
One day after first learning one-half is lost. By day two, one-half of
that remaining memory is lost, and by day four, one-half again is
lost. By day four, only one-sixteenth of the original memory is
intact.
At a similar rate, with review after one day only one-half of the
material that was reviewed will be lost. If reviewed again on day two,
the amount lost is again divided by two. If reviewed six times in a
thirty-two day period, the about retained will be more than
ninety-eight percent and the amount lost will only be about two
per-cent in the next thirty-two days versus fifty per-cent in one day.
* * * * *
Memorization
Three common ways of remembering are: repetition, association, and
exaggeration. [4] An similar skill is outlining, and samples of
various outlining styles can be found in Appendix 1.
Repetition is the key to long term memory. Physiologically, when brain
cells are activated by the memory process, the nerve cell coating,
known as the glial sheath, increases in thickness and becomes thicker
and thicker with each repetition, strengthening the electrical pathway
in brain that constitutes memory. In addition, when associations
between parts of a thing remembered are formed, the nerve cell body
sends out axon runners to other associated memory cells. These axon
runners from one cell connect through synapses to dendrite runners on
other cells. As the axon-dendrite pathway is used repetitiously, the
surrounding glial cells become larger and more tightly wrapped around
the electrically conductive axon-dendrite pathways, thereby
transforming the memory from a short-term memory to a long-term
memory.[5]
Memories of similar objects reside in nearby regions of the brain,
while memories of exotic or exaggerated objects are farther away. By
forming memories with creative and unusual associations, many more
pathways are established, much like a spider weaving a bigger and
bigger web, in which each part leads to the center by many
interconnected pathways.
Memory links are also established when a variety of sensations and
muscular activity are engaged. Indeed, some people seem to be more
proficient at learning by either seeing, hearing or writing, but no
one method can provide the more numerous pathways provided by all
three in combination.
Memory is enhanced not only by repetition, but also by association and
exaggeration of certain features of the object. Many memories are
recalled as series of objects. For instance, a memory device to
remember four common logical fallacies is a picture of the Earth, with
the green continents and blue oceans, viewed from outer space with a
flight of white geese circling around it. This image is used to recall
the statement "geese circle every continent." The first letters of
that statement (gcec) stand for the logic fallacies of generalization,
circularities, either/or, and cause and effect. (These fallacies are
discussed in detail in a later chapter.)
Size, also, seems to play a role in memorization. During the Middle
Ages, memory contests were held annually. In one, the winner
remembered one hundred thousand sequential items. [6] A time-proven
memory method from the Middle Ages is association of abstract ideas to
large objects. The objects used for trigger recall seem to need to be
about the size of a human, so that, if we were blind, we could
identify the object by touch. Large objects in the memory seem to
engage muscular memory areas as well as sight memory areas in the
brain and expand the memory web. For instance, remembering the points
of a speech about a military battle might involving walking from one
room to another in a familiar house. In the first room a ship's anchor
is propped up in a corner, in the next room is a cannon, in the third
room is a large telescope, and the in the fourth room is a horse. This
sequence of anchor, cannon, telescope, horse might remind the speaker
that the speech is about a ship being bombarded from the shore by a
cannon; and that the cannon was captured when a scouting party saw the
cannon through a telescope and sent for the cavalry.
Imagining numbers as objects in three-dimensional space is a very
powerful way of remembering a series of numbers. This also seems to
engage muscular memory. For instance, we might imagine block numbers
for Pi, 3.1416. These numbered blocks should be about four inches high
and one inch thick and should be imagined rotating in space about two
feet to the front and about six inches above eye level. We can imagine
them rotating slowly in a circle through an entire revolution. As they
turn, we can mentally reach out and feel them with our fingers on
every side. Such exercises, involving three-dimensional objects in
space and muscles, allow the associated memory cells to form many,
many more links than just a single glance at written numbers will
form. Additional associations not only form more axon-dendrite
connections, but also cause an increase in the surrounding glial
sheath of the brain cell.
* * * * *
Research Skills.
1. Mindil, Phyllis. _Power Reading_. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice
Hall, 1993.
2. Robinson, Francis P. . _Effective Studying_. 4th ed. New York: Harper
and Row, 1970.
3. Spitzer, Herbert F. "Studies in Retention". _Journal of Educational
Psychology_. Vol. XXX (Dec. 1930) No. 9.
4. Minninger, Joan. _Total Recall -- How to Boost Your Memory Power_.
Emmaus, Pa: Rodale Press, 1984.
5. _Neural mechanisms of learning and memory_. Mark R. Rosenzweig and
Edward L. Bennett, eds. Cambridge, Mass. MIT Press, c1976.
6. Spense, Jonathan D. _The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci_. New York:
Penquin Books, 1984.
================================
Practical Problem Solving
Sequential Problem Solving is a labor of love for all students who
seek success and for the parents and teachers who guide them.
Sequential Problem Solving also provides the lifelong-learner with the
satisfaction of being able to measure his performance.
The goal of Sequential Problem Solving is to provide learners with a
road map for successfully making decisions. Students can began their
adult lives with a framework that will help them pick noble goals,
know themselves, and be prepared for dealing with life's villains.
They can thus achieve peace and joy, and can be prepared for making
life's hard decisions as well.
Young people often dream of a loving spouse and joyful children. Older
people dream of success in business. Still others dream of securing a
suitable retirement. Whatever the age or the dream, the problems, of
making dreams come true, share some similarities.
People solving problems share certain common steps in resolving those
problems and face certain common difficulties. How do we develop
solutions? Where do we get information to work with? Who should we
trust for advise? At what point should we make a decision? What are
the alternatives?
Study leads to success, and organization builds bridges to the future.
Organized systematic thinking requires effort, and the effort is
justified by predictable success. This is contrasted to happenstance
decision making based on impulsiveness and wishful thinking.
Sequential Problem Solving is about organized thinking, and justifying
decisions based on solid facts, rather than on impulsiveness or
emotional indulgence. Growing to maturity is about planning rather
than acting on impulses or instant gratification. Instant
gratification often has costly consequences that forethought might
have averted. Sequential Problem Solving is about making dreams come
true while minimizing the hidden costs.
I remember well the magic of that first romantic glance across a
crowded ballroom, the guileless smile and downcast eyes that
instantaneously made my heart skip a beat. I remember the soul
stirring melody of _Band of Gold_ and the lingering smell of peaches
and the gentle winds against my ears on a pleasant summer night.
Sequential Problem Solving is about memories and dreams, making them
come true, and keeping them alive.
Sequential Problem Solving is about becoming both a success and a
lifelong-learner. Problem solving has two aspects: physical problems
in a scientific environment and personal problems in a spiritual inner
world. This book uses well known classical literary selections as
models for personal decision making and character development. These
works were chosen primarily due to their ready availability.
Part of the fun of sequential problem solving is mentally rewriting
stories to have more favorable outcomes. We imagine favorable
outcomes naturally, but successful people do so in a more systematic
fashion, that makes logical outcomes more certain. Using realistic
logic rather than wishful emotion requires that we know ourselves,
know our values and where they came from, and know clearly what our
basic goals are in life. Sequential Problem Solving systematically
outlines those aspects of our spiritual inner selves that play a part
in our decision making and, largely, determine our success.
Sequential Problem Solving explores the nature of personal internal
conflict and how literary characters change in the course of stories
to overcome personal weaknesses. Successful learners learn to
recognize their own internal conflicts and learn that courage is a
skill anyone can learn to re-direct their own destiny.
The first step in the adventure of becoming courageous is to write
down a philosophy of life: what we want to achieve and how we plan to
treat other people. A few words will do: I want to be happy, healthy,
wealthy, have a loving companion, help others, etc.
Everyone should develop, write down, and periodically review their
philosophy of life. If we are going to be successful, we need to have
a systematic way of going about it. What do we know today about
effective ways of becoming educated and successful?
At this point in time, my own philosophy for education has 11 parts.
First, learning has three basic components: specialized knowledge,
basic thinking skills, and mature thinking skills.[1] In the study of
Dickens' _Great Expectations_, "specialized knowledge" includes Pip's
turbulent relationship to his sister and to her husband Joe. "Basic
thinking skills" include the student's memorization of the various
characters and the sequence of the plot in the story. "Mature thinking
skills" include the student's analysis of Pip's internal conflict and
how Pip overcomes his internal weaknesses. Mature skills might also
include the creation of an alternative ending of how the story could
have achieved an even more satisfactory ending. This story is unique
in that there are two published endings: one, the author's original
ending, and the second written at the insistence of the author's
newspaper editor. These alternative endings illustrate how we can
create an alternative environment and make our dreams come true.
Sequential Problem Solving is about finding alternative solutions to
problems and executing well researched plans.
Second, students learn to trust their own ability through success, and
the teacher can help to insure that success. Success can be assured by
tailoring the curriculum to the student. The student with severe prior
knowledge deficits can usually be rapidly remediated by learning basic
thinking skills first: for instance, the basic memorization
techniques, note taking, outlining, and free association recall
techniques. (These are discussed in detail elsewhere.)
Students should be aware of what they learn and feel pride of
accomplishment. They should recognize for themselves when they
achieve success in learning. They should learn to constantly monitor
their own performance and the success of their strategies.
Learning occurs in well ordered ways:[2] first, the student gains
understanding of what is read or the teacher explains, then memorizes
the facts of the subject in order to analysis the information later
through comparing and contrasting. Next the student may use the
information to create something new, and finally he should use the
memorized information to evaluate his own performance. This sequence
is known to teachers as Bloom's taxonomy. [3]
Students need guidelines for making decisions. Those decisions may
involve physical, scientific problems, or they may involve
interpersonal problems, social values and moral decisions. Students
should learn a systematic workable framework for making decisions. All
students should develop the ability to evaluate their thought
processes as a learned skill. The mature learner should be able to
recall the steps of scientific problem solving, recognize specific
personal values and character traits, and remember the tests for
sequential steps in moral decision making. Students should then be
able to use apply those mature thinking skills to first literary
scenarios and then to real life problems. Studies of literature enable
the student to extend the analysis to television drama and ultimately
to real life and to subsequently imagine a variety of suitable
alternative outcomes.
Students should learn to recognize and control certain biological
feelings. A student should know how the human brain is organized and
recognize those times when animal-like impulses jeopardize more
mature, rational thought. A student should also be able to recall and
use basic information about basic nutrition, rest, and exercise, in
order to minimize the danger of thoughtless impulsiveness.
Students should develop a sense of belonging to a caring, helpful
humanity, and develop their own short and long term goals in achieving
peace and joy through helping others in a responsible manner.
Students should learn the dynamics of basic childcare and the
importance of continuous parental attachment in the first two years of
a baby's life. Students should be aware of how "unattached" children
are set up for failure and antisocial behavior disorders, by poor
bonding with the parent in the first few months and years of life.
Students should be prepared to deal with manipulative people. Students
should learn how to recognize people without a conscience. Students
should have strategies for managing interpersonal relationships, both
good and bad.
Students should have a knowledge of the religions of the world and
develop a toleration for other people.
Finally, students should become citizens of the world, dedicated to
helping others while making their own dreams come true.
Developing and maintaining a systematic philosophy of life entails
becoming a lifelong learner.
* * * * *
Learning.
Learning has three basic components: specialized knowledge, basic
thinking skills, and mature thinking skills.
Specialized knowledge is that part of a study that must be memorized.
This "disciplinary based knowledge" contains unique terms and
definitions. Language studies have their unique terms: nominative,
comma, plot; mathematics has its: tangent, sum, parabola, etc. These
are terms that must be memorized in order to understand and use the
subject matter.
Basic thinking skills include memorization techniques, the stream of
consciousness technique, outlining, note taking, rapid reading,
scanning for main ideas and keywords, questioning, and reorganizing.
Mature thinking skills include procedures that require specialized
knowledge and basic thinking skills, like applying the sequential
steps of problem solving and following the sequential tests for moral
decision making.
* * * * *
STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS
The stream of consciousness technique is a "basic" thinking skill,
along side outlining, note taking, rapid reading. The stream of
consciousness skill is also known as the free-association recall
technique.
Both creative writers, artists and scientific problem solvers use the
stream of consciousness or free-association skill. This skill is also
known as gestation, mulling things over, and getting a handle on
things. The process begins by letting our thoughts flow freely and
then sorting out the ones useful to our problem from the many that
came to mind. Often many of the random thoughts that come to mind have
no apparent connection to the problem; they are merely connected like
circular links in a spider's web to threads that interconnect with
others and run toward the center of the problem. The free association
technique begins by trying to think about nothing in a relaxed,
tension-free environment. Try as we might, something always intrudes
on our consciousness. It may a line running toward the center of the
web or it may be a seemingly meaningless, circular line. Every
thought should be written down as it comes to mind, and the task of
thinking about nothing begun anew. After ten or fifteen minutes, the
train of intrusive thoughts usually begins to slow down, and we can
then take the list of seemingly unrelated thoughts and sort out the
ones that relate to the problem. The next step of brainstorming is to
take the free association / stream of consciousness list and circle
the words that pertain to the problem, and connect them with "web"
lines into "clusters." These crude webs and clusters can then be
reconstructed into a more legible outline. (Several styles of
outlining are illustrated in the Appendix 2.) This outline can then be
used in the subsequent steps of problem solving. The subsequent steps
of the problem solving procedure involve hypothetico-deductive
reasoning and is a part of the scientific method.[4]
