Deep Understanding

Here’s something to think about. What if … there was no school? All ‘what if’ questions have easy answers. Easy if you don’t want to think too hard. ‘What if’ questions are meant to make us think, though.

Let’s dig deeper. Of course, if you think school is cool, your answer will be different from someone who finds school uncool. Okay, now we have two groups–the school is cool group, and the school is uncool group.

We could stop there, but we’re not going to. To remain in your group, you need to come up with some membership conditions. You know like, when you join a footy team, you have to be a certain age.

What are the conditions or reasons you chose school is cool? Suddenly, your answer about no school takes on a new meaning.

Now, how do you feel about your answer? You may have already said something about feelings in your first answer.

Yay! No school! Great! Or

Bummer! I’d miss seeing my friends.

You can use ‘What If’ questions to keep digging deeper. Here are some samples:

What if there was no school?

What if I didn’t see my friends enough?

What if I got tired of hanging out at the park all day?

What if there were no childcare places and Mum had to quit her job to look after me?

What if we couldn’t afford that holiday because Mum quit her job?

You may have heard your teacher talk about deep thinking. Next to reading, deep thinking is a skill each of us needs.