9. Of what significance in the life of an adult is fanciful imagery?
10. What, if any, is the danger involved in reveling in idealistic
productive imagery?
11. What advantages do verbal images possess as over against object
images?
12. Why would you ask children to try to image in teaching literature,
geography, history, or any other subject for which you are responsible?
13. How would you handle a boy who is hi the habit of confusing memory
images with images of imagination?
14. In what sense is it true that all progress, is dependent upon
productive imagination?
* * * * *
VII. HOW THINKING MAY BE STIMULATED
The term "thinking" has been used almost as loosely as the term
"imagination," and used to mean almost as many different things. Even
now there is no consensus of opinion as to just what thinking is. Dewey
says, "Active, persistent, and careful consideration of any belief or
supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it,
and the further conclusions to which it tends, constitutes reflective
thought."[5] Miller says, "Thinking is not so much a distinct conscious
process as it is an organisation of all the conscious processes which
are relevant in a problematic situation for the performance of the
function of consciously adjusting means to end."[6] Thinking always
presupposes some lack in adjustment, some doubt or uncertainty, some
hesitation in response. So long as the situation, because of its
simplicity or familiarity, receives immediately a response which
satisfies, there is no need for thinking. Only when the response is
inadequate or when no satisfactory response is forthcoming is thinking
aroused. By far the majority of the daily adjustments made by people,
both mental and physical, require no thinking because instinct, habit,
and memory suffice. It is only when these do not serve to produce a
satisfactory response that thinking is needed--only when there is
something problematic in the situation. Even in new situations thinking
is not always used to bring about a satisfactory adjustment. Following
an instinctive prompting when confronted by a new situation; blindly
following another's lead; using the trial and error method of response;
reacting to the situation as to the old situation most like it; or
response by analogy: all are methods of dealing with new situations
which often result in correct adjustments, and yet none of which need
involve thinking. This does not mean that these methods, save the first
mentioned, may not be accompanied by thinking; but that each of them may
be used without the conscious adjustment of means to end demanded by
thinking. That these methods, and not thinking, are the ones most often
used, even by adults, in dealing with problems, cannot be denied. They
offer an easy means of escape from the more troublesome method of
thinking. It is so much easier to accept what some one else says, so
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