The power of Visual Thinking Strategies: Observation, critical thinking, clear formulation

Students are expected to be active and ask questions in class.By Jens Thomaes, master Law & Technology

They must interact with the teacher or fellow students and be able to express their thoughts. Not only young but also older students find this scary.

In the classrooms, other students listen to your every word and your knowledge is still limited. Many dread the risk of losing face and therefore keep their mouths shut. Sometimes it takes a lot of effort for teachers to get their students to engage. This widespread classroom uncertainty hardly contributes to a satisfactory class experience for both students and teachers. So what would be helpful?

Participate in the Visual Thinking Strategies seminar

In the past few months, Studium Generale again organized a series of four Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) seminars. The aim of these interactive meetings is learning how to deal with difficult, complex situations. More specifically, VTS helps participants to focus on making accurate, personal observations and formulating critical thoughts and arguments from different perspectives. Full of skepticism but fueled by curiosity, I decided to attend a session.

Gadamer

Dr. Josette Jacobs of Wageningen University presented an introductory lecture on the fascinating philosophy of Gadamer.

As an assistant professor of Philosophy and Ethics, she knows all there is to know about this German philosopher, who developed important theories on hermeneutics (the interpretation of written texts). This is exactly what VTS is all about. After the introductory presentation, we put the theory to the test by trying our hand at interpretation.

Authentic views

The VTS facilitator Florentine Peijneburg showed a work of art and gave the participants a few minutes to take a good look at it. “What do you see? What strikes you? What does it make you think of?”, she asked her audience. At first, it was pensive looks and deafening silence, but then people started to give their views and interpretations of the work of art.

One person saw sadness, the other hope. Another person thought the work of art represented a wave of change. But whatever people claimed to see, something remarkable had happened to the audience: all participants spoke freely and shared views which they otherwise might not have expressed.

The result: the participants were confronted with each other’s authentic thoughts, which generated a whole spectrum of individual perspectives. The nice thing about this exercise was that you can let a different light shine on your personal views. It quite literally broadens your horizon. It forces you out of your mental bubble, to put it bluntly.

Fusion of horizons

Dr. Jacobs continued her lecture with Gadamer’s concept of ‘fusion of horizons’: the idea that an individual with goodwill and an open mind can investigate other perspectives and discover common ground with other views.

This process enables one person to ‘understand’ the other. If the other person is truly ‘understood’, it follows that a person’s original view changes, resulting in a fusion of horizons and, hopefully, personal growth.

To what extent do we trust an ‘authentic’ photo?

What I personally found the most interesting exercise was interpreting photos. Take a minute to try this, too. Imagine a blond young lady in a bikini who might have appeared on the cover of Vogue. Somebody has taken a picture of her on a beach, where, worried and apparently full of empathy, she is bending over two rescued but exhausted, male African boat refugees to comfort or help them.
Something interesting happened when our group discussed this picture. A heated debate arose between the older participants, on the one hand, who thought the picture was authentic (and also brought their photographic knowledge to bear on the argument), and the somewhat younger generation of participants, on the other. The latter group did not trust the image, suspecting the photo to have been staged. Since Instagram is functioning as an endless source of gratifying attention and a platform for commercial interests, they were unconvinced that the photo was authentic.

Mistrust

I fully admit: I also mistrusted the picture. Even the sad and iconic image of the drowned little boy that summed up the Syrian refugee crisis raised many questions and discussions.

Can we still believe in the authenticity of such pictures, knowing that images can be manipulated? Is it the umpteenth cry for attention from a would-be Instagram model trying to boost her number of followers by having her picture take while hovering over helpless refugees?

An unpleasant thought but certainly not unthinkable. The seminar was therefore a learning moment for both sides, since opposing perspectives were exchanged and vigorously defended.

Benefit for students

So what is the benefit of VTS for students? Firstly, together with the other participants, you learn to adopt an attitude that enables you, or gives you the courage, to share your views. Secondly, you also become increasingly aware of the fact that your view and somebody else’s are simply two views.

There are numerous other perspectives that may be just as valid. In sum, you better understand that your place in and understanding of the world are relative, and that you need the help of and the dialog with others to study and analyse it, and to ultimately form your own unique opinion.

In this way, you enable yourself to grow as a human being. Your self-confidence to share your perspective grows, which can be very valuable for others as well. And a small mistake in the lecture hall will no longer upset you very much. After all, it is about summoning up the courage to share your perspective with the world, so that we learn to better understand each other.