The Ability To Reason

As children make the transition from elementary school to middle school, many parents and kids have concerns about their ability to adapt to a whole new environment. This is a perfect time for students to learn the ability to reason “as a skill”; one they can actively use in the new situations they will encounter. Reason is defined by Webster’s College Dictionary as the use of the cognitive mental powers needed to form conclusions, judgments and inferences. The Ability to Reason is an art-based class taught for county probation in Goodhue County, MN as an innovative approach for early offenders in the criminal justice system. After two years, we have an 81% non-recidivism rate. This class has been adapted for use by social workers and is now being taught to special education teachers. It is also excellent for parents and teachers of middle school students. Our approach is effective because it is based on developmental and experiential learning.

The young people who take our class range from gifted to learning disabled. What they all have in common, however, are similar responses to the question; “What was the reason for your behavior?” The responses include, “ I don’t know,” “I felt like it”, or, “I wasn’t thinking”.

In class we use clay (or Play-doh) and colored pencils (or crayons) as the learning medium. The class is divided into two segments during which five abstract concepts – think, reflect, make decisions, work, and apply choice – are learned. We also teach basic information about how our brains work.

To THINK requires paying attention to our environment, evaluating a situation, and deciding our course of action.

To REFLECT means to look back upon something in order to learn from our mistakes and successes. Thinking ‘backwards’ teaches the developmental skill of understanding past, present, and future and allows us to learn from experience.

To MAKE DECISIONS means to make up one’s mind. This is an action word: Think—then Do. To make decisions we must have options, or be able to imagine different possibilities and their potential outcomes. When we act only on our emotions we are not making decisions, we’re simply re-acting. Imagining different possibilities and their possible outcomes allows us to expand our horizons, develop new neural pathways, and learn self-awareness and self-control.

WORK is the amount of energy one has to exert to do something. It’s important to understand the amount of work, or energy, we need to pursue a dream, interest or goal. We need to determine how much work we’re willing to put into a goal, and whether we have the skills necessary to achieve that goal. This requires an honest self-assessment. Our future is our own choice, but the bigger the dream or the goal, the more work it will be.

CHOICE is the act of making a selection. We must have a minimum of three options before we truly have choice. When we can see only one way to do, experience or think, we are acting with a habitual mindset that can turn compulsive, possibly addictive. When it’s “this” or “that”, we simply go back and forth. True choice must involve a third possibility to get us outside the box. Three options can be mixed and matched to create other options, just like the three primary colors can be mixed and matched to create more.

Once students have complied with the instructions, created the words and definitions out of clay, and written a simple sentence to define the concepts, they have learned the foundation of the Ability to Reason. It is up to students to use free will and make their own decisions. However, decisions can now be based on reason rather than emotion.

Human beings have an incredible capacity to think, plan, create and learn from mistakes, but these skills must be taught, developed and used. That is what this class teaches. Parent curriculum is now available.