Fostering Flexible Minds: The Effect of Probing Questions in Enhancing Divergent Thinking in Geography
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.59994/pau.2024.2.45Abstract
Developing students' divergent thinking abilities is an educational imperative for nurturing 21st century skills. Geography education lends itself well to embedding divergent thinking pedagogies by examining interconnected human-environment systems through varied spatial and cultural lenses. This study experimentally evaluated the efficacy of integrating structured probing question interventions to foster divergent thinking in secondary-level geography education. By using the experimental design, participants were 60 students divided into an experimental group receiving probing question training over nine sessions, and a control group receiving standard geography instruction. The experimental group demonstrated significantly higher divergent thinking scores across all components compared to controls at post-test. These improvements were maintained at follow-up, underscoring the durability of the probing intervention's effects. Findings empirically validate structured probing techniques as a promising pedagogical approach for purposefully cultivating flexible reasoning, creative ideation, and innovative geographic problem-solving capacities. This study contributes an empirically-grounded divergent thinking instructional framework that can empower students' abilities as engaged global citizens adept at grappling with the complexities of our interconnected world. This study pioneers an empirically-grounded instructional framework for purposefully cultivating divergent thinking skills through structured probing question within geography education. The findings contribute to the scholarly discourse on evidence-based strategies for nurturing essential 21st century competencies across the curriculum.
Keywords:
Divergent Thinking, Probing Questions, Geography Education, 21st Century SkillsReferences
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