INTRODUCTION

Chatting is a common occurrence in secondary school language classes such as in Chinese. It often presents a problem to language teachers and has an adverse effect on students' learning. Although various disciplinary measures can be taken to stop this type of disruptive behaviours in class, it could only be temporary and on the surface. Applying the Six Thinking Hats method created by de Bono (1985) could have a positive and everlasting effect on students as it will change each individual student's behaviour from within. This paper reports on a case in Chinese where success has been achieved by employing de Bono's (1985) Six Thinking Hats method. The paper intends to show to other LOTE teachers that if you walk with your students together to the heart of the problem of chatting in class, your students will see what they could not normally see only by following the conventional thinking method to approach this problem. This paper encourages the secondary school language teachers to mobilise their students to take part in the thinking process of solving the problem of chatting in class openly, collectively and creatively. This approach could help the students involved gain a better understanding of the problem concerned and improve their thinking skills in a fun, tangible and creative way. The thinking skills gained through this approach could also be transferred to the problem-solving in the teaching of other subject areas beyond the secondary schooling.

THE SIX THINKING HATS

Thinking has various modes: objective thinking, emotional thinking, negative thinking, positive thinking, critical thinking and creative thinking. de Bono (1985) used six different colours to represent these different thinking modes and created the Six Thinking Hats method. The White Hat possesses the feature of coldness; therefore, it represents objective thinking. When one wears a While Hat to think, one looks at the facts and figures only, not anything else. The Red Hat represents emotional thinking, because red is associated with anger; therefore, when one wears a Red Hat to think, one normally follows his or her emotions in the process of thinking. Black often suggests the negative and its feature is gloomy. When one wears a Black Hat to think, one will look at the issues under consideration more critically. Positive thinking is represented by the yellow colour. This colour is often related to the sun; therefore, its feature is bright and sunny. When one wears a Yellow Hat to think, one tends to look for all the positive things of a particular issue. Creative thinking is represented by the green colour which suggests fertile and growth; therefore, when one wears a Green Hat to think, one needs to search for new ideas. Blue symbolises the sky high above everything. When one wears a Blue Hat to think, one needs to look for the overall picture of a situation rather than only one tiny section of the problem area. Blue also suggest the Big Picture. According to de Bono (1985), people tend to wear one single colour hat when thinking of a problem.  This will result in a narrow understanding of the whole issue under consideration. The most effective way of thinking is to wear all six colour hats to look at an issue or a problem from all six directions. This will help put us in a good perspective to deal with the issue on hand.

EVIDENCE OF DIFFERENT THINKING OUTCOMES

Sixty Years 10-12 students of Chinese from four different classes were involved in this experiment in Term 1, 2007. Among them, 21 were from Year 10; 28 from Year 11; and 11 from Year 12. All studied Chinese as an elective in a Melbourne-based boys' school. The steps to gather the evidence of different thinking outcomes include:

1. introducing de Bono's Six Thinking Hats method in class with highlight on the colour features of this thinking method;
2. presenting the problem of chatting in Chinese classes to all the students involved;
3. dividing classes into small groups to employ the Six Thinking Hats method to solve the problem defined through filling out the worksheet given; and
4. in-class discussion on the best outcomes for all.

Based on the features of the Six Thinking Hats coined by de Bono (1985), the following from the students involved were obtained:

White Hat Thinking

• Students chat in language classes at any point of time during class.
• There is much noise that others can hear.
• There are students who become silly while chatting.
• There is much chaos in the classroom.
• The neighbouring classes can be affected by the noise.

Red Hat Thinking

• Some students feel happy to chat.
• Some feel frustrated by the noise.
• Some enjoy being heard.
• Some are angry to hear what they do not want to hear.
• Some feel bored so they start chatting.
• Some feel relaxed when they chat.
• Some are annoyed by the noise.
• Some are entertained by others chatting.
• Someone is hurt by the subject/topic of the chat.

Black Hat Thinking

• Valuable class time is wasted.
• Class is disrupted.
• Classroom is too noisy.
• Learning is compromised.
• Everyone is shouting and nobody is listening.
• It can cause the teacher to scream.
• Schoolwork is not done because of chatting.

Yellow Hat Thinking

• It is fun.
• It can help students get rid of stress.
• Everyone can say what he wants to say.
• I do not have to wait for my turn to say something; therefore, I do not forget what I want to say.
• It is socialising.
• It can help improve my verbal communication skills.
• It may cheer me up.
• Students can share information related to the areas other than the content to be covered in class.
• It can cover my fear of not knowing the content taught.

After each group leader presented their group views on this issue from four directions represented by the colours of white, red, black and yellow, the students from each class were encouraged to move on to creative thinking by ‘wearing' the Green Hat first and then the Blue Hat aiming for the best solutions:

Green Hat Thinking

• Establishing one-on-one teaching so that the student has nobody to chat to.
• Sending students chatting into a different room.
• Teacher using a microphone to talk.
• Awarding those who do not chat in class with Chupa-Chups.
• Making those chatting to sing or dance for class.
• Students who chat in class have to pay coins to class for using the class time to chat.
• Sticking a "Strictly No Chatting" sign on the desk of those chatting in class.
• Allocating a couple of minutes as chatting time at the beginning or the end of each period.
• Chatting in Chinese only.
• Organising more class discussion in Chinese.
• Chatting should be focused on how to learn Chinese well.
• Varying classroom activities so that students do not have time to chat.

Blue Hat Thinking

At the end of this problem-solving session, the students from each class were asked to make a choice to reflect their stance in relation to the problem of chatting in class. The following three choices were made in responding to the question of "I come to this class to"

1. learn
2. learn and chat
3. chat

Then, those who made the first choice were asked to move to the front of the classroom; those who made the second were requested to stay in the middle of the room; and those who made the third choice were requested to move to the back of the room. Being encouraged to keep wearing a Blue Hat to think about solving the problem defined, the students from each class were asked to label the three choices they made, thus:

1. Choice One = LEARNERS
2. Choice Two = CONFUSED INDIVIDUALS
3. Choice Three = CHATTER BOX

Surprisingly, as soon as these labels were announced to each class, a couple of students who initially moved to the back of the classroom immediately joined the middle group. This suggested that they did not want to be singled out as a chatter box.

SOLUTIONS

After some physical movements within the classroom, the students from each class were explained that they would need a TEACHER to teach the LEARNERS; a KEEPER to keep the CONFUSED INDIVIDUALS; and a MANAGER to manage the CHATTER BOX. Since there was only one Chinese teacher (the author of this article) in each classroom, this teacher had to concentrate on the teaching of the group who made the first choice and those who made the second or the third choice had to go to a separate room to let another member of staff if available to manage them. After this explanation was given, the students from each class were asked to move again according to their new choices. Much to the author's surprise, all said that they wanted to stay with their Chinese teacher to learn. After a full in-class discussion of de Bono's (1985) Six Thinking Hats method, all four classes changed their culture and everyone concentrated on learning. If somebody chatted at any point of time in class later in the year, this student was called out as ‘CHATTER BOX'. Finally after the experiment, chatting in these Chinese classes has been kept to the minimum; this disruptive behaviour has been self-regulated by the students themselves; and the Big Picture of "coming to learn" has been maintained.

CONCLUSION

Employing the Six Thinking Hats method by de Bono (1985) with language students can be a fun way of solving behavioural problems in class. This method is more effective on students as they are more receptive to this type of approach compared with the direct authoritative and disciplinary approach practised by many language teachers in the past. Most importantly, it helps improve students' thinking skills which could be transferred to solving problems in other areas of their life beyond their secondary education.

REFERENCES

de Bono, E. (1985). Six Thinking Hats. Little, Brown and Company.

de Bono, E. (2004). Parallel thinking - the Six Thinking Hats.

Creative thinking - how to use de Bono's 'Six Thinking Hats' to improve your thinking skills.

Mind Tools: Six Thinking Hats. (1995).