Before proceeding with this blog post, I would like to quickly address a possible misunderstanding. While it might seem to the reader that I believe the mere use of Thinking Maps will cure all that ails us in public education, nothing could be farther from the truth. Instead, I see Thinking Maps as blank canvases on which to neatly and efficiently bring together a diverse set of pedagogical theories and techniques. It just so happens that some of the many “paints” that can be applied to these canvases are the Meta-Cognitive Frames of Reference questions, which were, of course, developed by the Thinking Maps company (Sorry about the lame extended metaphor!). Eventually, this blog will delve into many non-Thinking Map ideas such as Gradual Release of Responsibility, Historical Thinking, Bloom’s Taxonomy, Collaborative Structures, Intellectual Virtues, and Literature Circles. My point is that Thinking Maps, when used to their fullest potential, allow me to layer some or all of these wonderful tools into a single, easily digestible graphic. Okay, on with my discussion of the Blue Frame!
Whereas the Green Frame of Reference asks students to consider the relatively straightforward question of where they got their information, the Blue Frame involves the much more cognitively challenging issue of what is (potentially) influencing that information. The implications of this question are powerful and far-reaching. It is one thing to know information came from a particular book; it is another thing entirely to understand how the information in the book has been influenced by its author’s point of view and the social and historical contexts in which it was produced.
The Blue Frame: What is influencing the information?
To paraphrase Dani Rojas, The Blue Frame is LIFE!
My guess is, if you ask the average (cool) teacher about her hopes for her students, you won’t hear much about scores, grades, or points. Instead, you will likely hear terms like empathy, perspicaciousness (assuming said cool teacher has a sweet vocabulary), lifelong learning, social and emotional intelligence, cultural sensitivity, and so on. It is my fervent belief that the Blue Frame is one of the most potent tools at your disposal in the struggle to achieve these noble goals. Oh, and it will also, magically, improve your students’ scores, grades, and points simultaneously. I am so certain of this point, that I suggest you start worrying less about how to incorporate the Blue Frame into your curriculum and more about how to incorporate your curriculum into the Blue Frame. Put another way, if you can teach your students to consistently identify and consider the points of view of themselves and others, recognize bias, distinguish between types of sources of information, and perceive the influence of historical and social issues on those sources, you have won my friend!
Point of ViewAs with the other frames, the Blue Frame is divided into two main guiding questions, the first of which is:
Is a specific point of view influencing the information in your map?
As I glance around my classroom, I see the term “Point of View,” or its synonym “Perspective,” just about everywhere. Here is proof:
The reasons for the ubiquity of these terms should be obvious, but in case they are not, here are a few (or more!) to ponder:In literary analysis, students need to learn to discern the points of view of characters, narrators, authors, and themselves as readers. Point of View is similarly important when analyzing informational texts; Wonders frequently asks students to identify authors’ viewpoints.
Although many sources refer to it as Opinion Writing, the truth is that, when students are asked to “Explain Why with Reasons” in the upper grades, it is almost always Point of View Writing they are being prompted to do; the difference, according to WFTB, is that Opinion Writing is more open-ended, whereas Point of View writing requires students to choose one of a limited number of stances (usually two or three).
I am a huge fan of the Stanford History Education Group’s Read Like a Historian program. The purpose of the program is to teach students to source, contextualize, corroborate, and close read primary and secondary sources. All of these thinking skills require students to consider points of view, as well as literally all of the other Blue Frame questions.
Merriam-Webster defines Empathy as: “the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner.” In other words, empathy is all about understanding the points of view of others. Given the power and importance of this SEL skill, shouldn’t we take every opportunity available to practice it with our students?
- Jason Baehr, a philosophy professor at Loyola Marymount, identifies Open-Mindedness as one of the nine intellectual virtues that will improve students’ thinking in all areas of study. He describes this virtue as: “An ability to think outside the box. Gives a fair and honest hearing to competing perspectives.”
The frequent consideration of Point of View has crucial metacognitive benefits. From a Bloom’s Taxonomy perspective, discerning the points of view of others requires analysis/inference skills, while determining one’s own point of view is a matter of judgment/evaluation. Before determining a point of view, a student should compare and contrast the available options (Double Bubble) before supporting their chosen point of view with reasons (Left-Sided Partial Multi-Flow).
Bias/Primary and Secondary Sources
The two follow-up questions on the Point of View side of the Blue Frame are:
Is there a specific point of view influencing the content/ideas in your map? Is that point of view biased?
and
Is the information in your map influenced by a primary or secondary source?
The importance of teaching kids about Bias deserves its own blog post. Being keenly aware of bias will, of course, make kids better consumers of social media, news, books, textbooks, websites, and the like, but it will also cause them to be more intellectually humble and honest with themselves. The ability to distinguish between primary and secondary sources is a foundational skill in Social Studies and supports the analysis of bias because each type of source has its own implicit biases.
Historical or Social Issues
The guiding question on the other side of the Blue Frame is:
Are there any historical or social issues influencing the information in your map?
The supporting questions are:
Does a specific time period influence your thinking about the information in your map?
and
Are there any cultural beliefs that are influencing your thinking?
I find these questions particularly helpful in Social Studies, but they are also quite relevant in literary analysis. When reading historical fiction, or any story written some time ago, students should consider how differences in technology, language, and social/cultural norms affect the narrative. It is also always important to be aware of the historical, social, and cultural circumstances in which an author wrote a novel or story. The same can be said for informational text as well.
Uses and Examples
I believe that, like the other frames, the Blue Frame questions were originally intended to help students reflect on the thinking they have done in the maps. The Bubble Map below, in which I ask students to consider their own biases regarding a character, provides an example.
Adding a Blue Frame question at the bottom of a map like this can help you increase rigor, review concepts and skills, and/or connect the map to other parts of the curriculum.
As I suggested above, the Blue Frame questions are often grade level standards in and of themselves. Whether they are or not, I think it makes sense to teach them explicitly as frequently as possible. As an illustration, here is a map I recently created to help students analyze author’s viewpoint in informational text:
Notice that, in both sample maps above, I used blue font to emphasize that certain questions and prompts pertain to this Frame.
The goal for all of the Frames of Reference questions should be for kids to apply them to their thinking without being prompted to do so. Incorporating them into assignments and/or making them the focus of assignments will help you achieve this goal. I realize this is all a lot to digest, but I hope you have found it helpful and enlightening. Next time, I will review the third and final frame: Red!
Here are the links to my other two posts about the Frames, along with one about the importance of Thinking Maps:
Green Frame: https://spotlightclassrooms.blogspot.com/2021/12/the-meta-cognitive-frames-of-reference.html
Red Frame: https://spotlightclassrooms.blogspot.com/2022/02/the-meta-cognitive-frames-of-reference.html
What's So Great About Thinking Maps?: https://spotlightclassrooms.blogspot.com/2021/10/whats-so-great-about-thinking-maps.html
Always Writing,
Eric Lovein
PS: Check out my post about Summarizing Flow Maps!: https://spotlightclassrooms.blogspot.com/2022/03/thinking-maps-for-fictional-narrative.html
...and my video on Circle Maps!:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuQ9RkXXZcI
