Module3 What's the big idea?

There are simple and complicated patterns almost everywhere around us. In a piece of art, music, writing, their own patterns exist. Recognizing patterns means that not only do we observe these random events carefully, but also we understand them more deeply. Furthermore, we can anticipate what the next event will be from the structure of these patterns. This means that we try to fit our new observation and experience into our anticipations. Although it is challenging, it is possible for individuals to understand relatively simple repetitions in something to recognize a combination of several different repetitions collectively. Mathematicians, scientists, and artists are very good at perceiving patterns and understanding relations between these patterns.

Forming patterns means combining two or more elements with operational functions. This can involve combining two or more elements together with rhythms and dynamics to explain the new patterns and its new functions. It can be done by using different senses as well. For instance, a pattern which is discovered by visual observations can be combined with other patterns which come from other types of observations from other multi sensory patterns.  

For example, we can apply heat to water with sawdust in the beaker to see the direction of the water due to the heat transfer. If we can find certain movement patterns of the sawdust by visual observation, this can lead to finding the patterns of heat transfer. Then, we apply this technique to different water temperatures and characterize them to see the frequency of fluctuation at a single position. The frequency can be found by observing the intensity of the sawdust with respect to time. This process can be considered as looking to seek new patterns, where the patterns visual dimension is now switched over to patterns in the frequency dimension. Also this new pattern has its own functions and can be used in various ways as well.

The concept of recognizing and forming patterns is a useful thinking tool for everyday life also. We can practice this while trying to find repetitions and irregularities in our daily lives and try to classify these two parts by the relationships between them so that we accept a certain situation with various unique perspectives. Thus, we can be creative every day, even though we live our lives through a routine pattern.

We can make the most use of this thinking tool in education. Training students to observe something with wide open minds and trying to grasp the basic structure of it is very important for recognizing patterns. To develop this ability, students should be encouraged to create a big functional structure with various small parts and to find something similarities between two or three different fields (e.g. find out something in common between the drawings and the songs). To develop the ability of forming new patterns, the efforts to find out the best way of communicating with others should be strongly required. Students can be encouraged to develop their own patterns from existing patterns so that they realize what kinds of patterns influence their actual learning process to be easier and more creative.