• Home
  • Lutheran learning experience
    ▼
    • Learning in a Lutheran school
    • What is a Lutheran education?
    • Parenting and schools – a learning partnership
  • Learning Journeys
    ▼
    • K-12 in Lutheran schools
    • Queensland Certificate of Education
    • Tertiary ready
    • Vocational Education and Training
    • Outdoor Education
    • International students
    • Boarding
    • Service Learning
  • Latest News
  • Find A Lutheran School
  • MyLEQ
  • Contact
  • About us
    ▼
    • About us
    • Our proud history
    • Our team
  • Careers
    ▼
    • Why work for Lutheran Education Queensland?
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
  • Staff Portal
  • Careers
  • Contact
  • MyLEQ
  • Search

Lutheran Education Queensland

Inspired learning for life

MENUMENU
  • Learning experience
    • Parenting and schools – a learning partnership
    • Learning in a Lutheran school
    • What is a Lutheran education?
  • Insider insights
  • Learning Journeys
    • Service Learning
    • Boarding
    • International students
    • Outdoor Education
    • Vocational Education and Training
    • Tertiary ready
    • Queensland Certificate of Education
    • K-12 in Lutheran schools
    • Overview
  • News
  • About us
    • Our team
    • Our proud history
    • About us
    • Job Openings
  • Find a school
Home / Modes of Thinking

Modes of Thinking

Have you ever, in the moment, tried desperately and intentionally to recall a word from your memory bank – a person’s name, a geographic location, a specific term – and frustratingly been unsuccessful? Has it been ‘on the tip of your tongue’?

Do you find that when you become distracted and stopped consciously thinking about it, the word you were trying to recall miraculously comes to you?

The brain uses two modes of thinking: the Focused Mode and the Diffuse Mode.

  • Focused Thinking is when you concentrate, focus on a problem and intentionally try to find a solution. Focused Thinking may come about as a result of such things as a conversation, reading, explicit teaching, observation and exploration. Focused Thinking purposefully and narrowly descends upon a specific concept or problem.
  • Diffuse Thinking involves inattentiveness. It takes place when you step back, take the pressure off and authentically relax. It’s through Diffuse Thinking that the brain unconsciously leaps from idea to idea and draws connections between concepts. Diffuse Thinking taps into strategic big-picture thinking.

There is a misconception that Focused Thinking is the only place where learning happens. And so we push for more instruction, more intensity, more structure, more opportunity, more this, more that. We can underestimate the need for Diffuse Thinking in the learning process. Focused Thinking gets us started on our learning, but breadth of understanding is only realised when we allow our brain to move between both the Focused and Diffuse Modes. This is one of the reasons those who laugh, play, wonder, imagine and daydream will often experience all-embracing and seemingly limitless learning, and produce more creative and ground-breaking outcomes, than those who persist purely with intense and explicit learning experiences.

So, now that you have this information, what will you do with it? My recommendation is to value the importance of recreational time for and with your children. Take a walk. Fly a kite. Climb a tree. Explore mud. Dream silly daydreams and laugh about them. Allow your children to participate in entirely unstructured play. Don’t worry about the mess. Give your children every opportunity to let their brain be free from things they find mentally taxing. Know and trust that it’s most often in the downtime that the tactical big-picture learning inconspicuously takes place.

Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted. John Lennon

Generously shared by Jane Mueller, Principal at Living Faith Lutheran Primary School.

Read more about Focused and Diffused Thinking:

  • Which is Better for Learning: Focused vs Diffuse Thinking?
  • Why Your Brain Needs Idle Time
  • The Meandering Path to That ‘Aha!’ Moment
  • Focused and Diffused Thinking: The Ping Pong Technique
  • How to Utilise Both Brain’s Thinking Modes
  • The Case for Doing Nothing

Find a Lutheran school near you

Search now

Footer

Lutheran Education Queensland logo - white reversed

REGIONAL OFFICE

Level 2, 24 McDougall Street
Milton Q 4064
PO Box 1535, Milton Q 4064
T:  (617) 3511 4050

Home

  • Careers
  • Contact
  • News
  • About us
  • MyLEQ
  • Copyright and privacy

LEQ Experience

  • What is a Lutheran education?
  • Learning in a Lutheran school
  • Parenting and schools – a learning partnership

Find A School

  • Find by location, service and name

Learning Journeys

  • K-12 in Lutheran schools
  • Queensland Certificate of Education
  • Tertiary ready
  • Vocational Education and Training
  • Outdoor Education
  • International students
  • Boarding
  • Service Learning

© 2023 Lutheran Education Queensland