Here is an abstract for a Poster Session at the 2022 Annual Meeting of the American Scientific Affiliation:
Improving Our Problem Solving with Education, Process, and Prayer
People want to flourish by recognizing Problems (opportunities to “make things better” in all areas of life) and Solving Problems by making things better. When we improve our Problem-Solving Process – with more effective Education (in learning from life-experiences) and Prayer (in two-way communications with God) – we improve our ability to make things better, and flourish. To help improve our Education for Process, I've developed a website (an extension of my PhD work) with teaching strategies that include visually-logical Action Diagrams to show how we Define Goals (for a good Problem-Solution), then creatively Generate Options (for a Solution) and critically Evaluate Options (by comparing Goals with Predictions & Observations) in iterative Cycles of Design. And why prayer? In our theistic worldview – our view of the world, used for living in the world – Christians believe that God is active, that He can change people (ourselves & others) and change situations. Because of this, “what happens” depends on our actions and God's actions, as in Exodus 17:11 with actions of Joshua (fighting) and Moses (praying) plus actions of God.
My attitude is not “holier than thou.” Instead I'm just trying to make fewer mistakes, by learning from past mistakes when I thought “oops” and asked “why didn't I do it better?” and often answered “ineffective Problem-Solving Process and/or inadequate Praying to ask God for wisdom and blessing.” I'll share what I'm learning about Education, Process, and Prayer. {more: EducationForProblemSolving.net/asa - it's this page}
And for a different description of the same ideas, here is the abstract for my talk at ASA's SoCal Meeting in January 2018.
Christian Education for Life — Using Prayer for Problem Solving
Broadly defined, a Problem is any opportunity to "make things better" in any area of life, so Problem Solving includes almost everything you do. And in everything you do, God wants to help you improve your problem-solving effectiveness, for the purpose of pursuing His goals and (usually) your goals. How? When you pray, God can help you improve in many ways, including... your understandings of God, yourself, and other people; your compassion for others; your love for God and people, actualized in your attitudes, relationships, and actions; your wisdom in making decisions about actions; the results of your actions, the overall effects on all life-situations, for others and yourself.
In every area of life, your prayers can be beneficial in many ways, when... God provides insights and guidance, through Holy Spirit, to help you think better, and transform your character; you pay attention to your process of problem solving, by asking "can I think better in creatively generating ideas, and critically evaluating ideas?" and "what is the best use of my time? (i.e. what should I do now, and later, trying to make things better?)" and, with empathy & self-empathy, "what do they want? what do I want? how might we achieve a better win-win result?" and other process-questions; you pause for relaxing interludes that can be naturally refreshing.
As one aspect of students' education for life, we can show them the many benefits they will receive when they ask God to help them improve every part of their problem-solving process, as throughout each day they are creatively Generating Ideas and — by comparing Predictions & Observations (made in Mental Experiments & Physical Experiments) with each other, and with their Goals for a satisfactory Problem-Solution — are critically Evaluating Ideas, using creative-and-critical cycles (Generate and Evaluate, Generate and Evaluate,...) of Design Thinking, often using cycles of "Plan, Do-and-Observe, then Re-Plan, Do-and-Observe,..." to learn more from their experiences in life.
{for more information, designprocesineducation.com/prayer}
To learn more about these ideas, you can explore...
• Using Prayer for Problem Solving (i.e. for Making Things Better)
in a 1-Page Summary & PowerPoint-for-Talk & Longer Overview.
• Education for Problem Solving in the homepage of my edu-website,
plus Action Diagrams in the homepage or a page with diagrams.
• my pages – about Creativity & Critical Thinking & Problem Solving – show why many people (in most areas of life) think these skills are extremely important, plus activities-and-strategies for improving the skills.
contact info: craigru178@yahoo.com and for talking, 614-396-9578 (landline).
also a devotional for a worship service? In late-2017, a reviewer (for my similar Talk/Q&A in January 2018 at ASA's SoCal Winter Day Conference) said it "might make a good devotional." I began thinking about this, and put the idea into action twice: in May 2018, I did the talk – appropriately adjusted to be more pastoral, with less about education and my model for problem solving – as a partial sermon, with my 9 minutes supplemented by the pastor's insights; and later in 2018, I led a discussion for our 25-person home group, in a different church.
If I can do a Devotional, in addition to the Poster Session, the main ideas – so you can know “what they will be” – are outlined in a 1-Page Summary (made for the 9-minute MiniSermon in May 2018); also, a PowerPoint (for my Talk at 2018 SoCal Winter Day, with goals of edification plus education) that is less-similar overall because for a devotional most of the slides about education will be cut, so the focus will be edification. {during the talk I'll say “for more about education, talk with me during the Poster Session,* and use the web-page you see in the abstract”} If I can do a devotional this year, there will be minor changes – especially if you want it shorter than 9 minutes (it can be any length you want) – but the basic ideas will be similar to four years ago.
* Because the Poster Session will be Saturday afternoon, the best timing for a related devotional would be Saturday morning. / an option: If you think it will be useful, I can have a 1-page handout (maybe slightly revised from 2018) for you to photocopy and give to attendees.
note: Temporarily this page is written for reviewers. Later it will be revised – by changing the sequence (so a reader first sees the extra web-resources) and eliminating most of the page, including this paragraph plus the two above & one below, and the options for a title – so it will be only “more information” to supplement the live presentation(s), whether this is a devotional + poster session, or just poster session.
my experience: In addition to the 3 talks (in 2018) about Education-Process-Prayer, I've done 4 Poster Sessions (and 3 Talks) about Education for Problem Solving, and for three years (2014-15-16) led RoundTable Discussions (as outlined in my program-descriptions & handouts) for the statewide California STEM Symposium plus many talks about a variety of topics for ASA Meetings between 1990 and 2016, with the most recent being "Education for Critical Thinking: Schrodinger's Cat in a Multiverse" where the part about "Schrodinger's Cat" was multiverse theology.
1a. Improved Problem Solving with Education, Process, Prayer
1b. Improved Problem Solving with Education, Process, and Prayer
1c. Improved Problem Solving with better Education, Process, and Prayer
1d. Improved Problem Solving with effective Education, Process, Prayer
2a. Improving Our Problem Solving with Education, Process, Prayer
2a. Improve Our Problem Solving with Education, Process, Prayer
2a. Improve Our Problem Solving with Education, Process, and Prayer
2a. Improve Your Problem Solving with Education, Process, Prayer
2a. Improve Your Problem Solving with better Education, Process, Prayer
2a. Improve Your Problem Solving with Education, Process, and Prayer
2a. Improve Your Problem Solving with Education, Process, Prayer
2a. Improve Your Problem Solving with Process and Prayer
etc – more, with different combinations of 1st part (our vs your) and 2nd part
3a. Improve Problem Solving with better Education, Process, and Prayer
3b,3c,etc – with this first part, plus one of the second-part variations above.
4a. Improved Problem Solving with better Process-and-Prayer
4b. Using Process-and-Prayer for Problem Solving
Here is the original part of my submission (in mid-March 2022) that described my preferences — for Devotional + Poster Session, or only Poster Session, or only Talk — before it was accepted for a Poster Session.
a devotional for worship service: In late-2017, a reviewer (for my similar Talk/Q&A in January 2018 at ASA's SoCal Winter Day Conference) said it "might make a good devotional." I began thinking about this, and put the idea into action twice: in May 2018, I did the talk — appropriately adjusted to be more pastoral, with less about education and my model for problem solving — as a partial sermon, with my 9 minutes supplemented by the pastor's insights; and later in 2018, I led a discussion for our 25-person home group, in a different church. / For the annual meeting of ASA, my ordered preferences for the submitted abstract are: the best would be a devotional plus Poster Session, followed by just a Poster Session, or an Oral Session (with Talk plus Q-and-A), or – also fine – none of these. {update: I should have just said "I want a Poster Session, or Devotional plus Poster Session."