Red Hat

The spectrum of feelings included under the Red hatrange from emotions to intuitions. No need to justify the feelings. How do Ifeel about this right now?Emotions - normal emotions such as joy, anger, fear and sorrow. Under thesepowerful emotions, our perceptions only select what supports the emotion. ie. anangry person will see reasons for anger.Feelings - covers a wider range than emotions. Includes feelings of unease,anxiety, interest, and uncertainty. Aesthetics is a feeling. Feelings covers matterslike admiration and respect.Hunches - lie somewhere between intuition and feelings. It takes the form ofstrong feeling or decision in favour of or against something.Intuitions - intuition is both right and wrong. Some claim that intuition is indeedlogical but that we are not consciously aware of this process.The value of the Red Hat is that it recognises emotions, feelings, hunches and intuitions as a valid part of thinking.

White Hat

Information.Questions.What information do we have?What are the facts?What information do we need to get?Wearing the white hat the students can visualise being explorers and making a map.A good place to start when wearing the white hat is to make note of all theinformation, formal and informal, that is readily available.What information do we have? The answer will provide an inventory.Formal information may include reports, statistics and facts.Informal information tends to come from personal experience.Describing our own feelings is Red Hat thinking, but reporting how others feel is WhiteHat thinking. White Hat thinking incorporates questions such as –• What is relevant?• What is most important?

Black Hat

Judgement.Bad points.What is wrong with this? Is this true? Will it work?What are the weaknesses? What is wrong with it?The words checking and checking out are important in explaining the uses of theBlack Hat. It is critical thinking.The main uses of the Black Hat are:Checking for evidence - what is the evidence to support the statement?Checking for logic - the validity of the logical argument.Checking for feasibility - is it realistic, will it work?Checking for impact - the consequences, who does it affect?Checking for fit - in simple terms: do things fit?

Green Hat

Creativity. Different ideas. New ideas.Suggestions and proposals. What are some possible ways to work thisout? What are some other ways to solve the problem?Generating reactive ideas - use the given idea as a starting point for thinkingand exploring creatively.Generating starting ideas - The White Hat collects information - the Green Hatis used to lay out some starting ideas.Generating better and further ideas - look for alternatives, enhance existingideas.Generating new ideas - create new ideas completely - use originality.Green Hat thinking can help when we need to take an action, providean explanation, forecast an outcome or design something new to fit a need.Forming hypotheses, speculating, and thinking laterally. 

Yellow Hat 

Assessing value.Extracting benefits.Making something work.The uses of the Yellow Hat fall into four areas:1. Good points.2. Benefits.3. Reasons why an idea will work.4. Likelihood.Things to look for when wearing the Yellow Hat are:What are the good points?What are the benefits? 

Blue Hat

 Organisation of thinking.Thinking about thinking.What have we done so far? What do we do next?Defining focus and purpose - What are we thinking about? What are we tryingto do?Setting out a thinking plan or agenda - setting the thinking steps, a strategy.Making observations or comments - metacognition - thinking about our thinking,commenting on our thought processes.Deciding on the next step - this step may involve moving to another hat. It isstopping thinking and taking a break.Defining outcomes and summarising - What decision have we reached? Theoverall outcome, solution, conclusion, choice or decision, or further plan.