# Advent of Systems Thinking for Children


After working with a few very skilled systems thinkers (all doctors) from Harvard and MIT, I'm convinced that although Systems Thinking is a seemingly novel and somewhat niche approach to analysis, it is really a natural extension of boxes and arrows type diagramming that exists in a wide range of fields and certainly already exists within the brainstorming toolkit if you can say there is one.

In many ways what is offered is actually a new and semistructured, semi-formal systematic way for approaching complex topics that are better handled with visual tools and not speech or prose. We are fond of saying that a picture is worth a thousand words, but for some reason, we are adverse to whiteboarding and creating rich diagrams that would capitalize on this truism. It is most definitely the case that the visual can represent much more than we can communicate with mere speech, and even if it weren't the case, we know from unified modelling language, that any idea we have can have multiple visuals associated with it to really fill out all the ideas that might be associated. There would be no reason to only use narrative forms or diagrammatic forms alone. To be complete, we should be willing to do all of the above, and by doing so we actually open up the door for children with skills in the visual domain to really excel.

Systems thinking is not very difficult to do. It might be difficult to attain the mastery that can be achieved very easily by someone who is extremely adept in the visual domain, but since all people are visual, it is a natural media to communicate complex ideas about the real world. Systems thinkers have put ample work into having a toolkit to do this in a way that almost everyone can appreciate and make use of within a very limited period of time. At no point, during my training in systems thinking, did I think that I would nto be able to learn the same skills when I was a child. I think it woudl be much easier to learn, than say arithmetic or calculus for example.

What is actually happening in systems thinking is a combination of depiction of real situations like described in my related article, but also discovery about the nature of the situations themselves, that is difficult to achieve without actually employing methods to get ideas on paper. While we are visual we are not always the best at creating diagrams and operating on them within our minds alone. Instead, after we get them outside of ourselves, we can use the visual and the tactile, and interact readily and communicate with others about what we are seeing.

I found from my class that it is also very likely that when a system is well designed, there will be very little to disagree about within a group. While people are very much ready to disagree when merely using language to talk about topics (using words that they might disagree about and so on), there is much less to disagree about when a depiction in a graph truly and obviously relates to something everyone sees in the real world. It is like disagreeing over a statue or a portrait that looks nearly identical to the real person. When it is done right, everyone knows it. Also, when there are defects, and they are pointed out, it is much easier to show everyone why there is a defect. Because as with the arts, the person doing the diagramming can simply go ahead and refine the diagram to include the new aspects that are improvements on the previous.

Let us take an example of a systems diagram. The diagram in this article that was a paper of mine while a student in a course at Harvard is posted here:

Post the link to Academia where you will have placed your newest version of your article.

This systems diagram is surely incomplete, and really there is no way that I could have gotten it to a point where it describes everything necessary without assistance from others who have knowledge in specific domains.

For anyone involved in the field of gifted education, I highly recommend looking into systems thinking approaches and tools that make it easy to diagram in a rule governed way how systems in the real world work. 

What is the reason for systems thinking?

The reason for systems thinking is really quite simple. To depict reality, even very basic chunks of reality, that we commonly call "situations", can be much more easily done in a complete way using drawings and not sentences. I learned from my professor, that in countries where few words are spoken to children, there is a much worse ability to cope with emotions and complex scenarios. Because there is much less to work with mentally because we don't fully represent situations unless we have the words or have the vision. This gets us out of that predicament to a degree by allowing people to have a better chance to get a real representation of the complexity of situations they are experiencign (that might be unique), and then to react with proper emotions. Additionally, if we can get away from the words, people are more likely to appreciate the truth in the diagrams and not be as affected by emotional words at play. 

People truly want to fully understand their predicaments and learn how to react to them. This is why they appreciate mentors. People who can say "but did you think about this..." and provide critical insights and gotchas that would not normally be noticed.

After my experience in my course on systems thinking the thing I'm most struck by is not the diagramming itself. Since I'm coming from a background in software architecture, I was familiar with many diagramming tools and feel adept at bringing systemic ideas into practice. What I am more struck by is the simplicity of the toolkit for quickly getting at situations that would be otherwise very difficult to communicate. One person who came to the class who was very skilled and mentioned that the systems thinking discipline opened his eyes to a new way of analysiing topics (many people in the class commented that they didn't think they could go back to their previous way of looking at the world from this methodology!). From this I have to say that beyond providing a way of looking at the world that is more accurate and novel, this offers an approach at communication that children can use from very early age.

We should not delude ourselves into thinking that because this stemmed from academia that this is not something that can be readily used by children. I believe that systems thinking is a topic that can be taught to children in a matter of weeks with no need for complex texts. All that is necessary is to choose situations that they are familiar with and begin to depict them with this toolkit.

We could go about instruction by first asking them to describe situations they are experiencing with words but then transitioning to showing them how *it could* be depicted using a systems map. Following that exercise a comparison can be made with what they wrote to show that their native visual skills often go beyond their native communication skills.

It would turn out, for certain, that some children are not as non-verbal as others. So some would be more comfortable explaining in words how they view situations, while others would be much better at describing with the pictures. What is great is that this would enable children who did not formerly have a way to approach the topic visually a way to communicate that didn't exist to them. Instead of trying to draw pictures of situations, or use other ad-hoc measures, they can actually use a toolkit probably more effective than narrative forms.



* Fundamental methodology to move from one system to another.
* Structures and alternative structures.
* You need the system map that accurately reflects the existing system.
* You then need to identify the parts of the system that you intend to impact structurally.
* You then need to know what kinds of change are possible given the forms of leverage.
* What degree of imagination will bear upon this topic?
* Then you need a methodology to move from one structure to another.
* There has to be a transformation methdology that we have not been exposed to.
* The size of the change would determine if it is characterized as a revolution or not.
* But there should be controlled ways to make cumulative changes, or very large changes.
* Certain changes should be impossible. 
* This connects with path dependence and so on.
* So this is where you would connect systems map transofrmations with tree map, sort of like in a git repository.

Idea that when people's income increases they make purchases for:

* planning
* flexibility
* convenicence/peace-of-mind
* opening of opporutities to create more income when the time comes
* safety (like with purchasing more insurance).
* total value (valuation method might not be the same as how people usually think about it). 
* people with high income might value things differently because of the social influence they have access to.
* Examples: real estate, land, large vehicles. Tools that don't even get used.

Could prepare a simple article on this in connection with a simple idea of why we use cars with five seats, and whether it is rational to have an SUV or large trucks.

Interesting question:
Efficience and optimization, verus having plenty of room for safety.
What margin of safety makes sense?
Psychologoically there could be a justification for a very high level of inefficiency and suboptimality to simply ensure that people are satisfied and comfortable. (!!)

GPT
GDP is how we are measuring consumption.
Velocity (like in the agile methodology)-- how fast could a particular technology be deployed.
Availability (This would be on the supply side).
Speed of consumption. (Great the technology can be quickly deployed in some place to increase the maturity, but then still it connects to the demand.

But this still seems to connect with supply and demand. But maybe what is different is how the supply and demand connects into flows between nodes of subsystems on the global scale.

Revolutions as transformations of systems at different paces. Timewise there would be a tree of progression and path dependence. So there must be a view that can be overlayed upon the systems diagrams that would show barriers and obstacles to progress. Also, the levers that will be pulled are necessarily those that would connect with cognition on the side of imagination.

Change or not to change? When to decide to act? Not nearly about motivation, but about motivation. What should motivate an action to make a change?

There is nothing infinite about this system. It seems clear that on a global scale everything could become part of a systems map, with a finite parameter space. But an interesting question would be "How large would a parameter space of interest be that would be instrumental at any given time."

The number of words that you hear in different classes is difference. If you don't have a certain class level you will hear less words, and you will have less of an ability to express yourself and manage your emotions. This would be a key thing to connect to your writing on the benfits of learning a language, because it seems that lanuages differ in their level of expressiveness and perhaps then the number of vocabulary words a person would be exposed to. Thus perhaps, people who are in areas where there is a lower concept space, they are worse at managing their emotions and not as good in general in thinking through complex topics.

Cognitions
Physics

What would be the key physical variables in a high level global systems map?

How do systems evolve over time and when do we think of it as a revolution?

When would it be due to balancing and reinforcing loops and when would we think of it as due to incipient subsystems that did not exist previously that impact the entire systems as they evolve over time.



## Compost Convo

What are the analogical case studies that you need to meet your research goals, apart from those that you are having Ann work on.

Or conversely: 

What are some systems thinking problems that are well enough understood that you can expect well developed systems maps to exist that would depict them.

Waste management.

The most interesting parts of the systems diagrams would be the fringe areas that are not well understood and the concepts of choice and the meaning that we would be able to connect with assumption.

The next most interesting part would be the correspondence with nature, and the accuracy of the system. The accuracy of the system would then allow for us to accept the structure of the natural system. Once we can accept the structure of the natural system, we can use the system's map indefinitely:

* To teach how the system works to students.
* to measure our level of ignorance over time. So it won't be perfect--there will be informaiton missing and there will be information that is not correct. Perhaps the wrong concepts are in place, and so on.
* Areas where it is accepted will provide historical benchmarking. Because we will then be able to say "Look, this is probably not perfect, but it was likely a good depiction of the state of the system at the time".
* This way development of systems maps can result in improved historical record. Also, it can allow us to measure differences in state of mind between time periods and also to see what truly differed between systems at different times.

Furthermore, cognition is limited in the ability to understand systems maps. Yet systems maps explain how real world systems actually work. So we should be able to determine who exactly is able to manage the information in the maps, and who is able to interact with systems in unique ways to improve the maps themselves and find issues. Especially, because as you dive down into the map, you end up in the logic of the science itself, quality of data, quality of data modelling, etc.. etc..


* Systems map for controls in education scenarios.
* Complete your equality article.
* Complete your situations article and ensure it connects to the idea of actually arriving at truth.
* New article on classroom value. The classroom is not of value to all participants. The value of a classroom is increased when the people who are participating are running the direction of the conversations. Because key ideas, that would generate the best conversation, and the best quality exchange of ideas, fulfilling the purpose of the classroom, and have the best results, with  the higher level takeaways in terms of knowledge (the point of the class is to increase everyone's knowledge and quality of cognition in relation to reality, such that they will be more effective in the world...)-- this is done when those in the classroom who are of a higher quality are actually ablle to provide inputs and are not simply drowned out by people who are more vocal.
* Complete the systems diagram.
* Get content in for the paper. Don't concern yourself too much with style. Just make sure it is logical and makes sense, has the correct references and research, and all the data that you need.
