The Organization of Dots instrument focuses on the cognitive operation of organization. It provides practice in projecting virtual relationships through tasks that require an individual to identify and outline given figures within a cloud of dots. The projection of a potential relationship requires that the learner search for meaning among otherwise separate phenomena. Through repeated practice and successful completion of progressively more difficult exercises, the instrument encourages task-intrinsic motivation and activates a variety of cognitive functions.
The Comparisons instrument focuses on the cognitive operation of comparison. It increases an individual’s ability to differentiate between parameters of comparison and to develop the cognitive functions involved in comparative behavior. The instrument provides concepts, labels, and operations with which to describe similarities and differences. From Comparisons students learn to organize and integrate separate and distinct bits of information into coordinated and meaningful systems of thought. The instruments build learners’ feelings of competence and independence by increasing and enriching the repertoire of attributes by which objects and events can be compared.
The Orientation in Space I instrument deals with the cognitive operation of understanding how objects relate to one another. It addresses the poor articulations, differentiation, and representation of space that may result from an inability to detach oneself from one’s own body position as a reference. It deals with a relative system of reference for localizing objects in space and in relation to one another. As a result of their experience with these tasks, learners discover why there are differing points of view in the perception of an object or experience and how to give consideration to an opinion that is different from their own.
The Analytic Perception instrument enhances one’s ability to differentiate (divide the whole into its parts) and integrate (join parts into a whole). Adaptation to the world depends upon having the flexibility to alternate between these two perceptual processes. As a result of their experiences with the tasks of this instrument, learners begin to differentiate between inner and outer sources of reference. They are then able to form and discriminately use internal referents to process information and to structure and restructure their varied life experiences.
| The Illustrations instrument presents a collection of situations in which a problem can be perceived and recognized. Learners attempt to offer an appropriate solution to the identified problem. This instrument mediates learners' ability to perceive details, use several sources of information, and exercise comparative behavior. This instrument lends itself to the development of vocabulary and oral and written language; it is also highly useful for generating task- intrinsic motivation.
The Family Relations instrument focuses on inferring, understanding, and explaining relationships. It uses a system of relationships to link separate beings and categories and emphasizes the necessary and sufficient conditions for inclusion in and exclusion from categories. The exercises in Family Relations demand precise use of language in encoding and decoding relationships and require inferential thinking, analytic thinking, and deductive reasoning to justify conclusions based on logical evidence.
The Categorization instrument focuses on the cognitive operation of classification. This instrument helps individuals develop the flexibility and divergent thinking necessary for categorizing and recategorizing the same objects into different sets as the principles and parameters of categorization change with new needs and objectives. In categorizing, an individual moves from establishing relationships among concrete items to projecting relationships among concepts. This ability is essential to and basic for logical and verbal operations.
The Numerical Progressions instrument helps learners search for, deduce, and induce relationships between separate objects or events. Learners draw accurate conclusions regarding the cause of progressions as the instrument increases their ability to compare, infer, and reason deductively and inductively. This instrument mediates precision, discrimination, and a willingness to defer judgment until all of the elements have been worked out in determining a common rule for a progression.
The Temporal Relations instrument focuses on the cognitive operation of Temporal Relations. It develops learners' ability to use temporal concepts to describe and order their experiences. An adequate orientation to time is important to relational thinking and is acquired through mediated learning experiences. Without an awareness of the continuity of time and its ordered succession and of the rhythm of events, individuals make no use of their past to predict, anticipate, plan, and prioritize future events. Temporal Relations helps mediate temporal relationships and appropriate and precise use of temporal concepts and relationships.
| The Instructions instrument focuses on encoding (giving) and decoding (receiving) information. The difficulty in the tasks is not in the meaning of the words themselves, although learners may occasionally have problems with unfamiliar terms; the difficulty is rather with the significance of the words and with what they imply in context. Through the insights gained into the reasons for their successes and failures, learners are transformed into generators of information, able and willing to interpret and transmit complex instructions.
The Orientation in Space II instrument introduces and provides practice in the use of external, stable, and absolute systems of reference. Geographical concepts such as compass points, coordinates, and graphs are used to describe relationships and an object's orientation in space. Learners have to simultaneously apply the relative (internal) system of reference and the absolute (external) system of reference to describe and understand spatial relationships.
The Syllogisms instrument focuses on the cognitive operations involved in syllogistic reasoning. In syllogistic reasoning, the integration of information from two premises about the relationship between terms yields the deduction of an unknown relationship. Through the tasks of Syllogisms, learners gain the ability to discriminate between valid and invalid conclusions and between possible and inevitable outcomes. The instrument fosters inferential and abstract thinking.
The Transitive Relations instrument focuses on the cognitive operations of transferring information we have from two pairs of item to a third pair. It deals with relationships that exist in ordered sets, in which the differences between set members are described by the terms "greater than," "less than," and "equal to." This instrument helps learners recognize conditions that permit deductive and inductive reasoning. Through the tasks in Transitive Relations, learners demonstrate their ability to engage in inferential thinking based on logical implication and relational thinking.
The Representational Stencil Design instrument consists of tasks in which the learner must mentally construct a design. The completion of the tasks requires a complex series of steps. The identification of the whole through its superimposed parts requires an active, mental construction drawing on inferences, and an anticipation and representation of the outcome. Answers are sought by affirmation, negation, and elimination of what is logically impossible. Learners must extrapolate from the known to the unknown and rely on logic to identify the constructions.
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