A student tests out an early version of the new online Rush Hour Brain Lab program.

We are excited to be exhibiting at the upcoming National Association for Gifted Children Annual Convention on Nov. 5-8th in St. Louis!

We've been busily developing our web-based Brain Lab program which we will unveil at NAGC! Using a game-based format, this online program brings our Super Solver System of problem solving to life as students play through carefully selected challenges and reflect on their thinking.

Put simply, the Big Picture question guiding the creation of this new program is, "How can we teach thinking skills to children?" a question I've been working on for years. The most obvious path towards an answer is through "problem solving," a process standard that the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) says is fundamental to a child's math education.

The grand guru of problem solving, George Polya, wrote his seminal book "How to Solve It" in 1945, and his theories have been widely used ever since. What I like best about Polya is that he understood that problem solving is a disciplined method. He believed that the key is learning how to confront problems with a disciplined approach that starts by understanding your objective and includes ongoing reflection and assessment.

Drawing from both Polya and more current research, a consistent theme and guiding principle is the idea that children must be explicitly taught thinking skills through modeling and given authentic opportunities to practice. To truly impart ownership of these thinking behaviors to students, a successful program must be engaging as well as focused on objectives.

One of the downfalls of the early attempts to teach problem solving in the 1980s was that the programs were centered on word problems. I don't know what your experience has been with word problems, but asking kids to do these is typically the equivalent of asking them to eat a plate full of Brussels sprouts... kids just shut down. ThinkFun games, on the other hand, are really fun, not at all like stinky vegetables, and kids love to play them!

Based around our hugely popular games like Rush Hour, Brain Lab guides players through challenges that have been carefully selected to help them understand and articulate their thinking and become reflective on their problem solving process. Rush Hour Brain Lab focuses specifically on Rush Hour Minimum Spaces, which directs players to not only get the red car out, but also to do it in the fewest number of spaces.

Many of these challenges appear so simple you can practically solve them in your head, but with several possible solutions, players must examine closely to really understand them and successfully solve the puzzle. To give you a taste, try out these four online challenges.

At NAGC, we will invite interested teachers to test this new program in their classrooms! Will you be attending? Please stop by Booth 423 and introduce yourself — we look forward to meeting you! If you are not attending but are interested in joining our testing community, please email Charlotte Fixler.