I love experimenting with visual thinking tools to see how far I can push them. One of my recent favorites is Speare, a writing tool that utilizes a flexible canvas of “boards” and “blocks” to enable you to capture your thoughts and writing and rearrange it at will.

One of the things I noticed about Speare is that its modular interface makes it especially well-suited to creative thinking and problem-solving. So I decided to build a demonstration of divergent and convergent thinking using this tool.

These two thinking technique refer to the brainstorming process, where your goal is to generate the greatest number and variety of ideas (divergent thinking) and the evaluation stage of creativity, where your goal is to identify the best and most valuable ideas to implement (convergence).

This process is explained in greater detail in the video below, demonstrated using Speare (click on the full-screen button in the lower right corner of the video to view a larger version).

Want to learn more about divergent and convergent thinking?

If you’re intrigued by the concepts of divergent and convergent thinking, I’ve prepared a free resource guide that will enable you to explore them in greater detail.

Happy idea hunting!