A classic example of insight is the case of the French mathematician POINCARE. I'll spell that, P-O-I-N-C-A-R-E. Poincare.

For 15 days, Poincare struggled with a mathematical problem and had no success. Then one evening, he took black coffee before going to bed which was not his usual custom. As he lay in bed, he couldn't sleep, and all sorts of ideas come to him. By morning he had solved the problem which had baffled him for over a forenight.

What do psychologists have to say about this process of problem solving? A very good and helpful description of the solving process has been made by Polya, a teacher of mathematics. I'll spell his name too, P-O-L-Y-A, Polya.

Remember that Polya is thinking of insight problems and in particular, mathematics problems, but his ideas should apply in all sorts of areas.

Polys's description has four stages. They are, Stage one, Understanding the problem. At this stage, the students gather all the information he needs and asks himself two questions,

the first question is, What is the unknown? What is my goal? What is my goal, in other words, what do I want to find out?

The second question is, What are the data and conditions? What is given? What is given? In other words, what do I already know?