Developing Critical Thinking: Importance and Strategies
Abstract
Critical Thinking has been an important issue in education for many years. After the 1948 Convention of the American Psychological Association, Benjamin Bloom took the lead in developing “the goals of the educational process,” including knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Critical thinking in education has been hotly debated since then.
It is our job as educators to equip young students with the skills and strategies to think critically in order to solve problems. The challenge is how to transform these important instructional objectives into real, developmentally appropriate activities that are integrated onto lessons across the curriculum. Implementation of these objectives and strategies may appear difficult, but often requires only a slight shift in one’s approach to the curriculum. This article shares some definitions, outlooks, and questions to inspire you to begin thinking critically about critical thinking. What is it? Should we teach it? Why… and How…..? References:
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Ms. Sarika Chauhan
Introduction
Critical Thinking has been an important issue in education for many years. After the 1948 Convention of the American Psychological Association, Benjamin Bloom took the lead in developing “the goals of the educational process,” including knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Critical thinking in education has been hotly debated since then.
It is our job as educators to equip young students with the skills and strategies to think critically in order to solve problems. The challenge is how to transform these important instructional objectives into real, developmentally appropriate activities that are integrated onto lessons across the curriculum. Implementation of these objectives and strategies may appear difficult, but often requires only a slight shift in one’s approach to the curriculum. This article shares some definitions, outlooks, and questions to inspire you to begin thinking critically about critical thinking. What is it? Should we teach it? Why… and How…..?
What is Critical Thinking?
The ability to analyze facts, generate and organize ideas, defend opinions, draw inferences, evaluate arguments and solve problems (Chance, 1986).
The intellectually disciplined process of understanding and evaluating arguments. An argument provides an assertion about the properties of some object or the relationship between two or more subjects and evidence to support or refute the assertion. Critical thinkers acknowledge that there is no single correct way to understand and evaluate arguments and that all attempts are not necessarily successful (Mayer & Goodchild, 1990)
Reasonable reflective thinking focused on deciding what to believe or do (Ennis, 1992)
Critical thinking, in general, is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skilfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. In its exemplary form, it is based on universal intellectual values that transcend subject matter divisions: clarity, accuracy, precision, consistency, relevance, sound evidence, good reasons, depth, breadth, and fairness.
Why Critical Thinking?
Everyone thinks; it is our nature to do so. But much of our thinking, left to it, is biased, distorted, partial, uninformed or down-right prejudiced. Yet the quality of our life and that of what we produce, make, or build depends precisely on the quality of our thought. Shoddy thinking is costly, both in money and in quality of life. Excellence in thought, however, must be systematically cultivated.
A well cultivated critical thinker:
Skills related to critical thinking
Across subject areas and levels, educational research has identified several discrete skills related to an overall ability for critical thinking. These are:
Rationality
We are thinking critically when we
Self-awareness
We are thinking critically when we
Honesty
We are thinking critically when we recognize emotional impulses, selfish motives, nefarious purposes, or other modes of self-deception.
Open-mindedness
Judgment
Discipline
We are thinking critically when we
Uses of Critical Thinking:
Building Categories
Students often are given (and asked to memorize) explicit rules for classifying information. For example, there is a set of criteria for determining whether a word is being used as a noun or as a verb. The Building Categories strategy, however, is an inductive reasoning tool that helps students categorize information by discovering the rules rather than merely memorizing them. Such active learning typically results in better understanding and better retention of the concepts and related material than is possible with a more directive teaching method.
Example: Distinguishing animals from plants. Students work in two groups (Animal Group and Plant Group). Worksheets prepared in advance ask for information about life span, energy sources, motility, anatomy, etc., of several different animals and plants. Once the information is collected, it is compiled into large wall charts (one for Animals, one for Plants).
At this point, some questions can be posed to both groups at once: What are the similarities among the members of each group? What are the differences between the two groups? How could the following statement be completed: "An animal is different from a plant because..." The teacher provides appropriate feedback throughout, using open-ended questions to help students identify inadequate or inaccurate categorization rules.
ConcepTests use multiple choice questions in which the response alternatives reflect different ways of understanding the concepts. To construct such a test, instructors need to know in advance the types of conceptual mistakes and misconceptions students are likely to have. In physics, student misconceptions in certain topic areas are well documented. A ConcepTest would be difficult to create if students’ theories and misconceptions of important concepts are not well known in your field.
Think Aloud Pair Problem Solving (TAPPS) engages students in a think aloud process. In a think aloud, a student says whatever comes to mind and keeps talking for the duration of the task at hand. In TAPPS students participate in pairs; one acts as the problem solver, the other as listener. The problem solver reads the problem aloud and talks through his or her solution. The listener follows along and catches any errors that occur. The role of the listener is to ask for clarification but not to guide or correct the problem solver.
Think alouds work best when the task or problem evokes elaborate thinking. A question or task that has a simple or single answer is not a good choice for a think aloud. The prompt does not have to be a problem in the traditional sense. For example, think alouds have been used to explore students’ thinking as they read and try to make sense of historical documents.
The Minute Paper is a technique in which students write a brief answer about their learning during the class period. Traditionally, the minute paper is used at the end of the class period (e.g., what was the most important thing you learned today?). But a minute paper could be used at any point in the class to monitor student thinking. For example, the instructor could ask students to explain their understanding of a key idea at a turning point in the lesson (e.g., Now that we have just discussed this topic, take a minute to write about what concept “X” means to you.). Moreover, the written answers could be used as the basis for class discussion. The instructor can ask several students to read and explain their answers.
Conclusion:
Any of these techniques can help teacher better observe student thinking during class. Ideally, the techniques are instructionally purposeful and support desired changes in student thinking. For example, the ConcepTest is part of an instructional approach called Peer Instruction designed to promote conceptual change and deeper understanding of physics. The ConcepTest question prompts students to articulate their current understanding of an important concept. Then, they test out their understanding by explaining their answer to a peer. At this point students may notice gaps in their own thinking or notice how the peer’s account is more complete or clarifies a point in a different way. Finally, the instructor uses the feedback from the tallied responses to elaborate on the concept. Rather than simply announce the right answer, the instructor can explain the concept in terms of different types of understanding. The instructional sequence is intended to promote conceptual change by having students articulate and examine their own ideas and then try to reconcile them with alternative views.
Assistant Professor
M.Ed. (Self Financed)
Department of Education,
VNSGU, Surat-395007.
Email:sarikawaymade@gmail.com
(M) +91 9428076116
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