Why Schools Need to Teach Critical Thinking as Its Own Class
By Dr. Roy van den Brink-Budgen, guest contributor.
https://www.macat.com/blog/why-schools-need-to-teach-critical-thinking-as-its
In Singapore, ranked among the best in the world at reading, mathematics, and science, officials are discussing extending critical thinking programs to kindergarten. In the UK, however, we are busy scrapping the Critical Thinking A-level.
Educationalists are overlooking this critical component in teaching children to be high achievers.
Young people don’t need to know what to think, they need to know how to think. That means dedicated classroom time on how to evaluate arguments, analyze evidence, ask questions, and reflect on meaning.
In 2008, Canadian researcher Philip Abrami analyzed 117 studies into how to teach critical thinking effectively. The conclusion was very clear. Critical thinking skills develop students’ ability to learn more in all subjects. The best way to equip students with such skills is to have a critical thinking class on the timetable, as well as to teach it through all the curriculum subjects. In other words, to teach it explicitly as opposed to simply expecting it to develop while you are teaching another subject.
Abrami also concluded that critical thinking skills were best taught through an authentic “critical dialogue” with teachers and among students. That is, a real argument rather than an invented exercise.
Critical thinking is not only necessary for school-age children, but also very much for higher learning. Universities want students to arrive with critical thinking skills so they can analyze and debate great works of scholarship. For example, such thinking is needed to study the work of Simone de Beauvoir, specifically her use of anthropology, psychology, and history in The Second Sex , the groundbreaking analysis of the position of women.
Yet many universities find it necessary to run a course for first-year undergraduates to get them up to speed. This is down to an often-confused attitude to acquiring such skills at school. In the UK the A-level in Critical Thinking has been dismissed as “easy” and will end in 2017. When I was chief examiner for the OCR (Oxford Cambridge and RSA) examining board, however, it was the hardest subject of all to get an “A” in. There is also evidence from Cambridge that students who take the critical thinking qualification achieved higher grades in other subjects.
That said, critical thinking does not have to be taught for an examination to earn its place on the school timetable. Many schools teach children to question, analyze, and reflect on what they are learning. Cognitive psychologists have demonstrated that four-year-olds can already understand reasoning. In light of this, I am working with Maryland Primary School in London on a program to develop thinking skills. It is not a selective school and draws pupils from a diverse community. Critical thinking is central to what they see as making Maryland a “good” school and eventually an “outstanding” one.
Those children will have a head start on their contemporaries in schools where teachers simply expect critical thinking to develop through traditional teaching. They will be better equipped to think flexibly and creatively in a twenty-first-century jobs market where simple cognitive skills are increasingly taken over by technology .
Economically strong nations need people who can think critically and solve problems creatively. No nation that values education should wait until university to give classes in critical thinking. It should start in kindergarten.
Dr. Roy van den Brink-Budgen has been working in the area of critical thinking for 30 years. During this time he has developed critical thinking assessments, taught the subject to thousands of students and teachers in various countries around the world, delivered presentations at international conferences, produced teaching programs in and written books and papers on the subject. He is director of studies at the Centre for Critical Thinking in Singapore. He is also head of the Thinking Skills Advisory Board at Macat .
Measure and develop your own thinking skills by joining the largest-ever study in partnership with the University of Cambridge. The project is fully funded by Macat; there is no cost to participate. Register your interest at www.macat.com/ct-study
Shane Fredericks I think it is a great idea to teach CT as its own class, I think it would remove some of the mystery behind the concepts in CT that are currently prevalent. As a class it should solidify or spark an understanding at an early age that Critical thinking is an actual ‘thing’ which can be used throughout one’s life interactions. It may even assist children once they are experiencing teenage life and some of its pitfalls. A smarter kid is usually what is hoped for by most.Show less
Jim King Schools need to involve students in their own learning so they teach themselves.
Basima Zaroor It will be great idea if CT be the main method from KG classes , students will learn how to use their thinking skills instead of be as a bowl full of bank information,The skills will assist him to look for the knowledge , using alternatives , solve the problems , from my experience we don't need to change the curriculum , but we need to provide teachers with the skills of CT. , so he can convert the lesson to questions, stimulated students to think and look for the answer. Show less
Gregory Sadler I tend to think it's best to have a standalone CT class, taught by experts in the field, and then to have CT infused throughout the curriculum. Of course, that requires that the experts be willing to do some faculty development work and partnering - but the benefits of having a robust, consistent focus on CT make that very attractive
Chavah Golden Gregory, I am with you on infusing CT throughout the curriculum and developing the faculty. I think that the course should teach kids to THINK... It should include visual thinking, meta-thinking, systems thinking, strategic thinking, and design thinking. I would advise against getting too technical in any of these (except for CT), but being heavy on action learning - through real problem identifying, problem solving, innovating, creating, following through, etc.Show less
Chavah Golden Amazingly, this just showed up on my radar. I think it is brilliant. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/09/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/399356/
Dr. Vandana Goswami We definitely need to start teaching critical thinking in primary education. However, being an educator working in India, I have a much more fundamental question --- who will teach these skills. I agree totally with Gregory Sadler and Chavah Golden that faculty development is one of the key requirements in incorporating these skills. In countries like India, where a majority of mainstream teachers themselves have no exposure to these skills, expecting them to teach these skills without adequate training is futile. Show less
Michael Fletcher I taught critical thinking to adults for 10 years and that led to many insights. When I began the task the obvious answer was "yes." After many lessons learned, I think that a strongly conditioned "yes" would be the wiser answer. After having taught CT I found that what I had done was actually mild counterproductive to effective thinking. By putting CT into a separate classes we imply it to be some separate and discrete activity when of course it needs to be interwoven with everything we do and think. We did partly solve that problem by present task specific applications, but getting past the assumption that Critical Thinking was a separate activity proved difficult.
Thus the wisest but most difficult course is to incorporate the whole basket of
CT skills into existing classes. That should include all relevant history and theory, followed by application. Show less