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What is critical thinking?
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Sun, 03/22/2009 - 14:03
Andrea mentioned critical thinking some time ago in the discussion about multidisciplinary approaches. It's a difficult concept to pin down. I'm interested in what people do in the classroom when the focus is critical thinking -- I mean what kinds of tasks are involved? Also, are we actually teaching thinking (especially with adult students) or is something else going on?
Anyone want to think critically about this?
Sue Argent
Sun, 03/22/2009 - 16:11
#2
I agree with Fazira that critical thinking is to fine answersto questions "Why?" and "How?Yes .Project work and case Study helpyou to develop critical thinking. Only hereyou practise what you learnt. this can not be taught, but one can be led towards this. By developing critical thinking one can go for research.
Sun, 03/22/2009 - 20:19
#3
Hi,
Great. I agree very much with both messages so far. Critical thinking is about curiosity -- how and why things happen. I think it's a very natural capacity and it's fun to get it going in the classroom.
Thu, 03/26/2009 - 08:08
#4
Hi Sue
I am not sure that 'critical thinking' is 'a very natural capacity' as you say. I think 'critical thinking' is different from having a 'curiosity about how and why things happen'. For instance, the scientist vs. the non-scientist. Some people just aren't at all curious about these things. They 'accept' that things are the way they are and never get curious about why things happen this or that way. Hence the people who are only interested in maintaining the 'statuts quo'. These people never question the 'givens' in life - social and/or culture. So I think a better way to discuss critical thinking is to define at as questioning the givens in life.
Here where I am in China, students are not encouraged to question the givens in Chinese society and culture, even though some do, have and are. Chinese students are taught to conform and obey, not to question or critique. That is changing, slowly, however. So it is sometimes difficult to get Chinese students to engage their so-called 'natural capacity' for critical thinking, if at all. I much prefer to think that critical thinking isn't a natural inclination, but it can be taught and learned, like other strategies. How easy that is I believe is context dependent.
robert
Tue, 03/24/2009 - 13:47
#5
Hello
Where I work, teachers periodically get the chance to do CORT training. (Sorry can't remember what the acronym means but there is a website... google it!) Anyway, it's all about critical thinking techniques, but much of it seems to be what we do naturally as 'thinking' individuals and to promote discussion in class - however, the seminars helped organise an approach to topic discussions and promoted 'what if' to the nth degree, etc.
I thought I'd suggest the approaches to my Year 13 daughter when she was working on an assignment - and I got a 'duh... that's commonsense, of course I do that,' reaction!
However, whilst it semed obvious to her, my students (male Arabs aged 19) are not accustomed to critical thinking and have difficulty coming up with ideas when faced with IELTS topics - one informed me that they'd never been asked to think in such a way before - at school or at home. Anyway, what I find when we discuss things is that it's very difficult in these circumstances to try and find ways for them to see things from another viewpoint - it's all very one-dimensional and they really have difficulty putting themselves in someone's shoes - and much of this is probably connected to a lack of knowledge of world issues and other cultures, too - and that can be deep water.
Heather
Tue, 03/24/2009 - 15:02
#6
Hi Heather,
I bet when your students buy their mobile phones they are critical thinkers, evaluating which option is best for the purpose they want to use it. They just don't realise it so they need your help to transfer their natural critical thinking skills to contexts where they have not before been encouraged to use them.
Olwyn
Tue, 03/24/2009 - 22:39
#7
Er - yes and no ... Lack of world knowledge/world awareness and global issues is definitely a problem. Maybe it arises from religion. Anyway, it's very frustrating and actually is a deterrant to the promotion of critical thinking. Very difficult and not necessarily advisable to challenge ingrained, long-standing, and possibily culture-related beiefs.
Heather
Tue, 03/24/2009 - 23:15
#8
I'd never thought of it like that, Heather. Obviously, as a language teacher you develop an awareness for the need to be cogniscent of cultural differences that could cause issues in the classroom, but I hadn't thought of critical thinking as one of them. I have, by the way, noticed the situation you describe with my students from your part of the world, so I agree with your statement of the problem. The question is whether it should be solved, for the reasons you mention, or can relatively easily be solved in the way mentioned by Olwyn. To be honest, I'm not sure.
Regards,
Kevin
Thu, 03/26/2009 - 08:59
#9
Hi Heather and Kevin,
I agree that some cultural issues are extremely sensitive and actually I don't think it's my place to deal with these in the classroom.I do an exercise where I list some beliefs [the earth is flat], some opinions [money is the root of all evil] and some facts [oranges grow in the south of France] and I get students to identify which ones are beliefs, opinions or facts. I also include statements like 'there is a God' which some students say is a fact but we agree eventually to treat as a belief.
I then suggest that the opinions and facts are things we can deal with in class but the beliefs are deeply held cultural artefacts that will not be changed by discussion and we should not try.
I agree that young people do not have a great knowledge of global issues but - hey - when I came to Britain from New Zealand in the 1970s I was about as knowledgeable of the wider world as many of these students. I wonder if it isn't an age thing rather than a cultural thing.
I do think too that we have to be careful not to adopt a position which says that so-called 'western' values are right. They are just different.
Olwyn
Sun, 03/29/2009 - 20:10
#10
Hi Olwyn,
I'd agree that cultural awareness is a major issue - and that it's not my place to 'teach' culture. I work in the Middle East, and can't really discuss too much about 'culture' or 'society' as the differences are considerable. It would also be extremely inadvisable to discuss anything connected with religion - and certainly casting any shadow of doubt on the existence of God would be professionally unacceptable.
Life experience (particularly any kind of struggle) possibly influences the ability to think critically, so if students lack that, then perhaps it is an age thing - the more life experience you have ... But sometimes it's better just to stick to issues like traffic regulations and hope that the basic idea of advantages and disadvantages and what if has been taken on board - and may be employed at a later time in their lives on a possibly more far-reaching issue.
Regards,
Heather
Wed, 03/25/2009 - 02:32
#11
Hi Olwyn,
I think we must remember that students are also influenced by advertising, brand image, peer pressure, etc. when buying mobile phones! Similarly, when students write academic texts they are influenced by a wide range of influences - including trying to please a particular tutor by citing all their articles!
Critcal thinking means becoming aware of these influences. The difficulty is when we propose that people are not aware of what they are influenced by and start to tell them to do things differently - the old problem of ideology (they can't see why they do it, but I can).
Low level "critical thinking" like evaluating cost effective options is one thing; but identifying whether an author's stance is overgeneralised or eurocentric or feminist or whatever is an entirely different kind of "critical thinking".
Whether this kind of critical thinking is beyond teaching or if it is such a eurocentric notion that maybe it shouldn't be taught, well, that is something I am interested in.
Tony
Thu, 03/26/2009 - 09:05
#12
Hi Tony,
I agree that the higher level critical thinking is where we want to get our students to but I believe it has to start with the low level stuff. In some earlier posts the critical thinking questions 'Why?' and 'How?' were mentioned. I think if students can be encouraged to look at , e.g. mobile phone advertising and ask these questions: 'Why does [company X] want you to buy its mobile phone? How does it make its mobile phone more attractive than [company Y]'s? this opens the world of reflection for them to some extent and then these questionscan be applied to other contexts.
I liked your point about trying to please a tutor by citing all their articles. I think even in a western context most students would not apply critical thinking to the papers written by their tutor. Critical thinking is also about knowing when to be a critical thinker and when not to be.
Olwyn
Mon, 03/30/2009 - 23:35
#13
Hi Heather!
I've come to the conclusion a long time ago, that critical thinking is alien to many cultures. Why? Because it suits many governments.
Regards,
Anita
Wed, 03/25/2009 - 05:06
#14
Hi All,
Our life connects with different things : policy, economy, mass media, education,
health, transport, everyday live....
A learner knows situations in some of fields,for example :education, everyday
life, and some of aspects of life mentioned above are not familiar to a learner.
It is natural.If a given theme for discussion or judgement is familiar for a learner ,
a learner can give her/his own opinion from the point of critical thinking,if he/she
don't possess information on the theme he/she say nothing. Our task as a teacher is
to develop a learner's background which is necessary for developing critical thinking.
I don't agree that some aspects(religion, country policy,world trends...)
of our life block to promote critical thinking. Critical thinking is the part of learner's
cognition,which develops out of our life aspects, it is individual thing,which defines a
learner's IQ .The task of a teacer is to develop critical thinking of a learner, it means that a learner
should have his/her own opinion or answers to questions of LIFE.
.
Mon, 03/30/2009 - 23:52
#15
Hi Fazira!
I don't agree with some things you said. I think some governments, religions and currents trends tend to block critical thinking all over the world. They want to stifle opinions, viewpoints and discussions.
A teacher can only encourage critical thinking if the tutor feels safe to do so!
Regards,
Anita
Tue, 03/31/2009 - 04:22
#16
Hi Fazira,
I agree that critical thinking may well be part of a learner's cognition, but, like Anita and Heather, I would point out that there are some areas which are completely taboo in classroom in certain places. Discussing anything to do with religion, culture or politics would, as Heather says, be inadvisable. Yes, there are other topics we can use to help students try to develop criticality, but there are also certain areas where we cannot go.
Phil
Tue, 03/31/2009 - 14:16
#17
Hi everyone. I am not sure critical thinking can be "taught". In fact, I think it can be developed together, students and teachers working as a team. There´s very interesting work that transcends the notion of critical thinking to take it into developing a critical literacy (please refer to a wonderful methology for this, by Vanessa Andreotti, OSDE Methodology, www.osdemethodology.org.uk , and the work of Chris Lima, amazing Brazilian colleague, Hornby Scholar, and moderator of the neighbouring Literature and Cultural Studies forum).
I believe criticality is inherent in human life, or at least it should be, no matter what our starting point is, which culture/ cultural group we were born into, there is always a different way of looking at things. I do not think it is possible not to deal with culture in our teaching. We always do, even if we believe we are not doing so; in that case we´re possibly working within the framework of Western culture, within certain religious views and a certain view of the world. THis is what I meant by recipes or rethinking life under a different heading in this forum.
best
Andrea
Thu, 04/02/2009 - 02:39
#18
Hi Andrea
My Media studies lecturer, Dr. Josie Arnold, from 1997 to 2000, made me aware of my own thinking processes, and suggested I try thinking in terms of social semiotics:
"Robert Hodge and Gunther Kress (1988) define these as acknowledging:
"...the importance of the flow of discourse in constructing meanings ...always negotiated in the semiotic process, never simply imposed inexorably from above by an omnipotent author through an inexorable code... Social semiotics cannot assume that texts produce exactly the meanings and effects that their authors hope for: it is precisely the struggles and their uncertain outcomes that must be studied at the level of social action, and their effects in the production of meaning." (1988:12)
For our purposes, I will define social semiotics as the |problematising| of the 'reality' of the signs that are all around us and that we read quite uncritically as an essential part of our culture. Social semiotics are the negotiation of many readings of our culture rather than the acceptance of dominant definitions. It is only when someone points out to us that these signs build upon a whole iceberg of knowledge that we can begin to look more critically at them, seeing them as driving the way we view ourselves as much as representing standards and values." (Emphisis mine)
[END OF QUOTE]
She met some resistance to this idea in the classroom - not from me - from guys and girls with 'uncritical' ways of thinking. In other words, non-critical thinkers. One reason why they were non-critical thinkers was because many guys, and some girls, had heard Dr. Arnold was a 'feminist', and they were culturally and intellectually opposed to 'feminism' - their version of it, at least - and so were more interested in maintaining the 'status quo' and not wanting to question anything. So they weren't open to looking at things from another perspective, at least, not from a 'feminist' perspective, even though she wasn't asking them to look at things from a purely 'feminist' perspective. The perspective she presents above is not a purely 'feminist' one.
I am a little confused by the meaning of 'critical thinking' as it is being used here on this discussion forum. It is a broader, more inclusive meaning of 'critical thinking'. Sue and others are using a meaning of 'critical thinking' that I have never used, and a definition of I have never imposed on it.
Dicitonary.com defines ‘critical thinking' as
"the mental process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating information to reach an answer or conclusion",
and seems to me to be fairly similar to Dr. Arnold's discussion of 'problematising' (or 'critical thinking') as she calls it, above.
Michael Scriven and Richard Paul provide a 'working definition' of 'critical thinking' which I tend to support:
"Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully 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. It entails the examination of those structures or elements of thought implicit in all reasoning: purpose, problem, or question-at-issue, assumptions, concepts, empirical grounding; reasoning leading to conclusions, implications and consequences, objections from alternative viewpoints, and frame of reference. Critical thinking - in being responsive to variable subject matter, issues and purposes - is incorporated into a family of interwoven modes of thinking, among them: scientific thinking, mathematical thinking, historical thinking, anthropological thinking, economic thinking, moral thinking, and philosophical thinking. (Emphasis mine)
Critical thinking can be seen as having two components:
1. a set of skills to process and generate information and beliefs, and
2. the habit, based in intellectual commitment, of using those skills to guide behaviour
It is thus to be contrasted with:
1. the mere acquisition and retention of information alone, (because it involves a particular way in which information is sought and treated,)
2. the mere possession of a set of skills, (because it involves the continual use of them,) and
3. the mere use of those skills ("as an exercise") without acceptance of their results
Critical thinking varies according to the motivation underlying it. When grounded in selfish motives, it is often manifested in the skillful manipulation of ideas in service to one's own, or groups', vested interest. As such, it is typically intellectually flawed, however pragmatically successful it might be. When grounded in fairmindedness and intellectual integrity, it is typically of a higher order intellectually though subject to the charge of "idealism" by those habituated by its selfish use.
Critical thinking of any kind is never universal in any individual; everyone is subject to episodes of undisciplined or irrational thought. Its quality is therefore usually a matter of degree and dependent on, among other things, the quality and depth of experience in a given domain of thinking or with respect to a particular class of questions. No one is a critical thinker through-and-through, but only to such-and-such tendencies towards self-delusion. For this reason, the development of critical thinking skills and dispositions is a life-long endeavour."
[END OF QUOTE] http://lonestar.texas.net/~mseifert/crit2.htm
And that's how I tend to think about 'critical thinking', not in the ways discussed by Sue and others. Critical thinking is a 'skill' or 'strategy' and can be learned, whether it is accepted and learned on initial exposure or developed over one's life time. I also tend to think of 'problem solving' as only an aspect of 'critical thinking' but not synonymous with it.
robert
Sun, 04/12/2009 - 13:58
#19
Hi Robert:
For myself, I view Critical Thinking as you have cited it in the dictionary definition:
"the mental process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating information to reach an answer or conclusion." I prefer this more general definition over that of Michael Scriven and Richard Paul.
I would add this comment: The "answer or conclusion" changes with the task, so "the mental process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating information ..." involves knowing which "answer or conclusion" to look for, which I think comes under the heading of "skillfully" in the definition. For example:
1. When examining information I obtained from a research project, the answer or conclusion that I am looking for is whether the research results are consistent with the null hypothesis, and if not, why not. In other words, whether or not the finding supports the theory. The critical thinking part of such a process also includes being aware of the influence my philosophical orientation has on my interpretation of the data.
2. When reading someone else's research report, the answer or conclusion I am looking for is (a) whether the author's research methodology is valid, (b) whether the author's conclusions are supported by the research findings, and (c) whether or not the research findings are consistent with my own research.
3. As a guide for analysis, I ask myself the questions, (a) "what assumptions have been made?" and (b) "has the veracity of all the assumptions been determined?" I can say from personal experience that identifying all the assumptions can prove to be difficult. The source of my mistakes can usually be traced back to not having identified all my assumptions.
Dan Jenkins (Foreign Expert, English Department, China University of Mining and Technology, Beijing, China)
Tue, 03/31/2009 - 16:56
#20
Hi All,
We were born with critical thinking , it is the main feature of human being,
without critical thinking who are we?
I think that critical thinking is needed for synthesizing information in order to make
the best decision for solving a given problem.
Tue, 03/31/2009 - 17:56
#21
Critical thinking is a component of problem solving. In teaching, the relevant issues would be the putative acquisition/learning dichotomy (SLA vs. SLL). The identification of learning styles and strategies is approached by attempting to put learners on a continuum between the extremes of field dependent (sociable and holistic) and field independent (analytic and less sociable). The ability to think critically is task dependent for most learners, but unless you are doing pure research, the average instructor is not likely to have the time to evaluate each student in depth in order to exploit one kind of learning.
People solve problems in many different ways, but my tendency is to identify critical thinking in students who have strong pattern recognition skills, because that is what informs my own study. I recognize the bias towards critical thinking in myself, and try to offer my students a variety of possibilities for learning.
I will follow the link on OSDE to learn more, it's a provocative idea.
Tue, 03/31/2009 - 18:34
#22
Hi all/fazira,
I don't think that we are endowed with the capacity to think critically since birth. I believe that the ability to think critically is an acquired one that has to be taught (consciously) and of course with the help of a teacher/instructor and in a structured way.
All comments are very welcome.
Cheerio;)
Tarik Boussetta- Global Issues Forum moderator
Tue, 03/31/2009 - 18:40
#23
Hi all,
I hope you'll enjoy reading this book - published online with the permission of the editor :)
Education, Autonomy and Critical Thinking
Good luck all:)
Tarik
Tue, 03/31/2009 - 19:32
#24
Yes, developing critical thinking as one aspect of problem solving, that is extremely necessary and valuable. Perhaps we should develop critical feeling as well? (if you allow me the silly play on words?), I mean going beyond the rational and connecting with fields of study from a more complete -yet critical- perspective.
Best
Andrea
Tue, 03/31/2009 - 22:47
#25
Hi everybody!
Nobody said it better than Francis Bacon in 1605: it is the art of being right. Perfect isn't it? To my mind CT is a liberating force in education and a powerful resource in one's personal and civil life. The best way to make students start thinking critically is to find the hottest and provoking topic to discuss. It could be one of short stories with unpredictable and unexpected end or without ending at all but provoking to fancy. You couldn't imagine how many ends provoked the "Skeleton in the cupboard" by Tony Wilmot. I would be grateful if anybody helped to find similar stories. Thanks.
Best
Elena
Wed, 04/01/2009 - 03:37
#26
Hi All/ Dear Taric, Elena
I think ,we everyday use Critical thinking because
we everyday solve some life problems(to do not to do, to choose
or not to choose), I don't think that critical think is such a special think
that we never have before and we acquire after birth, I think it is usually
in the matrix of the brain of each person.
20-30 yeas ago in the epoch of behaviourism in the methods of
teaching(stimul -reaction)we don't need critical thinking, a learner
recieved some information and next day he/she
retold this information in yesterday's format without changing it and that was
enough.
Now in the epoch of cognitivism we remembered that we deal with a person,
who is able to think,only now we began to force a learner to find ways how
to use the recieved knowledge
to fit to life. In order to do it a learner should find ways how to use the
recieved knowledge more effective with benefit to solve problems which a
learner has .
. In order to choose the right way a learner uses critical thinking ,
he thinks about pluses and minuses of the decision made by him/her.
And I agree with Elena, that we should design lessons in such a way that each
lesson should (probably must)have a problem( or problems) which makes
a learner to think.
Regards,
Fazira
Wed, 04/01/2009 - 05:35
#27
Hi Everyone,
Just went through all the postings on CRITICAL THINKING. I agree with all the points made regarding critical thinking. In order to take the issue further I would like to say that CRITICAL THINKING has to begin with self. For me, if a teacher starts reflecting on the course, material, methods (prescribed or otherwise), evaluation then it naturally emerges in the teaching ACT. I find that there are so many assumptions residing quite deep in our minds that hinder or even stop that crucial CRITICAL element in thinking. For example, I used to take it for granted that group work is a wonderful thing to do in classrooms/training rooms. I used to go these locations and declare it at the very outset that - see you know everything.... and I'm just here to learn with you.... and so on..... . But the sessions were not well received by the participants. I wondered why this great thing said by so many experts fails to work. Last year I was at the receiving end as a participant in workshop and there the tutor began with those grand expressions. I went to that workshop only to listen to the expert first and then see if I can do/make something of it. I was totally disappointed. So the lesson for me was that first one has to give what the participants expect, demand and then NEED. Often this NEED element is taken into consideration ignoring first two - expect and demand, I think. Learners NEED these and these things (for example, critical thinking) and to achieve it group work and learning through experience are the wonderful and effective modes. But to make this possible one has to fulfill the first two THINGS - expect and demand.
I know it is becoming a bit messy and will write a bit more sensibly later.
Look forward to hear more on this comment.
Thank you.
Krishna
Wed, 04/01/2009 - 15:13
#28
Oh wow. Interesting. We have been able to produce some interesting dialogue here. Let us see if I can follow:
First Sue wondered what critical thinking was and whether it could be taught.
Then Fazira referred to it as being related to the why and how of things.
Then there were allusions to case studies and project work as kinds of methodology that could help develop critical thinking, and to problem solving as one aspect of critical thinking, or rather, of critical thinking as a necessary component of solving problems.
Then we turned to the role culture plays in all this; how different cultures value critical thinking and what we should do as regards that.
Tony brought us back to the realm of EAP by making reference to some contexts where students would turn uncritical by citing all work by their tutors to please them.
Robert, your summary is amazing, as is the material on social semiotics, and I believe it takes us to this distinction between the rational and the "irrational" aspects of this matter (by which I do not mean literally "irrational"). The definitions you provide see critical thinking as a skill or a strategy, something that can be generated, taught and altered and which has to do with analysing, synthesizing, integrating. The way I see this, this is thinking, I do not know if we are doing justice to the critical component, that is, to see the why, more than the how of things. And "intellectually" and "disciplined" seem to lay emphasis on the same aspects, when it is necessary to transcend those notions, because, as you say, critical thinking relates to beliefs and action.
In the OSDE Methodology website, there is a booklet (link below) where the contrast between Critical Reading and Critical Literacy is shown. I see part of this discussion of Critical Thinking as referring to something akin to Critical reading (when talking of texts) and some other parts as going towards a more comprehensive notion related to Critical Literacy. The interesting thing is, as Vanessa used to tell us in our classes at Hornby Summer School Brazil 2006, once you go into Critical Literacy and you read reality from that perspective, whichever the ideological reading, it is almost impossible to come back to a Critical Reading perspective. The way I see it, it is like seeing the world in 3D and then trying to see it in 2D again. And I guess this is the way things work with all literacies: intercultural, technological (as the discussion on virtual worlds in another neighbouring forum would show us), visual. Once you read reality through an amplified lense, it is impossible to come back.
And I think this relates beautifully to what you say, Krishna, about the pedagogic implications of this. Do students expect us to tell them what to do, and how to see reality, especially in an EAP course? Would they resent us taking a more collaborative and open-ended stance? EAP being very much about genres, social constructions based on the demands of parent discourse communities, and expert knowledge, but, precisely, as social constructions, joint constructions, how would all this discussion relate to our role as EAP teachers? And how can we integrate this with the role of new technologies (another thread in this forum), materials design : is this possible with a coursebook(another one) and the global-local dichotomy?
Oh my, do we only have three days??!
best
Andrea
Wed, 04/01/2009 - 19:22
#29
Hello Andrea and everyone,
My name is Helen, and I am a visitor from the Global Issues area, where I am one of the moderators. I would like to thank Andrea for visiting our discussion on whether English should be simplified / standardised, and for pointing out the potential overlap between that discussion and this one. I would like to invite you to our discussion on "English or Globish" especially if you have not yet seen it.
It seems to me that whether we are talking about what form or forms of the language to teach, or what skills to teach and how, the impact that the local culture where we are working has on such decisions cannot be underestimated.
I would be curious to hear more about where you are working, and how your local context impacts on what you teach and how you teach it.
Best,
Helen
Fri, 04/03/2009 - 14:19
#30
HI Helen. In other sections of the forum we have been discussing the fact that most EAP materials seem to be prepared for people who will go to study subjects in English in England, the US and so on, but fail to take into account those students who are using Academic English in their own countries as part of their research, studying in English in their own coutnries, and attending conferences there and abroad.
I will visit the Global Issue forum try to contribute to the Globish discussion.
Best
Andrea
Thu, 04/02/2009 - 11:47
#31
Hi,
Critical thinking is clearly a fascinating concept, and the discussion has been very wide ranging, taking in semiotics and political philosophy. However, Krishna has reminded us that we need to think about what's happening in the classroom. We all seem to agree, more or less, that EAP students (i.e. students with academic purposes) need to be able to think critically, a least in some contexts. Krishna wants to consider students' expectations and demands. This requires us to explore with students the idea of critical thinking in relation to their own experience and purposes. To do this we may need to start with simpler and narrower explanations at first. A good place to start is thinking critically about the materials and methods we are using - as Krishna is doing - and share this with students.
One particular experience teaching out of my own cultural context brought this home to me. I was teaching in a Chinese university. Initially, my teaching approach was a bit new and challenging for my students and they didn't hesitate to criticise me through the class representative. This had never happened to me before. Even though I was a very experienced teacher, my confidence was badly shaken. However, I had to step back and think more about what they wanted and expected. We made compromises. We began to discuss, experiment with and evaluate ways of teaching and learning in a way that I continue to do with students back here in the UK.
When students feel safe and encouraged to think critically about what happens in the EAP classroom, they can start applying it more widely. And on the way they learn the conventions and language for doing so.
Thu, 04/02/2009 - 16:42
#32
Hi folks-
Interesting discussion. What I think we need to do is come up with a definition of "critical thinking" that we can agree on (or not?).
I follow Jacques Ellul's idea that critical thinking would be a second level of literacy which would allow the strudent/reader to critically analyze a text. This would include being able to get beyond simply accepting or rejecting it and would also allow comprehending a sequence of actions/results that follows a specific course of action, essentially Max Weber's concept of an "ethic of responsibility".
I developed some materials a while back for British Council in this regard. Any comments?
http://gcd.britishcouncil.org/frmContent.aspx?id=1052
kind regards,
Joseph
Fri, 04/03/2009 - 07:19
#33
Hello Joseph,
I'm really interested in your materials but couldn't get the link to work.
Sue
Fri, 04/03/2009 - 14:16
#34
HI Sue, Joseph and everyone. I haven´t been able to access the link either Joseph. Your materials sound very interesting. You suggestion about focusing on students´needs is wonderful Sue. So , how do you all think materials can take critical thinking into account in a way that is more consistent with the needs of EAP students?
best
Andrea
Tue, 04/14/2009 - 15:05
#35
Hi all,
Sorry for posting so late, but I've had trouble getting on, that and a good bit of time off ;-)>
If you are interested in any of the materials on the site (it must be a British Council intranet thing since I can access the material here at work), please send me an e-mail at joseph.guerra@pt.britishcouncil.org and I will email you electronic copies . . .
ki nd regards
Wed, 04/22/2009 - 20:35
#36
Hi all
I joined an online critical thinking course offered by Oregoen University last year. It is an old discipline developed by Artistole and Scorates, it had gone through many stages of formation to reach its present concepts. CT course was for teachers to help them to integrate the skills necessary for CT in the English language classroom. Integration of CT skills in lesson plans were supposed to help Ss to be better, logical, fair thinkers.CT is mainly based on Socratic questioning, Blooms taxaonomy and Elements of Thought. There is a lot of argument going on now that this farily "new" discipline is being pushed on many countries "Middle East"for what purpose? If any one interested I can link many useful sites
Regards
Hala
Thu, 04/23/2009 - 01:12
#37
Hi Hala!! Yes, it´d be great to see those sites. Thank you!!
best
Andrea
Hi ,
In my opinion critical thinking is to try to fit recieved information to life.
I had been studying for several years physics, I knew all themes of this subject including electrocity, but I can't repair irons. For what did I study it if I didn't use this knowledge in my life?
Critical thinking ,I think first of all to find answers to questions "WHY?" and"HOW?".
"WHY?" is for understanding the problem,"HOW?" is for solving problems.
For development of critical thinking ,one needs active activities such as :project work, role play, debate...,but not nonproductive exercises.