Teaching Critical Thinking: Its Critical to Student Success Saundra Y' McGuire, Ph'D' Director, Cent

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Teaching Critical ThinkingIts Critical to
Student Success! Saundra Y. McGuire, Ph.D.
Director, Center for Academic SuccessAdj.
Professor, Department of ChemistryLouisiana
State University
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Desired outcomes

• We will better understand what critical thinking
  is
• We will have concrete strategies to increase our
  students critical thinking skills
• We will know what motivates students to think
  critically
• We will use critical thinking skills to improve
  our success in teaching our students to think
  critically

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Reflection Questions

• What is critical thinking?
• Why is critical thinking important in the
  course(s) you teach?
• Why is that important?
• Why is that important?

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Working definitionCritical 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,
orcommunication, as a guide to belief and
action." --Michael Scriven and Richard Paul
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Another perspective

• "Critical thinking is not just a matter of
  applying the rules of logic (much less scientific
  method). It is a matter of thinking and feeling
  empathetically with others, of engaging one's
  imagination, of having access to a wealth of
  facts about the possible effects of alternative
  actions, of discerning patterns of meaning in
  experience, of looking at the world from
  different perspectives." --Warren Nord

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Lets DO some critical thinking!

• The Noun Game

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Prerequisites for critical thinking

• Substantial knowledge of facts, concepts, ideas
• Belief in ones ability to think critically
• Safe environment in which to express thoughts
• Rewards for thinking critically
• Others?

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Three kinds of instructor-influenced classroom
interactions consistently and positively related
to gains in critical thinking

• the extent to which faculty members encouraged,
  praised, or used student ideas
• the amount and cognitive level of student
  participation in class
• the amount of interaction among the students in a
  course."
• Terenzini, Springer, Pascarella, and Nora (1995)

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An Important Key to Learning

• We learn most efficiently when we begin with the
  big picture and move to details.
• Learning should be a continuous, ongoing process.
• soak it in

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Counting Vowels in 30 seconds

• How accurate are you?

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Keys to Developing Critical Thinking Skills

• There is a hierarchy of learning levels.
• It takes time and effort to climb the ladder of
  understanding.

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This pyramid depicts the different levels of
thinking we use when learning. Notice how each
level builds on the foundation that precedes it.
It is required that we learn the lower levels
before we can effectively use the skills above.
Blooms Taxonomy
Evaluation
Graduate School
Making decisions and supporting views requires
understanding of values.
Combining information to form a unique product
requires creativity and originality.
Synthesis
Identifying components determining arrangement,
logic, and semantics.
Analysis
Undergraduate
Using information to solve problems transferring
abstract or theoretical ideas to practical
situations. Identifying connections and
relationships and how they apply.
Application
Restating in your own words paraphrasing,
summarizing, translating.
Comprehension
High School
Memorizing verbatim information. Being able to
remember, but not necessarily fully understanding
the material.
Knowledge
Louisiana State University ? Center for Academic
Success ? B-31 Coates Hall ? 225-578-2872 ?
www.cas.lsu.edu
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Teach Students to Think Critically by Having Them
Put on Their Thinking Caps
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Parallel Thinking

• White Cap Information Available and Needed
• Red Cap Intuition and Feelings
• Gray Cap Cautions, Critical Thinking

• Yellow Cap Benefits
• Green Cap Alternatives and Creative Ideas
• Blue Cap Managing Thinking, Thinking about
  Thinking

Modified from Ed De Bonos Six Thinking Hats
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White Cap Information Available and Needed

• What information is available?
• What information would we like to have?
• What information do we need?
• How are we going to get the missing information?
• Caution Can get stuck here can be overused

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Red Cap Intuition and Feelings

• What is my gut reaction?
• What are my feelings right now?
• What does my intuition tell me?
• Controlled release of steam

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Gray Cap Cautions, Critical Thinking

• What can be the possible problems?
• What could some of the difficulties be?
• What are the risks?
• What are the points of caution?
• Must give logical reasons for concern
• can be overused
• Think of food it is essential but can be overdone

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Yellow Cap Benefits

• What are the benefits?
• What are the positives?
• What are the values?
• Can be used to introduce a different perspective
• Can be an assessment tool when used with gray hat

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Green Cap Alternatives and Creative Ideas

• Are there other ways to do this?
• What else could we do here?
• What are the possibilities?
• What will overcome our difficulties?
• Search for new ideas modify and remove faults in
  existing ideas no cautions

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Blue Cap Managing Thinking, Thinking about
Thinking

• What is our agenda?
• What type of thinking is appropriate at this
  stage?
• What type of thinking for our next step?
• How can we summarize the discussion so far?
• Metacognition Are we learning the material?
  Assessment

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Critical Thinking Problem

• How can we significantly increase the critical
  thinking ability of Eastern Illinois University
  students?

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Teach students to think critically by

• Using reflection activities in and out of class
• Using the Thinking Hats method
• Converting the course to a Communication across
  the Curriculum course
• Making the course a Service-Learning course
• Making all examinations cumulative
• Others?

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Wrap Up Activity Using Learning Styles and
Cognitive Science Information in Our Teaching

• Select a course you are teaching (or have taught,
  or may teach in the future)
• Describe how you can incorporate (or have
  incorporated) strategies to improve critical
  thinking into the course
• Describe one strategy you can use to teach
  students how to learn the course material

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References

• DeBono, Edward. 1999. Six Thinking Hats. New
  York, NY Little, Brown, and Company.
• Hale, Tom. 2005. Teaching Critical Thinking with
  Forced Analogies. Skip Downings On Course
  Newsletter.
• http//www.OnCourseWorkshop.com
• http//www.coping.org/write/percept/critical.htm
• Terenzini, P.T., Springer, L., Pascarella, E.T.,
  Amaury, N. 1995. "Influences Affecting the
  Development of Students' Critical Thinking
  Skills." Research in Higher Education 36 23-39.