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Enhancing the critical thinking skills of first
year business students
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Outline

1. What is critical thinking?
2. Who can think critically?
3. Why teach critical thinking?
4. Can you teach critical thinking? If so, how and
   what does it look like?
5. When/where can you teach critical thinking?
6. Concluding comments
7. Questions?

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Critical thinking has three broad components

1. Affective component ability to deal with
   ambiguity, recognize personal biases, and embrace
   divergent views
2. Cognitive component thought processes of
   problem definition, independent thinking and
   synthesis, reflection
3. Behavioral component actions related to data
   gathering, knowledge application in new
   situations, and changing positions because of new
   information

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1. What is critical thinking?

• Individual Exercise What do you think critical
  thinking is?
• Group Exercise Talk to at least one other
  individual about their definition of critical
  thinking. Adjust your original definition of
  critical thinking based on this conversation(s).
• Reflective Exercise

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Learning without thinking is labor lost thinking
without learning is dangerous.- Confucius
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2. Who can think critically?

• Anybody at any age can think critically
• How masterfully one can engage in critical
  thinking is dependent, in part, on ones
  intellectual maturity also known as intellectual
  development

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Humans are born with the capacity and inclination
to think. Nobody has to teach us how to think
just as no one teaches us how to move or walk. A
superb ballerina, tai chi master, or gymnast
needs years of practice, concentration,
reflection, and guidance to perform intricate
maneuvers on command with seemingly effortless
agility. Like strenuous movement, skillful
thinking is hard work. - Arthur L. Costa
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3. Why teach critical thinking?
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What have we heard over the past 2 days?

• Paul Cherry said/asked
• IFRS puts greater emphasis on principles over
  rules
• IFRS helps to see beyond the numbers
• Substance over form
• Asked Without rules, is there enough guidance?
• Glen Schmidt said/asked
• Question Are the competencies going to be the
  same?
• IFRS adoption means it is less clear when the
  right answer has been obtained
• Fewer bright lines
• IFRS means more judgment (John qualified and said
  huge judgment)
• David Baxter said
• Constantly changing contexts
• Youve all seen people who have opinions and no
  data
• We need to understand the consequences of
  assumptions

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Core competency

• Students need to learn how to learn which means
  educators need to help students enhance all
  components of critical thinking skill
  development
• Affective component
• Cognitive component
• Behavioral component

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5. Can you teach critical thinking? If so, how
and what does it look like?
To obtain specimens of critical thinking, it is
essential to create conditions favorable to that
operation (Robert White, 1970)
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• Students role
• The overriding objective of accounting programs
  should be to teach students to learn to learn on
  their own .... Students must be active
  participants in the learning process, not passive
  recipients of information. They should identify
  and solve unstructured problems that require use
  of multiple information sources. Learning by
  doing should be emphasized. Working in groups
  should be encouraged.
•  
• Instructors role
• class time will be used primarily to complement
  out-of-class learning by students only after
  students have attempted to actively learn on
  their own

Source AECC, 1990, pp. 4-5
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Problem

• Students memorize which leads to little
  retention/recall

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Problem

• Students memorize which leads to little
  retention/recall
• Students cannot apply knowledge (i.e. synthesis,
  analysis, decision-making)
• Instructors use traditional teaching methods
  which do not fully engage students in learning

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Traditional Teaching Model

• Traditional Instruction Teacher-centred
  (lecture)
• Assessments generally incorporate and reinforce
  teacher-centred approach (recipe book approach)

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Question

• Is critical thinking only for students?

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What do you replace the teacher-centred approach
with?

• Learner-Centred paradigm
• based on constructivism - - the learner must
  construct knowledge in order to retain it
• aka understanding by design or teaching for
  understanding or brain-based learning or
  critical thinking
• Instructor is the facilitator of learning (from
  sage on the stage to guide on the side)

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Learning Pyramid
5
10
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Average Learning Retention Rates
30
50
Learner-Centred and Active
75
90
Developed by National Training Labs, Bethel,
Main (2003)
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Why does a learner-centred approach work?

• Based on how the brain works
• Focused on helping students learn how to learn

Short-term memory
Dendrites Retention Power
Long-term memory processor
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The brain-based approach

• Incorporate key principles of brain compatible
  learning1 that have emerged from brain research2
• 1. High challenge, low
  threat
• 2. Immediate feedback
• 3. Enriched environment
• 4. Opportunity for mastery

1. Caine/Caine, Goleman
2. Edelman Nobel Prize for Physiology in 1972

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Critical thinking challenge

1. Identify one strategy you used with your students
   last semester that is not compliant with the
   brain based learning strategies. Be honest!!
2. Identify one strategy you might like to use with
   your students that does comply with the brain
   based learning strategies.

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Moving to a Learner-Centred approach

1. Apply critical thinking skills to course
   development
2. Explicitly teach/model critical thinking skills
3. Provide students with opportunities to acquire
   knowledge outside of class time

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Moving to a Learner-Centred approach

1. Apply critical thinking skills to course
   development
2. Explicitly teach/model critical thinking skills
3. Provide students with opportunities to acquire
   knowledge outside of class time
4. Help students apply knowledge during class time

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Learning Community

• 7 Principles of Good Practice
• Contact between students and faculty
• Reciprocity and cooperation
• Prompt feedback
• Time on task
• Active learning techniques
• Communication of high expectations
• Respect for diverse talents and ways of learning

(Learner Centred)
Setting Climate
Chickering Gamson (1987)
Supporting Discourse
Brain compatible teaching/learning strategies
Selecting Content
(Knowledge Centred)
(Assessment Centred)
Garrison, Anderson, Archer (2001)
(Bransford et al (2001)
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Primary Learning Objective
Do the learning activities match the desired
outcome? Are the assessments based on the
learning activities? Be honest!!!!
Brain compatible teaching/learning strategies
Garrison, Anderson, Archer (2001)
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Critical thinking challenge

• Identify the primary objective of your course
  ONE! State it in one sentence that would be
  understood by a lay person.
• Does the brain-based strategy identified earlier
  relate to your primary objective in a substantive
  way?

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Provide students with a critical thinking
framework

• What is the goal involved in the situation (from
  whose perspective)
• What is the problem(s)
• What are the facts
• What assumptions/ concepts/principles need to be
  considered
• What is the conclusion and resulting
  consequence/implication(s)

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Example
What is the best way to amortize a truck?
What is amortization?
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Why is knowledge acquisition important?

• What is the best way to deal with MRSA bacteria?

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Strategies to engage students (not an exhaustive
list)

• Outside of class
• Assign homework that students can check
  themselves
• Incorporate reading/writing assignments (analyze
  and make available less than perfect exemplars)

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Strategies to engage students (not an exhaustive
list)

• Outside of class
• Assign homework that students can check
  themselves
• Incorporate reading/writing assignments (analyze
  and make available less than perfect exemplars)
• Inclass
• 3. Teach/facilitate/model critical thinking
  skills
• Create relevancy (i.e. use simulations, mini case
  studies, newspaper articles, real financial
  statements - - create discussion questions)
• Experiment! i.e., clicker technology, Elluminate
• Make mistakes to facilitate asking questions
• Continually ask questions like why
• Weekly learning summaries/questions tied to
  primary learning objective
• Create peer-to-peer learning opportunities
• General
• Set performance standards for all assessments
• Identify primary learning objective of the course
  and tie everything to it repeatedly and
  explicitly
• Continually reflect on learning activities are
  they compliant with brain-based learning have
  you addressed the need for social/teaching/cogniti
  ve presence are the assessments based directly
  on the learning activities?

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Barriers to CT

• Absence of CT skills
• Old habits die hard
• Resistance to change is normal
• Limited subject specific
• content available

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5. When/where can you teach critical thinking?

• F2F
• Online
• Blended

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6. Concluding comments

• Be explicit tell students how you designed the
  course and why to enhance their critical
  thinking skills regarding the primary learning
  objective
• Use a model to develop your courses and reflect
  continuously
• Provide students with an explicit model for
  critical thinking
• Tie assessments to learning activities

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Questions?
tillyj_at_athabascau.ca