CRITICAL THINKING is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information, gathered or generated by observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, and/or communication as a guide to belief or action. Critical thinking is not the simple acquisition and retention information; the development of a particular set of skills, and/or the repetitive application of those skills without the critical evaluation of their results. Critical thinking encompasses the eight elements of reason: purpose, point of view, question at issue, information, interpretations and inference, concepts, assumptions, implications and consequences. (www.criticalthinking.org )
21st Century learning promotes the idea that knowledge must be examined. Students should actively engage in the process of thinking about the information they review in a logical manner, questioning, validating, justifying, predicting and making inferences. The ability to think critically is a must.
There are various venues to cultivate critical thinking. We emphasize that critical thinking is not only a part of the learning process but a part of life. In our cohort, critical thinking is fostered via Project Based Learning, Problem Based Learning and inquiry.
Implementing Problem Based Learning (PBL) provides students the opportunity to engage in critical thinking with lessons that require them to process information and determine which information is needed followed by implementing authentic research to answer the problem. Here are some websites that have cases created that you can use as is or modify.
http://www.cse.emory.edu/cases/ http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/projects/cases/ideas.htm
http://cte.umdnj.edu/active_learning/active_pbl.cfm
Here are two tools that we think can assist students with organizing information in the critical thinking process.
Take a look at https://bubbl.us/beta/ and www.mindmeister.com
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Critical Thinking
Global Connections
In 2007, the Global Connections Foundation came together to creat this statement: ...the Core Values of Global Connections reflect our commitment to developing global consciousness and promoting international cooperation between schools; and Whereas schools have a responsibility to be both local and global in their perspectives;
We ... declare that we will THINK AND ACT GLOBALLY AND LOCALLY with the aim of empowering our schools to have a positive influence both at home and abroad and further to act with respect as to existing cultures and models;
That we welcome cultural diversity in our schools through physical exchange of students and teachers...;
That while welcoming cultural diversity, we recognize that schools are rooted in their own cultures and identities;
That we will work to use technology as a means to facilitate the communication and collaboration between schools;
That we will recognize the importance of creating international opportunities not just for our students, but also for the professional development of our faculty;
That we recognize that we can all learn from each other and contribute to each other’s well being.
This statement reflects what educators at every level need to focus on and address at their schools to ensure that their students are prepared for the 21st century and the global connections that we all need to be successful.
The complete statement may be found at http://www.globalconnections.org/news/article.php?id=34
http://voicethread.com/share/932708/
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Creativity
In his speech on the power of the imaginative mind, Sir Ken Robinson argues that schools “are educating people out of their creative capacities.”* Having learned the central lesson that they must find the right answer, students renounce creativity, trial and error reasoning, and their own natural curiosity. They fear being told that they are wrong. But 21st century teaching acknowledges creativity as an essential skill that we teachers must encourage and nourish. As Daniel Pink urges, “The most creative among us see relationships the rest of us never notice. Such ability is at a premium in a world where specialized knowledge work can quickly become routinized work – and therefore be automated or outsourced away.”** When we fear being wrong, we limit the possibility of new discoveries. We must teach our students to seek connections, patterns, nuances, and the undiscovered wherever possible.
* http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html
** Pink, “A Whole New Mind,” pg. 135.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Collaboration
In the 21st century, the whole is truly greater than the sum of its parts. The tools at our disposal and the enormity of the problems we face call us to collaborative exercise. One person's abilities are not enough, no matter how dynamic the leadership style, no matter how forceful the ideas. Annmarie Neal, vice president for Talent Management at Cisco Systems states, "Command-and-control leadership style is becoming less and less valued in organizations. People have to understand the importance of working fluidly and across boundaries."*
The first stride toward collaboration is the sharing of information. Although my colleagues teach in other schools, and although we have no common planning time, we can share information over the Internet. Much of what we read and write is now in the global network of thought, and if that network has a nerve center, it would be the collection of bookmarks we make and share along the way.
*Wagner, "The Global Achievement Gap," p. 23.
Communication
Communication involves sending a message with the expectation that the intended recipient receives it and clearly understands its original content and intent. But "the problem with communication...is the illusion that it has been accomplished" (George Bernard Shaw). Apparently, students today seem to have a deficiency in the art of communication. According to Tony Wagner, the deficiency resides in fuzzy thinking and lack of a real voice. So what are we to do? Where are we to start? How do we get students to stop doing a million things at once to focus in on and express with clarity a single idea? How do we get them to connect with the subject in a way that they truly experience it, commit to it, and develop their own voice with which to express it? After all, with all the technology and the gadgets we have today, we still experience the challenge of clearly communicating our ideas: "the newest computer can merely compound, at speed, the oldest problem in the relations between human beings, and in the end the communicator will be confronted with the old problem of what to say and how to say it." (Edward R. Murrow).