Fostering critical thinking: Features of powerful learning environments

Critical thinking is a recurrent educational ambition. At the same time, it is not self-evident how that ambition can be realised. This is partly due to the different perspectives from which Critical Thinking can be approached. The literature on critical thinking is extensive and diverse, different meanings and aspects of critical thinking have been explored. However, there is agreement among several researchers that critical thinking entails both ability and attitudinal components. Research in psychology on different types of cognitive processing has similarly pointed to the importance of both skills and attitudes. This article builds on a tripartite notion of disposition that has been proposed in the context of education. The tripartite dispositional perspective on which we elaborate highlights the importance of ability, inclination and sensitivity. We describe and discuss an educational protocol aligned with the tripartite conceptualisation of disposition. The protocol identifies characteristics of powerful learning environments. We propose that the proposed educational protocol—aligned to Critical Thinking education goals, conditions and interventions—can be used for fostering critical thinking. More specifically, the use of four types of interventions are recommended: (1) modelling, (2) inducing, (3) declaring and (4) surveillance. Finally, we underscore that there is a need for further research on the use of the educational protocol.     

Investigating critical thinking and knowledge construction in an interactive learning environment

Critical thinking and knowledge construction have become essential competencies for people in the new information age. In this study, we designed an interactive learning environment involving three forms of interaction: individual reflections, group collaboration and, class discussions. The purpose of this study was to investigate the extent to which the three forms of interaction promoted students' critical thinking and knowledge construction. Seventeen students at National Institute of Education of Singapore participated in this study. Their reflections and discussions were analyzed by following a content analysis approach. Results showed that writing reflections had potential to promote critical thinking but, not all students thought critically. Knowledge construction in groups and in class discussions happened at lower levels. This paper presents the conceptual framework, design specifications and evaluation results of the ILE. Implications of the results are discussed.     

Enhancing critical thinking using team-based learning

This study examines students’ perceptions of the development of academic and critical thinking skills in college, with a specific focus on team-based learning (TBL), an active learning strategy designed to increase student interaction and engagement. Six hundred and fifty students in five different courses were surveyed at the beginning of the semester about the extent to which they felt the typical college course enhances various academic and critical thinking skills. These responses were compared to their responses after a semester of TBL regarding the extent to which the TBL environment enhanced these same skills. Students expressed significantly greater improvement in critical thinking skills in a TBL environment in comparison to typical courses for most of the skills assessed and greater improvement in all of these skills in comparison to lecture-based courses. These results held for every demographic subgroup examined, including males, females, freshman, sophomores, juniors and seniors, as well as all levels of academic achievement as measured by grade point average.     

The interplay between reflective thinking,critical thinking,self-monitoring,and academic achievement in higher education

The present study assessed the associations among higher-order thinking skills (reflective thinking, critical thinking) and self-monitoring that contribute to academic achievement among university students. The sample consisted of 196 Iranian university students (mean age = 22.05, SD = 3.06; 112 females; 75 males) who were administered three questionnaires. To gauge reflective thinking, the “Reflective Thinking Questionnaire” designed by Kember et al. (Assess Eval High Educ 25(4):380–395, 2000) was utilized. It includes 16 items measuring four types of reflective thinking (habitual action, understanding, reflection, and critical reflection). To assess critical thinking, the “Watson–Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal”(2002) was utilized. It comprises 80 items and consists of 5 subtests (inference, recognizing unstated assumptions, deduction, interpretation, and evaluation). Self-monitoring was measured via 8 items of the self-regulation trait questionnaire designed by O’Neil and Herl (Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Diego, CA, 1998). The results demonstrated that critical thinking and all components of reflective thinking positively and significantly predicted achievement with habitual action having the lowest impact and reflection exhibiting the highest influence. Self-monitoring indirectly exerted a positive influence on achievement via understanding and reflection. It was also found that among the four subscales of reflective thinking, reflection and critical reflection predicted critical thinking positively and significantly. Self-monitoring had a positive and significant impact on critical thinking. It also significantly and positively influenced understanding as well as reflection.     

Fostering and assessing student critical thinking: From theory to teaching practice

In an age of innovation and digitalisation, critical thinking has become one of the most valued skills in the labour market. This paper shows how teachers can empower students to develop their students' critical thinking. After recalling why critical thinking matters for democracy and the economy, a definition of critical thinking is outlined. Next, a demonstration is given of how the concept critical thinking can be translated and simplified using teacher-friendly rubrics that can support the design or redesign of lesson plans, teacher observations and formative assessment—as well as standardised assessments. In conclusion, the paper argues that critical thinking should be mainstreamed in all subjects in school curricula, and that it leads to deeper understanding of subject matter content.     

Using geometrical models in a process of reflective thinking in learning and teaching mathematics

In this paper we investigate how geometrical models can be used in learning and teaching mathematics, in connection with the development of a process of reflective thinking, which we study first in general. Some more specific questions — arising from the use of geometrical models in the classroom — have led us to an experimental study, the results of which are presented and discussed in the paper.     

Conceptual change through vicarious learning in an authentic physics setting

Recent research on principles of best practice for designing effective multimedia instruction has rarely taken into account students’ alternative conceptions, which are known to strongly influence learning. The goal of this study was to determine how well students of quantum mechanics could learn ‘vicariously’ by watching a student-tutor dialogue based on alternative conceptions. Two video treatments were created to summarize key aspects of quantum tunneling, a fundamental quantum mechanical phenomenon. One video depicted a student-tutor dialogue, incorporating many of the common alternative conceptions on the topic, and resolving inconsistencies in reasoning through discussion. The other presented the same correct physics material in an expository style without alternative conceptions. Second year physics students were randomly assigned to one of the two treatments and were tested before and after watching the video during a lecture. Results show a statistically significant (p < .01) advantage for the learners in the dialogue treatment (d = 0.71). Follow-up interviews of students yielded insight into the affective and cognitive benefits of the dialogue video.     

Critical thinking in criminology: critical reflections on learning and teaching

Fostering critical thinking abilities amongst students is one component of preparing them to navigate uncertain and complex social lives and employment circumstances. One conceptualisation of critical thinking, valuable in higher education, draws from critical theory to promote social justice and redress power inequities. This study explored how students’ critical thinking developed in a discrete core unit of criminology. Second and third year students were invited to participate in the research. Participants wrote critical reflections on how their thinking about crime and criminal justice had developed throughout the unit. Analysis of responses indicated that certain topics were salient to students, offering a way to engage them in deeper thinking. Students’ critical reflections showed evidence of personally relevant meaning-making, including the development of more nuanced thinking about crime and justice, and more compassionate rationales for aspiring to careers within the field. Implications for learning and teaching critical thinking in criminology are discussed.     

Analysis of instruction for critical thinking in distance learning materials

This paper discusses procedures for the analysis of instructional strategies incorporated into distance learning materials, especially with regard to the development of the higher order cognitive ability—critical thinking. It examines the function of task analysis as an integral part of the instructional design process, analysing three different approaches available to the instructional designer towards the analysis of tasks required of distance learners. Comparing the learning hierarchy, the concept hierarchy, and the information processing approaches, it was found that the latter was the only one suitable for this current study because of the requirement that critical thinking be linked with domain‐specific knowledge, rather than be learned as an independent ability. Different algorithms for both the student and the designer/analyst are included as part of the information processing approach, and, although these methods are yet to be validated, they seem to offer sufficient promise, while allowing the analyst to make further decisions during the analysis.     

A reflective learning taxonomy for an educational tour

This study is to investigate the reflective learning in a group of secondary school students who participated in an educational tour to Liannan, which is located in a rural area in Guangdong Province, Mainland China. The specific aim is to develop a framework to describe the learning in an educational tour. For this purpose, data were collected through students?? reflective writing in daily journals and end-of-trip sharing passages, triangulated with participant observation and interviews. The data analysis involved the use of grounded theory??s constant-comparative technique??an inductive method for generating hypotheses that are grounded in data. During the analysis of the data, the types of student learning which emerged were categorized in a Reflective Learning Taxonomy for an educational tour, comprising seven levels which are developmental in nature. The interpretative framework based on such a taxonomy of reflective learning reveals the rich context of learning in an educational tour and so makes a contribution to research on learning outside the classroom.     

Redesigning chat forum for critical thinking in a problem-based learning environment

Support is needed to promote problem-based learning (PBL) and to enhance critical thinking skills in discussion-based Internet forums. By advancing the capabilities of chat room and forum software, problem-based discussions for learning can be supported further in online learning environments. In this paper, the authors report on MALESAbrain, an intelligent learning tool. The model is built on the notions of threshold and knowledge weight from the discipline of machine learning. The model encourages learners to judge or critically evaluate the solutions posted by others before exploring further knowledge content. The system then sums up the judgment scores as its knowledge weight to pass the thresholds setup for ranking/arranging the learning issues. This constraint design, therefore, becomes a mechanism for critical thinking in a problem-based learning activity. MALESAbrain as a model helps transform the forum and chat room into rich learning discussion environments.     

Action learning and critical thinking: a synthesis of two models

Recent scholarship and the news media have identified a lack of critical thinking and ethical behavior in the business world. These deficiencies have led to faulty decision-making, ineffective planning, and frequent organizational dysfunction. This situation has focused attention on both practitioners in the field of business and on the university programs that educate them. A number of upper-tier universities have begun to address these important issues by exploring ways of revising their Master of Business Administration programs to place greater emphasis on their graduates' ability to think critically and consider ethical implications before and after taking action. The authors propose a potential means of addressing these issues in both the business and academic environments through a synthesis of two well-established models based on the constructs of critical thinking and action learning. This synthesis has the potential to produce symbiotic and synergistic effects that may provide educators and practitioners with a new tool for encouraging critical thinking and ethical behavior. The implications for future research and practice are also discussed.     

Peer interaction and the learning of critical thinking skills in further education students

A teaching programme is reported in which criticalthinking skills (in the sense of reasonedjustification of arguments; see Kuhn, 1991, 1993) weretaught. The principal aims of the study were todevelop, implement and evaluate a programme forteaching evidence-based justification to vocationaleducation students in Further Education colleges. Teaching was via modelling and peer-based critiquingexercises in the context of the students' projectwork. Eighty-four Further Education college studentsunderwent a 10-session teaching intervention whichdovetailed with their Additional Assessmentintegrative project work. Students took part inpeer-based exercises in which they learned to critiqueimaginary examples of project outlines and plans,followed by similar peer-based critiquing of eachothers' proposed projects. Analysis of the students'dialogues with each other indicated that they hadlearned the importance of justifying arguments, andcontent analysis of their written work indicated thatthey engaged in justification of their arguments to asignificantly greater degree than control groups. Several key variables in the dialogues correlatedpositively with justification in the written work,suggesting that the dialogue had impacted on thewritten work. However, justification tended to be ofa weak kind (using anecdotes or experience-basedgeneralisations), and strong (i.e. formalresearch-based) evidence remained relativelyinfrequent and sometimes inappropriately used. Apsychometric test of general critical thinking skillsshowed no evidence of transfer of learning.     

Tool-mediated authentic learning in an educational technology course: a designed-based innovation

This design-based research project is concerned with the design, development and deployment of interactive technological learning environments to support contemporary education. The use of technologies in education often replicates instructivist positions and practices. However, the use of Cultural Historical Activity Theory (C), authentic learning (A), and educational technologies as tools (T) to mediate learning provides an integrated CAT framework to design and use learning experiences that transform not only individuals but also their world view. The work reports on the design, redesign, and evaluation of an honors course on the use of information communication technologies in teaching and learning. Analyses identified a number of design principles useful in conceiving learning tasks to support the theoretical framework. The CAT framework fosters the use of learning mediation through the use of educational tools that support collective knowledge construction of individuals and their communities, rather than replicate the use of technology for instruction.     

外语与思辨能力研究的现状及启示

本文运用文献研究法对于近十年来国内外有关外语与思辨能力的研究进行综述和对比分析,发现国内研究在研究方法、对象以及内容等方面的不足,以期为国内外语工作者的研究提供一些启示。     

Using an interactive ubiquitous learning system to enhance authentic learning experiences in a cultural heritage course

This paper proposes a novel interactive ubiquitous learning system (IULS) for authentically teaching a cultural heritage course and imparting relevant concepts to students. Experimental results demonstrated that learning performance was significantly improved after students used the IULS. This study also demonstrated that students using the IULS achieved superior results to those achieved using conventional teaching models. No gender bias affecting the performance of students in the experimental group was observed because each student consistently performed to a higher standard on the learning tasks compared with students in the control group, particularly in learning comprehension-related content. The IULS was more effective in enhancing the overall learning performance of students exhibiting different cognitive styles in liberal arts education courses. Furthermore, the results of a survey on Instructional Materials Motivation Survey revealed that Relevance was the most highly rated motivational factor among students who used the IULS, suggesting that students were motivated to use the IULS. Thus, we believe that a liberal arts education supplemented with the IULS yields a significant learning advantage for students by improving overall learning performance and motivation.     

A critical evaluation of the usefulness of a coding scheme to categorise levels of reflective thinking

The use of reflective learning journals to encourage higher order learning outcomes is a growing area in higher education research and practice. However, without a unified and clear definition of reflection, identifying and assessing reflection is problematic for educators. In an attempt to address this issue, in 1999 Kember and colleagues devised a coding scheme based on the work of Mezirow, to identify and assess levels of reflective thinking in students' written journals. We evaluated the usefulness of this coding scheme in a business education context. Findings revealed that the scheme was useful in identifying categories of reflective thinking. Inter‐coder agreement was 0.802 which is satisfactory. On average, 65% of the journal content was coded as non‐reflection and 35% as reflection. A further outcome of the research was to refine the coding scheme and to provide suggestions for its application in teaching practice.