by Terry Heick
What does “critical thinking” mean?
Well, it depends on who you ask. For educators, as a term, critical thinking is similar to words like democracy, global, And organic: You hear people use them all the time, but no one seems to understand exactly what they mean.
This type of etymological opacity lends itself to be used badly, grind and abuse. In the long term, such an abuse empties his meaning until we throw it all with casualness in the midst of a sentence that is too complex to strengthen our own credibility or completely avoid the term.
If we can, for ends from here and now, agree that critical thinking means something in the sense of Think of producing judgmentSo we are already two thirds of the path to make a new meaning ourselves here.
Critical thinking is among the first causes of change (personal and social) but is a pariah in schools – for no other reason that it does not condition the spirit of suspecting the form and function of everything it sees, including your class and everything that is taught.
Of course, critical thinking without knowledge is embarrassing, like a farmer without field. They need each other – thought and knowledge. They can also disappear in each other while they work. Once we have established this – that they are separated, capable of merge, and that we need each other – we can arrive at the marrow and the fear of all this.
The definition of critical thinking
So what is the definition of critical thinking? It depends on who you asked, but most definitions are something close: Critical thinking is the suspension of judgment while identifying the underlying biases and hypotheses in order to draw precise conclusions.
But more than definition and clarification, we need contextualization – to look at the term as we use and see when and how it is used, and what type of reaction it is aroused when this happens. Here, there is a lot to look at: how to teach it, how to assess it, what role it plays in the learning process, how to use it in deceptive school mission declarations, how to drop it into step by class procedures or procedural documents (in a way that implies that it implies I do not know exactly how this lesson should be improved, so I encourage you to “encourage children to think critically”R, There is so much abstraction in your class that I have no idea what is going on, but my boy, there is probably a lot of critical thinking).
CriticsSthinking.org says that critical thinking is:
“Critical thinking is this way of thinking – on any subject, content or problem – in which the thinker improves the quality of his thought by analyzing it, evaluating it and skillfully reconstructing it. Critical thinking is self-managed, self-discipline, autonomous and self-corrective thought. It assumes that rigorous standards of excellence and the conscious command of their use. It involves effective communication and problem solving capacities, as well as commitment to overcome our self -centeredness and indigenous sociocentrism. »»
A document published in 2004 by a teacher at Harvard says that the definitions of critical thinking are “available in various sources are quite disparate and are often dependent on the field”, offering a definition based on psychology because “critical thinking examines hypotheses, discerns hidden values, assesses the evidence and evaluates the conclusions”.
In the same article, the philosopher Richard Paul and the educational psychologists Linda Elder define critical thinking as “this way of thinking – on any subject, content or problem – in which the thinker improves the quality of his thought by skillfully taking the structures inherent in thought and imposing intellectual norms.”
In education, critical pedagogy and critical thinking overlap almost entirely. The above definitions, while focusing on thought, do not focus much on criticism. In critical thinking, thought is only a strategy to reach enlightened criticism, which is in itself a starting point to understand yourself and / or the world around you. While in function, it can be parallel to the scientific method, science intends to arrive a impartial, neutral and human zero conclusion.
In critical thinking, there is no conclusion; It is a constant interaction with changing circumstances and new knowledge that allows a broader vision that allows new evidence, which recruits the process. Critical thought has the basis of raw emotion and tone.
Intention.
To think critically of something is to pretend first of all surrounding his meaning – to walk throughout him so that you understand him in a way that is only you. The thinker works with his own reflection tools – Schema. Basic knowledge. Feeling of identity. Meaning is as unique to this thinker as their own thumb print. There East No model.
After having turned the meaning of everything you think critically – a navigation necessarily achieved with the bravado and the goal – the thinker can then analyze the thing. By thinking critically, the thinker must see his parts, his form, his function and his context. After this type of survey and analysis, you can come and assess it – the monumer to support your own distinctive cognition on the thing so that you can report the faults, underline the biases, to focus on merit – to enter the mind of the author, the designer, the creator or the watchmaking and the criticism of his work.
This watchmaker did This clock.
This poet who mentioned this poem.
This scientist who worked for months on this study to prove or refute this ambitious theory.
This historian who has contextualized this historical movement in a series of documents and artifacts which now deserve their own contextualization.
Thinking in a critical way obliges you to aggregate knowledge, to form a kind of understanding, to enter the mind of the watchmaking, to judge their work, then to articulate everything for a specific form (for example, argumentative test) and to an audience (for example, teacher). Think about what it means.
It is easy for teachers to see the role of critical thinking in a more macro process. By analyzing and criticizing the work of others – in particular experts – students must temporarily merge with them (or they simply produce conjectures that seem intelligent). By thinking critically, they learn here by imitation – for a moment, flowing alongside others who, among other functions, act as ptresseurs. By combining this kind of angular thought with master workers and their works, we force students to dance with giants – or the giant holograms.
The tone here is intimidating for the development of thinkers – or should be, anyway. It is a tone that is simultaneously intellectual, collaborative and provocative. He said: “I have come to understand this complex thing worthy of study – which probably represents a more important achievement than anything I have ever produced in my life – then made judgment. I am both capable of all this, and willing to do so in a way that itself will be judged. »»
It is the kind of courage that takes years to grow.
What means to think critically; Image attribution Flickr user vancouverfilmschool
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