GT Back to School Planning: Critical Thinking
In the first blog post of this series, we explored depth of knowledge and ensuring gifted students are thinking at higher levels. In this blog post, we will build upon that knowledge by looking at a specific type of thinking: critical thinking.
What is critical thinking?
As teachers, we know that it is more important than ever to help develop our students abilities to think critically. Entering the workforce today is no longer about what you know, rather how you are able to problem solve. Critical thinking is essential to develop at a young age.
But what is critical thinking? With a simple google search, many links are titled “the 7 types of critical thinking” or “4 ways to train your brain to think critically”. But, none of these websites are identical. In the end, there is not specific answer to teaching critical thinking. Rather, critical thinking is the ability to analyze, reason, and problem solve. When thinking about our Depth of Knowledge chart, these are areas 3 and 4.
Critical thinking and underrepresented populations
The incredible thing about critical thinking is that kids do not inherently know how to think critically, they must be taught. Why is this incredible? Because ALL children have the ability to be taught. Sure, some children may have a strength area (we will talk more about this in a moment), but implementing explicit thinking lessons into your day can support ALL students and their talent development. By explicitly teaching these skills, it begins to break down barriers students of different backgrounds may have.
I have found that teaching critical thinking skills explicitly has allowed me to identify strengths in students that do not always excel in academics (many times our gifted students do not!). By helping teachers identify these strengths, they are also able to support these strengths and use them to teach areas of difficulties.
So how do we teach critical thinking?
As mentioned above, there are many MANY types of critical thinking. One of my favorite articles breaks down critical thinking skills into many different categories/definitions (check out pages 61-63). Explicitly teaching these skills are imperative for building deeper thinking. But, this list is long and can be hard for younger children to remember all of them.
PETS
When I began as a K-2 Gifted Teacher, I followed an amazing curriculum for teaching critical thinking skills to very young children. This curriculum was called Primary Education Thinking Skills (PETS).
What I loved about this curriculum was that it broke critical thinking down into 4 categories: Divergent Thinking, Convergent Thinking, Visual-Spatial Thinking, and Judgement/Evaluative Thinking. By explicitly teaching students these 4 types of thinking, the students were able to apply the thinking to different areas of their learning. Additionally, students were able to recognize their thinking strengths at an age as young as Kindergarten! If you are looking for a curriculum to implement in primary grades, I HIGHLY suggest this one.
After a year of teaching the PETS curriculum, I recognized that it was a commitment! Thought a great way for teachers to explicitly teach critical thinking at a young age, there were a few difficulties. For example, if teachers did not have time for a whole lesson, they would skip critical thinking lessons all together. Additionally, sometimes the lessons were too easy for children.
Finally, the biggest difficult I found was that the PETS lessons did not allow the students to connect the thinking to their learning. Therefore, I adapted the units by having 2 lessons teaching the skill, then one lesson relating the skill to reading, and one to math. I am hoping to have these adaptive units for sale on TPT soon! Stay tuned!
Power Points
Alternatively, to combat the difficulties I was having, I created Explicit Critical Thinking PowerPoints with 30 daily exercises for practice. I have used this resource with grades 1-5 and it is easy to adapt based on children’s levels. Each powerpoint has quick teaching slides and then many practices. My students have loved the conversations these brain teasers bring about and recognizing their own strengths.
By teaching all 4 types of critical thinking, students were able to recognize that every brain thinks differently. It is okay to struggle with the visual-spatial activities, because maybe the strength is divergent/creative thinking. It was incredible to see some of my gifted students own their weaknesses because their strengths are what make them an incredible thinker. Throughout the year, they found ways to use their strengths and were excited to develop/practice their more challenging types of critical thinking.
These are great to implement as morning warm-ups, math/reading center activity, small group discussions, or even partner ice-breakers. By spending about 10 minutes each day on these quick activities, you are able to ensure all of your students are being explicitly taught critical thinking skills with the opportunity for practice.
Check out my Power Points here:
Want more resources?
Colorado Department of Education Article (Page 61-63): As I mentioned above, this is one of my favorite resources with a long list of critical thinking skills you can make sure you are incorporating into your explicit teaching.
Convergent vs Divergent Thinking Blog Post – Learn more about the two specific types of critical thinking
In Conclusion…
Overall, there are many ways to teach critical thinking and many resources. But, the important thing at the beginning of the year as you plan and develop classroom routines is to find a time to EXPLICITLY teach thinking skills. Whether that is once a week with a long lesson or once a day with a quick activity, make sure all students are exposed to critical thinking.
On one last note, make sure you are subscribed to my email list – today’s subscribers received the Divergent Thinking PowerPoint as a freebie! Join below if you haven’t yet!
Happy planning and stay tuned for Blog #3 in the Back to School Series!!
