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Daniel Willingham is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia. His paper explores the ongoing debate over how critical thinking skills are developed and taught. He also outlines a plan for teaching specific critical thinking skills.

Willingham argues that while there is plenty of evidence to support explicit instruction of critical thinking skills, the evidence for how well critical thinking skills transfer from one problem to another is mixed.

How to teach critical thinking (PDF 373KB)

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Why Content Knowledge is Crucial to Effective Critical Thinking

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Critical thinking is all the rage in education. Schools brag that they teach it on their websites and in open houses to impress parents. Some argue that critical thinking should be the primary purpose of education and one of the most important skills to have in the 21st century, with advanced machines and algorithms replacing manual and repetitive labor.

But a fascinating review of the scientific research on how to teach critical thinking concludes that teaching generic critical thinking skills, such as logical reasoning, might be a big waste of time. Critical thinking exercises and games haven’t produced long-lasting improvements for students. And the research literature shows that it’s very difficult for students to apply critical thinking skills learned in one subject to another, even between different fields of science.

“Wanting students to be able to ‘analyse, synthesise and evaluate’ information sounds like a reasonable goal,” writes Daniel Willingham, a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia. “But analysis, synthesis, and evaluation mean different things in different disciplines.”

Willingham’s reading of the research literature concludes that scientists are united in their belief that content knowledge is crucial to effective critical thinking. And he argues that the best approach is to explicitly teach very specific small skills of analysis for each subject. For example, in history, students need to interpret documents in light of their sources, seek corroboration and put them in their historical context. That kind of analysis isn’t relevant in science, where the source of a document isn’t as important as following the scientific method.

Willingham wrote a paper, “ How to Teach Critical Thinking ,” in May 2019 for the Department of Education of New South Wales in Australia. But it is entirely applicable to the American context.

In the paper, Willingham traces the history of teaching critical thinking. More than a century ago, many thought that difficult subjects like Latin might improve thinking abilities. But scientists subsequently found that students who studied Latin didn’t do any better on tests than those who didn’t. There are mixed results from more recent studies in teaching students computer science. A  2018 meta-analysis  showed better creative thinking, mathematics, meta-cognition, spatial skills and reasoning for students who take computer programing. But the gains were much smaller  for studies with good control groups. A lot of the so-called benefit to studying computer science appears to be a placebo effect.

To be sure, there are basic logic principles that are true across subjects, such as understanding that “A” and “not A” cannot simultaneously be true. But students typically fail to apply even generic principles like these in new situations. In one experiment described by Willingham, people read a passage about how rebels successfully attacked a dictator hiding in a fortress (they dispersed the forces to avoid collateral damage and then converged at the point of attack). Immediately afterwards, they were asked how to destroy a malignant tumor using a ray that could cause a lot of collateral damage to healthy tissue. The solution was identical to that of the military attack but the subjects in the experiment didn’t see the analogy. In a follow-up experiment, people were told that the military story might help them solve the cancer problem and almost everyone solved it. “Using the analogy was not hard; the problem was thinking to use it in the first place,” Willingham explained.

To help student see analogies, “show students two solved problems with different surface structures but the same deep structure and ask them to compare them,” Williingham advises teachers, citing a  pedagogical technique proven to work  by researchers in 2013.

In math, students often get derailed when a word problem is slightly different from a step-by-step model that they’ve studied. A research-tested strategy here,  developed by Richard Catrambone at the Georgia Institute of Technology , is to label the sub-steps of the solution with the goal they serve. That way students can understand why they’re using each step and what it’s accomplishing.

But the bigger problem is that critical thinking varies so much. “Critical thinking is needed when playing chess, designing a product, or planning strategy for a field hockey match,” Willingham wrote. “But there are no routine, reusable solutions for these problems.”

And this is where content knowledge becomes important. In order to compare and contrast, the brain has to hold ideas in working memory, which can easily be overloaded. The more familiar a student is with a particular topic, the easier it is for the student to hold those ideas in his working memory and really think. Willingham uses chess as a good example. Once a student has a played a lot of chess, then he has many board positions memorized in his brain and can sort through which one is better in each particular circumstance.

Willingham says that the scientific research shows that it’s very hard to evaluate an author’s claim if you don’t have background knowledge in the subject. “If you lack background knowledge about the topic, ample evidence from the last 40 years indicates you will not comprehend the author’s claims in the first place,” wrote Willingham, citing his own  2017 book .

At what age should teachers begin this subject-specific teaching of individual, discrete critical thinking skills? Some teachers might think it’s developmentally inappropriate, and possibly harmful, to engage in cognitive work that seems more appropriate for an older child. But research from the last 30 years shows that young children are far more capable in engaging in reasoning that we once thought. Scientists now think that cognitive development is more gradual and starts young. “In some circumstances, even toddlers can understand principles of conditional reasoning, and in other circumstances, conditional reasoning confuses adult physicians,” wrote Willingham. “It all depends on the content of the problem.”

Willingham’s ideas are similar to those of Natalie Wexler, who makes an impassioned argument that schools should return to a content-rich curriculum in her 2019 book, “ The Knowledge Gap .” Both are worth reading as a strong counterpoint to the emphasis on critical thinking in schools today.

This story about  how to teach critical thinking  was written by Jill Barshay and produced by  The Hechinger Report , a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the  Hechinger newsletter .

How to teach critical thinking

• Perspective Article
• Published on: November 17, 2020

• Child Development |
• Cognitive science |
• Cross-Curricular |
• Open Access |
• Psychology |
• Research Engagement

Daniel T Willingham, Department of Psychology, University of Virginia, USA

Individuals vary in their views of what students should be taught. How should teachers discuss the misdeeds of a nation’s founders? What is the minimum accomplishment expected of each student in mathematics? But there is no disagreement on the importance of critical thinking skills. In free societies, the ability to think critically is viewed as a cornerstone of individual civic engagement and economic success.

But is there evidence that explicitly teaching critical thinking brings any benefit? There is, and such evidence is available for different subject matters. For example, in one experiment researchers taught college students principles for evaluating evidence in psychology studies – principles like the difference between correlational research and true experiments (Bensley and Spero, 2014). These principles were incorporated into regular instruction in a psychology class, and their application was practised in that context. Compared to a control group that learned principles of memory, students who learned the critical thinking principles performed better on a test that required evaluation of psychology evidence.

But perhaps we should not find this result terribly surprising. You tell students that this is a good strategy for this type of problem, and you have them practise that strategy, so later they use that strategy when they encounter the problem.

When we think of critical thinking, we think of something bigger. When I teach students how to evaluate the argument in a set of newspaper editorials, I am hoping that they will learn to evaluate arguments generally, not just those that they read, and not just those that they would find in other editorials. This aspect of critical thinking is called transfer The processes of applying learning to new situations More , and the research literature evaluating how well critical thinking skills transfer to new problems is decidedly mixed.

It is no surprise that programmes in school meant to teach general critical thinking skills have had limited success. Such programmes are usually curricular add-ons, during which students engage in critical thinking activities for perhaps five hours each week over the course of a year or two. Unfortunately, the evaluations of these programmes seldom offer a rigorous test of transfer. If the critical thinking regimen entails argument and debate, the outcome measure is usually the ability to evaluate arguments or take both perspectives in debate (see Kuhn and Crowell, 2011; Reznitskaya et al., 2012). When investigators have tested for transfer in such curricular programmes, positive results have been absent or modest and quick to fade (Ritchart and Perkins, 2005).

It is not useful to think of critical thinking skills, once acquired, as broadly applicable. Wanting students to be able to ‘analyse, synthesise and evaluate’ information sounds like a reasonable goal. But analysis, synthesis and evaluation mean different things in different disciplines. Literary criticism has its own internal logic, its norms for what constitutes good evidence and a valid argument. These norms differ from those found in mathematics, for example. And indeed, different domains – science and history, say – have different definitions of what it means to ‘know’ something. Thus, our goals for student critical thinking must be domain-specific.

But wait. Surely there are some principles of thinking that apply across fields of study? There are indeed principles that carry across domains of study. The problem is that people who learn these broadly applicable principles in one situation often fail to apply them in a new situation. The law of large numbers provides an example. It states that a large sample will probably be closer to a ‘true’ estimate than a small sample – if you want to know whether a set of dice is loaded, you’re better off seeing the results of 20 throws than two throws. People readily understand this idea in the context of evaluating randomness, but they are less likely to see the need for a large sample when judging academic performance; they are ready to say that someone who received poor grades on two maths tests is simply bad at maths.

We know that a student has understood an idea like the law of large numbers. But understanding it offers no guarantee that the student will recognise new situations in which that idea will be useful.

Critical thinking as problem recognition

We seem to face a significant challenge: how can we improve student critical thinking if it is difficult for them to appreciate that some new problems are actually ones that they have solved in the past?

Richard Catrambone developed a different technique to address a slightly different transfer problem. He noted that in maths and science classes, students often learned to solve standard problems via a series of fixed, lock-step procedures. That meant that students were stumped when confronted with a problem requiring a slight revision of the steps, even if the goal of the steps was the same. For example, a student might learn a method for solving work problems like ‘Trisha can paint a house in 14 hours and Carole can do it in eight. How long would it take them to paint one house, working together?’ A student who learns a sequence of steps to solve that sort of problem is often thrown by a small change – the homeowner had already painted a quarter of the house before hiring Trisha and Carole.

Catrambone (Catrambone, 1998; Margulieux and Catrambone, 2016) showed that student knowledge will be more flexible if students are taught to label the sub-steps of the solution with the goal it serves. For example, work problems are typically solved by calculating how much of the job each worker can do in an hour. If, during learning, that step were labelled so that students understood that the calculation was part of deriving the solution, they would know how to solve the problem when a fraction of the house is to be painted.

Open-ended problems and knowledge

Students encounter standard problems that are best solved in a particular way, but many critical thinking situations are unique. Critical thinking is needed when playing chess, designing a product or planning strategy for a field hockey match. But there are no routine, reusable solutions for these problems. Nevertheless, just as with routine problems, critical thinking for open-ended problems is enabled by extensive stores of knowledge about the domain (North et al., 2011).

Knowledge aids critical thinking in three ways. First, the recognition process previously described (‘Oh, this is that sort of problem’) can still apply to sub-parts of a complex, open-ended problem. Complex critical thinking may entail multiple simpler solutions from memory that can be ‘snapped together’ when solving complex problems (Koedinger et al., 2012; Taatgen, 2013). Calculating the best value among several vacation packages may be a novel, open-ended problem, but if the method of comparison calls for long division, I don’t need to think through a method to execute that sub-step.

The second way that knowledge contributes to critical thinking in open-ended problems is through its impact on working memory. Working memory is where you hold information and manipulate it to carry out cognitive tasks. So, for example, if I asked ‘How is a scarecrow like a blueberry?’, you would retrieve information about scarecrows (not alive, protect crops, found in fields, birds think they are alive) and blueberries (purple, used in pies, small) from your memory and then you’d start comparing these features, looking for overlap.

An important feature of working memory is its limited size. Suppose that I said, ‘What do these objects have in common: a blueberry, a scarecrow, a flowerpot, a drumstick and a dishwasher?’ Working memory would be overwhelmed. There’s probably space for the five words, but not for the five words and a bunch of information about each word, plus leftover attention to compare them.

So how does a chess player think about all 32 pieces on the board and their relative positions, and have attention left over to contemplate effective moves? Knowledge allows the player to treat groups of pieces as a single unit. The king, a castle and three pawns in a corner of the board relate to one another in the defensive position, so the expert will treat them as a single unit. This ability to clump multiple entities into a single, meaningful unit has been observed in many domains of expertise, as varied as dance and computer programming. When experience allows you to unite many separate dance moves into a single unit, it saves working memory space. That allows more working memory space for the dancer to think about more subtle aspects of movement, rather than crowding working memory with ‘what I am to do next’.

The third way that knowledge may contribute to critical thinking is in enabling you to deploy thinking strategies. We can tell students that they should evaluate the logic of the author’s argument when they read an opinion piece. Students should have no trouble recognising ‘Oh, this is that sort of problem’, and they may have committed to memory the right thinking strategy. But they may not be able to use the strategy without the right domain knowledge. This point is rather obvious in the case of a critical thinking skill like evaluating an argument: abstract principles like ‘look for hidden assumptions’ won’t help much in sizing up an opinion piece about the war in Afghanistan if you know very little about the topic. And never mind evaluating the argument – if you lack background knowledge about the topic, ample evidence from the last 40 years indicates that you will not comprehend the author’s claims in the first place (Willingham, 2017).

How to teach students to think critically

So what does all this mean? Is there really no such thing as a ‘critical thinking skill’ if by ‘skill’ we mean something generalisable?

Maybe. But one fact ought to be salient. We are not sure that the general skills exist, but we are quite sure that there is no proven way to teach them directly. In contrast, we have a pretty good idea of how to teach students the more specific critical thinking skills. I suggest that we do so. Here is a four-step plan.

First, identify what is meant by critical thinking in each domain. Be specific. What tasks showing critical thinking should a secondary school graduate be able to do in mathematics, history and other subjects? It is not useful to set a goal for students to ‘think like historians’. If students are to read as historians do, they need to learn specific skills like interpreting documents in light of their sources, corroborating them and putting them in historical context. These skills should be explicitly taught and practised – there is evidence that simple exposure to this sort of work without explicit instruction is less effective (Abrami et al., 2008; Halpern, 1998; Heijltjes et al., 2014).

Second, identify the domain content that students must know. We have seen that domain knowledge is a crucial driver of thinking skills. For example, sourcing historical documents means interpreting their content in light of the author, the intended audience and the circumstances under which the author wrote. It is not enough to know that a letter was written by an army sergeant to his wife just before the Battle of Romani. The student must know enough about the historical context to understand how this sourcing information ought to influence his or her interpretation of the letter.

What knowledge is essential to the type of thinking that you want your students to be able to do? That of course depends on one’s educational goals. The prospect of someone deciding which knowledge students ought to learn – and what they won’t learn – sometimes makes people uneasy exactly because this decision depends on one’s goals for schooling, and goals depend on values. Selection of content is a critical way that values are expressed (Willingham, 2012); making that choice will lead to uncomfortable trade-offs. But not choosing is still making a choice. It is choosing not to plan, and to let random forces determine what students learn.

In the third step, educators must select the best sequence in which to learn the skills. It is obvious that skills and knowledge build on one another in mathematics or history, and what is true of maths and history is true of other domains of skill and knowledge; we interpret new information in light of what we already know. The right preparation makes new learning easier.

Fourth, educators must decide which skills should be revisited across years. Studies show that even if content is learned quite well over the course of half a school year, about half will be forgotten in three years (Pawl et al., 2012). That doesn’t mean that there’s no value in exposing students to content just once; most students will forget much but they’ll remember something and, for some students, an interest may be kindled. But when considering skills that we hope will stick with students for the long term, we should plan on at least three to five years of practice (Bahrick, 1984; Bahrick and Hall, 1991). Most of the time, this practice will look different – it will be embedded in new skills and content. But this revisiting should be assured and planned.

Some practical matters of teaching critical thinking

When should critical thinking instruction start? There is not a firm, research-based answer to this question. What children can and cannot do varies depending on the content. For example, in some circumstances, even toddlers can understand principles of conditional reasoning, and in other circumstances, conditional reasoning confuses adult physicians. It all depends on the content of the problem (Willingham, 2008).

Thus, research tells us that including critical thinking in the schooling of young children is likely to be perfectly appropriate. It does not, however, provide guidance into what types of critical thinking skills to start with. That is a matter to take up with experienced educators, coordinating with colleagues who teach older children in the interests of making the curriculum seamless.

Should everyone learn critical thinking skills? The question sounds like a set-up. But the truth is that, in many systems, less capable students are steered into less challenging coursework, with the hope that by reducing expectations, they will at least achieve mastery of the basics. Access to challenging content and continuing to tertiary education is, in nearly every country, associated with socioeconomic status (OECD, 2018). Children from high socioeconomic status families also have more opportunities to learn at home. If school is the chief or only venue through which low socioeconomic status students are exposed to advanced vocabulary, rich content knowledge and demands for high-level thinking, it is absolutely vital that those opportunities be enhanced, not reduced.

This is an edited extract from Willingham D (2019) How to teach critical thinking. Education Future Frontiers: Occasional Paper Series. education.nsw.gov.au

Copyright: Daniel T. Willingham and the NSW Department of Education, Education Futures and Governance, 2019

Abrami PC, Bernard RM, Borokhovski E et al. (2008) Instructional interventions affecting critical thinking skills and dispositions: A stage 1 meta-analysis A quantitative study design used to systematically assess th... More . Review of Educational Research 78(4): 1102–1134.

Bahrick HP (1984) Semantic memory content in permastore: Fifty years of memory for Spanish learned in school. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 113(1): 1–29.

Bahrick HP and Hall LK (1991) Lifetime maintenance of high school mathematics content. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 120(1): 20–33.

Bensley DA and Spero RA (2014) Improving critical thinking skills and metacognitive monitoring through direct infusion. Thinking Skills and Creativity 12: 55–68.

Catrambone R (1998) The subgoal learning model: Creating better examples to improve transfer to novel problems. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 127(4): 355–376.

Halpern DF (1998) Teaching critical thinking for transfer across domains: Disposition, skills, structure training, and metacognitive monitoring. American Psychologist 53(4): 449–455.

Heijltjes A, Van Gog T and Paas F (2014) Improving students’ critical thinking: Empirical support for explicit instructions combined with practice. Applied Cognitive Psychology 28(4): 518–530.

Koedinger KR, Corbett AT and Perfetti C (2012) The knowledge-learning-instruction framework: Bridging the science-practice chasm to enhance robust student learning. Cognitive Science The study of the human mind, such as the processes of though... More 36(5): 757–798.

Kuhn D and Crowell A (2011) Dialogic argumentation as a vehicle for developing young adolescents’ thinking. Psychological Science 22(4): 545–552.

Margulieux LE and Catrambone R (2016) Improving problem solving with subgoal labels in expository text and worked examples. Learning and Instruction 42: 58–71.

North JS, Ward P, Ericsson A et al. (2011) Mechanisms underlying skilled anticipation and recognition in a dynamic and temporally constrained domain. Memory 19(2): 155–168.

OECD (2018) Education at a Glance 2018: OECD Indicators . Paris: OECD Publishing.

Pawl A, Barrantes A, Pritchard DE et al. (2012) What do seniors remember from freshman physics? Physical Review Special Topics – Physics Education Research 8(2): 020118.

Reznitskaya A, Glina M, Carolan B et al. (2012) Examining transfer effects from dialogic discussions to new tasks and contexts. Contemporary Educational Psychology 37(4): 288–306.

Ritchart R and Perkins DN (2005) Learning to think: The challenges of teaching thinking. In: Holyoak KJ and Morrison RG (eds) The Cambridge Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 775–802.

Taatgen NA (2013) The nature and transfer of cognitive skills. Psychological Review 120(3): 439–471.

Willingham DT (2008) What is developmentally appropriate practice? American Educator 32(2): 34–39.

Willingham DT (2012) When Can You Trust the Experts? How to Tell Good Science from Bad in Education . San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Willingham DT (2017) The Reading Mind . San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

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How to Teach Critical Thinking in the Digital Age: Effective Strategies and Techniques

In today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape, the ability to think critically has become increasingly important for individuals of all ages. As technology advances and information becomes more readily available, it is essential for teachers to adapt their methods to effectively teach critical thinking skills in the digital age.

However, the task of teaching critical thinking can prove challenging. Research from Daniel Willingham , a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, suggests that students may struggle to apply these skills across different subjects and contexts. Nonetheless, with the right strategies and resources, educators can successfully incorporate critical thinking into their digital learning experiences , empowering their students to navigate the complex world of information.

The Importance of Critical Thinking in the Digital Age

In the digital age, we are constantly surrounded by information from various sources, making it essential for individuals to develop critical thinking skills in order to effectively evaluate the credibility and relevance of the content they consume. Furthermore, critical thinking helps people think through problems and apply the right information when developing solutions.

One of the challenges that the digital age presents is the need to differentiate factual and fake information. With the rise of social media and digital platforms, it becomes increasingly easy for false or misleading information to spread quickly. As a result, being able to discern between reliable and unreliable sources becomes an essential skill (The Tech Edvocate) .

In addition, critical thinking skills are vital in the workforce, as employees are expected to be effective problem solvers, innovative thinkers, and strong communicators. Possessing strong critical thinking skills prepares individuals to thrive in a constantly changing environment, as they can adapt to new situations, understand different perspectives, and make educated decisions.

Teaching critical thinking from a young age is crucial. Educators can use various strategies and techniques to integrate critical thinking in their lessons, such as using open-ended questions, encouraging students to evaluate sources, and promoting group work where students can learn from each other (Forbes) .

Challenges Faced in Teaching Critical Thinking Online

Teaching critical thinking skills online can be a challenging task for educators due to numerous obstacles. This section discusses the challenges of teaching critical thinking, focusing on difficulties such as information overload and technology distractions.

Information Overload

In the digital age, online students have access to an overwhelming amount of information. This can lead to difficulty in focusing on critical thinking exercises and applying those skills to new subject areas, as students struggle to navigate the vast online landscape of resources and materials.

Information overload can impede the development of effective critical thinking skills, as students find it more difficult to discern credible resources and make informed judgments. Educators must guide students in selecting appropriate resources and actively engage them in critical reflection on the information they encounter.

Technology Distractions

Another challenge in teaching critical thinking online is the presence of technology distractions. Online learners have to manage their time and attention across multiple devices and platforms, which can detract from their engagement with the learning material.

These distractions impact students’ ability to concentrate on critical thinking tasks and apply learned strategies. Additionally, constant multitasking can reduce the effectiveness of online learning, as students must split their focus between different tasks without giving their full attention to any one subject.

To mitigate technology distractions, educators can incorporate strategies such as limiting the use of technology during specific times, promoting time management skills, and offering engaging multimedia content. They can also foster a structured and supportive online learning environment, which encourages students to practice critical thinking throughout their coursework.

Techniques for Teaching Critical Thinking

Asking open-ended questions.

One effective technique for teaching critical thinking is to ask open-ended questions. These questions require more thought and exploration than simple yes or no answers, prompting students to critically analyze the issue at hand. Incorporating open-ended questions into lessons can encourage a deeper level of engagement and understanding in various subjects.

Debate and Discussion

Another valuable method for teaching critical thinking skills is to promote debate and discussion in the classroom. Through debates and discussions, students learn to listen to diverse perspectives, analyze arguments, and develop their own informed opinions. Encouraging students to express their ideas and engage with their peers in a respectful and thoughtful manner can foster a culture of critical thinking in the classroom.

Case Studies and Real-World Applications

Using case studies and real-world applications can help students develop critical thinking skills by connecting the material with real-life scenarios. When students analyze case studies, they can practice solving complex problems and applying the theoretical concepts they have learned to make informed decisions. Additionally, incorporating real-world examples and applications in lessons can make the learning experience more engaging and relevant for students.

Teaching Argument Evaluation

Teaching students how to evaluate arguments is an essential aspect of fostering critical thinking skills. By teaching them to identify the strengths and weaknesses of different arguments, students can better understand the nuances of logic and reasoning. This skill is especially crucial in the digital age, where students are often exposed to various sources of information, both reliable and unreliable. By developing their argument evaluation skills, students will be better equipped to navigate and assess the credibility of information they encounter online and in everyday life.

Digital Tools for Enhancing Critical Thinking

Teaching critical thinking in the digital age can be facilitated by leveraging digital tools that promote active learning and deeper engagement. This section explores various digital tools that can enhance critical thinking skills in students, including interactive learning platforms and collaboration and communication tools.

Interactive Learning Platforms

Interactive learning platforms help students develop critical thinking skills by engaging them in challenging activities that require problem-solving, analysis, and evaluation. These platforms often incorporate game-based elements and multimedia content to stimulate interest and maintain motivation.

For example, digital storytelling can be used to promote reflection, analysis, and synthesis skills in students. By creating and sharing their stories, students can critically assess their beliefs, values, and experiences, while comparing and contrasting them with their peers’ perspectives.

Collaboration and Communication Tools

Collaborative tools, such as online discussion forums, video conferencing, and shared documents, facilitate opportunities for students to exchange ideas, brainstorm solutions, and develop arguments on various topics. These tools foster critical thinking by encouraging students to analyze and evaluate different perspectives.

For instance, implementing project-based learning activities encourages students to work together, research, analyze data, and propose solutions to real-world problems. Through this collaborative process, students refine their critical thinking skills while learning how to communicate effectively and resolve conflicts.

Another example is the use of video conferencing tools, such as Zoom or Google Meet, for online debates or panel discussions. These sessions enable students to take a deep dive into topics and engage in structured discussions that challenge their assumptions and hone their critical thinking abilities.

Overall, integrating digital tools in the teaching process can effectively promote critical thinking in students, preparing them to thrive in the digital age.

Assessing Students’ Critical Thinking Skills

Assessing students’ critical thinking skills in the digital age requires a combination of formative and summative assessment methods. This section will outline these methods and explain how they can effectively be applied in the classroom.

Formative Assessment Methods

Formative assessment methods focus on continuous feedback and monitoring of students’ progress during the learning process. These methods aim to identify areas where students may require additional support or instruction. Some formative assessment methods for critical thinking skills include:

• Think-Pair-Share: An activity in which students think about the topic or question, discuss their thoughts with a partner, and then share their ideas with the whole class. This encourages students to evaluate different perspectives and revise their thinking accordingly.
• Questioning Techniques: Employing open-ended and higher-order questioning strategies can stimulate students’ critical thinking skills, prompting them to analyze, synthesize, and evaluate information. Examples of these questions can be found here .
• Peer Review: Students provide feedback on each other’s work by identifying strengths, weaknesses, and areas for improvement. This encourages self-reflection and fosters a collaborative learning environment.

Summative Assessment Methods

Summative assessments measure students’ critical thinking skills at the end of a unit, course, or academic year. These assessments aim to determine students’ level of competence and measure their growth over time. Some summative assessment methods for critical thinking include:

• Performance-Based Assessments: These assessments require students to apply their critical thinking skills to complete a task or solve a problem. Examples include case studies, debates, and presentations.
• Essay Examinations: Essay exams provide an opportunity for students to demonstrate their critical thinking skills through written analysis, synthesis, and evaluation of information.
• Digital Assessments: Digital assessments can be used to assess critical thinking skills by incorporating multimedia elements, interactive features, and real-time feedback. Examples can be found at ExamSoft .

By integrating both formative and summative assessment methods, educators can provide a comprehensive and accurate understanding of students’ critical thinking abilities in the digital age.

Continuous Improvement and Adaptation

In the digital age, it is crucial for educators to promote continuous improvement and adaptation in the development of critical thinking skills. As technology and information evolve rapidly, teachers must actively engage students in reflecting on their learning process and adjusting their strategies accordingly.

A useful approach to foster continuous improvement is to encourage students to set goals, reflect on their progress and actively seek feedback. This process can be facilitated through digital tools such as online discussions, project-based learning, and gamification .

Furthermore, educators can:

• Implement mini research assignments that challenge students to investigate topics further and engage in self-guided exploration.
• Introduce debates or collaborative projects that require students to apply critical reasoning and consider multiple perspectives.
• Use active learning methods such as brainstorming sessions, trainings, and case studies to encourage students to analyze and evaluate information before drawing conclusions.

Taking advantage of digital resources, teachers can create an environment where students continuously refine their critical thinking abilities and adapt to the ever-changing digital landscape. By implementing these strategies, educators will better prepare students to effectively navigate and contribute to the digital age.

In the digital age, teaching critical thinking skills requires the incorporation of effective instructional strategies and innovative technologies. Engaging learners in activities such as data collection, analysis , and group discussions promotes a dynamic learning environment where students can develop and sharpen their thinking abilities.

Teachers should consider multiple methods to facilitate the development of critical thinking. By integrating different teaching approaches , educators can create a rich and diverse educational experience for their students. This may include the use of various digital tools, such as collaborative platforms, serious games, and immersive technologies, which enhance the learning process and keep the students motivated and engaged.

Adaptability and continuous professional improvement are essential aspects for educators striving to foster critical thinking skills in a digital age. By staying up-to-date with current trends and research , as well as incorporating new instructional approaches and technologies, teachers will be better equipped for navigating and succeeding in the rapidly evolving educational landscape.

Ultimately, empowering learners with robust critical thinking skills will not only prepare them for academic success but also help them become responsible digital citizens who can make informed decisions in a highly interconnected world. By embracing the opportunities that digital technologies provide and adapting teaching practices accordingly, educators can truly make a lasting impact on their students’ lives.

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Ask the Cognitive Scientist: How Can Educators Teach Critical Thinking?

How does the mind work—and especially how does it learn? Teachers’ instructional decisions are based on a mix of theories learned in teacher education, trial and error, craft knowledge, and gut instinct. Such knowledge often serves us well, but is there anything sturdier to rely on?

Cognitive science is an interdisciplinary field of researchers from psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, philosophy, computer science, and anthropology who seek to understand the mind. In this regular American Educator column, we consider findings from this field that are strong and clear enough to merit classroom application.

I ndividuals vary in their views of what students should be taught, but there is little disagreement on the importance of critical thinking skills. In free societies, the ability to think critically is viewed as a cornerstone of individual civic engagement and economic success.

Despite this consensus, it’s not always clear what’s meant by “critical thinking.” I will offer a commonsensical view. 1 You are thinking critically if (1) your thinking is novel—that is, you aren’t simply drawing a conclusion from a memory of a previous situation; (2) your thinking is self-directed—that is, you are not merely executing instructions given by someone else; and (3) your thinking is effective—that is, you respect certain conventions that make thinking more likely to yield useful conclusions. These would be conventions like “consider both sides of an issue,” “offer evidence for claims made,” and “don’t let emotion interfere with reason.” This third characteristic will be our main concern, and as we’ll see, what constitutes effective thinking varies from domain to domain.

Critical Thinking Can Be Taught

Planning how to teach students to think critically should perhaps be our second task. Our first should be to ask whether evidence shows that explicitly teaching critical thinking brings any benefit.

There are many examples of critical thinking skills that are open to instruction. 2 For example, in one experiment, researchers taught college students principles for evaluating evidence in psychology studies—principles like the difference between correlational research and true experiments, and the difference between anecdote and formal research. 3 These principles were incorporated into regular instruction in a psychology class, and their application was practiced in that context. Compared to a control group that learned principles of memory, students who learned the critical thinking principles performed better on a test that required evaluation of psychology evidence.

But perhaps we should not find this result terribly surprising. You tell students, “This is a good strategy for this type of problem,” and you have them practice that strategy, so later they use that strategy when they encounter the problem.

When we think of critical thinking, we think of something bigger than its domain of training. When I teach students how to evaluate the argument in a set of newspaper editorials, I’m hoping that they will learn to evaluate arguments generally, not just the ones they read. The research literature on successful transfer of learning * to new problems is less encouraging.

Teaching Critical Thinking for General Transfer

It’s a perennial idea—teach something that requires critical thinking, and such thinking will become habitual. In the 19th century, educators suggested that Latin and geometry demanded logical thinking, which would prompt students to think logically in other contexts. 4 The idea was challenged by psychologist Edward Thorndike, who compared scores from standardized tests that high school students took in autumn and spring as a function of the coursework they had taken during the year. If Latin, for example, makes you smart, students who take it should score better in the spring. They didn’t. 5

In the 1960s, computer programming replaced Latin as the discipline that would lead to logical thinking. 6 Studies through the 1980s showed mixed results, 7 but a recent meta-analysis offered some apparently encouraging results about the general trainability of computational thinking. 8 The researchers reported that learning to program a computer yielded modest positive transfer to measures of creative thinking, mathematics, metacognition, spatial skills, and reasoning. It’s sensible to think that this transfer was a consequence of conceptual overlap between programming and these skills, as no benefit was observed in measures of literacy.

Hopeful adults have tried still other activities as potential all-purpose enhancers of intelligence—for example, exposure to classical music (the so-called Mozart effect), 9 learning to play a musical instrument, 10 or learning to play chess. 11 None have succeeded as hoped.

It’s no surprise then that programs in school meant to teach general critical thinking skills have had limited success. Unfortunately, the evaluations of these programs seldom offer a good test of transfer; the measure of success tends to feature the same sort of task that was used during training. 12 When investigators have tested for transfer in such curricular programs, positive results have been absent or modest and quick to fade. 13

Transfer and the Nature of Critical Thinking

We probably should have anticipated these results. Wanting students to be able to “analyze, synthesize, and evaluate” information sounds like a reasonable goal, but those terms mean different things in different disciplines. Literary criticism has its own internal logic, its norms for what constitutes good evidence and a valid argument. These norms differ from those found in mathematics, for example. Thus, our goals for student critical thinking must be domain-specific.

But wait. Surely there are some principles of thinking that apply across fields of study. Affirming the consequent is always wrong, straw-person arguments are always weak, and having a conflict of interest always makes your argument suspect. 14 There are indeed principles that carry across domains of study. The problem is that people who learn these broadly applicable principles in one situation often fail to apply them in a new situation.

The law of large numbers provides an example. It states that a large sample will probably be closer to a “true” estimate than a small sample—if you want to know whether a set of dice is loaded, you’re better off seeing the results of 20 throws rather than two throws. People readily understand this idea in the context of evaluating randomness, but a small sample doesn’t bother them when judging academic performance; if someone receives poor grades on two math tests, observers judge they are simply bad at math. 15

In another classic experiment, researchers administered a tricky problem: a malignant tumor could be treated with a particular ray, but the ray caused a lot of collateral damage to healthy tissue. How, subjects were asked, could the ray be used to destroy the tumor? Other subjects got the same problem, but first read a story describing a military situation analogous to the medical problem. Instead of rays attacking a tumor, rebels were to attack a fortress. The military story offered a perfect analogy to the medical problem, but despite reading it moments before, subjects still couldn’t solve the medical problem. Merely mentioning that the story might help solve the problem boosted solution rates to nearly 100 percent. Thus, using the analogy was not hard; the problem was thinking to use it in the first place. 16

These results offer a new perspective on critical thinking. The problem in transfer is not just that different domains have different norms for critical thinking. The problem is that previous critical thinking successes seem encapsulated in memory. We know that a student has understood an idea like the law of large numbers. But understanding it offers no guarantee that the student will recognize new situations in which that idea will be useful.

Critical Thinking as Problem Recognition

Happily, this difficulty in recognizing problems you’ve solved before disappears in the face of significant practice. If I solve a lot of problems in which the law of large numbers is relevant, I no longer focus on the particulars of the problem—that is, whether it seems to be about cars, or ratings of happiness, or savings bonds. I immediately see that the law of large numbers is relevant. 17 Lots of practice is OK if you’re not in a hurry, but is there a faster way to help students “just see” that they have solved a problem before?

One technique is problem comparison; show students two solved problems that have the same structure but appear to be about different things, and ask students to compare them. 18 In one experiment testing this method, business school students were asked to compare two stories, one involving international companies coping with a shipping problem, and the other concerning two college students planning a spring break trip. In each, a difficult negotiation problem was resolved through the use of a particular type of contract. Two weeks later, students were more likely to use the solution on a novel problem if they had contrasted the stories compared to other students who simply read them. 19 Richard Catrambone developed a different technique to address a slightly different transfer problem. He noted that in math and science classes, students often learned to solve standard problems via a series of fixed, lockstep procedures. That meant students were stumped when confronted with a problem requiring a slight revision of the steps, even if the goal of the steps was the same. For example, a student might learn a method for solving word problems involving work like “Nicola can paint a house in 14 hours, and Carole can do it in 8. How long would it take them to paint one house, working together?” A student who learns a sequence of steps to solve that sort of problem is often thrown by a small change—the homeowner had already painted one-fourth of the house before hiring Nicola and Carole.

Catrambone 20 showed that student knowledge will be more flexible if students are taught to label the substeps of the solution with the goal it serves. For example, work problems are typically solved by calculating how much of the job each worker can do in an hour. If, during learning, that step were labeled so students understood that that calculation was part of deriving the solution, they would know how to solve the problem when a fraction of the house is to be painted.

Open-Ended Problems and Knowledge

Students encounter standard problems that are best solved in a particular way, but many critical thinking situations are unique. There are no routine, reusable solutions for problems like designing a product or planning a strategy for a field hockey match. Nevertheless, critical thinking for open-ended problems is enabled by extensive stores of knowledge about the domain. 21

First, the recognition process described above (“oh, this is that sort of problem”) can still apply to subparts of a complex, open-ended problem. Complex critical thinking may entail multiple simpler solutions from memory that can be “snapped together” when solving complex problems. 22 For example, arithmetic is needed for calculating the best value among several vacation packages.

Second, knowledge impacts working memory. Working memory refers, colloquially, to the place in the mind where thinking happens—it’s where you hold information and manipulate it to carry out cognitive tasks. So, for example, if I said “How is a scarecrow like a blueberry?,” you would retrieve information about scarecrows (not alive, protect crops, found in fields, birds think they are alive) and blueberries (purple, used in pies, small, featured in Blueberries for Sal ) from your memory, and then you’d start comparing these features, looking for overlap. But working memory has limited space; if I added three more words, you’d struggle to keep all five and their associations in mind at once.

With experience, often-associated bits of knowledge clump together and thus take up less room in working memory. In chess, a king, a castle, and three pawns in a corner of the board relate to one another in the defensive position, so the expert will treat them as a single unit. An experienced dancer similarly chunks dance moves allowing him to think about more subtle aspects of movement, rather than crowding working memory with “what I’m to do next.”

Third, knowledge is sometimes necessary to deploy thinking strategies. As noted above, sometimes you have an effective thinking strategy in your memory (for example, apply the law of large numbers) but fail to see that it’s relevant. In other situations, the proper thinking is easily recognized. We can tell students that they should evaluate the logic of the author’s argument when they read an op-ed, and we can tell them the right method to use when conducting a scientific experiment. Students should have no trouble recognizing “Oh, this is that sort of problem,” and they may have committed to memory the right thinking strategy. They know what to do, but they may not be able to use the strategy without the right domain knowledge.

For example, principles of scientific reasoning seem to be content free: for example, “a control group should be identical to the experimental group, except for the treatment.” In practice, however, content knowledge is needed to use the principle. For example, in an experiment on learning, you’d want to be sure that the experimental and control groups were comparable, so you’d make sure that proportions of men and women in each group were the same. What characteristics besides sex should you be sure are equivalent in the experimental and control groups? Ability to concentrate? Intelligence? You can’t measure every characteristic of your subjects, so you’d focus on characteristics that you know are relevant to learning. But knowing which characteristics are “relevant to learning” means knowing the research literature in learning and memory.

Experimental evidence shows that an expert doesn’t think as well outside her area of expertise, even in a closely related domain. She’s still better than a novice, but her skills don’t transfer completely. For example, knowledge of medicine transfers poorly among subspecialties (neurologists do not diagnose cardiac cases well), 23 technical writers can’t write newspaper articles, 24 and even professional philosophers are swayed by irrelevant features of problems like question order or wording. 25

How to Teach Students to Think Critically

So what does all this mean? Is there really no such thing as a “critical thinking skill” if by “skill” we mean something generalizable? Maybe, but it’s hard to be sure. We do know that students who go to school longer score better on intelligence tests, and certainly we think of intelligence as all-purpose. 26 Still, it may be that schooling boosts a collection of fairly specific thinking skills. If it increases general thinking skills, researchers have been unable to identify them.

Although existing data favor the specific skills account, 27 researchers would still say it’s uncertain whether a good critical thinker is someone who has mastered lots of specific skills, or someone with a smaller set of yet-to-be-identified general skills. But educators aren’t researchers, and for educators, one fact ought to be salient. We’re not even sure the general skills exist, but we’re quite sure there’s no proven way to teach them directly. In contrast, we have a pretty good idea of how to teach students the more specific critical thinking skills. I suggest we do so. Here’s a four-step plan.

First, identify what’s meant by critical thinking in each domain. Be specific by focusing on tasks that tap skills, not skills themselves. What tasks showing critical thinking should a high school graduate be able to do in mathematics, history, and other subjects? For example, educators might decide that an important aspect of understanding history is the ability to source historical documents; that is, to interpret them in light of their source—who wrote it, for what purpose, and for what intended audience. Educators might decide that a key critical thinking skill for science is understanding the relationship between a theory and a hypothesis. These skills should be explicitly taught and practiced—there is evidence that simple exposure to this sort of work without explicit instruction is less effective. 28

Second, identify the domain content that students must know. We’ve seen that domain knowledge is a crucial driver of thinking skill. What knowledge is essential to the type of thinking you want your students to be able to do? For example, if students are to source documents, they need knowledge of the relevant source; in other words, knowing that they are reading a 1779 letter from General George Clinton written to George Washington with a request for supplies won’t mean much if they don’t have some background knowledge about the American Revolutionary War—that will enable them to make sense of what they read when they look up Clinton and his activities at the time.

The prospect of someone deciding which knowledge students ought to learn—and what they won’t learn—sometimes makes people uneasy because this decision depends on one’s goals for schooling, and goals depend on values. Selection of content is a critical way that values are expressed. 29 Making that choice will lead to uncomfortable tradeoffs. But not choosing is still making a choice. It’s choosing not to plan.

Third, educators must select the best sequence for students to learn the skills. It’s obvious that skills and knowledge build on one another in mathematics and history, and it’s equally true of other domains of skill and knowledge; we interpret new information in light of what we already know.

Fourth, educators must decide which skills should be revisited across years. Studies show that even if content is learned quite well over the course of half of a school year, about half will be forgotten in three years. 30 That doesn’t mean there’s no value in exposing students to content just once; most students will forget much, but they’ll remember something, and for some students, an interest may be kindled. But when considering skills we hope will stick with students for the long term, we should plan on at least three to five years of practice. 31

Some Practical Matters of Teaching Critical Thinking

I’ve outlined a broad, four-step plan. Let’s consider some of the pragmatic decisions educators face as they contemplate the teaching of critical thinking.

Is it all or none ? I’ve suggested that critical thinking be taught in the context of a comprehensive curriculum. Does that mean an individual teacher cannot do anything on his or her own? Is there just no point in trying if the cooperation of the entire school system is not assured?

Obviously that’s not the case; a teacher can still include critical thinking content in his or her courses and students will learn, but it’s quite likely they will learn more, and learn more quickly, if their learning is coordinated across years. It has long been recognized among psychologists that an important factor influencing learning, perhaps the most important factor, is what the student already knows. 32 Teaching will be more effective if the instructor is confident about what his or her students already know.

Student age : When should critical thinking instruction start? There’s not a firm, research-based answer to this question. Researchers interested in thinking skills like problem solving or evidence evaluation in young children (preschool through early elementary ages) have studied how children think in the absence of explicit instruction. They have not studied whether or how young children can be made to think more critically. Still, research over the last 30 years or so has led to an important conclusion: children are more capable than we thought.

The great developmental psychologist Jean Piaget proposed a highly influential theory that suggested children’s cognition moves through a series of four stages, characterized by more and more abstract thought, and better ability to take multiple perspectives. In stage theories, the basic architecture of thought is unchanged for long periods of time, and then rapidly reorganizes as the child moves from one developmental stage to another. 33 A key educational implication is that it’s at least pointless and possibly damaging to ask the child to do cognitive work that is appropriate for a later developmental stage. The last 30 years has shown that, contrary to Piaget’s theory, development is gradual, and does not change abruptly. It has also shown that what children can and cannot do varies depending on the content.

For example, in some circumstances, even toddlers can understand principles of conditional reasoning. For instance, conditional reasoning is required when the relationship of two things is contingent on a third thing. A child may understand that when she visits a friend’s house, she may get a treat like cake or cookies for a snack or she may not. But if her friend is celebrating a birthday, the relation between those two things (a visit and getting cake) becomes very consistent. Yet when conditional reasoning problems are framed in unfamiliar contexts, they confuse even adult physicians. Much depends on the content of the problem. 34

Thus, research tells us that including critical thinking in the schooling of young children is likely to be perfectly appropriate. It does not, however, provide guidance into what types of critical thinking skills to start with. That is a matter to take up with experienced educators, coordinating with colleagues who teach older children in the interests of making the curriculum seamless.

Types of students : Should everyone learn critical thinking skills? The question sounds like a setup, like an excuse for a resounding endorsement of critical thinking for all. But the truth is that, in many systems, less capable students are steered into less challenging coursework, with the hope that by reducing expectations, they will at least achieve “mastery of the basics.” These lower expectations often pervade entire schools that serve students from low-income families. 35

It is worth highlighting that access to challenging content and continuing to postsecondary education is, in nearly every country, associated with socioeconomic status. 36 Children from high socioeconomic status families also have more opportunities to learn at home. If school is the chief or only venue through which low socioeconomic status students are exposed to advanced vocabulary, rich content knowledge, and demands for high-level thinking, it is absolutely vital that those opportunities be enhanced, not reduced.

Assessment : Assessment of critical thinking is, needless to say, a challenge. One difficulty is expense. Claims to the contrary, multiple-choice items do not necessarily require critical thinking, even when items are carefully constructed and vetted, as on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). One researcher 37 administered items from the history NAEP for 12th-graders to college students who had done well on other standardized history exams. Students were asked to think aloud as they chose their answers, and the researchers observed little critical thinking, but a lot of “gaming” of the questions. Assessing critical thinking requires that students answer open-form questions, and that means humans must score the response, an expensive proposition.

On the bright side, the plan for teaching critical thinking that I’ve recommended makes some aspects of assessment more straightforward. If the skills that constitute “critical thinking” in, say, 10th-grade chemistry class are fully defined, then there is no question as to what content ought to appear on the assessment. The predictability ought to make teachers more confident that they can prepare their students for standardized assessments.

A s much as teaching students to think critically is a universal goal of schooling, one might be surprised that student difficulty in this area is such a common complaint. Educators are often frustrated that student thinking seems shallow. This review should offer insight into why that is. The way the mind works, shallow is what you get first. Deep, critical thinking is hard-won.

That means that designers and administrators of a program to improve critical thinking among students must take the long view, both in the time frame over which the program operates and especially in the speed with which one expects to see results. Patience will be a key ingredient in any program that succeeds.

Daniel T. Willingham is a professor of cognitive psychology at the University of Virginia. He is the author of When Can You Trust the Experts? How to Tell Good Science from Bad in Education and Why Don’t Students Like School? His most recent book is The Reading Mind: A Cognitive Approach to Understanding How the Mind Reads . This article is adapted with permission from his report for the government of New South Wales, “How to Teach Critical Thinking.” Copyright 2019 by Willingham. Readers can pose questions to “Ask the Cognitive Scientist” by sending an email to [email protected] . Future columns will try to address readers’ questions. *For more on the research behind transfer of learning, see “If You Learn A, Will You Be Better Able to Learn B?” in the Spring 2020 issue of American Educator , available here . ( return to article )

1. D. T. Willingham, “Critical Thinking: Why Is It So Hard to Teach,” American Educator 31, no. 2 (Summer 2007): 8–19. 2. P. C. Abrami et al., “Instructional Interventions Affecting Critical Thinking Skills and Dispositions: A Stage 1 Meta-Analysis,” Review of Educational Research 78, no. 4 (2008): 1102–1134; and R. L. Bangert-Drowns and E. Bankert, “Meta-Analysis of Effects of Explicit Instruction for Critical Thinking,” in Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association (Boston: 1990), 56–79. 3. D. A. Bensley and R. A. Spero, “Improving Critical Thinking Skills and Metacognitive Monitoring through Direct Infusion,” Thinking Skills and Creativity 12 (2014): 55–68. 4. C. F. Lewis, “A Study in Formal Discipline,” The School Review 13, no. 4 (1905): 281–292. 5. E. L. Thorndike, “The Influence of First-Year Latin upon Ability to Read English,” School and Society 17 (1923): 165–168; and C. R. Broyler, E. L. Thorndike, and E. Woodward, “A Second Study of Mental Discipline in High School Studies,” Journal of Educational Psychology 18, no. 6 (1924): 377–404. 6. S. Papert, “Teaching Children to Be Mathematicians versus Teaching about Mathematics,” International Journal of Mathematical Education in Science and Technology 3, no. 3 (1972): 249–262; and S. Papert, Mindstorms (New York: Basic Books, 1980); see also D. H. Clements and D. F. Gullo, “Effects of Computer Programming on Young Children’s Cognition,” Journal of Educational Psychology 76, no. 6 (1984): 1051–1058; and M. C. Linn, “The Cognitive Consequences of Programming Instruction in Classrooms,” Educational Researcher 14, no. 5 (1985): 14–29. 7. Y.-K. C. Liao and G. W. Bright, “Effects of Computer Programming on Cognitive Outcomes: A Meta-Analysis,” Journal of Educational Computing Research 7, no. 3 (1991): 251–268. 8. R. Scherer, F. Siddiq, and B. S. Viveros, “The Cognitive Benefits of Learning Computer Programming: A Meta-Analysis of Transfer Effects,” Journal of Educational Psychology 111, no. 5 (2019): 764–792. 9. J. Pietschnig, M. Voracek, and A. K. Formann, “Mozart Effect-Schmozart Effect: A Meta-Analysis,” Intelligence 38, no. 3 (2010): 314–323. 10. G. Sala and F. Gobet, “When the Music’s Over: Does Music Skill Transfer to Children’s and Young Adolescents’ Cognitive and Academic Skills? A Meta-Analysis,” Educational Research Review 20 (2017): 55–67. 11. G. Sala and F. Gobet, “Do the Benefits of Chess Instruction Transfer to Academic and Cognitive Skills? A Meta-Analysis,” Educational Research Review 18 (2016): 46–57. 12. For example, A. Kozulin et al., “Cognitive Modifiability of Children with Developmental Disabilities: A Multicentre Study Using Feuerstein’s Instrumental Enrichment-Basic Program,” Research in Developmental Disabilities 31, no. 2 (2010): 551–559; D. Kuhn and A. Crowell, “Dialogic Argumentation as a Vehicle for Developing Young Adolescents’ Thinking,” Psychological Science 22, no. 4 (2011): 545–552; and A. Reznitskaya et al., “Examining Transfer Effects from Dialogic Discussions to New Tasks and Contexts,” Contemporary Educational Psychology 37, no. 4 (2012): 288–306. 13. R. Ritchart and D. N. Perkins, “Learning to Think: The Challenges of Teaching Thinking,” in The Cambridge Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning , ed. K. J. Holyoak and R. G. Morrison (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 2005), 775–802. 14. R. H. Ennis, “Critical Thinking and the Curriculum,” in Thinking Skills Instruction: Concepts and Techniques , ed. M. Heiman and J. Slomianko (West Haven, CT: NEA Professional Library, 1987), 40–48. 15. C. Jepson, D. H. Krantz, and R. E. Nisbett, “Inductive Reasoning: Competence or Skill?,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 6, no. 3 (1983): 494–501. 16. M. Gick and K. Holyoak, “Analogical Problem Solving,” Cognitive Psychology 12, no. 3 (1980): 306–355; and M. Gick and K. Holyoak, “Schema Induction and Analogical Transfer,” Cognitive Psychology 15, no. 1 (1983): 1–38. 17. For example, Z. Chen and L. Mo, “Schema Induction in Problem Solving: A Multidimensional Analysis,” Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning Memory and Cognition 30, no. 3 (2004): 583–600. 18. K. J. Kurtz, O. Boukrina, and D. Gentner, “Comparison Promotes Learning and Transfer of Relational Categories,” Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning Memory and Cognition 39, no. 4 (2013): 1303–1310. 19. J. Loewenstein, L. Thompson, and D. Gentner, “Analogical Encoding Facilitates Knowledge Transfer in Negotiation,” Psychonomic Bulletin and Review 6, no. 4 (1999): 586–597. 20. R. Catrambone, “Aiding Subgoal Learning: Effects on Transfer,” Journal of Educational Psychology 87, no. 1 (1995): 5–17; R. 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Rikers, H. Schmidt, and H. Boshuizen, “On the Constraints of Encapsulated Knowledge: Clinical Case Representations by Medical Experts and Subexperts,” Cognition and Instruction 20, no. 1 (2002): 27–45. 24. R. T. Kellogg, “Professional Writing Expertise,” in The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performances , ed. A. Ericsson et al. (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 2018). 25. E. Schwitzgebel and F. Cushman, “Philosophers’ Biased Judgments Persist Despite Training, Expertise, and Reflection,” Cognition 141 (2015): 127–137. 26. M. Carlsson et al., “The Effect of Schooling on Cognitive Skills,” Review of Economics and Statistics 97, no. 3 (2015): 533–547; S. Ritchie and E. Tucker-Drob, “How Much Does Education Improve Intelligence? A Meta-Analysis,” Psychological Science 29, no. 8 (2018): 1358–1369; and T. Strenze, “Intelligence and Socioeconomic Success: A Meta-Analytic Review of Longitudinal Research,” Intelligence 35, no. 5 (2007): 401–426. 27. S. Ritchie, T. C. Bates, and I. J. Deary, “Is Education Associated with Improvements in General Cognitive Ability, or in Specific Skills?,” Developmental Psychology 51, no. 5 (2015): 573–582. 28. Abrami et al., “Instructional Interventions”; D. F. Halpern, “Teaching Critical Thinking for Transfer across Domains: Disposition, Skills, Structure Training, and Metacognitive Monitoring,” American Psychologist 53, no. 4 (1998): 449–455; A. Heijltjes, T. Van Gog, and F. Paas, “Improving Students’ Critical Thinking: Empirical Support for Explicit Instructions Combined with Practice,” Applied Cognitive Psychology 28, no. 4 (2014): 518–530. 29. D. T. Willingham, When Can You Trust the Experts? How to Tell Good Science from Bad in Education (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2012). 30. A. Pawl et al., “What Do Seniors Remember from Freshman Physics?,” Physical Review Special Topics—Physics Education Research 8, no. 2 (2012): 020118. 31. H. P. 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Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Education at a Glance: 2018: OECD Indicators (Paris: OECD Publishing, 2018). 37. M. D. Smith, “Cognitive Validity: Can Multi-Choice Items Tap Historical Thinking Processes?,” American Educational Research Journal 54 (2017): 1256–1287.

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How to Teach Critical Thinking

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• Daniel Willingham, Education Future Frontiers

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• A1. Transferable Skills

In this Occasional Paper Series from Education Future Frontier, cognitive scientist Daniel Willingham takes a deep dive into the science behind teaching critical thinking and offers strategies such as understanding the domain knowledge required for understanding, creating conditions for transferable skills, and understanding the structure of the problem, to help students gain and use critical thinking skills across the curricula.

Curriculum Connection

Critical thinking is essential in all areas of the curriculum and this article broadly supports the successful implementation of developing critical thinking skills across all curricula. 

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