Teaching critical thinking skills involves understanding students’ analytical level, emphasizing essay writing, encouraging students to see the bigger picture, and teaching them to choose good sources of research information. It is important to teach students to reflect on a problem without making a hasty decision and to use creative thinking and brainstorming to reveal more options in solving related problems. The “forest and trees” analogy can help raise the level of thinking and avoid excessive generalization.
Top tips for teaching critical thinking skills include understanding your students’ analytical level and emphasizing essay writing. Because essays involve supporting the writer’s thesis, or main idea, with supporting arguments and research, students can be taught the difference between well-reasoned judgments and mere opinions or beliefs. Another way to teach critical thinking skills is to encourage students to see both the details and the bigger picture using the “forest and trees” analogy. Introducing a four-step approach to problem solving that involves acknowledging the problem, exploring all options through creative brainstorming, taking time to think through the problems, and finally eliminating any solutions or ideas that won’t work.
Reasoning based on valid information is a keystone of critical thinking. A good tip to keep in mind when teaching critical thinking skills is to make sure students understand how to choose good sources of research information when completing essay assignments. Otherwise, it is unlikely that reasonable judgments and logical supporting statements can be made.
It can be easy to believe that almost all sources have reliable information, unless taught to look only for good sources. Not having accurate sources or facts makes it difficult to eliminate solutions or misconceptions in problem solving. Students should learn to ignore inaccurate or dubious information based on a lack of evidence or facts to support the source and use critical reading approaches instead.
Teaching students to take time to reflect on a problem or issue without making a hasty decision, especially one based on emotion, is critical to communicating the concepts of critical thinking. Unless trained otherwise, many people don’t actually spend their time thinking and reflecting on the different sides and questions involved in an argument. Rather, they voice their opinion, which is usually fueled by past personal emotions or experiences rather than a considered, broader perspective. Teaching critical thinking skills with an emphasis on reflection can often be accomplished by instructing students to think about an issue or problem from many different sides.
Such creative thinking, brainstorming, or open-ended thinking, usually leads to related questions or ideas which in turn can lead to valid points about the topic or situation. The openness of the topic also tends to reveal more options in solving related problems. Presenting a problem to the class for student brainstorming and reflection can help teach critical thinking skills.
Since the solutions are mentioned by different students, evaluating the suggestions using a critical approach can benefit the lesson. If the class seems to focus on options that are too general or too specific, bringing up the “forest and trees” analogy can help raise the level of thinking. The phrase “not being able to see the forest for the trees” can convey the message that too much attention to detail is leading to missing key points. The opposite scenario, “not being able to see the trees for the forest” will present another common problem when teaching critical thinking skills. Observing only the general trend, without looking at individual cases, can especially counteract critical thinking, as it often leads to stereotypes through excessive generalization.
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