{"id":1902,"date":"2025-05-30T11:34:15","date_gmt":"2025-05-30T15:34:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/?p=1902"},"modified":"2025-06-05T11:38:56","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T15:38:56","slug":"teaching-critical-thinking-is-essential","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/teaching-critical-thinking-is-essential\/","title":{"rendered":"Teaching Critical Thinking is Essential"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Critical thinking is a common cornerstone of education, emphasized across K-12 and higher education standards \u2013 from Common Core to NGSS to NACE and AACN. Yet, while it\u2019s widely recognized as essential, students are rarely taught how to think critically in explicit, structured ways. This post offers some practical guidance for faculty to intentionally cultivate critical thinking in their courses. Or, if you want to take a deeper dive, consider completing ACUE’s short course (less than an hour), \u201cDeveloping Students’ Critical Thinking and Analytical Skills,\u201d on evidence-based ways to bring more critical thinking skills to your teaching. If you don\u2019t have an ACUE Commons account yet, contact me at reeveslg@uscupstate.edu<\/a> to get started! Learn more about ACUE’s Critical Thinking Short course here.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

To get students engaged in critical thinking, some approaches may include:  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ask questions <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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  1. Use open-ended, thought-provoking questions that can\u2019t be easily answered with a single word or phrase.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Have students play and analyze fun, low stakes games like Quandry<\/a> that \u00a0promote ethical thinking and reasoning.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Encourage students to transfer the decision making and evidence gathering processes in the game or other question-based experiences to course-specific tasks. \u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Use strategies like Socratic Questioning<\/a> or Fish Bowl<\/a> to extend opportunities for students to deepen their questioning and analysis skills.
     <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Balance activities <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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    1. Use case studies<\/a>, problem-based learning<\/a>, and simulations<\/a> in addition to multiple choice and solve for a single answer assignments.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
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      1.  Seek examples that are short, but meaningful. A strong case will include a decision-maker faced with a challenge, issue or problem; a description of the challenge, issue, or problem; and the data and other supporting materials they have or need to resolve the problem.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
          \n
        1. Students can work individually or in groups, in several configurations, to assist the decision-maker.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

          Close with reflection <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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          1. Guide students to think about how their thinking led them to the choices they made during the assignment. Have them try to write a step by step guide for their decision making process. They can do this individually, but working together may allow them to use collaborative frames like, \u201cthat\u2019s interesting you made that choice…when I got there, I made the choice to…\u201d or \u201cI made the same choice for a different reason…\u201d  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
              \n
            1. If students have worked in groups, have them complete a Force Field Analysis<\/a> of their experience. This activity invites students to reflect on a collaboration and identify the forces that help and hinder their movement toward a specific goal.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

              Model and scaffold critical thinking<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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              1. While students may have used critical thinking skills many times in their academic and personal lives, it is valuable to demonstrate to them what faculty mean by critical thinking and how it is applied in their discipline.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
                  \n
                1. Faculty can offer think-alouds where they walk students through the mental steps they use to prioritize information, seek connections between different ideas, approach a problem in fair and sensible ways, and seek evidence. <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
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                  1. Develop or use rubrics<\/a> for critical thinking and give examples of how students can meet the different achievement levels.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

                    Welcome uncertainty <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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                    1. Illustrate for students a focus on inquiry and asking questions, not having all of the answers. Ensure grading practices reflect this; if the highest grade can only be achieved by the number of pre-determined right answers, then the course grading practices and an inquiry approach may be at odds with each other. This is confusing for students.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
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                      1. Be open to learning something from students and encourage them to expect to learn something from each other.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
                          \n
                        1. Promote curiosity as an academic asset.  <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

                          For additional resources on critical thinking, check out Brown’s Questions to Provoke Critical Thinking<\/a>; UTC’s Short Critical Thinking Activities<\/a> (with video examples); University of Louisiana @ Lafayette’s Critical Thinking Resources<\/a>, which include lessons, sample activities, and skill development; and SUNY’s Critical Thinking Skills <\/a>resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                          By designing assignments and learning engagements that challenge students to analyze, evaluate, and reflect, we prepare them for academic and life success. What if Rosalind Franklin<\/a> had not asked, “what does DNA look like on the molecular level?” or if George Washington Carver<\/a> had not wondered, “how can we improve the lives of poor farmers in the South?” Good critical thinking begins with a question – and the courage to pursue it. By encouraging our students to ask bold, meaningful questions, we empower them to become the innovators, problem-solvers, and changemakers of tomorrow. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

                          Critical thinking is a common cornerstone of education, emphasized across K-12 and higher education standards \u2013 from Common Core to NGSS to NACE and AACN. Yet, while it\u2019s widely recognized as essential, students are rarely taught how to think critically in explicit, structured ways. This post offers some practical guidance for faculty to intentionally cultivate … Continue reading Teaching Critical Thinking is Essential<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1901,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,42,48,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1902","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-acue","category-facultydev","category-student-success","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-vibrant-and-colorful-illustration-representing-critical-thinking.-The-image-should-feature-a-human.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1902","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1902"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1902\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1913,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1902\/revisions\/1913"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uscupstate.edu\/tip\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}