Critical Thinking Teaching Guide
Critical thinking is more than a classroom skill; it is a thought process that helps people throughout their entire life. Microsoft's guide on teaching critical thinking through Web research skills, along with the many excellent educator community resources it includes, can help you better teach critical thinking skills as part of your existing curriculum. These materials can help you teach students how to ask the right questions, to think for themselves, to research subjects more effectively, and ascertain the validity and reliability of information skills that will be critical to their future success in the connected 21st century digital world.
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Lesson plans, templates, and other resources that help you teach both critical and creative thinking
The critical thinking guide offers three levels of coursework for middle school and high school students. Beginners to advanced students are introduced to critical thinking concepts via teacher's lesson plans, worksheets, and teacher demonstrations in five Critical Thinking categories: validity and reliability, plagiarism, civil discourse, citing Web resources, and searching. They will help you structure your classroom for not just critical thinking, but creative thinking as well.
Developing critical thinking skills for web research can help students:
- Improve online search skills
- Evaluate information more effectively
- Incorporate appropriate information in daily schoolwork and projects
- Learn to apply critical thinking in their daily life
System requirements:
- A current version of Adobe Reader.
Resources
Microsoft in Education: Critical thinking
Downloadable teaching guide, lesson plans, and worksheets that help you develop your students' critical thinking skills.
Crap detection 101
Famous Internet pioneer Howard Rheingold offers an excellent set of questions to ask when assessing the validity and reliability of information.
The Critical Thinking Community Channel on YouTube
Videos on critical thinking for educators and students at all levels.
The Critical Thinking Community Web page
The Foundation and Center for Critical Thinking aims to improve education at all levels. They support professional development programs, emphasize instructional strategies, Socratic questioning, critical reading and writing, higher order thinking, assessment, research, quality enhancement, and competency standards.