Developing a Thinking Culture
• Define• Rank
What does it mean ‘Thinking Skills’?
What are Thinking Skills?• focus on ‘knowing how’ rather than
‘knowing that’
• learning how to learn
• embedded in all subjects
• present in all good teaching and learning
Fisher, 2000
What are Thinking Skills?• The ability to reason• To make informed judgements• To critically evaluate information• To think creatively• To apply knowledge to solve problems• The ability to think about thinking, metacognition
Michael Pohl
• Alphabet chart• Record language
associated with thinking
What is the ‘Language of Thinking’?
• Highlight higher order verbs
• Leave lower order verbs uncoloured
What are higher order and lower order thinking skills?
• new information and stored information
• interrelates and/or rearranges and extends this information
• to achieve a purpose
• to find possible answers in perplexing situations
Lewis and Smith,1993
Higher Order Thinking Skills (H.O.T.S)
Lower Order Thinking Skillsroutine or mechanical application
listing information inserting numbers
Higher Order Thinking Skillsto interpretto analyse
to manipulate information
L.O.T.S vs H.O.T.S
Thinking Skills Cognitive Goals
Low Level Information and recall skills Knowledge
Low Level Ability to grasp the meaning Comprehension
Mid Level Use learned material in new
and concrete situationsApplication
High Level Ability to break down material into
component parts to understand
structure
Analysis
High Level Ability to put parts together
to form a new wholeSynthesis
High Level Ability to judge the value of material Evaluation
Essentially higher order skills are skills of the autonomous learner or the ‘executive control process’ of the able thinker and are those which many management courses seek to develop.
Gagne 1975
Thinking Skills
METACOMPONENTS PERFORMANCE COMPONENTS
KNOWLEDGE ACQUISITION COMPONENTS
High Order Process
controlling memory
planning
decision making
evaluating
What We Do
remembering
reflecting
generating ideas
problem solving
Learning New Material
seeing
hearing
physical/sensory experience
Executive Control Output Input
Where is the evidence?What specific strategies
do you use in your
teaching?
• MINDMAP RESPONSES
Are thinking skills taught in our classrooms all of the time?
Evaluation Sequence
Do we need to develop thinking skillsin our classrooms?
Yellow = Positive
Black = Negative
1/2 of the room report the positive aspects and everyone else report back the
negative aspects.
• needs of people in the C21st
• increasing rate of change
• amount of information is doubling every
2.5 years
• problem solving skills are vital
• pupils need both higher order and lower order thinking skills
Why do we need thinking skills?
• thought process• connections between pieces of information• easier recall• break information into manageable amounts• easier to see relationships• formation of concepts
Empowering thinkers to exchange and compare ideas, articulate points of view, defend their own thinking and examine thoughts of others.
Why do we need thinking skills?
‘Only more able children will be capable of higher order thinking’.
• Partners
• Brainstorm thoughts and opinions
Fluency: the number of responses
Elaboration: a detailed ideaOriginality: unlike others in your group
Score each extended brainstorm and total points.
Extended Brainstorm
‘Only more able children will be capable of higher order thinking’.
• almost literally stretch their minds
• they become cleverer, across the
curriculum
• CASE programme (Cognitive Science Education) students achieved better across the board in all areas
‘Only more able children will be capable of higher order thinking’.
• ‘thinking skills diet’ maximises our mental potential
• teaching pupils ‘how’ to think not ‘what’ to think
1. How could a specific ‘thinking skills programme’ be implemented?
2. How would it link to the rest of the curriculum?
3. How essential is it that it becomes an integral part of each lesson?
Use the first question and consider the following questions when
completing your diagram.
CONSEQUENCE WHEEL DIAGRAM
• plaster approach - doesn’t stick
• thinking and solving problems that are real and relevant to our lives
• embed the skills in context and then reflect on our thinking processes
• deliberately work towards transferring those skills into a different context
Belle Wallace, Teaching Thinking Skills Across the Primary Curriculum (2001)
A whole-school approach:
• Empower students• Managing, organising and recording thinking• Higher order thinking skills• Transfer of skills for life-long learning
An essential element in developing a thinking culture will be the explicit teaching of thinking skills to all students.
Michael Pohl, Teaching Thinking Skills in the Primary Years, 1997.
A whole school approach for the teaching of thinking skills will assist in overcoming some of the less desirable practices to be observed in some school. e.g.
• ‘feast or famine syndrome’
• ‘flavour of the month syndrome’
Michael Pohl, Teaching Thinking Skills in the Primary Years, 1997.
What evidence is there that teaching thinking skills
makes a difference?
THINK, PAIR, SHARE
As students are exposed to a range of thinking strategies their thinking skills will develop in many different ways;
– critical
– creative
– problem solving and
– metacognitive thinking
• all individuals can improve their capacity to think
• all individuals are capable of reasoned decision making.
• modeling thinking skills supports the slow learners
• provides faster learners with skills for independent or small group work
Belle Wallace
Lewis & Smith
• in a perplexing situation, higher order thinking is necessary
• higher order thinking skills are important for everyone, not an ‘extra’
• teaching of higher and lower thinking skills may be closely interwoven in the classroom
• helping children with learning difficulties to develop skills in higher order thinking may be especially important
• Use the question matrix at your table to design a range of questions.
List questions you have
regarding ‘thinking skills’.
