Critical Thinking
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Today’s school system in junior high and high school are based on memorization. Teachers restate information from textbooks trying to get information passed into the student’s mind. This routine learning might have worked in the past, but today’s information age requires more than just memorization. The learning process called critical thinking needs to come into play, where students are required to use different perspectives when looking at information.
When students are thinking actively, they also think critically. Critical thinking involves analyzing the information. Students who just read the book and never look at it again are not critical thinkers. Instead of being a passive learner, they should be asking questions and looking for answers when they read. The Socratic method is the process of asking questions, staying active as you learn. Critical thinkers analyze, reason, and draw conclusions from information. They have their own opinions on it and are able to back it up with their own statements.
Critical thinking retains information much better than just plain memorization. The student gets a deeper meaning and a “visual picture” for their subject. They are able to make links and connections to other related information. They want to learn more about the subject and have an interest on the topic. All these things occur when the student uses critical thinking.
To use this skill called critical thinking, teachers need to be able to get the students to reason and make opinions. They can get the students into groups and make them discuss the information. Students need to find an answer to the problem presented and use different types of learning to solve the problem. Critical thinking involves planning and organizing; as a result, it requires the student to react to the information. The bottom line is that the student needs