This link has been bookmarked by 20 people . It was first bookmarked on 29 Apr 2008, by Shaun Fletcher.
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16 Aug 11
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07 Jul 11
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Why Should We Redesign Instruction?
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When we teach in "mother robin" fashion — trying to mentally chew up everything for our students so we can put it into their intellectual beaks to swallow — students tend to become, if I can slightly mix my metaphor, "Polly parrot" learners:
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Rarely do they integrate what they are learning into what they already know or believe. Rarely do they learn to grapple with, or grasp the logic of, what they are learning. Content comes and goes as something independent of thought, dissociated from active engagement, from give-and-take, from disciplined reading, writing, speaking, or listening. Intellectual paralysis sets in. The trance-like state that students bring typically to class becomes permanent.
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What is reasoning? Expressed most simply, it is the art of "figuring things out for yourself".
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One must be willing to make mistakes and to learn from one’’s mistakes, to grow progressively in ability over an extended period of time. Insightfully conceived instruction is designed to create all of the above conditions: to facilitate students learning the general principles and strategies intrinsic to the disciplined mastery of a body of content; to facilitate students actively making critical thinking moves in reading, writing, speaking, and listening; to facilitate students talking about intellectual standards; assessing their own and other students’’ reasoning; to facilitate student intellectual development over an extended period of time.
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As teachers, therefore, we should therefore continually be asking:
How can I get my students to reason more and reason better?
How can I get my students when "studying" science to reason scientifically? How can I get them enthusiastic about and skilled in scientific reasoning? To pose scientific questions? To seek scientific data and information? To acquire scientific concepts? To question their non-scientific assumptions? To grasp scientific truths?How can I get my students when "studying" math to reason mathematically? How can I get them enthusiastic about and skilled in mathematical reasoning? To pose mathematical questions? To seek mathematical data and information? To acquire mathematical concepts? To question their false mathematical assumptions? To grasp mathematical truths?
How can I get my students when "studying" history to reason historically? How can I get them enthusiastic about and skilled in historical reasoning? To pose historical questions? To seek historical data and information? To acquire historical concepts? To question their false historical assumptions? To grasp historical truths?
How can I get my students when "studying" geography to reason geographically? How can I get them enthusiastic about and skilled in geographical reasoning? To pose geographical questions? To seek geographical data and information? To acquire geographical concepts? To question their false geographical assumptions? To grasp geographical truths?
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29 Jun 11
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27 Jun 11
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When we teach in "mother robin" fashion — trying to mentally chew up everything for our students so we can put it into their intellectual beaks to swallow — students tend to become, if I can slightly mix my metaphor, "Polly parrot" learners:
"I can't understand anything unless you tell me exactly how and what to say and think. I need you to figure out everything for me. I shouldn't have to do more than repeat what you or the textbook say."
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Teachers feel by this level that they have no choice but to think for their students, or worse, that they should not require any thinking at all, that students are not really capable of it.
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To learn how to teach critically, teachers must abandon mother robin teaching and make every effort to discourage Polly parrot learning. To learn how to think critically, students must learn to shift to use reasoning as a pervasive tool of learning.
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What is reasoning? Expressed most simply, it is the art of "figuring things out for yourself"
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In everyday life, of course, we continually have to figure things out for ourselves
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The depth with which they understand anything is in direct proportion to the degree to which they have engaged in intellectual labor to figure it out for themselves.
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Whatever is to have meaning to them must be given meaning by them. They must work new meanings into the network of meanings they already have. They must relate new experiences to experiences they have already had. They must relate new problems to problems they have already solved. To create new meanings, to understand new experiences, to solve new problems, they must actively and intellectually participate in the "figuring out" process, going up and back between what they have already figured out and what they have not. They must do intellectual work. They must reason to learn-- and to learn well they must reason well.
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When students do not engage in intellectual labor, they do not meaningfully learn, their learning is falsified.
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Good teachers arrange circumstances and design activities to facilitate this process of "thinking something through"
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Pseudo learning is addictive precisely because it appears to provide substantial learning with little effort. It seems genuine — when only parroted responses are called for. It seems substantial — as long as no one asks the students to explain what they have learned in their own words. It seems easy as long as no one figures out how much time is wasted teaching the same content over and over and how little students retain after their schooling is completed
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It is because of pseudo learning that most students are unable to explain in their own words what makes a scientific experiment scientific. It is because of pseudo learning that most students are unable to solve problems that require more than one inference. It is because of pseudo learning that students soon lost interest in the subjects they are "studying" (Who wants to study what one is not understanding?).
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Good teachers are not persons who know how to get students to learn without having to think. They are persons who know how to create conditions and activities, incentives and opportunities, in which those willing to think things through for themselves can achieve what they will.
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Make no mistake. Mother robins can be very useful to baby robins. But let us also not forget that baby robins are hungry when fed and instinctively swallow what is put into their beaks. And more. If mother robins never pushed their babies out of the nest nor expected them to do their own digging for worms, nor their own chewing once found, neither they nor their species could or would survive.
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Furthermore, most of the curriculum of schools as well as most of the philosophy that accompanies that curriculum, if taken seriously, cannot legitimately be reduced to what can be learned automatically and robotically. Most of it, to be genuinely — i.e., meaningfully — learned, requires a lot of "figuring out" of things, a lot of good reasoning, a great deal of testing, a great deal of intellectual work. Unfortunately, research and experience tells us that good reasoning is about the last thing to expect in the typical classroom on a typical day.
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Unfortunately, we are more familiar with the mastery of skilled moves and strategies in the physical than we are in the intellectual domain. We are much better at disciplining our bodies than disciplining our minds.
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If students seek to join the basketball, the soccer, the football, or the tennis teams, they are well aware of the need to understand thoroughly the object of the game, the principles of sound play, the strategies and moves based on those principles, and the appropriate way to self-assess their moves in play. For example, for students to develop basketball skills and abilities, it is essential that they be willing to learn such principles as "square yourself to the basket whenever making a shot".
To learn this principle they practice by the hour doing what it calls for — squaring themselves to the basket — whenever they shot. They also learn to integrate the skilled use of this move into a variety of strategic situations on court. They do this with a combination of theoretical discussions and practical applications. They talk a lot about how to play the game — how to make this or that move, how to work with this or that strategy, how to counter this or that opposing strategy. And they spend a lot of time actually playing the game, trying in the process to put good theory into practice. They also spend considerable time critiquing their performance, making reference to the standards of excellent performance, as well as to the moves, principles, and strategies intrinsic to that excellence.
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Learning to think critically and reason well as a result is the intellectual analog of learning to play basketball, tennis, or chess well. It is analogous to learning how to dance ballet or do architecture well. As in the other domains, there are general principles and strategies intrinsic to the doing of it. There are skilled "moves"--critical thinking moves-- to be learned. One must find the time to practice the moves, to talk about the principles that underlie them, to critique and assess one’’s own, and others’’, use of them. One must commit oneself to standards--intellectual standards. One must not only practice but strive continually for excellence in practice.
One must be willing to make mistakes and to learn from one’’s mistakes, to grow progressively in ability over an extended period of time. Insightfully conceived instruction is designed to create all of the above conditions: to facilitate students learning the general principles and strategies intrinsic to the disciplined mastery of a body of content; to facilitate students actively making critical thinking moves in reading, writing, speaking, and listening; to facilitate students talking about intellectual standards; assessing their own and other students’’ reasoning; to facilitate student intellectual development over an extended period of time.
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A fit mind can successfully engage in the designing, fashioning, formulating, originating, or producing of intellectual products worthy of its challenging ends. To achieve this fitness the mind must learn to take charge of itself, to energize itself, press forward when difficulties emerge, proceed slowly and methodically when meticulousness is necessary, immerse itself in a task, become attentive, reflective, and engrossed, circle back on a train of thought, recheck to ensure that it has been thorough, accurate, exact and deep enough.
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In a sense, of course, all minds create and produce in a manner reflective of their fitness or lack thereof. Minds indifferent to standards and judgment tend to judge inexactly, inaccurately, inappropriately, and prejudicially. Prejudices, hate, irrational jealousies and fears, stereotypes and misconceptions — these too are “created”, “produced”, “originated” by minds. But they are not the products of “creative” minds. They reflect an undisciplined, an uncritical mode of thinking and therefore are not properly thought of as products of “creativity”. In short, except in rare circumstances, creativity presupposes criticality and criticality creativity.
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We can now begin to see why the mastery of reasoning is intrinsic to becoming a certain kind of person. At the highest level of development, the mastery of reasoning entails the development of a variety of interrelated character traits: intellectual humility, intellectual courage, intellectual perseverance, intellectual civility, intellectual integrity, intellectual curiosity, intellectual responsibility, intellectual autonomy, fairmindedness, and faith in reason.
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The redesign of instruction is based upon a judgment as to what students are presently not learning that they should be learning. We have argued at length that the most fundamental failure in education is the failure to teach students to reason well. Reasoning, we have contended, is the only means by which people acquire knowledge, master content, and solve problems. If students become proficient in figuring things out--while reading, writing, speaking, and listening, while studying the subjects that they should master, while tackling the problems of everyday life--then they get precisely what it is that schooling at its best should be "giving" them but is not.
As teachers, therefore, we should therefore continually be asking:
How can I get my students to reason more and reason better?
How can I get my students when "studying" science to reason scientifically? How can I get them enthusiastic about and skilled in scientific reasoning? To pose scientific questions? To seek scientific data and information? To acquire scientific concepts? To question their non-scientific assumptions? To grasp scientific truths?How can I get my students when "studying" math to reason mathematically? How can I get them enthusiastic about and skilled in mathematical reasoning? To pose mathematical questions? To seek mathematical data and information? To acquire mathematical concepts? To question their false mathematical assumptions? To grasp mathematical truths?
How can I get my students when "studying" history to reason historically? How can I get them enthusiastic about and skilled in historical reasoning? To pose historical questions? To seek historical data and information? To acquire historical concepts? To question their false historical assumptions? To grasp historical truths?
How can I get my students when "studying" geography to reason geographically? How can I get them enthusiastic about and skilled in geographical reasoning? To pose geographical questions? To seek geographical data and information? To acquire geographical concepts? To question their false geographical assumptions? To grasp geographical truths?
It is questions and concerns such as these that are essential to the successful redesign of instruction. If we put these questions continually at the center of our thinking as teachers, we will progressively move toward a model for instructional design and redesign which helps transform students into excellent thinkers and learners.
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Six Forms of Decision-Making in Designing or Redesigning Instruction
I) Get Clear About What the Students Have to Reason About (the domain, the topic and the issue).
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II) Find Something That Students Are Already Familiar With to Use as a Bridge or Crutch to Help Them Learn What They are not Familiar With
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III) Make Decisions About How You Are Going to use Large and Small Groups
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IV) Get clear about Assessment Issues
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V) Include Critical Writing as Well as Critical Speaking and Listening
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VI Gathering And Interpreting Information
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Every teacher teaches in a patterned way, though few teachers are explicitly aware of the patterns implicit in their teaching. It is important for teachers who aspire to take command of their teaching to foster higher order learning to begin to develop a sense of the patterns implicit in their own instruction and a sense of the patterns they might experiment with that would enable them more readily to cultivate the critical thinking of their students. For one thing, once one discovers one or two powerful patterns of teaching with which one can successfully work, it is possible to structure a whole semester of teaching around that pattern.
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06 Apr 11
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01 Dec 10
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II. How Do We Redesign Instruction
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Six Forms of Decision-Making in Designing or Redesigning Instruction
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) Get Clear About What the Students Have to Reason About (the domain, the topic and the issue).
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II) Find Something That Students Are Already Familiar With to Use as a Bridge or Crutch to Help Them Learn What They are not Familiar With
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III) Make Decisions About How You Are Going to use Large and Small Groups
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V) Get clear about Assessment Issues
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V) Include Critical Writing as Well as Critical Speaking and Listening
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VI Gathering And Interpreting Information
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Now let us get clear about why each of these dimensions is important:
1) Getting clear about what the students have to reason about forces us to become clear about the logic within which we want students to reason.
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2) Finding something that students are already familiar with to use as a bridge to help them learn forces us to become clear about the present logic of the students' thinking.
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small and large groups forces us to consciously consider how to maximize the active involvement of the students
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assessment issues forces us to decide on how we are going to help the students to assess their own reasoning.
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how and when students will read and write, as well as engage in Socratic questioning and/or role playing forces us to decide on which of these important modes of reasoning the students will engage in.
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find opportunities for students to gather information on their own forces us to maximize the extent to which our students will free themselves from dependence on others for information.
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we want to teach in such a way that students get experience in putting their geographical questions into clear and precise form.
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08 Nov 10
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There is no way to teach what requires understanding so as to eliminate the "figuring out" process for the learner.
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design activities to facilitate this process of "thinking something through".
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Figuring things out has a crucial role in learning the simple and the complicated, the surface and the deep, the theoretical and the applied.
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practice
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talk about the principles that underlie them,
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critique and assess one’’s own, and others’’
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practice
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grow progressively in ability over an extended period of time
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make mistakes and to learn from one’’s mistakes
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art of reasoning
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critical thinking
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nine elements
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purpose
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problems
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information
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ideas and concepts
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conclusions and interpretations
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reasons
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takes for granted
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whatever it implies
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point of view
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As good reasoners
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What am I trying to accomplish?
b) What problem or problems do I have to solve?
c) What information do I need and where can I get it?
d) What basic concepts do I need to clarify and carefully use?
d) What conclusion or conclusions shall I come to?
e) What do I base those conclusions on?
f) What am I taking for granted? Should I?
g) What is implied in my reasoning? To what consequences do they lead?
h) From what point of view am I reasoning? Do I need to consider another? -
elements
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elements
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The Socratic questioner orchestrates questioning in a variety of ways using any of the full variety of critical thinking abilities and moves in the process.
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Reasoning
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means by which people acquire knowledge, master content, and solve problems.
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As teachers
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How can I get my students to reason more and reason better
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What the Students Have to Reason About
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domain
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Express the question as specifically and as clearly
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what sorts of things a person must do to reason well about this question
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Already Familiar
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Use as
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not Familiar
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Crutch to Help
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students already deal with this question.
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give them a group of examples from everyday life that they could examine and come to a conclusion about, pro or con.
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Large and Small Groups
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arge group discussion
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groups report to another group, having the groups give feedback to each other
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clear about Assessment Issues
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Critical Writing as Well as Critical Speaking and Listening
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writing assignment.
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Gathering And Interpreting Information
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clear
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already familiar
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maximize the active involvement of the students in the learning process
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how we are going to help the students to assess their own reasoning.
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Socratic questioning and/or role playing
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modes of reasoning
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gather information
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Every teacher teaches in a patterned way
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to foster higher order learning to begin to develop a sense of the patterns implicit in their own instruction and a sense of the patterns they might experiment with that would enable them more readily to cultivate the critical thinking of their students.
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what is wrong with didactic instruction
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nature and dimensions of critical thinking
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pedagogical strategies that can be used to effectively integrate critical thinking into instruction
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Are the students reasoning their way through the class or are they falling back into roles of passivity
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What strategies and what patterns of instruction am I using to keep students involved in disciplined critical thinking
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04 Oct 10
Julia AlsirtMother Robin and Polly Parrot analogy.
May be useful for background and argument for CT. -
11 Jan 10
jcurtis4082Good Article on Critical Thinking
education curriculum teaching teacher learning 2010Delicious
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30 Oct 09
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what is wrong with the way teachers typically go about teaching and what is wrong with the way students typically go about learning.
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"mother robin teaching".
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When we reason we puzzle something out, work out our understanding of it in relationship to what we already know. It contrasts, therefore, with thoughtlessly accepting what others say. It intrinsically involves testing as we learn to see if this or that is so. There are two ways we go about testing as we learn, and the two often work together: physical testing and mental testing. We physically test things by trying them out in the physical world. We mentally test things by trying them out in our minds. Hence we test ideas and beliefs by ideas, beliefs, and experiences we already have. For example, you tell me that you’ve just met a really perfect person and I, by thinking of my experience of people and my conception of human nature, inwardly decide that what you are saying cannot be true. I have tested out what you said in my mind and what you said “failed” the test.
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05 May 08
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04 May 08
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03 May 08
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01 May 08
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Very significant consequences follow from how students learn. The depth with which they understand anything is in direct proportion to the degree to which they have engaged in intellectual labor to figure it out for themselves. Whatever is to have meaning to them must be given meaning by them. They must work new meanings into the network of meanings they already have. They must relate new experiences to experiences they have already had. They must relate new problems to problems they have already solved. To create new meanings, to understand new experiences, to solve new problems, they must actively and intellectually participate in the "figuring out" process, going up and back between what they have already figured out and what they have not. They must do intellectual work. They must reason to learn-- and to learn well they must reason well.
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29 Apr 08
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Joe WoodIdeas on redesigning instruction to include critical thinking components.
criticalthinking teachingresources 21stcenturyskills ITMCNING
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Joe WoodIdeas on redesigning instruction to include critical thinking components.
criticalthinking teachingresources 21stcenturyskills ITMCNING
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