Teaching Critical Thinking Skills to Children
Teaching critical
thinking skills to children is increasingly becoming inevitable. Development
has resulted to accessing information with ease. Some information is beneficial
and in some cases, the information presented is unnecessary ‘junk’. Unless
children learn critical thinking skills, they will lack the capacity to
differentiate between what is good for consumption or otherwise.Teaching critical
thinking skills to children requires you to come up with lessons plans for
teaching critical thinking skills. The lessons plans for teaching critical
thinking skills are suitable in setting achievable goals and for evaluation
purposes.Although many prefer to
conduct an analysis at the end of a course, it is advisable to evaluate
yourself and your students in the course of teaching critical thinking skills
to children constantly. Lessons plans for teaching critical thinking skills to
children should include critical thinking skills test. As a teacher, you can
choose to come up with the test, or you can log on to classified websites for
customized tests, although it is advisable that you come up with the test.
What
should you include in your
lessons plans for teaching critical
thinking skills to children:
Ask questions-
read books together with the children. If they are advanced in age, you can
allow them time to read on their own after which you ask questions. Questions
you ask may include: what do you understand from the text? Why do you think so?
Is there another approach to this? What do you think of this other approach?
Encourage them to ask questions-
let children ask you questions on the concepts they have learnt. One of the
best ways to encourage them to ask questions is by asking them when they fail
to. You can also encourage this by giving a gift for every question asked.
Give room for discussion-
do not be quick to approve or disapprove a decision from children. Let them
give an explanation for their thought, after which you also give your thoughts
on the matter. That will help the child make an informed decision.
Model critical thinking to them-
you can do so by thinking aloud in their presence, or involve them in decision
making. In some cases, point out a few things you need them to consider. In
case you have a different opinion from what they have, explain it to them and
confirm that it makes sense to them. Let them be actively involved in making decisions
that affect them.
