Supporting Student Critical Thinking

While reading chapter 4,” Supporting Student Critical Thinking,” I learned many new and interesting facts. I learned that critical thinking helps younger students with higher thinking and effective decision making, not only inside the classroom but outside as well.  I also was intrigued by the role critical thinking plays with individuals in regards of meeting other learning goals, such as their level of communication and creativity. I really enjoyed reading this chapter because it informed me on how important critical thinking skills are in the development of young children today.http://www.edutopia.org/stw-kipp-critical-thinking-10-tips-for-teaching

Clarification

               Although teachers play a major role in students learning, I still need more clarification on how teachers don’t necessarily teach the concept of critical thinking, however, teachers support and coach these skills by utilizing technology to assist with critical thinking.

 

Classroom Connection

               One classroom connection I found in chapter 4 was the idea of “media literacy”. According to the textbook, media literacy means students are able to evaluate and make good decisions about what media present such as on the internet. I had the opportunity to complete an activity using media literacy just this week. In Ms. O’Keefe synchronous class I was able to recognize validity and reliability of websites through a group activity called “Bad Apples”. Since this activity was both informative and fun I plan to implement it into my future classroom as well.