Get Your Students Hired
Critical Thinking skills are vital in most career choices, especially in those dealing with the public. Everyday can bring unexpected circumstances, and you have to know how to handle them.
In my nutrition course students have to track and analyze their own diet and then do a comparison against a variety of standards.
Hello Patricia:
I am teaching medical law and ethics to a group of aspiring pharmacy technicians. I provide the students with a current pharmacy related article where they will analyze the issue, and use their critical thinking skills to discuss why it happened, who they believe is at fault (why or why not) as well as what could have been done to prevent it from happening. They have approximately 10 minutes to read and answer the questions; then the answers are discussed as a group including myself.
Hi Jerrod,
Great exercise to help get students to utilize their critical thinking abilities.
Patricia Scales
I do lecture and activity on syncretism. One of the man ideas I ask is how the South, Central and North America's would be different without the following influences. I list "Spanish, African, Western European" and then the students have to explain the absence of each group. Then....to take it a step further they have to explain what are the global outcomes of a very different America.
Hi Justin,
Great exercise to help students prepare for how it is like in the real world.
Patricia Scales
I currently put my students in a situation where they are required to figure out the configuration of a studios and to properly assemble a working studio with only the supplies required. They have to determine what will be used and how and what will be discarded from the assembly. This is a great activity to get them physically determining what they need to accomplish their gaol.!
Hi Lori,
Love it! You really make learning in your classroom pertain to the real world. Students need to know the types of things they are going to encounter in the real world. Continue to prepare your students for the work force.
Patricia Scales
I teach a human resource course and I provide real life scenarios that managers and supervisors have to deal with on a day to day basis when dealing with human relations. I like to call the class People Management because it immediately changes the perception of the course and how to work and deal with employee dilemmas. When dealing with human relations, one can not go off a "feelings" and there has to be an analyzes of a situation to correctly handle the situations.
Hi Marcia,
Try the following methods as ways to promote critical thinking: role playing, scenario learning, mock learning, and case studies.
Patricia Scales
I think it is hard to teach critical thinking to students, especially in a class, such as nutrition. It is very hard to 'actively' engage them when you have so much information to cover, and it is very detailed in nature; for example what happens to a carbohydrate as it is digested and assimilated into the body, or the role that nutrition plays with various diseases, such as Diabetes, or Cancer. I tried a group presentation, with a structured outline of topics to cover. One class did marvelously, but a succeeding class, as a whole, had very poor presentations. Class maturity and previous knowledge may have a played a part in the poor presentations. Any suggestions how to incorporate active learning activities, and getting the students to participate with 'owning their learning' and critically thinking, with complex subjects?
Hi William,
Word problems are great to promote critical thinking for math students. Students need to know how to apply application in a practical way, such as you have mentioned.
Patricia Scales
As a math teacher I find that students need to know the basics but some critical thinking can be included as we proceed. Students can multiply by fractions but critical thinking comes into play when a practical problem is introduced. 1) I am purchasing a car battery; if I have two years left on my warranty and it was prorated for 5 years how much credit will I have when paying for the new battery if the new battery costs 100.00. Various years of prorate and cost can be used.
Many story problems are examples of critical thinking themselves.
Hi Tracey,
What an interesting way to test retention of material. This project is very thorough, and I am sure it serves as a great eye opener for students. I bet some students realize that they did not learn the material, they only memorized it.
Patricia Scales
I currently teach a Medcial terminology course and I apply a project that ties it all together at the end of term. It is called potato man surgery. Not only do they need to perform surgery on the potato, but they have to know locations, directions, terminolgy, and positions that they learn throughout the term. I then make them write an office note using the correct terminolgy after each step is completed. This shows me who learned to memorize and who learned the content througout the term. The students also enjoy the project but comment that it is harder than they thought it would be.
Hi Charles,
Students love being able to discover the subject. They need to dig deep into the subject and get into it so that they can think critically.
Patricia Scales
Hi Curran,
What a great question to ask students to allow them to utilize their critical thinking skills.
Patricia Scales
one of the best examples from the courses I teach is asking the students how it is possible to time the cams in the rear head of a 90 degree V-twin engine with the front cylinder at Top Dead Center Overlap. this is a great question because the answer is simply that we need to follow the instructions laid out by the manufacturer ahead of understanding why they specify to do it that way. this leads us to realizing that timing this way can work even if it is different from how we initially learn how to time cams.
One assignment for our finance students asks them to go online and find different types of credit cards then compare it to their current one. After the comparison they need to justify why the one they have is the best choice or why they should consider changing it.