How can you help K-12 students develop critical thinking skills?

1 Model critical thinking

One of the best ways to help your students develop critical thinking skills is to model them yourself. Show your students how you approach a problem, question, or topic, and how you use evidence, logic, and criteria to support your claims or decisions. Think aloud and explain your reasoning, assumptions, and perspectives. Invite your students to challenge, question, or add to your thinking. Demonstrate how you handle uncertainty, ambiguity, or conflicting information. By modeling critical thinking, you can make it visible and accessible for your students.

2 Use open-ended questions

Another effective strategy to help your students develop critical thinking skills is to use open-ended questions that require more than a yes or no answer. Open-ended questions encourage your students to think deeply, creatively, and critically about a topic, and to justify their responses with evidence and reasoning. You can use open-ended questions to stimulate discussion, debate, inquiry, or reflection. For example, you can ask your students to compare and contrast, to evaluate and critique, to apply and transfer, or to synthesize and create.

4 Provide feedback and scaffolding

A fourth strategy to help your students develop critical thinking skills is to provide feedback and scaffolding that support your students' learning and growth. Feedback is the information that you give to your students about their performance, progress, and areas for improvement. Scaffolding is the support that you give to your students to help them complete a task or achieve a goal. Feedback and scaffolding can help your students to monitor, regulate, and improve their critical thinking skills. You can provide feedback and scaffolding through various methods, such as verbal or written comments, rubrics, checklists, models, examples, hints, prompts, or questions.

5 Encourage collaboration and diversity

A fifth strategy to help your students develop critical thinking skills is to encourage collaboration and diversity in your classroom. Collaboration is the process of working with others to achieve a common goal or outcome. Diversity is the recognition and appreciation of the differences and similarities among people, cultures, and perspectives. Collaboration and diversity can help your students to develop critical thinking skills by exposing them to different ideas, opinions, experiences, and viewpoints. They can also help your students to communicate effectively, respect others, and learn from each other.

6 Foster a growth mindset

A sixth strategy to help your students develop critical thinking skills is to foster a growth mindset in your classroom. A growth mindset is the belief that one's abilities and intelligence can be improved through effort, feedback, and learning. A growth mindset can help your students to develop critical thinking skills by enhancing their motivation, resilience, and confidence. It can also help your students to embrace challenges, learn from mistakes, seek feedback, and persist in the face of difficulties. You can foster a growth mindset in your classroom by praising your students' efforts, strategies, and progress, rather than their innate abilities or outcomes.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?