6 Critical Thinking Questions For Any Situation

Guest Post by TeachThought Staff

Originally posted @ TeachThought.com 

While it’s true that critical thinking is a foundation rather than a brick, how you build that foundation depends on the learning process itself: exposing students to new thinking and promoting interaction with that thinking in a gradual release of responsibility approach.

The following graphic from learningcommons is most useful for its universal applicability via its simplicity–six basic questions that characterize critical thinking.

The questions are general enough that they can be used with almost anything–different age groups, content areas, and various learning contexts.

Whether you’re exploring math theories with a high school classroom, astronomical phenomena in a university, or a picture book in the elementary classroom, the questions can be used with few changes to promote critical thinking.

In addition to 28 Critical Thinking Question Stems For Any Content Area, the questions below might prove useful to you as you help your students better understand what ‘critical thinking’ means and how it can improve their own lives.

6 Critical Thinking Questions For Any Situation

1. What’s happening?

Establish the basics and begin forming questions.

2. Why is it important?

Ask yourself why this is or isn’t significant.

3. What don’t I see?

Consider, alone or with others, if there’s any crucial information or perspective you might be missing, or that the ‘thing’ in question is missing.

See also 6 Alternatives To Bloom’s Taxonomy For Teachers

4. How do I know?

Identify how you know what you think you know, and how that meaning was constructed.

5. Who is saying it?

Identify the ‘position’ of the ‘thing’–a speaker and their position on an issue, for example–and then consider how that position could be influencing their thinking.

6. What else? What if?

Ask, ‘What else should we consider?’ and ‘If we consider it, how will it change X or Y?”

Note from Bob:  Kindergarten students start school asking an average of 200 plus questions a day!  16 years later they graduated from college asking an average of 20 questions a day.  What happened?  Most likely starting in Kindergarten the teacher told that young question-asker, “It’s my job to ask the questions!  It is your job to answer them!”  And indeed by the time they graduate from college the vital skill of “Asking Great Questions” has pretty much been made dormant.   This is why I personally love all those who focus on helping students develop the vital skill of asking great questions! Here are several past posts related to stimulating students to ask great questions:

TeachThought

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

TeachThought.com is an organization dedicated to innovation in education through the growth of innovative teachers.

MORE RECENT POSTS

Antidote to Stress and Anxiety

Guest Post by Roy Peterson The pressure of leadership in the business and ministry world has taken its toll...

7 QUESTIONS YOU CAN USE TO HELP ANYONE DEVELOP, EVEN THE BOSS

Guest Post by Dan Rockwell Leadership is more than getting things done. Leaders bring out the best in people....

Where Were You and What Were You Doing When You Heard the News 22 Years Ago Today

Today is a Day of Remembrance!  22 years ago today, America was attacked. I am curious, if you were then...

Is Your Message Good Enough?

Guest Post by Dr. Ron Harris Note from Bob:  You can either view Dr. Ron Harris sharing his “Guest...

How to Ask Questions That Generate Possibilities

Guest Post by Keith Webb Originally published at keithwebb.com  Questions are not all equal. Some questions...

Harvard Research: Effective Leaders Use These 3 Words to Improve Performance, Teamwork, and Buy-In

Guest Post by Jeff Haden In one study, simply adding one of the three words to a sentence increased...

30 Engaging Questions to Ask Your Senior Leaders

Guest Post by Benjamin Wann Originally Posted @ BenjaminWann.com In the entire stretch of your professional...

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.