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March 2010 Newsletter

Foundation for Critical Thinking

NEWSLETTER
Foundation for Critical Thinking
www.criticalthinking.org

March
2010

Join us at the... World's Longest Running Annual Conference on Critical Thinking 2010 CONFERENCE THEME: How To Teach Students To Master Content By Developing A Questioning Mind July 19 - 22, 2010 Preconference: July 17-18 Near U.C. Berkeley The Center and Foundation for Critical Thinking have together hosted critical thinking academies and conferences for three decades. During that time, we have played a key role in defining, structuring, assessing, improving and advancing the principles and best practices of fair-minded critical thought in education and in society. We invite you to join us for the 30th International Conference on Critical Thinking. Our annual conference provides a unique opportunity for you to improve your understanding of critical thinking, as well as your ability to more substantively foster it in the classroom and in all aspects of your work and life. Early Discount Registration is Now Open.
SPRING 2010 Workshop Series It’s not too late to sign up for our spring workshops to be held March 20-21 in Berkeley, CA. Please note that our hotel room block rate expires on MARCH 8. Choose one of the following three workshops: Integrating a Comprehensive Understanding of Critical Thinking into Effective Design for Teaching and Learning Academic Content… Richard Paul Placing a Robust Framework for Critical Thinking At the Heart Of Your Institution’s Mission, Accreditation or Reaccreditation Process… Linda Elder Approaching Students as Thinkers; Cultivating the Intellect… Enoch Hale To find out more, please check our conference page: Spring Workshop information
In Current News... You may be interested in reading an article by Dr. Linda Elder entitled "Reason to Live" and published in Times Higher Education, A UK higher education publication. The article focuses on how faculty can use Socratic methods to develop rational thought..and to move closer to the realization of cultures which value critical thinking. Click here to read the full article
News from the Archives…by Linda Elder In 1985, many educators and critical thinking theoreticians began to use the phrase “critical thinking movement” in reference to what appeared to be real progress in the direction of infusing critical thinking across the curriculum, across the various levels of education (K-12 and beyond), and across the country. In January 14, 1985, The US News and World Report featured an article entitled: Think: Now Schools are Teaching How: A variety of efforts…are being used to spur more critical thought. This article states: “In classrooms across the country, teachers have launched an urgent effort to make young people think rather than memorize masses of facts. Many educators say nurturing of the ability to reason has been neglected in the campaign to teach basic subjects in recent years, and a catch-up is necessary to provide young people with the proper tools to prosper in an increasingly complex society.” A number of initiatives are listed and discussed in the article, all presumably aimed at critical thinking. The winter 1985 edition of Phi Kappa Phi Journal, National Forum, also focused on the topic of critical thinking and featured articles by important theoreticians of the day, including Neil Postman, Mathew Lipman, Edward Glaser, Robert Ennis, Michael Scriven and Richard Paul. An introductory article by Richard Paul was entitled The Critical-Thinking Movement: A Historical Perspective. In this article, Paul says: “The ‘critical thinking’ movement is just now beginning to have a palpable effect on the day-to-day life of American schooling. California is a bellwether in this regard. Four years ago, the massive nineteen-campus California State University system instituted a graduation requirement in critical thinking intended to achieve: ‘…an understanding of the relationship of language to logic, leading to the ability to analyze, criticize, and advocate ideas, to reason inductively and deductively, and to reach factual or judgmental conclusions, based on sound inferences drawn from unambiguous statements of knowledge or belief.’ Within two years the even larger community college system established a parallel requirement. And now, two years further down the line, the California State Department of education is preparing to test all eighth grade pupils in three areas…Remarkable, and representing a striking new testing emphasis, approximately one-third of the items have been designed to test critical-thinking skills (p. 2).” Paul optimistically goes on to say “If I read the signs correctly..then finally and at long last the time has come [for critical thinking] (p. 32). Sadly, and I think Paul would agree, he was wrong. California’s K-12 schools, on average, are very far from embracing critical thinking (similar to schools across the nation). Though the California State University system and the California community college system both still require students to take critical thinking courses, there is no guarantee that these courses will not be courses in formal logic, informal logic, rhetoric, communications, or any number of other subjects disguised as critical thinking. In the state of California, departments of philosophy tend to have a stranglehold on critical thinking courses, usually requiring faculty who teach such courses to hold degrees in philosophy. Because critical thinking is not yet a discipline of its own, it tends to be “defined” in accordance with the subjects or courses faculty already teach, especially when FTE is part of the equation. The argument would go something like this: “I teach formal logic, therefore critical thinking is formal logic.” Or informal logic or anything else the instructor already teaches and can argue is “critical thinking.” At present we are experiencing what might be considered another critical thinking “movement.” More institutions are using critical thinking as the keystone of their accreditation and reaccreditation processes. The phrase “critical thinking” has never been used more often than it is today, historically speaking. But the challenge of bringing about change through critical thinking in the long-run so as to transform the way we think of education, and indeed life itself, remains.
“The critical habit of thought, if usual in society, will pervade all its mores, because it is a way of taking up the problems of life.” William Graham Sumner, 1906