Structures of Thought
After talking with my students and discovering that their sense of
critical thinking as a process was not very clearly formed in their
minds, I worked out a sequence of lessons that was intended to
accomplish three objectives: to help them understand CT better, to
have them apply their new understanding to course-related material,
and to have fun.
Lesson One:
I divide the class up into groups of four or five students. I give
each group twelve sheets of (recycled) 8 1/2” x 11” paper,
six feet of 1” masking tape, and a pair of scissors. Here are
the instructions I give them:
Your group will have 25 minutes to construct a free-standing
three-dimensional object from the materials you have been given.
(Free-standing means that it cannot be taped or otherwise secured to
anything else: it must stand on its own.) At the end of 25 minutes,
your constructions will be evaluated using four criteria: Height,
Stability, Aesthetic Appeal, and Task Efficiency. Points will be
awarded as follows: in each category, 5 points to the group which
comes in first, 3 points to the group that comes in second, 1 point
to the group that comes in third, and no points for the remaining
groups. The “height” category will count double, so there
are actually ten points available there.
Height should be self explanatory, and will be measured first. Second
will be stability, which I will test by coming over and blowing on
your construction. I will blow first softly, then a little harder,
and then I will huff and puff and attempt to blow your house down.
Aesthetic Appeal will be judged third. It will be a purely subjective
decision on my part about whether or not I find your construction
elegant and visual stimulating. Any construction which has failed the
huff and puff test will be deemed aesthetically unpleasing.
“Task Efficiency” will enable whatever groups finish early
- as long as they finish before the deadline to - pick up points.
Extra credit will be awarded to the members of the group that
performs best according to the stated criteria.
I will appoint in each group a process observer. The process observer
cannot participate in the actual construction, but should make notes
on the process the group uses: what it decides to do, how it decides
to do it, how the plan evolves and changes, what roles the members of
the group adopt. The process observer can make suggestions for
changes in the process, but cannot participate in the actual
construction or planning.
On my signal, the groups begin work. This activity generally turns
out to an extraordinarily high-interest and high-intensity exercise.
When time is called, I go through the judging as outlined above. We
then have about ten minutes left to hear the reports of the process
observers. As they report on their observations, I make note on the
board of some of the strategies unique to each group, and comment on
the thinking that gave rise to them. (For example, in one classs one
group figured out that if they simply ignored the height criterion
and concentrated on creating a piece that was elegant, and stable,
and got it done early, they would pick up 15 points and win. Most of
the other groups operated under the assumption that since height
counted double it was the most important factor. That assumption
proved to be faulty.) My goal in directing the discussion about the
process observations is to highlight for the students the idea that
there always IS a process and that that process is subject to
manipulation - IF anyone is paying attention. It was the job of the
process observer to pay attention.
Lesson Two:
Yesterday I asked you to work together in groups to build a
structure. Today I am going to ask you to work together in the same
groups to build another structure, but this time it’s not going
to be a three-dimensional structure, it’s going to be a
conceptual structure: a bridge.
I am going to give you two texts to work with. Your task is to build
a bridge between the two texts; that is, to come up with a statement
that shows the connections between them.
You will again have 25 minutes. This time the product will be in the
form of sentences written on this file card. I will give one file
card to each group. Before time is called today I would like your
group to come to an agreement as to what should be written on the
card. Yesterday’s criteria were Height, Stability, Aesthetic
Appeal, and Task Efficiency, which are appropriate criteria for
judging a three-dimensional product. Today’s criteria are
different, but should be familiar to you, since they are drawn from
the set of standards for writing and thinking that we have been
discussing all year. They are, Clarity, Accuracy, Relevance, and
Significance.
Once again I will ask the group to appoint a process observer. (You
may need to design a process for determining in a fair way who the
process observer will be.) Today the process observer can participate
in the discussion, but his/her primary concern will be to watch the
way the group works and once again report on how the group
operates.
At this point I give them copies of the two texts and read them out
loud. In the exercise I just completed, I asked the students to
compare part of a paragraph from All the Pretty Horses, the book we
are currently reading, with William Blake’s poem “The
Tyger.” (Click here to see the two
texts.)
I then ask the students to re-form in the same groups as the day
before and begin. At the end of the 25 minutes I ask the process
observers to report again, and we talk about process issues. At this
point I tell them explicitly that both of these exercises have been
designed as a kind of metaphor for or mirror of Critical Thinking. I
have come to believe that the essential message of CT as I understand
it can be expressed in two sentences:
1) You are always involved in a process.
2) You can always change the process if it is not working.
In each of these two lessons there was a question at issue, a
task. Completing the task involves coming up with some sort of
action plan. Once the task is completed, the next step is
generally some sort of assessment: did we solve the problem?
Is the solution a good one? How do we know?
The thinking that takes place at the level of action is just
thinking. But the thinking that monitors the process as it evolves,
that adapts or redefines the task, that troubleshoots along the way
and figures out how to overcome obstacles or get un-stuck:
THAT’s critical thinking as I understand it.
Now of course, all of this work has been done by students in small
groups. But I explain to the students that the group work is in a way
just a mirror of what individual thinkers do on their own inside
their heads. The role of the process observer is the critical
thinking function of the brain: the little voice inside your head
that talks you through whatever task is at hand.
Lesson Three
I have photocopied the file-card responses from each group. I tell
the students that I am going to turn over to them the responsibility
for doing the assessment of the file-card responses. I ask them to
rank-order the file card responses by applying the four criteria:
clarity, accuracy, relevance, and significance. At first they do this
individually. Then I ask them to get into groups, compare their
rankings, and see if they can come to a consensus within the group.
Again we compare and debrief.
(Click Here to see samples of
“winning” student response
to the assignment based on All the Pretty
Horses.)
It is my teacherly hope that this sequence of lessons gives the
students a clearer understanding of what CT is all about, and how to
apply it in the context of daily tasks and challenges. The message,
once again, is just this:
1) You are always involved in a process.
2) You can always change the process if it is not working.