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Education & Teaching vocabulary · Teaching Methods and Approaches

Critical thinking

Meaning in education & teaching, with examples

nounCore term

In education & teaching, critical thinking means: The ability to analyze information, question ideas, judge evidence and reach well-reasoned conclusions instead of simply accepting what you read or hear.

In Turkish: eleştirel düşünme

How it is used

Appears in almost every modern curriculum as a key skill. Teachers develop, encourage or promote critical thinking, and tasks are designed to build critical thinking skills. Often grouped with creativity, communication and collaboration as '21st-century skills'.

Example sentences

  1. Comparing two news reports about the same event is a good way to practice critical thinking.

  2. The new curriculum puts more emphasis on critical thinking and less on memorization.

Common collocations

  • critical thinking skills
  • develop critical thinking
  • encourage critical thinking
  • promote critical thinking
  • inquiry-based learningAn approach in which students learn by asking questions, investigating, gathering evidence and drawing their own conclusions, with the teacher guiding the process.
  • Bloom's taxonomyA framework that sorts thinking skills into levels, from remembering and understanding up to analyzing, evaluating and creating, used to write objectives and questions.
  • rote learningLearning information by repeating it until it can be remembered, often without understanding its meaning or how to use it.
  • digital literacyThe ability to find, evaluate, create and share information safely and responsibly using digital devices, software and the internet.

More terms: Teaching Methods and Approaches

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