How Can You Build Thinking Skills in Your Students?

Thinking is a very important part of an effective classroom and must be encouraged and taught. Marzano describes metacognitive thinking or ‘thinking about thinking’ as the primary vehicle for student learning. Metacognitive thinking is not easy to teach as it is an internal process. However, one can work toward creating a classroom that encourages higher order thinking skills.

How do students benefit from learning to think in the classroom?

• Improved academic achievement
• Relating what is learned in classrooms to real life situations
• Transfer and application of learning from one task to another
• Thoughtful actions and sound judgments in relation to real life situations
• A deeper interest in classroom learning as the student understands its implications

Application

How can a teacher encourage thinking in the classroom?

Higher order thinking can be encouraged in the classroom in both teacher focused and student-centered strategies in the following ways:

• Inquiry and analysis
• Setting specific learning objectives before each lesson
• Feedback on student approach
• Encouraging different modes of representation of the material by the students
• Encouraging the students to reflect on the way they approach the tasks given
• Decision making and problem solving approaches
• Hypothesizing

Discuss here: What strategies do you use to encourage thinking in your classroom?

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