NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOL PRINCIPALS Thinking About Thinking

This document summarizes five studies that offer insight into the nature of higher-order thinking skills and the most effective methods for teaching them to students. The reviews outline the conclusions, definitions, recommendations, specific methods of teaching, instructional strategies, and programs detailed in the documents themselves. Strategies mentioned include the Concept Attainment Model, the Inductive Thinking Model, the Group Investigation Model, a continuum of teaching styles, classroom climate, listening, wait-time, active learning, recognition, a contingency strategy, and a permeation strategy. The dccuments reviewed include: "Understanding Thinking Skills" (Bijaya K. Shrestha); "Teaching Critical Thinking Skills in the Psychomotor Domain" (Ron E. McBride, Carl C. Gabbard, Glenn Miller); "Critical and Creative Thinking in the Classroom" (Jerry L. Thacker); "Integrating Thinking Skills into the Curriculum" (Barry K. Beyer, and Judith Dorsch Backes); and "How to Keep Thinking Skills from Going the Way of All Frills" (Carl Bereiter). The unifying theme in these reports is a belief that thinking skills should not be taught in is'lation, but rather integrated across the rurriculum. (CLA) * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. *