Lesson Plan: Critical Thinking for AP High School/College Levels

Objectives: Students should be able to

-define critical thinking;

-become aware of their thinking process (how they think); and

-articulate what their thinking process is for/during a problem-solving activity.

Time Frame: One class session (Day one of the semester or quarter)--of three hours.

Preliminary Discussion:

Prompt--What does critical thinking mean to you?

Students would write for ten to twenty minutes, then share their responses.

What often comes up is the response that the adjective "critical" has negative connotations/implications. The instructor can bring in the dictionary definitions of the word, emphasizing that discernment will involve negative, positive, and even neutral elements, approaches, and results.

Another prompt will help launch students' thinking about thinking, and about what critical thinking will be good for in school and in life:

How can we use critical thinking as a study aid? Or, how can thinking critically benefit us?

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The instructor will then introduce the first activity, mentioning how, to think, we might first understand (or get to know) our thinking process(es):

Here the instructor will have students get into pairs (or manageable groups of no more than four). Once they are settled, hand out cards from the game MindTrap™ (or homemade handout cards with logic problems).*

*The Mind Trap Game cards are each two-sided: on one side is the "question"-a riddle, problem, or anecdote to be figured out-and on the other side is the "answer"-or solution.

I usually carry the box around, urging each group to grab a handful. I also stress that it is very important the cards stay face up, so only the question side is showing.

One student will read one card (the problem side) aloud.

One student will record everything every person in the group says and does as soon as the card is read. The note-taker is observing every step taken during the process.