Assessing and Developing Students' Critical Thinking

Abstract

The development of critical thinking is an important step in achieving the goals of holistic education, not only through helping students gain knowledge but above all through ensuring that they think effectively. The aim of this article is to explore the concept of critical thinking and to discuss possibilities to develop students' critical thinking. This article presents results of an experiment that was carried out in Vilnius Pedagogical University and designed to develop students' critical thinking skills and to strengthen their motivation to think critically. We investigated how a critical thinking development programme influenced students' critical thinking skills and motivation. Our programme of critical thinking is based on the ideas of humanistic psychology and meaningful learning, and the main learning methods deployed were based on co-operative learning. Our critical thinking development course significantly influenced all the measured components of the students' critical thinking skills and some components of their motivation. We discuss the result, draws conclusions and suggest recommendations.