Педагогические науки/5. Современные методы обучения

К.п.н. Туласынова Н.Ю.

Северо-Восточный Федеральный университет им. М.К. Аммосова, Россия

Critical thinking development in English language teaching

Nowadays society needs undergraduates with critical thinking,that is the ability to acquire and use knowledge for problem solving. The process of Critical thinking formation and development is still educational problem which requires solving.

In modern literature there are many definitions of critical thinking. B. Russell says: « The critical thinking is a process of estimation or a categorization of basic knowledge in terms … it includes instructions plus knowledge plus skills of thinking».

It is possible to present it in the form of equality [1]: Instructions + Knowledge + Skills of thinking = Intellectual thinking. Thus, developing critical thinking, we develop students’ intelligence. Hence, the first and essential component of critical thinking is instructions development and readiness for critical thinking.

Studying of critical thinking is based on the taxonomy of the pedagogical purposes developed in 1956 by the group of American psychologists and teachers under the direction of famous scientist B. Bloom [2]. The concept of "taxonomy" means the classification and ordering objects which is constructed on the basis of their natural interrelation and uses the categories arranged consistently on complexity for the description of objects.

Bloom distinguishes six categories of the educational purposes: 1. Knowledge. 2. Understanding. 3. Application. 4. The analysis. 5. Synthesis. 6. Opinion. Three levels of taxonomy analysis, synthesis and opinion scientists classify to critical thinking, or Higher-Order Thinking (Matt Thomas, Anthony Manzo) [3].

Let’s examine the educational process on theme: «the Student's family» at teachers training institute, the students of extralinguistic high schools – 2^nd course, 4^th semester.

1. Level of Knowledge. Theme studying begins with vocabulary. After vocabulary studying it is recommended to make exercises to memorize it: Gapped Text, Sentence transformation, Open Close exercises, the exercises aiming to information exchange and others. These exercises are based on cognitive and speech-thinking activity and, hence, are connected with thinking development. For vocabulary application and its formation into speech exercises on language, guess development and transformation are effective and also the questions-answers form of work which serves as a preparatory stage to discussion. Following types of tasks are applied: list, tell, show, name.

2. Level of Understanding. Before reading the text «Students’ family» it is necessary to give students instructions to follow author’s reasoning for understanding author’s view. Then we can proceed to text discussion and intellectual abilities formation. At this stage basic intellectual abilities are formed, i.e. abilities to find out the main idea, reconstruct the information and find out the detailed information. It is necessary to check up how adequately students have understood the material. Text discussion is recommended to be spent in the form of the questions directed on text interpretation, and using a face-to-face activity since in case of the false answer a teacher can help to find a true answer by means of leading questions and achieve the whole comprehension. Keywords for tasks at this level are: compare, contrast, explain, translate, classify, summarize. For example: 1. Explain: what is students’ family? 2. How do students bring up children? 3. Compare: how do family students study? 4. Summarize: what is the main reason for marriage? 5. Explain: what is the basis of family?

After students have discussed the text and teacher has checked up what they have understood and comprehended the text, students receive the task to retell it shortly. Ability to summarize the information is the important intellectual ability and deserves special attention. It is necessary to explain the task: the teacher introduces the scheme of text retelling beforehand. This task is recommended for conducting in small groups or teams as team work allows listeners to exchange opinions and judgments, argue and come to a common decision in the process of task performance. The teacher controls and organizes the educational process so that all the participants have been involved in work and are responsible for their part of work. The result is summed up by the teacher who gives the critical analysis of answers, pointing out the strong and the weak points of answers.

3. Application level. A following important stage from the point of view of critical thinking development is the problem statement, which is connected with ability to ask questions, which refers to abilities of critical thinking. This task suggests "brainstorming" work in small groups. Each group suggests a problem which a teacher writes down on a board: 1. Can living conditions influence studying process? 2. Is student’s scholarship enough for studying and living? 3. Is a child problem or happiness? 3. Is students’ family possible? After the problem is defined, it is necessary to find out what students know about it, what they should find out, what information is necessary for conclusion making. This stage corresponds to the level of "application". Keywords for tasks here are: apply, choose, plan, develop and organize.

4. Level of Analysis. At this stage detailed arguments discussion is taking place. This stage suggests the development of such abilities as ability to choose the information from different sources, analyze it, compare the facts, reason and opinions. It corresponds to the level of "analysis". The following tasks are recommended: analyze, compare, contrast, examine, list and distinguish. For example: What do you think about early marriages? Are you for or against it. Compare: the advantages and disadvantages of early marriage? Examine the pros and cons of cohabitation or living together? List the advantages of registered or official marriage? Students received the task to make the questionnaire, question the 2^nd and 5^th year students of faculty of Elementary education, make the questionnaire analysis, compare questionnaire results and finally, find out the advantages and disadvantages of early, official and civil marriages.

5. Level of Synthesis. Having analyzed and comprehended the questions, students should formulate the relation to problem giving reasons. It corresponds to the level of "synthesis" in B. Bloom's taxonomy. At this stage they should demonstrate the ability to establish cause and effect relationships, compare different opinions, agree or disagree with any of them and formulate the given reason conclusions. Keywords for tasks are: combine, compose, plan, predict, propose, imagine. The role-game was offered to the students: Let’s discuss a problem of early marriages: Imagine: You are both 17 and you decided to get married. Explain your reasons. You are their parents and you worried. You do not think they should get married at such a young age. Give your reasons. Students model the situation in which it is necessary to play a role of children who are going to get married and their parents.

6. Level of Opinion. It corresponds to level of "estimation" in B. Bloom's taxonomy and assumes ability to formulate the position on a concrete problem on the basis of found information, define how important the information is for the problems solving. Therefore tasks can be the following: justify, recommend, prove, and agree. At this stage the task was given to students to prepare presentation on the basic problems: 1. Difficulties: living conditions and student’s budget. 2. Is a child a problem or happiness? 3. Family from Female Student of View.

Students demonstrated presentations by means of Power Point programme, shared opinions on a student's family, revealed problems of student's families, presented the results of questionnaire of the 2^nd and 5^th year students and suggested ways of problems solving. Students conducted information research, found a large quantity of material for the conclusions argument. It shows the abilities to distinguish the fact from opinion, compare different points of view, structure and generalize the information and make basic conclusions.

Thus, studying foreign language we can solve a problem not only to form the communication competence, but also to develop students’ critical thinking by means of foreign language. In this case a foreign language is both the purpose, and the tutorial. Reading text or listening to the information we should understand the main idea, reconstruct logic of a statement, single out a problem, compare it with what we have already known and define what additional information is necessary for drawing a conclusion and formulate opinion on a concrete problem. As we see, it demands certain intellectual abilities. We should be able to analyze gathered information, estimate its importance, choose and structure required information, then synthesize it and use at the problem solving and reason opinions. All these are critical thinking abilities. Critical thinking formation and development abilities should be conducted at all levels of foreign language teaching.

Literature

1. Халпeрн Д. Психология критического мышления. – Спб.: «Издательство «Питер», 2000.

2. Bloom’s Taxonomy. http.://www. faculty. washington.edu/ rumme/guides/bloom.html

3. Matt Thomas, Anthony Manzo. Higher-Order Thinking Strategies for the Classroom. http.: // members.aol.com/ MattT10574/ html