While university students are adept at acquiring knowledge, they are less and less skilled in critical thinking, and nearly illiterate in enlarged understanding, or contextual thinking. Higher education trains students to merely assume responsibility for tasks, not think about the larger realities of which they are a part. (MSE)

The author defends and clarifies a previous assertion that college faculty may need to be taught to take advantage of classroom opportunities to make insights and awareness clear to their students. (MSE)

The traditional college curriculum is seen as a collection of answers for students who do not yet have the questions; an alternative approach that nurtures students' capacities for inquiry is suggested and outlined. (MSE)

The reflective judgment model offers a rich context for analysis of science and science teaching. It provides deeper understanding of the scientific process and its critical thinking and reveals fundamental connections between science and the other liberal arts. Classroom techniques from a college chemistry course illustrate the utility of the…

Literature and liberal arts college students' early research experience usually stresses methodology and is carefully structured and supervised. In advanced work, students must begin to develop habits of critical thinking, personal involvement with their material, and development of a metacritical attitude. (MSE)

College honors programs provide an especially promising context in which to promote reflective judgment by challenging and expanding students' intellectual horizons. However, faculty must carefully assess the different levels of cognitive development among their students, cultivate the skills of reflective judgment accordingly, and understand that…

Examines key psychological principles in contemporary theories of learning (constructivism) and highlights conceptual connections between them and aspects of critical thinking and epistemological maturity described by the reflective judgment model of adult intellectual development. Also describes an undergraduate psychology lesson that bridges…

The effect of college course content on students' growth in critical thinking was investigated. Students enrolled in various philosophy courses and a non-philosophy control were pre- and post-tested for critical thinking. Only the logic course had a consistent impact on certain aspects of critical thinking. (Author/RD)

This article discusses William G. Perry's model of intellectual development, which posits that college students move through four phases of understanding their relationship to knowledge: dualism (knowledge as received truth), multiplicity (knowledge as opinion), relativism (knowledge as relativistic), and commitment in relativism. Specific…

Despite some concerns about its limitations, one college English teacher has found the reflective judgment model (1) very useful in a first-year course on the Vietnam War for understanding students' processes of deliberation, (2) supportive of undergraduate teaching approaches that emphasize critical inquiry, and (3) helpful in guiding responses…

The formal development of critical thinking is discussed, and guidance is provided to help faculty insure that critical thinking becomes an integral part of learning. Theory, research, teaching practice, and college programs pertinent to the development and role of critical thinking are presented in order to show how educators have shaped…

This book offers broad, practical strategies for teaching science and engineering courses and describes how faculty can provide a learning environment that helps students comprehend the nature of science, understand science concepts, and solve problems in science courses. The student-centered approach focuses on two main themes: reflective writing…

This report describes the development over three trial semesters of a required course for sophomores at Baker University (Kansas) to develop reasoning and critical thinking skills that would prepare them for a required senior capstone course. The report describes the work of the faculty team that prepared two textbooks ("Reasoning and…

The essentials of Piaget's theory and its application to teaching at the college level are described as part of the Learning and Evaluation Service workshop, Teaching Students to Reason, offered at Michigan State University. Objectives are to enable the teacher to: (1) diagnose and classify reasoning patterns of students; (2) evaluate current…

An approach to developing college students' critical thinking skills, designed for freshman composition students but adaptable for other disciplines, is outlined. Components include: establishing bounds of analysis; using bibliography to foster scholarship; capitalizing on emotional response; learning the genre to be analyzed by writing in it;…