Thinking Skills Concept

A. Explain the concept of “thinking skills”

What is thinking?

Thinking involves critical and creative aspects of the mind, both the use of reason and the generation of ideas. Thinking is involved in any mental activity that helps to formulate or solve a problem, to make a decision or to seek understanding.

Thinking Skills is the mental processthat involve solve problems, make decisions, ask questions, construct plans, evaluate ideas, and organize information. The development of thinking skills is often listed as the most important reason for formal education because the ability to think critically is essential for success in the contemporary world where the rate at which new knowledgeis created is rapidly accelerating. Although most educators

In order to engage students in critical thinking, the teacher needs to act as a facilitator to allow for discussion and encourage a freer thought process, and to encourage understanding that thinking critically does not always end with a right answer, but instead sometimes ends in more questions or differing evaluations of the topic (Halx&Reybold, 2005; Arend, 2009). The educator’s role as facilitator also encourages a peer review process, even in the youngest of children, and helps students to learn appropriate responses to conflicting evaluations and opinions (Henderson-Hurley & Hurley, 2013; Tsai et al.,

Why is it important to teach “thinking skills” to school students?

Thinking skills are viewed as fundamental for educated persons so as to be able to cope with the rapidly changing world. Many teachers believe that specific knowledge will not be as important to tomorrow’s workers and citizens as the ability to learn and make sense of new information. It is considered very important to teach school students “thinking skills” since they are going to be citizens and workers after leaving school. There are different types of thinking skills that the teacher needs to teach to students.

Thinking skills consist of reflective thinking, critical thinking, creative thinking and higher order thinking. Critical thinking and reflective thinking are often used synonymously. Critical thinking involves a wide range of thinking skills that lead towards desirable outcomes and reflective thinking focuses on the process of making good or bad judgments about what has happened.

However, reflective thinking is most important in prompting learning during complex problem-solving situations as it provides students with the opportunity to step back and think about the appropriate problem solving strategies so as to achieve their goal. Thinking skill force the students to look at the information as a process instead of simply information to be memorized. It helps them to develop skills of recognition and prediction, hence increasing their reading and problem- solving