Critical Thinking

Curated search. Gives you a list of credible resources. Students need to determine what is relevant. Visit SweetSearch for School Librarians for content that helps students use the Web effectively. Visit our SweetSites for teachers and students, organized by subject and academic level. Visit SweetSearch Biographies for profiles of 1,000+ significant people. Visit SweetSearch Social Studies for our best social studies content. Take our Ten Steps to Better Web Research

"INFORMATION SKILLS RATING SCALE This document was developed as part of a consulting assignment with the library media staff of the Oak Harbor (WA) Schools, who wished to create a rating scale which would help them assess how well students are performing on the tasks associated with the Research Cycle . The document is copyrighted by the Oak Harbor Schools and by Jamie McKenzie, but copies may be made by schools for distribution to staff. Any other duplication or transmittal in any form is prohibited unless permission is granted expressly."

David, This looks extremely useful. How might we get "permission granted" for school-wide use? Jean

"Welcome to ProCon.org. We promote critical thinking, education, and informed citizenship by presenting research on controversial issues in a straightforward, nonpartisan, and primarily pro-con format. Our websites are free, unbiased, and updated periodically. ProCon.org is an independent, nonpartisan, 501(c)(3) nonprofit public charity."

"Students have more information at their fingertips than ever before, yet the challenge remains for them to find, evaluate, and apply the information they discover in the classroom and beyond. Applying critical thinking skills through web research can help students: * Improve search skills. * Evaluate the information they find. * Incorporate them in their work. Explore the ready-to-use curriculum below, including detailed lesson plans, student worksheets, and class demonstrations on: * Mechanics of searching * Validity and reliability * Plagiarism * Citing web sources * Civil discourse"

"Top Rationality Blogs " Blogs are organized by category. Some of them are: Skeptic Zoners Sorting out Science Skeptico Fallacy Files Science-Based Pharmacy Bad Science

... not just any type of mistake in reasoning counts as a logical fallacy. To be a fallacy, a type of reasoning must be potentially deceptive, it must be likely to fool at least some of the people some of the time. Moreover, in order for a fallacy to be worth identifying and naming, it must be a common type of logical error. "Some years after I began to amass these files, I wondered just what I ought eventually to do with them, how best to organize the information within them, and in what form to make them available to others interested in fallacy studies. The present hypertext web version, The Fallacy Files, was first published on March 11th, 2001, and is the result of this score of years of research and fieldwork on the fallacies. "

"A SUPER-STREAMLINED CONCEPTION OF CRITICAL THINKING Robert H. Ennis, 6/20/02"

"I'd like to briefly take a look at using critical thinking specifically for reading blogs and tweets (although this method could apply to just about anything). While there isn't an official formula for doing this, I'd like to suggest using "The Five W's" that we learn in elementary school as guidelines for inquiry; they include Who?, What?, Where?, When?, Why?, and (sometimes) How?. Instead of using the Five W's for developing content (they're the basics for writing a successful news piece), use the Five W's to analyze any post/piece of writing. Here's how to get started:

Analysis of critical thinking. Very good resource for evaluation as well.

"Neil Postman's classic essay Bullshit and the Art of Crap-Detection. Contains a handy taxonomy of forms of bullshit, and some useful "laws" such as: Almost nothing is about what you think it is about-including you.""

"Questioning: A comprehension strategy for small-group guided reading http://www.readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=408 A lesson plan for grades 3-5 English Language Arts * Learn more about language arts, metacognitive strategies, questioning, and reading. * Email * Delicious Delicious * Digg Digg * Facebook Facebook * StumbleUpon StumbleUpon\n\nIn this ReadWriteThink lesson, the teacher explains the difference between thin (factual) and thick (inferential) questions, and then models how to compose question webs by thinking aloud while reading. Students observe how to gather information about the topic and add it to question webs in the form of answers or additional questions. Students practice composing thin and thick questions, as well as monitoring their comprehension, by using question webs independently in small-group reading. This practice extends knowledge of the topic and engages readers in active comprehension. "

"III. Research and Information Fluency \nStudents apply digital tools to gather, evaluate, and use information. Students: \n A. plan strategies to guide inquiry.\n B. locate, organize, analyze, evaluate, synthesize, and ethically use information\n C. evaluate and select information sources and digital tools based on the appropriateness to specific tasks. \n D. process data and report results. \n\nIV. Critical Thinking, Problem-Solving & Decision-Making \nStudents use critical thinking skills to plan and conduct research, design and manage projects, solve problems, engineer solutions and make informed decisions using appropriate digital tools and resources. Students: \n A. identify and define authentic problems and significant questions for investigation. \n B. plan, design and manage activities to develop a solution or complete a project.\n C. collect and analyze data to identify solutions and/or make informed decisions.\n D. use multiple processes and diverse perspectives to explore alternative solutions. "

"TruthOrFiction.com...your Email Reality Check \n\nGet the truth about rumors, inspirational stories, virus warnings, hoaxes, scams, humorous tales, pleas for help, urban legends, prayer requests, calls to action, and other forwarded emails."

"Regret the Error reports on media corrections, retractions, apologies, clarifications and trends regarding accuracy and honesty in the press. It was launched in October 2004 by Craig Silverman, a freelance journalist and author based in Montreal."

"Fundamentals are not "because I said so" facts and figures; they're the tools, the equipment, we need to get to the real stuff, the critical thinking and the creativity in any endeavor. When you hear a jazz musician riffing at a million miles an hour, he is absolutely improvising; he is not winging it. He's giving his brain the freedom to be brave, to explore, unencumbered by the burden of needing to actively cogitate on those fundamentals. He knows his art so thoroughly that he has the discipline to toe the line, the freedom to confidently act outside preconceived parameters, and-most importantly-the wisdom to know when to do one or the other."

reading: lifting your mind up from understanding less to understanding more; we must read above our "level"

"The only standard we have for judging all of our social, economic, and political institutions and arrangements as just or unjust, as good or bad, as better or worse, derives from our conception of the good life for man on earth, and from our conviction that, given certain external conditions, it is possible for men to make good lives for themselves by their own efforts." Mortimer J. Adler

Google Search of Primary Sources Documents: Getting to the truth; finding the perspectives; analyzing the progression; making connections; projecting into the future

"As I talk with leaders in the education and librarian communities, I am, particularly bothered by reports of students who just paste information from Wikipedia or Google into their term papers and call it a day. No matter what search brand you are using, these reports mean that a generation of youngsters are growing up accepting that just the first few examples of information they see on their screens are sufficient, and a generation of teachers are spending time struggling to convince them they need good Internet research skills. "