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Diigo provides a great way to model and practice reading informational text and to engage students in collaborative virtual discussions.  Many know Delicious and Diigo as social bookmarking sites.  Diigo is so much more!  Find a website that you want your students to read.  Then use Diigo to model the active reading process and make notations right on the web site by using the Diigo tools of Sticky Notes and Highlighting.  Paste a sticky note at the beginning of the text to remind students to ask themselves, “What do you already know about this topic?”  Also, add a sticky note reminding students to note their purpose for reading.  Diigo’s highlighting tools include four different colors.  Use the various colors and model how to find the main ideas and highlight only the essential words in yellow.  Supporting details, key vocabulary words,  and confusing parts can each be highlighted with different colors.  Consistency in highlighting color will provide another cue for students about text structure.  Diigo serves as  an excellent tool for modeling the pre-reading process, for pointing out text features and structure, and to practice active reading by making connections and asking questions.  Once students are ready for independent practice, Diigo can be taken to another level.  Educator accounts allow teachers to create classes.  Each student  in the class can annotate  and highlight the assigned web site article independently.  Connections, questions, and comments  are then shared with the teacher and the class.  “Sticky note”  or “Read and Say Something” conversations can then be conducted through Diigo. 

Critical thinking is a set of values and cognitive strategies employed to rationally evaluate information for its potential usefulness and accuracy. In this regard, critical thinking covers three fields; Personal values embracing logic, reasoning, objectivity and internal consistency of information Skills and cognitive approaches that allow the individual to search for and evaluate different information sources An appreciation of the relationship between the application of accurate information in decision making and the probability of a predictable outcome

In an age of diverse media, especially with regards to the internet, information sources present confusing options. Not all information is equal. Teaching people to understand the context and cues associated with good information gives them the ability to make better informed decisions that will have the best chance of leading to those outcomes they wish for.

This places critical thinking at odds with philosophies that elevate some bodies of knowledge to being dogmatic and beyond question.

Don’t show, don’t tell? Cognitive scientists find that when teaching young children, there is a trade-off between direct instruction and independent exploration. Emily Finn, MIT News Office

It turns out that there is a “double-edged sword” to pedagogy: Explicit instruction makes children less likely to engage in spontaneous exploration and discovery.

The danger is leading children to believe that they’ve learned all there is to know, thereby discouraging independent discovery.