DEVELOPING CRITICAL THINKING THROUGH CLIL

 


Today I would like to focus my post on critical thinking skills in any content area. By now all of you know that I am a firm believer in the importance of  appropriate classroom  questions. Following critical thinking essentials,  I will try to show you some powerful evidence to support my belief. In order to do this, I will  share the outcomes of a recent research entitled " Effective questioning in CLIL classrooms: empowering thinking".  

The research was conducted by  Professor Rebecca Valverde.  I would like to congratulate her on this powerful research  and I highly recommend that should read it by entering this link. In short, the research aimed at determining whether stimulating higher-order thinking in CLIL classrooms  would result in a significant improvement in student outcomes. The results showed that this methodological intervention succeeded in its aim, as a marked improvement in student responses was achieved. These findings highlight the value of optimizing the use of questions to foster critical thinking and empower students for the knowledge economy in which we live.

Rebecca's reader-friendly paper includes a wide range of examples for  students aged 9 and 10 years old. I reckon that you will be able to adapt them to fit your Secondary classroom contexts  but I have written this worksheet with some examples for different content areas at Secondary level. I hope you will find it useful. 

Last but not least, keep in mind what the greatest critical thinker said: 


  



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