teaching higher order thinking skills during a culture war
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Teaching Higher Order Thinking Skills During a Culture War. Anthony W. Palmer MA. Azusa Pacific University. Overview. Overview. Background of Paper and my Biography Definitions and Descriptions The Ethical Dilemma The Perspectives of Major Players Ethical Perspectives A Resolution - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Teaching Higher Order Thinking Skills
During a Culture War
Anthony W. Palmer MA.Azusa Pacific University
Background of Paper and my Biography
Definitions and Descriptions
The Ethical Dilemma
The Perspectives of Major Players
Ethical Perspectives
A Resolution
Question and Answer
Overview
Background of this Paper
The Ethics Paper
The Perspectives of Major Players
Ethical Perspectives
A Resolution
Higher Order Thinking Skills
Bloom, B. S. (1956). Taxonomy of educational objectives, handbook 1: Cognitive domain. New York: Longmans Green.
Anderson, L. W. (86). Krathwohl (Eds.). (2001). A Taxonomy for learning, teaching, and assessing: A revision of bloom's taxonomy of educational objectives.
Higher Order Thinking Skills Versus
Lower Order Thinking Skills
No Child Left Behind - Race to the Bottom of Blooms Taxonomy
HOTS
LOTTS
Analyzing
“Breaking material into constituent parts, determining how the parts relate to one another and to an overall structure or purpose through differentiating, organizing, and attributing.” (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001, pp. 67)
Evaluating
“Making judgments based on criteria and standards through checking and critiquing.”(Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001, pp. 67)”
Creating
“Putting elements together to form a coherent or functional whole; reorganizing elements into a new pattern or structure through generating, planning, or producing.” (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001, pp. 68)
Texas Republican Party Platform, 2012
“We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking
Skills (HOTS), (values clarification), critical
thinking skills and similar programs that are simply
a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE)
(mastery learning) which focus on behavior
modification and have the purpose of challenging
the student's fixed beliefs and undermining parental
authority.”
•
Image: Johnathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind via the Chronicle of Higher Education
Bishop, B. (2009). The big sort: Why the clustering of like-minded America is tearing us apart. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
The Percentage of Citizens with College Degrees
1990 2009
Bishop, B. (2009). The big sort: Why the clustering of like-minded America is tearing us apart. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Texas Republican Party Platform, 2012
“We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking
Skills (HOTS), (values clarification), critical
thinking skills and similar programs that are simply
a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE)
(mastery learning) which focus on behavior
modification and have the purpose of challenging
the student's fixed beliefs and undermining
parental authority.”
The Necessity of Higher Order thinking skills
The Survival of American Democracy
Survival in a 21st Century Economy
The Survival of American Democracy
“Among American adults, a mere 20% have the capacity to
understand the nuances of politics and public policy. More
than half of the population of American adults cannot make
sense of the complex information patterns that shape public
policy” (Stoller, 2012). Higher order thinking skill are
requisite for a nuanced understanding of complicated issues
such as global climate change, the war on terrorism, and the
importance of regulating financial institutions.
The Survival of 21st Century Economy
“According to the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, these
poll results are the same as the findings of a study of
employers done in 2006. In that study, U.S. employers
indicated that today's students are ill prepared for workplace
demands and would continue to be so until 21st-century skills
are systematically taught as part of the curriculum.”
(Rosenfeld, 2007, p.6)
The Survival of 21st Century American Economy
“Knowledge workers of the 21st century must be highly skilled in
analysis, synthesis, and evaluation” (Aloysius Sequeira, 2012, p. 1).
HOTS are not just
“the icing on the cake”,
HOTS are the cake!
Ethical Positions
Jesus Christ Immanuel Kant John Stuart Mill Altruism Categorical Imperative Utilitarianism
Immanuel Kant’s Categorical Imperative
“Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.”
(Immanuel Kant; translated by James W. Ellington [1785] (1993). Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals 3rd ed. Hackett. p. 30).
Major Players
Students
Teachers
Principals
The Texas GOP and others opposed to Higher Order Thinking Skills
Christian Perspectives On Higher Order Thinking Skills
Progressive Christianity Christian Fundamentalism
Christian Fundamentalism
Versus
Progressive Christianity
- Contextual reading of the Bible- Accommodation to Science- Ethic of Altruism - Avoid Authoritarianism
("Soul Play: What Is Progressive Christianity Exactly?". The Flip Side. University of
Wisconsin – Eau Claire.)
Progressive Christianity
“A person who is a good and true
Christian should realize that truth
belongs to his Lord, wherever it is
found, gathering and acknowledging it
even in pagan literature, but rejecting
superstitious vanities and deploring and
avoiding those who 'though they knew
God did not glorify him as God...”
- Saint Augustine, On Christian Teaching II.75.
Christian Fundamentalism
- Literal reading of the Bible- Reaction against Modernity - Reaction against Science i.e. evolution, age of the Earth, sex education - Authoritarian Ethic
Torrey, R. A., Dixon, A. C., & Meyer, L. (Eds.). (2003). The fundamentals: A testimony to the truth (Vol. 3). Baker Books.
Christian
Fundamentalism “Let every soul be subject unto the
higher powers. For there is no
power but of God: the powers that
be are ordained of God. Whosoever
therefore resisteth the power,
resisteth the ordinance of God: and
they that resist shall receive to
themselves damnation.”
Romans 13:1-2 KJV
Christian
Fundamentalism Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right" (Ephesians 6:1 KJV)
“Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything” (Colossians 3:22 KJV)
“Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's” (Mark 12:17 KJV)
Christian
Fundamentalism “We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking
Skills (HOTS), (values clarification), critical thinking
skills and similar programs that are simply a
relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE)
(mastery learning) which focus on behavior
modification and have the purpose of challenging the
student's fixed beliefs and undermining parental
authority.”
(Texas Republican Party Platform, July
2012)
The Ethical Resolution
Educators must find a way to be faithful to the academic
standards in the context of the current culture war.
Resolution
Teachers must teach these crucial
skills, administrators should
support teachers who do and
challenge and equip those who
do not.
Resolution
School boards should defend
the teaching of Higher Order
Thinking Skills and provide a
strong, articulate, and
compelling defense of the
teaching of Higher Order
Thinking Skills to the
community.
Resolution
State Legislatures should resist
any attempt to prevent the
teaching of Higher Order
Thinking Skills. The State
Legislatures should require the
teaching of Higher Order
Thinking Skills in every school
in their respective states.