MayJune2006

Volume 78Issue 6

The Agricultural

EDUCATIONM A G A Z I N E

THINKING CRITICALLY

2 The Agricultural Education Magazine

EDITORIAL

Critical Thinking: A Life-Long Endeavor

By Jamie Cano

Jamie Cano is an Associate Pro-fessor at The Ohio State Universityand is Editor of The AgriculturalEducation Magazine.

Everyone thinks, it is our nature

to do so. But much of our thinking, leftto itself, is biased, distorted, partial, un-informed, or down-right prejudiced. Yetthe quality of our life and that of whatwe produce, make, or build dependsprecisely on the quality of our thought.Shoddy thinking is costly, both in moneyand in quality of life. Excellence inthought, however, must be systemati-cally cultivated.

The ability to think critically isessential if individuals are to live, work,and function effectively in our currentand changing society. Students mustmake choices, evaluations, and judg-ments every day regarding informationto obtain, use, and believe and actionsto take. As adults, our students will beliving in a complex world and in a de-mocracy where both individual and col-lective actions will require effectiveselection, processing, and use of infor-mation.

Critical thinking of any kind isnever universal in any individual; ev-eryone is subject to episodes of undis-ciplined or irrational thought. Its qual-ity is therefore typically a matter ofdegree and dependent upon, amongother things, the quality and depth ofexperience in a given domain of think-ing or with respect to a particular classof questions. No one is a critical thinkerthrough-and-through, but only to such-and-such a degree, with such-and-suchinsights and blind spots, and subject tosuch-and-such tendencies towards self-delusion. For this reason, the develop-ment of critical thinking skills and dis-positions is a life-long endeavor.

Focusing directly on thinkingskills and the development and use ofthinking skills over time tends to pro-duce more effective thinking than un-planned emphasis on skill developmentor short term emphasis. State educa-tion programs often times emphasizethe development of thinking skillsthroughout the curriculum over time.Emphasis should be given to criticalquestioning, reading, writing, listening,and planning and carrying out activi-ties in all curriculum areas of agricul-tural education.

There are many reasons to be-lieve that the development of higher-order reasoning rests squarely on theavailability of ample amounts of rel-evant discourse. The development ofhigher-order reasoning has not oc-curred on any regular basis in mostagricultural education programs due tolack of teacher knowledge, lack ofmaterials, and class sizes. Organiza-tional arrangements which would dra-matically reduce class size, at least fora proportion of the school day, wouldlikely enhance the development ofhigher order thinking skills (Bennett,1987).

The quality of discourse and theamount of student interaction are alsoimportant. There needs to be a shiftin many agricultural education classesfrom a teacher-centered classroom toa student-centered classroom in whichstudents can be involved in collectingand analyzing information, paired prob-lem solving, cooperative learning set-tings, simulations, debates, and criticalreporting sessions.

Providing experiences in real-lifesituations or situations that simulatereal-life increases the probability thatskills will be used. Providing modeling

of the skills, ample opportunities forpractice, and feedback on the effec-tiveness of the student’s thinking arealso important considerations. Selec-tion of experiences should be based onthe developmental levels of the stu-dents.

Critical thinking is, in short, self-directed, self-disciplined, self-moni-tored, and self-corrective thinking. Itpresupposes assent to rigorous stan-dards of excellence and mindful com-mand of their use. Critical thinkingentails effective communication andproblem solving abilities and a commit-ment to overcome our native egocen-trism and sociocentrism.

References

Bennett, S. (1987). New dimen-sions in research on class size and aca-demic achievement. National Centerfor Effective Secondary Schools. Uni-versity of Wisconsin, Madison.

3 May - June 2006

Theme: Thinking Critically

CONTENTS

Editorial:Critical Thinking: A Life-Long Endeavor ................................................. 2By Jamie Cano, Editor

Theme Editor Comments:Can We Really Teach Students to Think Critically? ............................... 4By Rick Rudd

Theme Articles:How Do You Teach a Disposition to Think Critically? ............................ 8By Curt Friedel

It’s All Interpretation ............................................................................... 11By John Ricketts

Using Analysis in the Classroom ......................................................... 14By Chris Morgan & Jon Ramsey

Four Steps to Teaching Evaluation Skills ............................................. 16By Lori Moore

Inference: An Alternative to the Guess-What’s-On-My-Mind Game ...................................................................................... 18By Travis D. Park

Teaching the Critical Thinking Skill of Explanation .............................. 21By Tracy Irani

Helping Students Regulate Through Reflection .................................. 23By Nicole Stedman

Bring It to Class .................................................................................... 26By Julia Rotman-Smith & Donna Moore

SubscriptionsSubscription price for The Agricultural EducationMagazine is $10.00 per year. Foreign subscriptions are$20.00 (U.S. currency) per year for surface mail, and $40(U.S. currency) foreign airmail (except Canada). Ordersmust be for one year or longer. We can accept up to a threeyear subscription. Refunds are not available. Please allow4 - 6 weeks delivery of first magazine. Claims for missingissues cannot be honored after three months from date ofpublication, six months for foreign subscriptions. Singlecopies and back issues less than 10 years old are availableat $5 each ($10.00 foreign mail). All back issues areavailable on microfilm from UMI University Microfilms,300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, MI 48106. UMIUniversity Microfilms telephone number is (313) 761-4700. In submitting a subscription, designate new orrenewal and provide mailing address including ZIP code.Send all subscriptions and requests for hard copy backissues to the Business Manager: James H. Smith, Texas TechUniversity, Box 42131, Lubbock, TX, 79409, Phone (806)742-2816, FAX: (806) 742-2880.E-mail: james.h.smith@ttu.edu.

Article SubmissionArticles and photographs should be submitted to theeditor or theme editors. Items to be considered forpublication should be submitted at least 90 days prior tothe date of the issue intended for the article or photograph.All submissions will be acknowledged by the Editor. Noitems are returned unless accompanied by a written request.Articles should be typed double-spaced, and includeinformation about the author(s). One hard copy and oneelectronic copy of the article should be submitted. A recent,hardcopy photograph should accompany the article unlessone is on file with the editor. Articles in the magazine maybe reproduced without permission but should beacknowledged.

EditorDr. Jamie Cano, Associate Professor, Department of Humanand Community Resource Development, The Ohio StateUniversity, 208 Agriculture Administration Building,2120 Fyffe Road, Columbus, OH, 43210, Phone (614) 292-6321, FAX: (614) 292-7007.E-mail: cano.1@osu.edu

Publication InformationThe Agricultural Education Magazine (ISSN 07324677)is the bi-monthly professional journal of agriculturaleducation. The journal is published by the AgriculturalEducation Magazine, Inc. and is printed at M&DPrinting, 515 University Avenue, Henry, IL61537.

Periodicals postage paid at Ames, IA 50010 andadditional offices.

POSTMASTERS: Send address changes for TheAgricultural Education Magazine to theattention of James H. Smith, Texas TechUniversity, Box 42131, Lubbock, TX, 79409,Phone (806) 742-2816, FAX: (806) 742-2880.

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ENHANCING DIVERSITY

This issue will look at diversity in a global perspective. Whydoes agricultural education need to diversify its programs? Is

the concept of urbanizing agricultural education programsnow at the forefront of the profession?

THEME EDITOR: BILLYE FOSTER

4 The Agricultural Education Magazine

Can We Really Teach Students to Think Critically?

THEME EDITOR COMMENTS

By Rick Rudd

In a recent conversation with a

colleague, he asserted that teachingstudents to think in the context of aclassroom is next to impossible. Ourjob as educators he suggested was toprovide the knowledge for students sothat they would have it in “reserve”when a decision needed to be made ora problem was presented to be solved.You may be able to guess that as themeeditor for this issue of the AgriculturalEducation Magazine, I took issue withthat position!

Good thinking skills will not de-velop on their own, they must be taught(Beyer, 1987). Sutton and de Oliveira(1995) asserted that although studentscomplete basic courses, they have onlya superficial understanding of whatthey have learned. In fact, few stu-dents are taught the skills needed toexamine principles, values and facts.We can (and should) teach students tothink critically and arrive at betterproblem solutions and better decisions.These “critical thinking outcomes” areinfluenced by knowledge and experi-ence but they are also influenced byan individual’s critical thinking skill andcritical thinking disposition.

Teaching students to think criti-cally about decisions and problems isa task that we should undertake as ag-ricultural educators. Huitt (1998) saidthat critical thinking is one of the mostimportant attributes for success in the21st century. Paul (2002) proposed that“in a world of accelerating change, in-tensifying complexity and increasinginterdependence, critical thinking isnow a requirement for economic and

social survival”.

So, how can we teach studentsto think critically in and about agricul-ture and life? It begins with a clearunderstanding of critical thinking on ourpart. Rudd, Bake,r and Hoover (2000)defined critical thinking as, “A rea-

and information and for which an in-controvertible solution is unlikely.”Chafee (1988) defined critical thinkingas “our active, purposeful, and orga-nized efforts to make sense of ourworld by carefully examining our think-ing, and the thinking of others, in orderto clarify and improve our understand-ing” (p.29).

Norris and Ennis (1989) providedthis simple definition of critical think-ing, “Reasonable and reflective think-ing that is focused upon deciding whatto believe or do” (p. 18). Critical think-ing is about reasoning, reflecting, in-trospection, purpose, and solutions.

Critical Thinking, ProblemSolving, and Higher-Order Think-ing

Often, critical thinking is confusedwith problem solving and higher-orderthinking. Although some authors usesimilar terminology in describing com-ponents of critical thinking which areused to describe problem solving andhigher-order thinking, the concepts areunique.

Hedges (1991) constructed a di-chotomous breakdown of critical think-ing and problem solving (p. 1). Ac-cording to Hedges, problem solving isa linear process of evaluation, whilecritical thinking is an overlying set ofabilities that allow the inquirer to prop-erly facilitate each stage of the linearproblem-solving process (See Table1).

Some confuse critical thinkingwith cognitive processing, lower-orderthinking and/or higher-order thinking.Although critical thinking does not nec-essarily entail hierarchical or linear pro-cessing such as cognitive processing,it does involve operation at a particular

Goodthinking

skillswill notdevelopon their

own,they

must betaught.(Beyer, 1987)

soned, purposive, and introspective ap-proach to solving problems or address-ing questions with incomplete evidence

5 May - June 2006

knowledge, comprehension, applica-tion, analysis, synthesis, or evaluationlevel. Critical thinking is a process thatis influenced by cognition and the cog-nitive process.

Critical Thinking Skills andDispositions

Peter Facione (1990) conducteda study to determine the common ele-ments of critical thinking as held byexperts in philosophy, psychology, so-ciology, and education. This study re-vealed two distinct components of criti-cal thinking: critical thinking skills andcritical thinking dispositions.

Six critical thinking skills wereidentified by the expert panel (see Table2). These skills and sub-skills can be

learned in formal and non-formal set-tings. Examples of instructional meth-ods that can be utilized to teach theskills also appear in Table 2. Skillstaught within a context (such as agri-culture) are more likely to be remem-bered and applied by students in thefuture.

Critical thinking dispositions bringattitudes, values, and beliefs into thethinking process. Dispositions are notchanged easily and are solidified overtime. They are a very important com-ponent in the critical thinking process.Researchers in the Department ofAgricultural Education and Communi-cation at the University of Florida haveidentified three components of criticalthinking disposition. They include:

♦Engagement – Anticipating asituation to use good reasoning andbeing confident in one’s ability to rea-son, solve problems and make deci-sions. Also can confidently communi-cate and explain the reasoning processone used to make a decision or solve aproblem.

♦Ιnnovativeness – Consistentlylooking for new knowledge in their pro-fession, situation, life and world. Alsois intellectually curious using all re-sources to find the truth, even if con-flicts with personal beliefs and opin-ions.

♦Cognitive Maturity – Beingaware of one’s disposition and biaseswhen making a decision and solving a

Table 1Hedges’ Typology of the Relationship Between Critical Thinking and Problem Solving

Critical Thinking Problem Solving

1. The ability to identify and formulate problems, as well as the ability to solve them.

2. The ability to recognize and use inductive reasoning, as well as the ability to solve them.

3. The ability to draw reasonable conclusions from information found in various sources, whether written, spoken, tabular, or graphic, and to defend one’s consclusions rationally.

4. The ability to comprehend, develop, and use concepts and generalizations.

5. The ability to distinguish between fact and opinion.

1. Recognizing a problem situation.

2. Defining the problem.

3. The ability to comprehend, develop and use concepts and generalizations.

4. Testing hypotheses and gathering data.

5. Revising hypotheses and testing revised or new hypotheses.

6. Forming a conclusion.

6 The Agricultural Education Magazine

problem. Also is conscious that theiropinions are shaped by their environ-ment and experiences and their answermay not always be the right answer(Rickett, Irani, Rudd, & Gallo-Meagher, 2003).

Critical Thinking Outcomes

Figure 1 illustrates a model forhigh quality critical thinking outcomesthat begins with a stimulus and con-cludes with a high – low quality think-ing outcome. Teachers who are inter-ested in teaching students to arrive atreasonable, high – quality critical think-

ing outcomes should pay particular at-tention to developing the students criti-cal thinking skill, teaching the knowl-edge necessary to solve the problemsfaced, and molding critical thinking dis-positions. In addition, teachers mustbe aware of student academic strengthsand weaknesses, as well as other per-sonal factors that can influence prob-lem solving and decision making. Fi-nally, the environment in which theteaching and learning occurs is criticalto the success of thinking processes.

Can we teach students to thinkcritically? Yes! Agriculture teachers

Table 2Proposed Critical Thinking Cognitive Skills, Sub-Skills, and Instructional Skills

Interpretation Sub-Skill Instructional Component

Interpretation

Analysis

Evaluation

Inference

Explanation

Self-Regulation

CategorizationDecoding SignificanceClarifying Meaning

Examining IdeasIdentifying ArgumentsAnalyzing Arguments

Assessing ClaimsAssessing Arguments

Querying EvidenceConjecturing AlternativesDrawing Conclusions

Stating ResultsJustifying ProceduresPresenting Arguments

Self-ExaminationSelf-Correction

and others interested in teaching stu-dents to think in and about their disci-pline can use critical thinking skills anddispositions to couch course content insuch a way that will teach students thecontent and teach them the process ofarriving at high quality critical thinkingoutcomes.

References

Beyer, B.K., (1987). Practicalstrategies for the teaching of thinking.Boston MA: Allyn and Bacon, Inc

Chaffee, J. (1988). Thinking criti-

Factual KnowledgeDiscussion

Modeling

Case Study AnalysisRole Playing

Guest SpeakersAction Learning

PresentationDebates

Ethical and Social AnalysisReflective ExaminationSelf-Evaluation

Facione (1990)

7 May - June 2006

Rudd & Irani (2004)

Rick Rudd is an Associate Profes-sor at the University of Florida-Gainesville

cally. Boston, MA, Houghton Mifflin.

Facione, P.A., (1990). Criticalthinking: A statement of expert con-sensus for purposes of educationalassessment and instruction. Millbrea,CA: The California Academic Press.

Hedges, L. E. (1991). Helpingstudents develop thinking skills throughthe problem-solving approach to teach-ing. The Ohio State University Colum-bus, OH.

Meyers, C. (1986). Teaching stu-dents to think critically. San Francisco,CA. Jossey-Bass Inc. Publishers.

Norris, S. P. and R. H. Ennis(1989). Evaluating critical thinking.Teaching thinking.

Paul, R., W. (2002). The Inter-national Center for the Assessment of

Thinking: Critical thinking Essay Ex-amination. Santa Rosa, CA: Founda-tion for Critical Thinking.

Ricketts, J.C., Irani, T., Rudd,R.D., Gallo, M., (2003). Critical think-ing dispositions for the EMI. The Uni-versity of Florida, Gainesville, Fl.

Rudd, R.D., & Irani, T. (2004).Model of quality critical thinking out-comes. The University of Florida,Gainesville, Fl.

Rudd, R.D., Baker, M.T., &Hoover, T.S., (2000). Undergraduateagriculture student learning styles andcritical thinking abilities: Is there a re-lationship? Journal of Agricultural Edu-cation. 41, (3), 2-12.

Sutton, J.P., de Oliveira, P.C.(1995). Differences in critical think-ing skills among students educated in

public schools, Christian schools, andhome schools. Eric Document. ED390-147.

Stimulus

ProblemDecision

InformationFelt need

InvolvementOthers…

CriticalThinking

DispositionKnowledge

CriticalThinking

Skill+ +

HighQualityCriticalThinkingOutcome

LowQualityCritical ThinkingOutcome

No CriticalThinkingOutcome

High High High

Low Low Low

Personal factors

External factors

Model Of Quality Critical Thinking Outcomes

8 The Agricultural Education Magazine

September - October 2006Theme: Developing Professionals

What does it mean to be a professional? Why should one belong to professionalorganizations? How does one mentor student teachers and first year teachers?What is the reponsibility of first year teachers related to their professional devel-opment?

Theme Editor: Julie HarlinTexas A&M University104B Scoates HallTAMU 2116College Station, TX 77843Email: j-harlin@tamu.eduPhone: (979) 862-3014

Articles Due to Theme Editor: July 15, 2006Articles Due to Editor: August 1, 2006

How Do You Teach a Disposition to ThinkCritically?By Curt Friedel

THEME ARTICLE

Have you ever noticed in the

classroom that some of your studentsare really smart, but don’t have thatthing we generally call common sense?Or a student may be more street smartthan book smart? Simply said, somestudents are great at using higher-or-der thinking skills to make decisionsand solve problems, while others arenot. Even if we teach critical thinkingskills in the classroom, SAE and FFA,we find some students do not alwaysuse those learned skills. Why is this?

To answer this question, manyvariables play a role in describing thethinking behaviors of students; theseinclude previous knowledge, values,motivations, ability and the environ-ment. However, research has foundthat a student’s disposition toward us-ing critical thinking skills is also a vari-able that may promote or inhibit theirability to think critically (Norris, 1994).If this is true, a student taught criticalthinking skills may not use those skillsif he/she lacks the proper disposition.This poses two questions: 1) What isa critical thinking disposition? and 2)How can you teach a critical thinkingdisposition? This article will attemptto answer both.

What is a critical thinking dispo-sition?

Many researchers have tried todetermine the components of a criti-cal thinking disposition and there is stillmuch research to conduct in this area.However, there seems to be an agree-ment in the literature that a student’sdisposition towards using critical think-

ing skills is necessary for good reason-ing. In problem solving and decisionmaking, a critical thinking dispositionis commonly referred to as a student’sfelt need to apply reason to the issueat hand. But what is a felt need? Asagricultural instructors we commonlyrelate the concepts learned in the class-room to students’ past experiences,SAE projects, and FFA Career Devel-opment Events to develop a felt needto learn. How is this different thandeveloping a felt need to criticallythink?

It is important not to confuse acritical thinking disposition with a criti-cal thinking skill. A thinking skill, asdiscussed in other articles in this maga-zine, can be performed at a specificlevel of expertise. A thinking disposi-tion is composed of character traitssupplying the proper attitude to usethose skills. A skill can be taught in asemester, but a disposition must be de-

veloped over a longer period of time.Several authors have tried to define thecomponents of critical thinking disposi-tion. Paul and Elder (2001) believe thata critical thinking disposition includeseight essential traits. They include thefollowing:

♦ Intellectual Humility – Notclaiming to know more than you actu-ally know.

♦ Intellectual Courage – Fairlyexamining beliefs that are against yourown.

♦ Intellectual Empathy – Genu-inely understanding the reasoning of an-other person.

♦ Intellectual Autonomy – Think-ing for oneself with control over yourbeliefs, values and inferences.

9 May - June 2006

♦ Intellectual Integrity – Admit-ting your thinking is inconsistent withyour actions.

♦ Intellectual Perseverance –Need to answer unsettled questions forbetter understanding and insight.

♦Confidence in Reason – Faiththat using reason will best serve hu-mankind.

♦Fairmindedness – Treating allviewpoints alike without regard to emo-tions (p. 13-14).

Collaborative research in theDepartment of Agricultural Educationand Communication at the Universityof Florida found three components ofa critical thinking disposition. They in-clude the following:

♦Engagement – Anticipating asituation to use good reasoning andbeing confident in one’s ability to rea-son, solve problems and make deci-sions. Also can confidently communi-cate and explain the reasoning processone used to make a decision or solve aproblem.

♦ Innovativeness – Consistentlylooking for new knowledge in their pro-fession, situation, life and world. Alsois intellectually curious using all re-sources to find the truth, even if con-flicts with personal beliefs and opin-ions.

♦Cognitive Maturity – Beingaware of one’s disposition and biaseswhen making a decision and solving aproblem. Also is conscious that theiropinions are shaped by their environ-ment and experiences and their answermay not always be the right answer(Ricketts, Irani, Rudd, & Gallo-Meagher, 2003).

The point of showing the two listsof disposition components is not to lookfor similarities and differences, but togive better explanation to describing acritical thinking disposition and to dis-tinguish it from a critical thinking skill.A student may have a higher disposi-tion for critical thinking allowing him/her to adequately use learned criticalthinking skills. However, if a studenthas a lower critical thinking dispositionhe/she will tend not to use critical think-ing skills. In other words, teaching criti-cal thinking skills is pointless if studentsdo not have a high critical thinking dis-position! Can this be true? Certainlythere is more to know.

How can you teach a criticalthinking disposition?

That is a tough question! Re-member critical thinking skills can betaught in a semester, but a critical think-ing disposition takes a much longer timeto develop. Fortunately, if your stu-dents stay in the agricultural programfor a couple of years, you may havean opportunity to influence their criti-cal thinking disposition. Little researchhas been conducted concerning howto teach for a higher critical thinkingdisposition, but Tishman and Andrade(1996) believe that a critical thinkingdisposition is best developed by im-mersing a student in a culture of criti-cal thinking. To create this culture,Tishman and Andrade propose the fol-lowing four fundamentals: models, ex-planations, interactions, and feedback.

The teacher must model and usemodels of good reasoning to providestudents with examples to help themidentify critical thinking in real-life situ-ations. To do this, stay current withthe news and keep a newspaper onyour desk. The opinion section is agreat place to start to analyze some-one else’s reasoning. Be willing to dis-cuss agricultural issues, your opinion

on those issues, and why you hold thoseopinions. Allow students to voice theirview and then ask them why they holdthat view. Question your own biasesin class and allow students to questiontheir own in order to keep emotions incheck. Bring in a speaker to discusstheir position on animal rights, or ac-ceptance of biotechnology. Later, hostanother speaker with opposing viewsand discuss with students if eitherspeaker’s reasoning was better. Askstudents if they can logically understandhow a rational person can have an op-posing point of view.

The teacher must give explana-tion to why critical thinking is impor-tant and overtly teach elements of criti-cal thinking. It is not enough to usecritical thinking in the classroom; ateacher must also define the terminol-ogy for the students. By teaching thestudent the difference between opin-ion, fact and theory, he/she can makedistinctions for themselves and becomemore proficient as a critical thinker.Other need-to-know terms include bias,beliefs, values, hypothesis, evidence,argument, reason, rhetoric, and propa-ganda. Being knowledgeable of theseterms and how they are related will alsoimprove your critical thinking ability andserve as a better critical thinking modelfor your students.

FFA’s LifeKnowledge© lessonsHS 24: Critical Thinking Skills andHS 25: Applying Critical ThinkingSkills may help you begin to incorpo-rate elements of critical thinking intoyour curriculum. Furthermore, explainwhy it is important for everyone to usegood reasoning. What would happenif leaders did not use critical thinking?What is the difference between poorjudgment and good judgment? Whatare the benefits of a group having di-versity of thought as opposed to thoughtcoming from the same culture, valuesand beliefs? What are the disadvan-tages? Using questions like these, to

10 The Agricultural Education Magazine

frame your lessons are sure to beginmeaningful discussions to explain theelements of critical thinking.

The teacher must provide studentinteraction during the reasoning pro-cess. Giving students the opportunityto apply critical thinking skills togetherallows for more meaningful assessmentof their peers’ critical thinking disposi-tion and their own disposition. This canbe accomplished using a think-pair-share technique or various other groupwork activities. Place students intogroups and provide each group withcopies of a different article. Direct thestudent groups to find faults in theauthor’s logic of their article and thenhave each group present the article tothe rest of the class. You may also tryorganizing a debate between groups ofstudents. Pick a topic and allow stu-dents a class period to work togetherin researching and formulating an ar-gument against the position of the othergroup.

Once you have done this, havestudents switch sides and take the othergroups position. This will challenge thestudents by forcing them to think aboutthe issue from another perspective.Another idea is to have groups of stu-dents evaluate or develop a publicpolicy. Let each group decide whatpolicy they will develop or evaluate asit relates to the current unit being stud-ied in the course. You may want tointroduce this assignment at the startof the unit and have students presenttheir findings at the end of the unit. Thiswill assist student engagement duringthe presentation of the content and pro-vide a great student review at the endof the unit.

The teacher must provide feed-back to the students regarding theircritical thinking disposition. Strengthsand weaknesses of one’s critical think-ing ability can be assessed throughteacher feedback, student peer feed-

back, and self feedback. If a studentdoesn’t know if his/her reasoning isfaulty, how are they going to improve?However, the teacher must be carefulto provide supportive feedback and notbe condemning. It is vital to create anatmosphere where students feel com-fortable to make mistakes in reasoningand openly explain their thoughts. Startby posting a set of ground rules of dis-cussion for all students to follow. As ateacher, purposely make an obviousmistake in your critical thinking and seeif your students catch it. Then openlyadmit that you were wrong and thatyou will try to improve your criticalthinking disposition in the future. Thiswill help students realize that it is ok tomake mistakes and that everyone canimprove their ability to reason. Per-sonally, I have found that the best toolsfor creating a supportive classroomenvironment are sincerity and honesty.Students know when you are sincereand honest and they will reciprocate.

Conclusion

There is strong evidence that acritical thinking disposition is necessaryfor a student to apply critical thinkingskills to the topic at hand. Although

critical thinking skills can be taught ina semester, a critical thinking disposi-tion takes a longer period of time todevelop. A student’s critical thinkingdisposition can be influenced by theteacher’s use of modeling, explanation,interaction and feedback concerningthe elements of critical thinking dispo-sitions and skills. An agricultural pro-gram incorporating these four funda-mentals is certain to foster students’critical thinking dispositions and skills.All of this will help ensure that our fu-ture agricultural leaders will know howto effectively reason when it is neces-sary for them to solve complex prob-lems and make decisions in our vastlychanging world.

References

Norris, S. P. (1994). The mean-ing of critical thinking test performance:The effects of abilities and dispositionson scores. In D. Fasko (Ed.), Criticalthinking: Current research, theory,and practice. Dordrecht, The Neth-erlands: Kluwer.

Paul, R., & Elder, L. (2004). Theminiature guide to critical thinkingconcepts & tools. Dillon Beach, CA:Foundation for Critical Thinking.

Ricketts, J., Irani, T., Rudd, R.,& Gallo-Meagher, M. (2003). The ef-fectiveness of teaching critical think-ing in the context of plant biotechnol-ogy. Paper presented at the 2003American Association for AgriculturalEducation Annual Conference, Or-lando, FL.

Tishman, S., & Andrade, A.(1996). Thinking dispositions: A re-view of current theories, practices,and issues. Cambridge, MA: ProjectZero, Harvard University.

Curt Friedel is a Graduate Studentat the University of Florida.

The teachermust be

careful toprovide

supportivefeedback and

not becondemning.

11 May - June 2006

THEME ARTICLE

It’s All InterpretationBy John Ricketts

All learning [in agricultural

education] involves personal inter-pretation, since whatever we learnwe must integrate into our ownthinking and action (Paul, Binker,Martin, & Adamson, 1995).

I know we have some DiamondRio fans who read this magazine, es-pecially since many of us have had theopportunity to hear them at the NationalFFA Convention on several occasions.Regardless of whether or not you’refans, I am sure all of you are familiarwith the lyrics:

“It’s all interpretation,

To find the truth you gotta readbetween the lines,

Work out your own salvation,

That narrow path is hard to de-fine,

Heaven’s more than a place; it’sa state of mind…”

Ok you can stop singing in yourhead now. I agree. A Diamond Riosong is a strange way to begin an ar-ticle but the lyrics about finding “truth”by “reading between the lines” is a rea-sonable likeness of what it means toutilize interpretation as a good criticalthinker.

What is Interpretation?

Interpretation is about develop-ing and providing one’s own concep-tion of a particular topic/idea/issue inlight of previous experiences, perspec-tives, or points of view. For instance,many of us agriculture teachers have

different interpretations of the diver-sity problem in agricultural educationbased on our diverse set of prior expe-riences, perspectives, or points of view.Interpretation is different from facts,evidence, and situations, but the bestcritical thinkers certainly consider allof the information. In fact, good criti-cal thinkers “recognize their interpre-tations, distinguish them from evidence,consider alternative interpretations,[and] reconsider their interpretations inthe light of new evidence” (Paul et al.,p. 369).

Breaking Interpretation into thesubskills of Categorization, Decod-ing Significance, and ClarifyingMeaning (Facione, 1990) provides fur-ther clarification about what it meansto use Interpretation as a good criticalthinker. Categorization is about iden-tifying themes, distinctions, or catego-ries so that information, experiences,or beliefs are meaningful. Decodingsignificance is about detecting anddescribing the most important, butsometimes hidden parts (content orfunction or motive or purpose or valueor viewpoint) of information. Lastly,clarifying meaning is about paraphras-ing, making things understandable, andremoving the confusion associated withkey content.

Let’s interpret the following sce-nario. If you saw four cows walkingin a straight line could you determinewhere they are going? What if younoticed that the four cows were blackand white? Would that help you makeany interpretations about where thefour cows are going? Sure it would.You might use categorization to de-termine that the cows are Holstein.Through decoding significance, youmight also determine that the cows aregoing to the milking parlor to be milkedsince Holsteins are dairy animals. You

could clarify the meaning of theseinterpretations if you had more infor-mation (i.e. cows have large udders).

Learning and Interpretation

The dairy cow example is a veryelementary example, but the total pro-gram of agricultural education (Class-room/lab, FFA, and SAE) provides theperfect atmosphere for good criticalthinkers to engage in many rich active

Interpretationis about

developingand providing

one’s ownconception ofa particulartopic/idea/

issue in lightof previousexperiences,perspectives,or points of

view.

12 The Agricultural Education Magazine

learning and interpretation activities.Learning in agricultural education in-volves interpretation by students, be-cause whatever our students learn mustbe integrated into their own thinking andactions. Learning must be given mean-ing by students, must be meaningful tostudents, and therefore involves inter-pretive acts by our students (Paul etal., 1995). Consequently, interpretiveacts associated with land judging,agriscience labs, extemporaneous pub-lic speaking, and agriculture marketingCDEs, just to name a few, all qualifyas significant vehicles of learning viathe critical thinking skill of interpreta-tion.

Students practice the skill of in-terpretation when they comprehendand express the meaning or significanceof a wide variety of experiences(Facione, 1990) available to themthrough agricultural education. How-ever, we educators must still be inten-tional about ensuring that our studentsare gaining this valuable critical think-ing skill. Being intentional involvesmodeling the skill as teachers and us-ing teaching tools that foster Interpre-tation.

Modeling Interpretation

Teachers are the starting point forimproving critical thinking skills, espe-cially the skill of Interpretation. Teach-ers who want their students to be ableto find the truth by reading betweenthe lines need to model interpretationskills themselves. “Thacker lists [sev-eral] recommended teacher behaviors,all of which will be familiar to goodteachers, for fostering a climate con-ducive to the development of thinkingskills:”

♦Setting ground rules well in ad-vance

♦Providing well-planned activi-

ties

♦Showing respect for each stu-dent

♦Providing nonthreatening ac-tivities

♦Being flexible

♦Accepting individual differ-ences

♦Exhibiting a positive attitude

♦Acknowledging every re-sponse

♦Allowing students to be activeparticipants

♦Creating experiences that will

esnure success at least part of the timefor each student

♦Using a wide variety of teach-ing modalities (Jerry Thacker, as quotedin Gough 1991, p. 5).

We have all practiced each of theimportant teacher behaviors above, butwe need to stay diligent in practicingthem if we want our students to be-come good critical thinkers. Let’s lookat some teaching tools that will alsohelp us be more intentional about mak-ing sure our students are adept at cat-egorization, decoding significance, andclarifying meaning.

Teaching Interpretation

Silence

How often do you pose a ques-tion to a group of students and thenanswer your own question almost assoon as you ask it? It takes an aver-age of 10 seconds for an adult to pro-cess a new or complex question and toorganize a response. Imagine how longit might take for a teenager who can’twait for the 3:00 bell to ring to processyour question and organize a response.Silence is a great tool because criticalthinkers need time to interpret infor-mation. When we always answerquestions for our students we are sti-fling the development of their interpre-tation skills.

Discussion

Research (Gokhale, 1995) tells usthat collaborative learning tools suchas Socratic Discussion or Fishbowlingare effective instruments for helpingstudents developing critical thinkingskills such as Interpretation. Socraticdiscussion, developed by Socrates, is amethod of conversational discussionthat gives everyone a chance to con-tribute to the discussion, but more im-

Teachers arethe startingpoint for

improvingcriticalthinkingskills,

especially theskill of

Interpreta-tion.

13 May - June 2006

portantly it gives everyone a chance tounderstand a focal point of informa-tion. The discussion usually revolvesaround a focal reading or statement(i.e. Avian Influenza is coming toAmerica). Then there is usually a fo-cus question (i.e. how could Avian In-fluenza affect the USA?). This ques-tion is posed to the entire group of stu-dents and the teacher, who is preparedwith all of the necessary facts, infor-mation, and clarifying questions leadsthe discussion. Following discussionthere should always be a debriefingseeking to identify students’ percep-tions of the discussion followed by atime of conclusion and summarizationof the topic.

Fishbowling is another discussionmethod where a small group of stu-dents discuss a topic while sitting in themiddle of a circle of a larger group ofstudents. The larger group can onlylisten. Then members of the largergroup move to the middle of the circleto discuss having listened intently to theprevious discussion. Both methodschallenge students to work on catego-rization, decoding significance, andclarifying meaning.

Critical Reading and Writing

Most of us read uncritically,meaning that we miss part of what thewriter was trying to express while con-fusing other parts. Critical reading is atool that more of us agriculture teach-ers should employ as a teaching tool.Critical reading is an active, intellectu-ally engaged process in which thereader participates in an inner dialoguewith the writer (Paul et al., 1995, p.360). The critical reader [our students]looks for significance and attempts toclarify meaning as they read throughselected text.

Writing is another key teachingtool for teaching critical thinking. In

writing “it is essential that our studentsunderstand what our thesis is, how wecan support it, how we can elaborate itto make it intelligible to others, whatobjections can be raised to it from otherpoints of view, what the limitations areto our point of view and so forth” (p.361). Good writing requires good think-ing and good thinking is achievedthrough good writing. (Paul et al.). Ifwe want students who can think, weneed to assign writing assignmentsregularly, and then we need to evalu-ate the assignments based on contentand grammar, but also on areas wherethey could improve their thinking.

Summary

Perhaps you are asking yourself,“What’s the point?” The point is thatall of the research points to this onefact. Improved critical thinking skillslead to improved academic perfor-mance. Intentionally focusing on im-proving students’ critical thinking skillsin Interpretation is a great place tostart. Recall that Interpretation is aboutdeveloping and providing one’s ownconception of a particular topic/idea/issue in light of previous experiences.As agriculture teachers, let’s keep pro-viding those valuable experiences thatour program is so good at providing.Let’s also use these experiences alongwith teaching behaviors and teachingtools that promote critical thinking and

our students will be more competentcritical thinkers in Interpretation as aresult.

References

Facione, P. A. (1990). Criticalthinking: A statement of expert con-sensus for purposes of educationalassessment and instruction. Millbrae,CA, The California Academic Press:19.

Gokhale, A. A. (1995). Collabo-rative learning enhances critical think-ing. Journal of Technology Educa-tion, 7(1). Retrieved from http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JTE/v7n1/gokhale.jte-v7n1.html

Gough, D. (1991). Thinkingabout thinking. Alexandria, VA: Na-tional Association of Elementary SchoolPrincipals. (ED 327 980)

Paul, R., Binker, A. J. A., Martin,D., & Adamson, K. (1995). Criticalthinking handbook: High school.Santa Rosa, CA, Foundation for Criti-cal Thinking.

John Ricketts is an Assistant Pro-fessor at the University of Georgia

Most ofus read

uncritically.

14 The Agricultural Education Magazine

Using Analysis in the Classroom

By Chris Morgan and Jon Ramsey

THEME ARTICLE

Have you ever received or

found an object that you did not recog-nize? Maybe it was something old, arelic of sorts, and you wanted to deter-mine the origin or use of this object.As you begin to examine the object,you decide to use a large magnifyingglass so you can get a closer look. Youbegin by searching for some identify-ing marks, maybe a maker’s name tohelp you understand more about thisobject. You examine the base, lookingintently for some sort of symbol thatwill provide you with some truth aboutthis object.

What you were doing to this mys-terious object was analyzing it. Youwere examining it for clues that leadto the truth. You may have had someidea of what it could possibly be, butyou needed to confirm or disaffirm yourideas. Critical thinking skills and sub-skills, such as analysis, provided a wayfor you to evaluate the object.

When we begin to think of analy-sis in terms of critical thinking thereare many similarities to the analysis ofthe old relic. Critical thinking focuseson the evaluation of ideas and argu-ments. In the example above, we ex-amined the object to determine its ori-gin or use. In critical thinking we ana-lyze arguments and examine ideas todetermine their validity; that is, we at-tempt to determine if they are factual.By doing this we begin to understandwhat parts of an idea or argument aretrue, partially true, or false. Expertsdefine analysis as “To identify the in-tended and actual inferential relation-ships among statements, questions,

concepts, descriptions or other formsof representation intended to expressbeliefs, judgments, experiences, rea-sons, information, or opinions”(Facione, 1990).

Analysis is part of Blooms tax-onomy as well. Bloom listed the cog-nitive skill of analysis as the fourth levelof thinking (Bloom & Krathwohl,1956). Authors have described cogni-tive analysis as “seeing patterns,” “or-ganization of parts,” “recognition ofhidden meanings,” and “identificationof components” (Learning Skills Pro-gram, 2005).

The sub-skills of analysis aremade up of two parts: Examining ideasand detecting arguments (Facione,1990). It’s as if someone proposes anidea and, before we accept it as truth,we critique and ponder the idea, deter-mining how it measures up to what wealready know and the theories we hold.Analysis has been described as “con-scious evaluation” and being able tobreak down arguments into parts anddetermine the relationship between theparts (Harris, 2001). When practicinganalysis, a person is more likely to con-nect observations with their theoreti-cal knowledge base (Facione, Giancarlo,Facione, & Gainen, 1995).

How can we teach students toanalyze and use analysis properly?Prompting students to ask questionsabout ideas and arguments is a goodplace to start. Some sample questionsto use are: How is this known? Whatdoes it mean? Are reasons given?What is implied? Is this a balancedpresentation? Is something missing?Are there underlying motives? Is therebias? Are there inferences we canmake? How does this measure up toother things I know about this subject?

(Fowler, 2004; Harris, 2001). By en-couraging students to ask these typesof questions we are teaching them togo beyond face value when examiningideas. They learn to probe and seekout facts upon which the idea isfounded.

The Department of AgriculturalEducation, Communications & 4-HYouth Development at Oklahoma StateUniversity is working hard to developcritical thinking skills in future genera-tions of agricultural education instruc-tors. AGED 4113, Laboratory Instruc-tion in Agricultural Education, focuseson laboratory safety instruction, meth-ods of teaching, and application of tech-nical agriculture skills to the second-ary program. This course is deliveredat the beginning of the student teach-ing block, at a time when the students’may or may not see the value of theinformation presented to them.

Critical thinking skills like analy-sis help students identify where thisinformation “fits” and allows them torelate new information to somethingthey already know (Rudd, 2005). InAGED 4113 students begin the studentteaching block with a variety of pre-existing experiences and expectations.Throughout the course, topics are pre-sented that either reinforce those ex-periences or create some cognitive dis-sonance that requires students to sortand identify for future reference.

The interpretation of the teach-ing block experience is facilitated in theform of a concept matrix. Studentsrecord their experiences provided inAGED 4113 in a concept matrix, whichallows them to reflect on the topic as itrelates to application in an agriculturaleducation program. The final interpre-tation culminates in a 3-5 page paper

15 May - June 2006

that allows the student teachers to in-terpret and analyze what they havelearned, discover why the informationis important and relate the experienceto an agricultural education program.

Students use the skill of analysisto examine their pre-existing ideasabout pedagogy, classroom discipline,lesson planning, etc. and compare theseideas to the their teaching block expe-riences. Through this process manystudents who began the teaching blocknot seeing the need for this intensive“pre-student teaching” experience be-gin to understand how this experiencehas improved their teaching skills andhas better prepared them for their stu-dent teaching experience.

Teacher educators have longbeen familiar with Blooms taxonomyand the importance of moving studentscloser to higher order thinking. Agri-cultural education teacher preparationprovides a rich contextual opportunityfor students to understand the techni-cal concepts inherent in agriculturethrough the development of criticalthinking skills.

Students of all ages, whether inhigh school, college, or adult learners,can benefit from practicing the skill ofanalysis. Encouraging students to askquestions such as “what’s the point?”,“what are the assumptions?” and“what evidence or information supportsthe position?” helps them to understandthe relevance or irrelevance of infor-mation. This questioning also helps stu-dents to detect fallacies, not only in theinformation and arguments presentedto them, but also of their own ideas andarguments. The conceptual matrix pre-sented here is one method that allowsstudents to examine ideas, and analyzearguments so they can better under-stand how this information “fits” to-gether and how this information is rel-evant to them. Creating experiences

which allow students to compare pre-conceived ideas with factual informa-tion helps them to take ownership ofand better understand why they believewhat they believe.

Regardless of the age, we wantstudents to be critical thinkers. It seemsthat many times our students are re-ceivers of information without properlyinterpreting and analyzing what is pre-sented. We ask them to receive,memorize, and then recite information,but what we really want is for studentsto be thinkers. They need to know howto process information so they canmake intelligent decisions and be suc-cessful in life. To do this they need tothink critically. The skill of analysis willhelp students analyze arguments andexamine ideas, bringing students one-step closer to becoming a criticalthinker.

References

Bloom, B., & Krathwohl, D.(1956). Taxonomy of educationalobjectives: The classification of edu-

cational goals, by a committee ofcollege and university examiners.New York: Longman, Green.

Facione, P. A. (1990). Criticalthinking: A statement of expert con-sensus for the purposes of educa-tional assessment and instruction.Retrieved. from http://w w w. i n s i g h t a s s e s s m e n t . c o m /pdf_files/DEXadobe.PDF.

Facione, P. A., Giancarlo, C. A.,Facione, N. C., & Gainen, J. (1995).The disposition toward critical think-ing. Journal of General Education,44(1), 1-25.

Fowler, B. (2004). Critical think-ing across the curriculum project:Bloom’s taxonomy and critical think-ing. Retrieved March 10, 2006, fromht tp : / /www.kcmetro .cc .mo.us /longview/ctac/blooms.htm

Harris, R. (2001). Introduction tocritical thinking. Retrieved February21, 2006, from http://www.virtualsalt.com/think/introct.htm

Learning Skills Program. (2005).Blooms taxonomy. Retrieved March10, 2006, from http://www.coun.uvic.ca/learn/program/hndouts/bloom.html

Rudd, R.D. (2005, August).Teaching for Critical Thinking. Pre-sentation at Oklahoma State Collegeof Agriculture Teaching EffectivenessWorkshop, Stillwater, OK.

Chris Morgan is an Assistant Pro-fessor at Oklahoma State Univer-sity

Jon Ramsey is a Graduate Studentat Oklahoma State University

How canwe teachstudents

to analyzeand useanalysis

properly?

16 The Agricultural Education Magazine

WEBMASTER

Four Steps to Teaching Evaluation Skills

By Lori Moore

THEME ARTICLE

Almost every agriculture

teacher, at some time during their ca-reer, has been asked the question,“What do you teach?” Many of us re-ply with the title of the courses we teachor focus on the subject matter. Yet,what we know to be true but some-times have trouble communicating tothose outside agricultural education isthat, through the content in each of ourclasses, we teach transferable skillsthat help students become better prob-lem-solvers and better thinkers. Onesuch transferable skill is the criticalthinking skill of evaluation.

Evaluation is one of those termsthat everyone knows what it means yethas trouble defining the concept. Agroup of critical thinking experts havedescribed evaluation as the ability “toassess the credibility of statements orother representations which are ac-counts or descriptions of a person’sperception, experience, situation, judg-ment, belief, or opinion; and to assessthe logical strength of the actual or in-tended inferential relationships amongstatements, descriptions, questions orother forms of representation”(Facione, 1990). These same expertsincluded assessing claims and assess-ing arguments as sub-skills of evalua-tion. But what exactly does all of thismean and, perhaps more importantly,how can we teach students the skill ofevaluation?

When I started thinking aboutteaching evaluation as a critical think-ing skill, the first thing that came to mindwas ways we teach students to assessthe value of information and the cred-ibility of sources. Anecdotal evidence

suggests that students today believe theinternet has replaced the library. Oneteacher I know stated, “Students thinkthat if it is on the internet, it is as goodas if it were in the bible.” So I startedthinking about ways to teach studentsthe skill of evaluation using the internet.I thought about teaching a lesson ongenetically modified foods and howteachers might incorporate activitiesdesigned to teach students how evalu-ate internet sites by comparing andcontrasting information.

Through such a lesson, it wouldbe possible to teach students how toassess the credibility of various sitesand claims related to the production andconsumption of genetically modifiedfoods. This type of lesson could be veryeffective at teaching evaluation. But,after more thought, I realized that someof the most popular activities withinagricultural education and the FFA arealso some of the best activities for help-ing students develop evaluation skills.Whether we realized it or not, agricul-ture teachers have long been teachingstudents evaluation skills when prepar-ing students to compete in many of theevaluation-based Career DevelopmentEvents (CDEs), such as the livestockevaluation CDE.

When trying to develop students’evaluation skills, it does not really mat-ter if you are trying to teach criticalthinking in an on-line world or how toplace a class of market swine. Whatmatters is the development of the think-ing process required for students tomake reasoned judgments and supportthem. No matter the content used andthe context in which it is taught, I be-lieve there are four steps involved inteaching the skill of evaluation.

Step 1: Provide Foundation

Knowledge

Before students can evaluatesomething, they must first speak thelanguage. As teachers, it is our job tohelp students acquire the necessaryfoundation knowledge. In the case ofevaluating livestock, students must firstlearn such things as the parts of eachspecies, general terms appropriate fordescribing animals, specific terms ap-propriate for describing market animals,specific terms appropriate for describ-ing breeding animals, and the perfor-mance measures used in the evalua-tion of livestock. For example, studentsshould learn that finish is the appropri-ate term for describing the fat coverof market animals while condition is theappropriate term for describing the fatcover of breeding animals. Learning thefoundation knowledge is an importantfirst step in developing evaluation skills.

Step 2: Provide EvaluationCriteria

After learning to speak the lan-guage, students must know the criteriathat will be used in the evaluation. Inother words, they have to know whatto look for. In the case of livestockevaluation, the criteria for evaluatingmarket animals is different that the cri-teria for evaluating breeding animals.According to Gillespie (2004), there arenine factors students should look at

How can weteach students

the skill ofevaluation?

17 May - June 2006

when judging classes of market ani-mals (type; muscling; finish; carcassmerit; yield; quality; balance; style; andsmoothness) and five factors whenjudging breeding animals (condition;size; feet, legs, and bone; breed char-acter; and sex character). Studentsshould learn what each factor meanswhen learning the foundation knowl-edge in Step 1, but should learn whatto look for with respect to each factorduring this second step. For example,in Step 1, students should learn thatmuscling refers to the natural fleshingof the animal and in Step 2 that thewidth of the round, depth of the round,and width between the legs are thingsto look for when assessing the mus-cling of animals when looking at themfrom the rear (Gillespie, 2004). Studentsneed to learn what to look for whenevaluating a class of feeder cattle asopposed to a class of slaughter cattle.They need to learn how to look at aclass of eight keep/cull ewes and nar-row it down to the four most desirableanimals. In essence, teachers need tohelp students identify what factors tolook for when evaluating each type ofclass they will find in the livestockCDE. By doing this, students know thecriteria they will be using when con-ducting the actual evaluation.

Step 3: Apply the Criteria

Once they know the evaluationcriteria, students are ready to learn howto conduct the evaluation. In the caseof livestock evaluation, students needto learn how to critically evaluate a setof animals. Every teacher probably hastheir own specific method that theyteach their students, but for the mostpart, students are taught to identify thestrengths and weaknesses of each ani-mal on an individual basis and then com-pare and contrast the differences be-tween animals. Once these character-izations have been made, students areoften taught to group the animals into

an obvious top animal, an obvious bot-tom animal, and a middle pair of simi-lar animals or into a two pair class witha top pair and a bottom pair. Thesetechniques provide students with aframework for making judgments aboutthe animals in each class and identify-ing the reasons behind those judgments.Essentially, students have conductedthe evaluation by applying the criterialearned in Step 2.

Step 4: Communicate Findings ofthe Evaluation

After applying the criteria andconducting the evaluation, studentsneed to communicate the findings ofthe evaluation. In livestock judging, stu-dents usually communicate their find-ings through oral reasons. By prepar-ing their reasons, students must onceagain go through the thought processthey used to make their placing. In de-livering their reasons, students makeclaims about each animal and justifytheir placing. In essence, students aretrying to demonstrate to others that theyhave the skills to conduct sound evalu-ations.

Conclusion

Education reform has called forthe integration of critical thinking skills.In other words, schools should be teach-ing students how to think, not just whatto think. Agriculture teachers have longbeen teaching the skill of evaluation.What we need to remember, and per-haps emphasize more, is that teachinglivestock evaluation is just as muchabout teaching the skill of evaluationas it is about judging livestock.

Not all of our students will remainin the field of agriculture, but thechances of them one day buying a caror a house is pretty good. The evalua-tion skills they learned when judginglivestock are transferable to these, and

many other situations, but only if stu-dents recognize exactly what it is theylearned. Students should know thatjudging livestock, or even assessing thecredibility and accuracy of informationon the internet in a lesson on geneti-cally modified foods, is really an exer-cise in thinking. In terms of teachingthe skill of evaluation, the final respon-sibility of the teacher is to emphasizethe transferability of the skills learnedin the process by which students ar-rived at their decisions.

References

Facione, P. A. (1990). Criticalthinking: A statement of expert consen-sus for purposes of educational assess-ment and instruction. American Philo-sophical Association, ERIC DocumentReproduction Service No. ED 315 423.

Gillespie, J. R. (2004). Modernlivestock and poultry production (7th

ed.). Clifton Park, New York: DelmarLearning.

Lori L. Moore is an Assistant Pro-fessor in Agricultural and Exten-sion Education at the University ofIdaho.

18 The Agricultural Education Magazine

Inference: An Alternative to the Guess-What’s-On-My-Mind Game

By Travis D. Park

THEME ARTICLE

As a newly minted teacher, son

of an agriculture teacher, and formerFFA officer, I was certainly ready forthe challenges of teaching secondaryagricultural science and business at Tri-County High School. Well, that was thefirst day. When day two arrived, thehoneymoon was over and studentsceased to be awed by my newness,personality, and FFA credentials. Theywanted relevant, challenging, and in-teresting instruction in and about theagricultural sciences. So, we lectured,handed out worksheets, and played theguess-what’s-on-my-mind game; allfor little avail in helping students learn.

Somewhere in the first couple ofyears of teaching, I realized that stu-dents are capable of much more criti-cal thinking than I had given them creditfor. What’s more, they actually wantedto think critically about agriculture, itsissues and problems. My students werecapable of finding evidence to supportpositions, examining alternative solu-tions, and arriving at feasible conclu-sions related to problems in agriculture.They were capable of drawing infer-ences about agricultural sciences, theirSAE, and FFA chapter activities.

How do agricultural scienceteachers help their students think criti-cally and inference? What kinds ofevidence do we challenge students togather and analyze? How do we leadthem to create and consider alterna-tive solutions to problems and issues?What help do we provide them in draw-ing conclusions and testing suitablehypotheses? These questions all relateto a fundamental aspect of critical

thinking: inference.

Inference is where the prover-bial rubber meets the road with criticalthinking. During inference, we secureappropriate evidence for the problem,conjecture alternative hypotheses andsolutions, and draw conclusions andopinions regarding the issue or prob-lem (Facione, 1990). Often, especiallyin agriscience, we even apply thoseconclusions to real issues and problemsin agriculture classrooms, SAE, andFFA experiences. How can we chal-lenge our agriscience students to con-sider appropriate evidence, explorepossible alternatives, and arrive at fea-sible conclusions?

Querying Evidence

Querying evidence involves judg-ing what kinds and pieces of informa-tion are relevant to the problem at hand(Facione, 1990). Students consider evi-dence when answering manyagriscience questions. Yet, queryingevidence is perhaps one of the moredifficult aspects of critical thinking forstudents. After all, in today’s informa-tion age, many pieces of informationexist which may or may not constitutecredible evidence. Many pieces of in-formation and data appear to be rel-evant to the problem, but not all areimportant. Determining what evidenceis relevant and credible is key to criti-cal thinking.

Agricultural education teachersuse text approximately 20% of the timein their courses (Park & Osborne,2006). As students read, they shouldattempt to construct meaning from thetext, which means that they are query-ing evidence to support a position orgather information to propose a solu-

tion related to agriscience problems.Teachers may assist in this venture toquery evidence from text through theuse of anticipation guides. Anticipa-tion guides are presented to studentsprior to reading and ask them to re-spond in some way (agree/disagree,true/false, yes/no, etc.) to statementsrelated to the reading. After studentshave responded to the statements, theythen read the passage to find evidenceto support their response. In doing so,they are querying the evidence in thetext. Sometimes they find that their ini-tial response was incorrect based uponthe evidence in the text. Thus, with newevidence, they may develop a new re-sponse or conclusion to a particularstatement. They then cite this new re-sponse and the appropriate evidencefrom the text to support their conclu-sion. Right there, on their paper, stu-dents can see their learning.

Students may often query evi-dence when performing calculationswithin agriscience. For example, eachspring in my horticulture class, wedetermined the selling price for ourgreenhouse products. What pieces ofevidence are necessary to determinepricing? While this calculation mayseem straightforward, I found that stu-dents struggled with the task, and per-haps rightly so. It is a rather complextask. Logically, one must determine thecost of production for each product,which involves geometric and arith-metic calculations. However, simplyfiguring the cost of production does notlead to a simple selling price. Otherevidence and information are neces-sary, such as pricing for similar prod-ucts in the local area, anticipated salespromotions, and loss of plants that re-main unsold, among others. Challeng-ing students to consider these other

19 May - June 2006

pieces of evidence for determining sell-ing price is crucial to the learning pro-cess. Teachers cannot forget thesesimple agricultural problems that pro-vide a rich learning opportunity for stu-dents. While I could have easily calcu-lated the pricing or referred to the pre-vious year’s sales information, doingso would have also circumvented aprofitable learning opportunity for myhorticulture students.

Students also query evidencewhen determining and selecting an ap-propriate SAE. What resources areavailable? What need can be filled bya young, energetic student with initia-tive? Teachers have a prime learningtool available for helping students queryevidence in starting a SAE—theAmerican FFA Degree Star Battery.Students, even those early in their SAE,can use the star battery to describe anyspecial advantages or disadvantages—in other words, evidence—that theyanticipate will have a major impact ontheir SAE. When considering the levelof achievement related to their SAE,older students must also cite relevantevidence to support their achievement.Further, in calculating efficiencies laterin the star battery, students find evi-dence that supports their increased ef-ficiency in production and placement.

While some teachers may balkat completing pencil-and-paper FFAapplications such as the National Chap-ter Award application, these also pro-vide an opportunity for students toquery evidence. (Writing has a fineway of stimulating thinking!) Whencompleting the chapter award applica-tion, my FFA officers had to determineour three best activities/programs inmember, chapter, and community de-velopment. Because the applicationcalls for a statement of goals, planning,and evaluation of the activity, studentsmust set goals and then find evidencethat supports their conclusion that the

activity is one of the chapter’s best. Infact, the National Chapter AwardsApplications Tips specifically encour-ages chapters to query the evidencefor each activity by showing how thegoals were achieved, illustrating thebenefit of the activity, showing thenumber of members and others in-volved in the activity, and explainingwhat other organizations were involved(National FFA Organization, 2006). Inessence, these measures are evidenceof successful chapter activities. Byconsidering the evidence of success-ful activities, chapter leaders are alsoconjecturing alternatives among therange of possible best events.

Conjecturing Alternatives

When students brainstorm mul-tiple solutions to problems with theirSAE, experimental classroom or labo-ratory project, or FFA chapter activi-ties, they are, in essence, conjecturingalternatives. Conjecturing alternativesinvolves developing hypotheses, creat-ing alternative plans for achieving goals,and/or projecting a range of possibleconsequences for decisions, actions,and beliefs (Facione, 1990). When weconjecture alternatives, we imagine thepossibilities.

Embedded within theLifeKnowledge© lessons are e-mo-ments, one of which is the go-with-the-flow moment. This flow chart ac-tivity is an effective means of engag-ing students in develop a sequence ofevents with possible consequences andoutcomes. It can be used for manyapplications in our agriscience class-rooms. When using a flow chartgraphic organizer, students propose asequence of events that should lead topossible outcomes, such as reversingglobal warming, finding a solution toengine trouble so that it starts and runs,and conducting an experiment that con-trols for extraneous factors and tells

us which feed is the most efficient atpromoting growth in mice.

Again, real problems in agricul-ture provide opportunities to teach stu-dents about conjecturing alternatives.For example, why are all of the mari-golds in the greenhouse facing south?This question arose during my horti-culture classes nearly every spring.Once students determined that the po-sition of the sun in the spring sky wasthe culprit, then they could devise al-ternative hypotheses for combating thesouth-facing marigold problem. In thisway, they proposed and tested theirhypotheses for an authentic learningexperience.

Students also conjecture alterna-tives within their SAE. For example,what is the difference if I rely uponmom or dad to provide resources formy SAE (i.e.: give me half of the flo-rist business) or if I create my ownSAE from my own resources outsideof those which mom and dad can pro-vide? What happens if I start a SAEand the market falls apart? What hap-pens if my SAE is wildly successful?These questions about a student’s SAElead the student to develop alternativehypotheses and plans for achievingtheir SAE goals.

When FFA advisors give theirFFA members more freedom in select-ing, developing, and managing chapteractivities, they often challenge thosemembers to conjecture alternatives forchapter improvement. For example,each year as our officers and commit-tees revised the chapter program ofactivities, the FFA members realizedthat they wanted to add more activi-ties and propose more changes thanour chapter calendar of events andbudget would allow. Thus, in order forthe chapter to add a new activity, thechapter and officers had to decidewhat activity to drop from the program

20 The Agricultural Education Magazine

of activities. In working through thisdecision, leaders in the chapter had todevelop plans for the new activity andproject both the ramifications of drop-ping the existing activity and the op-portunities for improvement derivedfrom the new activity. Then, they madea decision about both events, in essencedrawing conclusions and charting thechapter’s course for the future.

Drawing Conclusions

Drawing conclusions asks thatstudents develop conclusions that standup to tests of logic and reason, and thatthey determine which conclusions aremore strongly supported by the evi-dence so as to have a greater prob-ability of success (Facione, 1990).These conclusions are the precursorsto action in many instances. Queryingthe evidence, conjecturing alternatives,and then arriving at viable conclusionsare the hallmarks of developing criti-cal thinking and living a conscious life.Agricultural education provides a richcontext for considering alternative con-clusions to a variety of problems andissues.

When reading texts of varioustypes in agriscience, teachers mayscaffold learning about how to drawconclusions by using discussion webs.With a discussion web, the agriscienceteacher selects a reading passage thatelicits a relatively strong response fromstudents, such as global warming, ge-netic engineering, or organic food pro-duction. Students read the passage.Collectively they determine the keyquestion in the article. Then, in groupsof three or four, they identify three tofive reasons for answering “yes” (pro)to the question and a three to five rea-sons for answering “no” (con). Then,as a class, students discuss the pas-sage using the evidence that theygleaned from reading. The learningevent concludes as one or both of the

following happen: 1) students individu-ally take a conclusive stand on the is-sue, or 2) the teacher guides the stu-dents to develop a class conclusion tothe issue or problem.

The very nature of SAE andmaintaining appropriate records callsfor students to develop logical conclu-sions to real applications of their agri-cultural science learning. An effectiveuse of SAE would be for students toupdate their records regularly and writea year-end analysis of the progressiontoward accomplishing the goals of theSAE. Further, students should also an-ticipate changes in their SAE and ex-trapolate conclusions to different sce-narios. For example, a student with alawn care SAE may have developed alarge clientele, so much so that s/heneeds to either purchase larger, newerequipment or hire another employee.The student should gather financial andresource evidence, consider the alter-natives, and then develop a conclusionthat has the highest probability of suc-cess. If the student is nearing highschool graduation, perhaps another vi-able conclusion could be selling theenterprise.

The FFA chapter and its activi-ties provide another avenue for stu-dents to practice developing practicalconclusions. The whole competitivenature of CDE may help students de-velop conclusions, especially when theydo not win first place. For example,FFA advisors can ensure that all stu-dents read the feedback from judges.Upon reading the feedback, advisorscan challenge students to also analyzetheir preparation for the CDE. Basedupon these pieces of information, theadvisor can work with students to de-velop conclusions about their practice,preparation, and performance in theCDE. Out of these conclusions, stu-dents should also develop improvementplans for reengaging in the CDE. These

improvement plans represent a formof conclusion by themselves.

Conclusion

Similar to a newly minted agri-culture teacher, we may occasionallyconduct our classroom, SAE, and FFAprograms based upon what we know,rather than what we want students tolearn. By taking advantage of realproblems in agriculture and implement-ing a few active learning strategies,teachers can assist students in devel-oping the critical thinking skills, espe-cially inference, that will help ensurelifelong learning. It will also help teach-ers avoid playing the guess-what’s-on-my-mind game. Students are capableof and want to query evidence, ana-lyze alternatives, and draw conclusionsabout real agricultural, personal, andleadership problems.

References

Facione, P. A. (1990). Criticalthinking: A statement of expert con-sensus for purposes of educationalassessment and instruction. Millbrae,CA, The California Academic Press:19.

National FFA Organization.(2006). National chapter awardsapplications tips. Retrieved on March13, 2006, from http://www.ffa.org/pro-g r a m s / n a t c h a p / d o c u m e n t s /nca_apptips.pdf.

Park, T. D., & Osborne, E. (Inpress). Content area reading strategiesand textbook use in agricultural edu-cation. Journal of Agricultural Edu-cation.

Travis D. Park is an Assistant Pro-fessor at Cornell University

21 May - June 2006

Teaching the Critical Thinking Skill of Explanation

By Tracy Irani

THEME ARTICLE

As children, we’ve all had the

experience of being asked to explainourselves. “Tell me why you hit yourbrother!” “Explain Newton’s third lawof motion.” “Tell me how you did this.”

But, although explanation is a skillthat may be fairly easy to observe, it isalso one of the most difficult to mea-sure. In the classroom, in particular, wesee examples of the skill of explana-tion every day. As instructors, we firstseek to explain concepts in our disci-pline to our students. We then ask themto explain how and why they arrivedat a particular answer, based on thequestions we have posed to them. Butmeasuring the quality or level of ex-planation itself is not easy. Explana-tory power or skill can be affected bya variety of influences, including knowl-edge, efficacy, expressiveness, person-ality, etc. These influences can makeit harder for a teacher to evaluate astudent’s level of explanation objec-tively, and even more of a challenge totry to build students’ skills in explana-tion.

Explanation is a term that is usedin a variety of ways in everydayspeech, both in and outside the class-room. We explain how to make or dosomething, how we solved a problemor arrived at an answer, and/or whatwere the results of a test or process(Mayes, 2006). Explanation goes be-yond mere description; the key aspectis an emphasis on why things happen.In fact, it is common to think of expla-nation as an attempt to identify thecause of something. According toHempel, explanation is “an argumentthat the phenomena to be

explained…..was to be expected”;Salmon argued that adequate explana-tion for a phenomenon or event can’tbe achieved unless the cause has beendetermined, while Achinstein felt thatexplanation was connected to the “pur-suit of understanding” (Mayes, 2006,para 9).

Explanation and Critical Think-ing

Looking at explanation from thestandpoint of critical thinking may pro-vide a way to separate the skill fromwhat surrounds it. From a teaching andlearning perspective, explanation holdsa special place as one of six core criti-cal thinking skills, as defined by theDelphi study on critical thinking(Facione, 1990). According to

Facione, “good critical thinkers canexplain what they think and how theyarrived at that judgment” (Facione,1998, p. 5). The Delphi study expertpanel defined explanation as being able“to state the results of one’s reason-ing; to justify that reasoning in termsof the evidential, conceptual, method-ological, criteriological, and contextualconsiderations upon which one’s resultswere based; and to present one’s rea-soning in the form of cogent arguments”(Facione, 1998, p. 6).

In addition to the skill, the Delphiexperts identified a set of three sub-skills underlying explanation. Theseinclude stating results, as in statingone’s research findings or writing downone’s current thinking about a com-plex matter; justifying procedures,

22 The Agricultural Education Magazine

which could entail presenting all con-siderations used in forming an opinionabout something; and presenting argu-ments, as in writing an advocacy pa-per arguing for a particular position orpolicy based on evidence and infer-ence.

Using Explanation in the Class-room

Critical thinking, and especiallythe core skill of explanation, is directlyrelated to communication and expres-sion. After all, the way you expressyour thoughts is through communica-tion. This process has been formal-ized in the rhetorical tradition of theacademic debating team, with its fo-cus on argumentation, evidentiary logicand reasoning capability. Facione him-self argues that there is a strong linkbetween critical thinking and readingcomprehension. It’s no surprise there-fore, that teaching students how to en-hance the skill of explanation shouldinvolve communication processes. Aholistic approach to critical thinking(Heaslip, 2005) should involve the con-cepts of critical listening, thinking, writ-ing, reading and speaking.

For the Critical Thinking in theSciences project, a USDA funded grantproject focusing on teaching for criti-cal thinking in the specific context ofbiotechnology, the instructional modelidentified classroom presentations anddebates as specific curriculum compo-nents that could be utilized to stimulateexplanation. The focus of this projectwas on the restructuring of a college

level course in biotechnology to showhow to teach for critical thinking in ascience context. One of the major as-signments of the restructured courseinvolved having students create a newbiotechnology derived plant based foodproduct, to research its potential at-tributes, and then to design and presenta business case for the product, includ-ing a self designed label. This assign-ment is a good example of how thesubskills components of explanation canbe factored into student learning. Stu-dents presented the results of their re-search as to what would make a vi-able new plant biotech product, justi-fying its development through present-ing attributes in terms of the benefits itwould convey, and through the self-designed label, were able to give rea-sons for their claims and potentiallyrefute any objections through labelingdisclaimers.

Teaching to Improve Your Stu-dents’ Skill in Explanation

Explanation is an important skillfor everyone, no matter what field stu-dents decide to pursue. Becoming goodat explanation requires practice, as doall skills. But, given our human needto communicate, express ourselves andabove all argue for our point of view,our students are probably more pre-disposed to engage in this critical think-ing skill than almost any other. Theclassroom provides many great oppor-tunities to engage students in presen-tation, debate, contests, representationsand depictions of phenomena andevents under study. These activitiesare all associated with good teachingpedagogy, and students usually feelthey learn from the hands-on practiceexplanation oriented assignments pro-vide. Explanation may be a criticalthinking skill that’s hard to measureempirically, but it can be a skill that’s agreat joy to teach, and employ in theclassroom. Think about the many

ways you can use explanation to helpstudents learn and to think criticallyabout what they are taught in yourclassroom.

References

Facione, P. A. (1990). Criticalthinking: A statement of expert con-sensus for purposes of educationalassessment and instruction. The Cali-fornia Academic Press: Millbrae, CA.

Facione, P. A. (1998). Criticalthinking: What it is and why itcounts. The California AcademicPress: Millbrae, CA.

Heaslip, P. (2005). Criticalthinking: to think like a nurse. Re-trieved July 21, 2005 from the CriticalThinking in Nursing Education web site:http://www.cariboo.bc.ca/nursing/fac-ulty/heaslip/nrsct.htm

Mayes, G.R. (2006). Theoriesof explanation. In J. Fieser & B.Dowden (Eds.) The Internet Encyclo-pedia of Philosophy. Retrieved March13, 2006 from http://www.iep.utm.edu/e/explanat.htm

Tracy Irani is an Associate Profes-sor at the University of Florida

There is a stronglink between criticalthinking and reading

comprehension.

23 May - June 2006

THEME ARTICLE

Helping Students Regulate Through Reflection

By Nicole Stedman

THEME ARTICLE

Insanity: doing the same thing

over and over again and expecting dif-ferent results.

~Albert Einstein

So, what does this quote have todo with Critical Thinking? It illustratesthe rationale of instructing students inthe critical thinking skill of self-regula-tion. So many times, we want some-thing to change, but lack the neces-sary know-how to make it so.

As teachers, this often material-izes in students wanting better gradesand performance, but not willing to putin the time or energy to successfullycreate the change. The frustrationoften occurs after repeatedly gradinga paper with the same errors, regard-less of the instruction provided. So,maybe the question becomes, how canwe guide students through the skill ofself-regulation, so they become bettercritical thinkers?

Self-regulation refers to one’sability to evaluate judgments with theintention of questioning, confirming,validating, or correcting the reasoningor results. In other words, it is howwell we are capable of justifying orcorrecting our reasoning. Self-regula-tion does not function on its own; it issupported by two sub skills, self-ex-amination and self-correction.

These two complementary subskills require students to reflect upontheir reasoning and then correct thereasoning based upon any deficienciesidentified. As educators, we want ourstudents to face new experiences withan open-mind and to be critical of their

biases and view points. But, if theproper guidance is not provided to stu-dents during this time then outcomesmay fall short.

When discussing the use of re-flection as a teaching methodology, stu-dents are usually told to reflect, whichcould be interpreted as a number ofbehaviors. In most cases, the outcomedesired is the recording of one’s per-sonal thoughts and opinions about atopic or an experience. This affectivedimension of reflection is one piece.

Reflection, defined as, “consider-ation of some subject matter, idea, orpurpose” is an obscure process that webelieve students should be able to do.However, much like critical thinking, ifwe have never been taught this skillthen the reflections may be shallow andone-dimensional. One goal of criticalthinking is proficiency in self-regulationand so is reflection.

In order to encourage students tothink deeper about a topic or subjectmatter an outline for how to reflect andwhat to reflect upon is helpful. Oneway to do this is to support students inthe three domains of learning, Cogni-tive, Affective and Psychomotor.These are also commonly referred toas, knowledge, attitude and skills. Thecognitive domain focuses on the de-velopment of intellection. With that,there are six categories, these we arefamiliar with as Bloom’s Taxonomy(Bloom, 1956), and are knowledge,comprehension, application, analysis,synthesis, and evaluation. The seconddomain addresses the emotional devel-opment of students and can be catego-rized into five parts.

The affective domain has fivecategories developed in 1973, byKrathwohl, Bloom and Bertram andwere meant to focus on how studentsbegin to internalize experiences. The

How can we guidestudents through

the skill ofself-regulation, sothey become bettercritical thinkers?

24 The Agricultural Education Magazine

most simplistic form is to receive phe-nomena, then to respond to phenom-ena, on to valuing, organizing, and thenthe internalization of values. The in-tent of this domain of learning is stu-dents begin to recognize any feelingsor attitudes they may have about theexperience. In this case, as we dis-cussed with self-examination, biasesmay be uncovered and addressed.

The third domain, psychomotor,emphasizes the physical or behavioraland motor-skill area. Simpson (1972)identified seven categories of psycho-motor development. These rangedfrom perception, set, guided response,mechanism, complex overt response,adaptation, to origination. The intent,as with the other two domain catego-ries, is that the student moves from avery basic level of performance, orunderstanding, into a higher level ormore complex level of performance orunderstanding over time.

Utilizing these three domains en-

sures regardless of the impact the ex-perience has made on the student, theywill have had to think through the ex-perience. For example, in a class of30 students, it may be difficult to de-termine the effect of the experienceon a student; did they gain more knowl-edge?, were their emotions or attitudesimpacted?, or, did they learn a new skillor behavior? The reflections documentwhat they student felt he/she got fromthe experience and provides a basis forfurther development.

Providing students with instruc-tion on reflection provides them with asense completion. In experiential learn-ing, reflection-in-action (Cervero,1988), refers to the students ability toallow thinking to reshape their actions,or what they are doing. In Self-Regu-lation, this is a perfect example of howreflection can assist students in exami-nation of their current thoughts or be-haviors.

The difficult part of this strategy

in teaching is developing experiencesthat encourage students to think criti-cally and to support thoughtful reflec-tion of those experiences. Educationalobjectives can provide a starting pointfor creating critical thinking outcomesof students. It is important to establishcritical thinking as a measurable out-come of the educational experience,because students will have a better ideaof the challenge in assignments.

The challenge of the assignmentsoften is not the reflection and exami-nation, but the correction. Self-correc-tion is a skill students need assistancedeveloping. With that, if students areleft with the reflection, but without theopportunity to correct the behavior orreasoning then the process is incom-plete. Experiential learning comple-ments the development of self-correc-tion because it allows students to ac-tively experiment (Kolb, 1984) withbehaviors, or in the case of criticalthinking, thoughts, judgments and rea-soning.

Learning to Reflect

In a leadership education program, students were exposed to a number of experiences to developtheir understanding of leadership. In one experience, students were invited to dine with an interna-tional community. Below are the examples of the questions the teachers asked to encourage thought-ful reflection. Each set focuses on the three domains of learning:

Affective - In your conversations with others at the potluck dinner, how did your perceptions ofdiverse cultures change throughout the evening?Psychomotor - What behavioral norms (perhaps mannerisms), including your own, did you observeacross the cultures during this event?Cognitive - Contrast similarities and differences between yourself and other students present atthis event. How does this new knowledge fit with your current knowledge? What has changed?

Being provided guiding questions takes the guess work out of reflection. It offers focus allowingthe teacher to be purposive in directing outcomes of a learning experience. The goal of this expe-rience was to expose students to an international community to develop their understanding ofcultural diversity and to break down any barriers that may have existed.

25 May - June 2006News & Events

Once students have completedthe reflection process, it is importantto have them document their points ofperceived deficiency. During this step,the student may define the goals ofself-correction. The self-correctionprocess should provide ample oppor-tunity for students to discuss and sharetheir reflections and receive feedback.At this time, students can verbalize thecorrected reasoning or practice thenew behavior.

Reflection can be a wonderfulteaching tool to develop the skill of self-regulation. As discussed in this article,it is not an easy task and ample con-sideration should be made in guidingstudents through the process of devel-oping their sub skills of self-examina-tion and self-correction. However, self-regulation does not operate in avacuum and the other skills of criticalthinking should be equally developedby students in order to produce true

Self-Correcting as a GoalAgain, students in the leadership education program were presented with a task ofdefining leadership. Definitions were pictorially presented and shared with theclass. As one may predict, students did not have many experiences, in which tobase their definition. After being presented with a number of lessons, discussionsand the opportunity for reflection, students were asked to revisit the pictorials.

During this time, definitions of leadership became more complex and includedmany more descriptions than the original pictorials. Students were then providedthe opportunity to tear-up the original pictorials, representing their moving be-yond their first thoughts and definitions of leadership.

Although, this was not a complex task to carry out, students were surprised attheir new vision of leadership.

critical thinkers.

References

Bloom, B.S. (1956). Taxonomyof educational objectives, hand-book 1: The cognitive domain. NewYork: David McKay Co., Inc.

Cervero, R.M. (1988). Effectivecontinuing education for profession-als. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Facione, P.A. (1990). Criticalthinking: A statement of expert con-sensus for the purposes of educa-tional assessment and instruction.Millbrae, CA: California AcademicPress.

Kolb, D.A. (1984). Experientiallearning. Upper Saddle River, NJ:Prentice Hall.

Krathwohl, D.R., Bloom, B.S., &

Bertram, B.M. (1973). Taxonomy ofeducational objectives, the classifi-cation of educational objectives,handbook 2: Affective domain. NewYork: David McKay Co., Inc.

Simpson, E.J. (1972). The clas-sification of educational objectivesin the psychomotor domain. Wash-ington D.C.: Gryphon House.

Nicole Stedman is an Assistant Pro-fessor at Texas A&M

26 The Agricultural Education Magazine

THEME ARTICLE

By Julia Rotman-Smith & Donna Moore

Bring It to Class

Students won’t find it in a text-

book, they can’t ask a friend what it is,and the teacher will not give it to them.It is the proper response to a questionthat requires critical thinking - the “rightanswer”. Why do so many studentsstruggle when they are asked to pro-vide their own reflective response toan open ended question? Why is it sodifficult for teachers to encourage stu-dents to think and formulate their ownideas about a topic? How do teacherscreate less passive learners and instead,guide students to develop abilities inwhich they actively engage in criticalthinking practices in the classroom.

There may be several factors thatcontribute to a student’s inability to in-terpret and analyze material, think criti-cally, and respond to reflective ques-tions. These factors may range fromfamily issues to “lethargic indifference”or simply a lack of previous instruc-tion. As teachers we cannot create theperfect thinker. However, teaching theskills of critical thinking can be incred-ibly empowering for both the teacherand students if both are able to over-come the perceived barriers. Once ateacher understands the concepts andprocess of critical thinking, it is impor-tant to create an intellectually safe en-vironment for students in which theycan express their thoughts and thoughtprocesses without fear of ridicule. In-tegrating the skill of critical thinking intothe curriculum may seem like a daunt-ing task, but taking on the challenge insmall steps and accepting that there willbe bumps in the road when a lessondoesn’t quite go as planned will make

the process a little easier to tackle.

A Naked Brain

Developing of intellectual safetyfor students evolves over time. Forexample, Julia’s classes are in three-hour blocks so she likes to have a breakin the middle of the session where sheoften brings in snacks to share. Aninteresting “phenomenon” occurs ev-ery year when new students join herclass; most of them will not eat thesnack even if it is a good snack likecookies or chips. As the yearprogresses, the students evolve fromself-conscious eaters to a “swarm oflocusts”, cleaning her out of every typeof food in the classroom. Why thechange? It is a matter of their percep-tions of safety in the learning environ-ment. Students don’t want to be thefirst ones to take the snack for fear ofstanding out. What if they take a snackand no one else does? How will theirpeers perceive them? If students arenervous about eating a simple snack infront of others, then how do we ex-pect them to voice their personal re-flections about their own thought pro-cesses unless we create an intellectu-ally safe classroom environment?

Asking students to think about andrespond to an assignment using criticalthinking can be a very intimidating ex-perience for the students and a chal-lenging process for the teacher. Howmight a teacher be able to reduce thelevel of intimidation that her studentsexperience as they attempt to provideresponses to questions that requiresome degree of critical thinking? De-veloping an intellectually safe class-room environment can contribute asmuch to a student’s willingness to en-gage in critical thinking as their under-standing of the actual process itself.

As teachers in agricultural education,we take classroom safety very seri-ously when it comes to our laboratorylayout, tool maintenance, and safetyinstruction, but how often do we thinkabout the intellectual safety that weprovide for our students?

While teachers may not specifi-cally think about the intellectual safetyof their students, typical planning prac-tices and pedagogy generally providesan environment that encourages stu-dent participation. What then is intel-lectual safety? It is an environment inwhich the teacher is, “open and car-ing, demonstrates respect, and em-braces the uniqueness of students andtheir perspectives” (Schrader, 2004, p.98) in a classroom where all studentsare encouraged to participate in dis-cussions and activities under the teach-ers direction and guidance. Since criti-cal thinking encourages students toshare how or what they think, intellec-tual safety is necessary to ensure stu-dents feel there is little risk of negativecomments from their peers and theyare contributing to the educational ex-periences in their classroom (Schrader,2004).

Critical Thinking in Practice

A stack of books and articlesabout critical thinking, a safe classroomenvironment, and good intentions; theonly piece missing – integration. Tak-ing time to realign and integrate a newteaching habit into the curriculum todevelop critical thinking abilities in stu-dents, while sustaining an agricultureteaching day that already includes mul-tiple class preparations, projects, andthe latest FFA chapter activity may beoverwhelming. Some suggestions totransition from the ideas on paper tothe living and breathing classroom in-

27 May - June 2006

clude:

♦Be realistic. Learning andteaching critical thinking is a consider-able charge that must develop into ahabit over time. Are students going tobe complete critical thinkers in 12weeks? Probably not. However, theywill hopefully begin to gain an under-standing of the processes of criticalthinking and become more active (ver-sus passive) thinkers.

♦Start small. Select one coursein which the concepts of critical think-ing are compatible with the curriculumand the students, perhaps an agricul-tural leadership class. Choose an areasuch as one specific element or con-cept of critical thinking and focus onteaching that versus teaching the en-tire process at once.

♦Chat with colleagues. Morethan likely other teachers are teachingpieces of critical thinking in their cur-riculum, (hint: they may not refer to itas “critical thinking”). English teach-ers often cover clarity, accuracy, pre-cision, completeness, and relevancefairly well. While not all agriculturalstudents may be taking the sameclasses or be in the same grade, un-derstanding what is already beingtaught throughout the school may helpnarrow down an otherwise enormousarea to cover.

♦Choose a topic taught fre-quently. Critical thinking is a habit thatmust be reiterated over time. Recreat-ing lots of different lessons is not al-ways realistic for teachers under aconstant time crunch, instead selectseveral easily adapted lessons that as-sist students in analyzing and assess-ing their own thinking; something thatis not taught during one stand alone les-son.

One example of a lesson that maybe taught frequently is a review and

synopsis of a current agriculture maga-zine article in which the students areinstructed to respond to guiding ques-tions that integrate critical thinking con-cepts. Choose an article that presentsan issue (hint: initially pick one that stu-dents probably know something aboutand have an opinion such as animalrights). Before reading the article, havestudents respond to questions that bringout their preconceived perceptionsabout the topic such as: what are yourthoughts on this topic, and what con-nections do you have to this topic? Stu-dents might find the use of a graphicorganizer (discussion web) a helpfulway in which they can connect theirprior experience or knowledge to thetopic. After the students complete thearticle have them factually summarizeit.

Many students will add their ownopinions to a factual article summary.This is an opportunity for teachers topoint out that people often perceivetheir own opinions as fact. At the con-clusion of the assignment, have stu-dents evaluate whether or not their ini-tial assumptions impacted their read-ing and if the facts in the articlechanged their initial assumptions. Askstudent to provide evidence for theiranswers. A yes or no answer is notsufficient. Rephrased or guiding ques-tions may be needed as a follow up tothe assignment

Other additional activities formore advanced thinkers could includecreating a “T” chart of the pros andcons stated in the article. Or have stu-dents reflect on questions and state-ments such as: Is this article taking aside? What evidence in the article de-fends this answer? Who are the “play-

ers” and/or “stakeholders” in the ar-ticle? Is the article written from theperspective of one of these stakehold-ers? What is the evidence of this per-ception? What are some perspectivesthat are not addressed? Identify theinformation in the article that is reli-able and that which is unreliable. Whatconnections can be made to other ar-ticles or information discussed in class?Students should be encouraged toclearly discuss their responses to thequestions, perhaps first in small groupsas a means of providing a safe class-room environment.

A small group activity that incor-porates critical thinking could be cre-ated based on a series of articles re-garding a particular issue. Each stu-dent within a group would be expectedto address the issue presented in thearticles with the aforementioned ques-tions. Students would prepare a roundtable discussion in which they mustdevelop a thesis statement regardingthe issue and lead a portion of the dis-cussion (a teacher may assign a side,or have the students dispute it neu-trally). During the roundtable discus-sion each student would ask questionsof a peer committee and be askedquestions as well. It can be incrediblybeneficial to have students argue theside that they are initially against.

References

Schrader, D. E. (2004). Intellec-tual safety, moral atmosphere, and epis-temology in college classrooms. Jour-nal of Adult Development, 11 (2), 87– 101.

Julia Rotman-Smith teaches agri-cultural science at the Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES in Auburn, NY.

Donna M. Moore is the Senior Pro-fessional Development Specialistfor Agricultural Education andState FFA Advisor in New York.

Why is it so difficult forteachers to encourage stu-

dents to think and formulatetheir own ideas about a topic?

28 The Agricultural Education Magazine