{"id":12117,"date":"2019-08-06T11:43:19","date_gmt":"2019-08-06T02:43:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/themantic-education.com\/ibpsych\/?p=12117"},"modified":"2020-09-07T16:30:04","modified_gmt":"2020-09-07T07:30:04","slug":"critical-thinking-summarized-in-one-word","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themantic-education.com\/ibpsych\/2019\/08\/06\/critical-thinking-summarized-in-one-word\/","title":{"rendered":"Critical Thinking Summarized in ONE WORD!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Understanding the requirements of critical thinking can be a tricky task for students\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>teachers. While everyone has their own ideas about what “critical thinking” is and what it looks like in IB Psych’ exam answers, this post provides a simple and straightforward answer.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

I like to define critical thinking as “a critical reflection of the value and validity of one’s knowledge and understanding<\/em>.” Now, that’s a pretty technical and rather abstract definition, so it needs simplifying in order to be useful. While I believe we can summarize critical thinking in a single word, we first need to identify what the “knowledge and understanding” is that we’re talking about.<\/p>\n

Remember the key to knowledge and understanding in Psychology lies in these two questions:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. How and why do we think and act the way we do? (Behaviour and Cognition)<\/li>\n
  2. How do we know? (Evidence – studies)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Answering these questions using the content from the IB Psychology curriculum is the knowledge and understanding. Now we’re ready to critically reflect on it.<\/p>\n

    So what is the one magical word that defines critical thinking?<\/p>\n

    “BUT….”<\/strong><\/h2>\n

    It’s that simple. If we go a step further and break the whole IB Psychology course down into three simple levels of questions…<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. \n

      What is….<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
    2. \n

      How does…<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
    3. \n

      But…<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      …we can now see how that critical thinking is just saying “but…” (and then of course being able to offer a clear explanation of what it is you’re doubting).<\/p>\n

      The first step in critical thinking is asking the question. The second step is trying to answer it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

      Is it really that simple?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

      Think about it: you have to know the behaviours, cognitions, variables and research methods that you’re referring to: cultural dimensions, hormones, social cognitive theory, experiments, etc. Then you have to explain how these affect behaviour, or how they are affected by other factors. You also have to show you know this based on evidence.<\/p>\n

      So critical thinking is just asking “But…”\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

      Read more:<\/strong> Five types of IB Psychology Exam Questions (Link<\/a>)<\/p>\n