Remodeling for Critical Thinking

The University of Victoria's conception of critical thinking
Despite critical thinking's popularity and its catch-phrase status among educators, it remains largely misunderstood! If you are interested in learning more about critical thinking, be sure to check out reputable sites.  Most scholars and informed teachers talk about critical thinking as consisting of skills (coming up with criteria and applying it, formulating good and insightful questions, reasoning, constructing and analyzing arguments, etc.) as well as dispositions (curiosity, open-mindedness, willingness to listen, willingness to change one's position, etc.).

Laura Pinto's Summary of CT literature
 
Beyond disagreement on the precise definition, critical thinking is not without critique. Some suggest that it privileges male ways of thinking (for example, see Blythe Clinchy's work on connected knowing), and for privilegeing "western" ways of knowing (see, for example, some of Yvonne Turner's work). This is all to say that teachers who emphasize critical thinking in their classrooms need to be ware of how emphasis on critical thinking can lead to gender and cultural bias in pedagogy and assessment.

Despite the cautions offered above, critical thinking has many potential benefits in students' skill development and even engagement in schooling including among students labelled "at risk" (when done well, of course!).

The best source of ideas for Critical Thinking remodeling is the Critical Thinking Community's library of remodeled lessons:
These lessons show an original lesson, critique it, and offer solutions to improve it. Many of the ideas presented in these examples can be adapted for other subjects and topics.