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How Do We Promote Higher Level Thinking Today?

It’s one thing for educators to teach to tests that offer learners certification that proves they’ve mastered key facts and concepts that panels of experts deem necessary for an ‘educated’ person to know.

It’s another thing altogether to help learners exploit their native curiosity and continuously improve their higher order thinking so they are able to solve the endless stream of complex problems that everyday life delivers. It’s true, as Tony Karreer says, life is mostly an open book test.

For many years, Bloom’s Taxonomy has offered teachers and learners some useful distinctions that help break down complex tasks into structured learning experiences that allow people to build on their success.

The early taxonomy began with knowledge, understanding, and application as lower level skills and cast higher level skills as analysis, synthesis, and evaluation.

However, getting learners engaged - and keeping them engaged - in the increasingly busy and ‘noisy’ information environment of the 21st century seems to be presenting new challenges.

In 2001, Anderson and Krathwohl adapted Bloom’s model to fit the needs of today by employing more outcome-oriented language, workable objectives, and changing nouns to active verbs.

Most notably, knowledge was converted to remember. In addition, the highest level of development is now called create, rather than evaluate.

Recently, Barbara Clark (2007) provided an adaptation of Bloom’s work to facilitate active learning.

This circle is called the Cognitive Taxonomy Circle:

I find Clark’s tool useful when I need to respond to learners’ needs directly, actively, and specifically. I use it to help me meet learners of all ages - and all abilities - where they are in their personal inquiry, not where I am, or where I think they ought to be.

When I’m able to do this, engagement seems to take care of itself.

What tools do YOU use to help you meet learners where they are?

Starting today, our radio show, “Teaching For A Living, Not Just A Paycheck” will now be hosted both here and on my profile page inside the WeAreTeachers Network.

Show #2 features an interview with Mark Cruthers, an AP History teacher living in Pinion Hills, California, where he teaches both face-to-face and online.

Monday to Friday, from 7:30am to 3:30pm, Mark teaches traditional high school students face-to-face. Then, after 4pm, Mark teaches teaches homeschool students - online.

Last year, he and his wife, Deborah, made an extra $25,000 teaching 13 homeschoolers AP History, AP English and AP Psychology using a free, virtual classroom tool called WizIQ. And every one of them passed their AP History exams with flying colors, too!

I’d call what Mark’s doing teaching for a living, not just a paycheck.

Listen to him talk about how he’s doing this here:

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