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 The Natural Approach to Teaching Thinking Skills by Debbie Strayer “What do you think you should do? Did you think about that before you did it? What were you thinking?” These are all common phrases that come out of the mouths of parents on a daily basis. As a homeschooling parent, my goal was for my children to think, and think deeply about many issues. Was it a good idea to throw the ball into the pond? Should you come when you are called? What did we learn about tigers and where they live? Did the character in the story do the right thing? The ability to think critically is the skill our children need most, and the one we are most afraid they don’t have. While we may believe we know what the result of thinking looks like, the notion of teaching someone to think seems intimidating, so let’s start with the basics. What is thinking? How can we develop our children’s ability to think, and more importantly, do I have to buy another curriculum just to teach my children how to do it? The answers are easier than you expect. The term thinking is fairly general. It involves what your mind does, such as form an opinion, reason, or make a judgment. In other words, your children already think to some degree. If the conclusions they reach are not always the ones you would like, then there are steps you can take as a parent, to improve the process. The beauty of thinking is that it is done by a marvelous creation called the brain, and is not solely dependent on our input. Often thoughts will pop into our mind without any preparation by us. This is one of the wonders and dangers of thoughts – they can be somewhat unpredictable. The concern of parents and teachers alike over the centuries is not necessarily what thoughts may pop into a child’s mind, but what the child does with the thought. Here’s where the opportunity to teach comes in. Over time, and in a natural manner, teach your child what the following words mean, and use them to give him direction. Model the way to use these terms correctly for him and you have enabled your child to take more steps towards greater ability to think. 1) Reflect means to consider something you remember in an unhurried manner. Some good uses of the concept of reflection for a homeschooling mom would be to reflect on what you did yesterday in school, what curriculums have worked well for you, what disciplinary measures were most effective with your children, or whether or not your grace level during school means you need to get more sleep! The key elements in reflection are that it is unhurried, and it involves thinking about something that has already happened. You could reflect aloud to show your child what it means to reflect. Here are some questions for your child to reflect upon: How did my family treat me when I was sad about something? What trip have we taken as a family that is my favorite? What was the best present I have ever been given? Did I follow the rules when we went to the play? Reflection is a key to evaluating decisions you have made. Without stopping to consider the results of our actions, our feelings about things in the past do not give us the instruction that will help future decisions. Always provide reflection time when there have been both good and bad consequences for your children. As they get older, writing can also provide great opportunities for reflection that children can actually see the purpose for. Ask your child to reflect on previous events, and to tell you what he learned from the circumstances. Don’t lose the benefit that life naturally has to offer. We cannot assume that our children will automatically stop to reflect, so we need to instruct them to do so, and show them how in our own lives. 2) Deliberate means the slow, careful reasoning that takes place before an opinion is formed or a conclusion reached. This is the type of thinking we as parents pray for. To be honest our job as parents is to teach our children how to do this, and when to do this. It is a skill that is best taught when it has been modeled by parents repeatedly, and when the process is shared with children. Of course it is not necessary for a parent to tell a child how a decision has been reached, but it is very helpful if you expect your child to use the same process as you do. For us, when a request that was important to a child had to be denied, it was often helpful to the child for us to explain our deliberations to him. Explaining the process we went through and the factors we considered in making a decision often would enable our children to reach peace about the answer much more quickly. Deliberating also communicates a certain level of care or concern. If you make a decision quickly, it doesn’t show much consideration or importance. If you take time to deliberate about something, it shows others how much you value a certain decision and the people it will affect. Again, it was not necessary for us to do so as parents, but it was a natural opportunity to show our children how the process of deliberation works. When they had a big decision to make, we would encourage them to go through the decision making process. If they came to us with a decision that seemed hasty, or unwise, we would send them back to consider their facts again. This was not always accompanied by our opinion of what needed to change, but hopefully they would reach the same conclusion without us making the connections for them. When important choices needed to be made by our children, it was always a good opportunity to encourage deliberation. We would often discourage quick decisions, and ask for them to explain their thinking to us. If they were unable to do so, they would be sent back to the drawing board of deliberation. It was sometimes very surprising to them, that after time and thought, they would come to a different conclusion than the one they would have initially made. This is the stuff over which parents rejoice! Remember, teaching your child to critically think doesn’t have to be expensive or boring. It can be a part of everyday life and the benefits can become evident very early on. After a decision or choice has been made, remember to go back and discuss the outcome of the decision so that connections will be made for the child between what was chosen and what took place. Developing thinking skills is time well spent as a homeschooling family. You never know how far your child’s ability to think will take him! |
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