Alternative Teaching Strategies: The Case for Critical Thinking

Alternative Teaching Strategies: The Case for Critical ThinkingAuthor(s): Don WeastSource: Teaching Sociology, Vol. 24, No. 2 (Apr., 1996), pp. 189-194Published by: American Sociological AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1318809 .

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ALTERNATIVE TEACHING STRATEGIES: THE CASE FOR CRITICAL THINKING*

DON WEAST University Of Wisconsin-Waukesha Center

T HE BEST THING I EVER DID IN MYTEACHING career was to make critical thinking an inte- gral part of my social problems classes. As I will demonstrate in this paper, learning and applying critical thinking skills have helped my students to become better social scientists: they are more competent in assessing the logical and empirical adequacy of arguments about controversial social issues.

I used to teach the old-fashioned way: I gave lectures, answered questions as I went along, encouraged class discussions, required term papers, used questions from a test bank to generate several objective examinations, and graded the students according to a rea- sonable standard of percentiles. Occasionally, I substituted essay questions for multiple- choice exams, and graded the students' an- swers more thoughtfully, albeit subjectively.

I never was satisfied with this traditional method of teaching, however. I knew it was important to present the sociological perspec- tive-the principles, concepts, and theories as well as the qualitative and quantitative meth- ods for acquiring knowledge. Still, I was always troubled by the feeling that my students were little more than receptacles for this information. They were not being taught to think for themselves in a logical, systematic, and coherent way, but were simply regurgitat- ing lectures and text materials back to me. As Neil Browne once wrote to me,

[S]uch learners can merely nod their heads in mute agreement when they hear claims reinforced or supported by that small subset of sociological principles they heard in class or read in the text. It is not hyperbole to compare such learning to the behavior of a puppet with the strings being held by the teacher or text book author.... Unfor- tunately, those who feel they have acquired knowledge in sociology or any other type of class now feel free to announce pompously their opin-

*I would like to thank Bob Bermant, Phil Groth, Mansour Haghighatian, and Phil Zweifel for their invaluable assistance. I am also grateful to the copy- editor, Karen Feinberg, and three anonymous review- ers for their helpful comments.

ions on any topic for which they recall the ac- cepted classroom doctrines. Openness and humil- ity dissipate. Proof is what the learner memorized in sociology. Newly acquired "expertise" becomes a substitute for thought (Personal Communica- tion).

I also was intellectually dissatisfied with the traditional method because it failed to accomplish what I always had thought was a major goal of sociological training: to help one think more logically or critically or scientifically about the social world, or, as Charles Logan put it, to help us get "away from the kind of thinking where we base our beliefs and opinions on emotion, ideology, fashion- able credos, folk wisdom, and other such nonrational bases...forming instead the habit of examining ideas for their logical soundness and empirical support" (1976:30).

Even though sociology is proclaimed to be a social science, and even though introductory textbooks emphasize that they will help students to think more analytically, more care- fully, more systematically and more critically, I doubted that students were really "getting the message." These doubts remained even though I put great emphasis on the need to examine ideas for "their logical soundness and empirical support." Yet this emphasis was not articulated or reinforced with course materials. I always wondered whether the students were really learning how to think about social issues in a more logical, more critical way. Logan's research confirmed my suspicions about my effectiveness as a teacher, and at the same time showed that students indeed can learn to think more "critically, logically, and scientifically if they [take] course work having that task as an explicit goal" (Logan 1976:29).

STRATEGY FOR TEACHING CRITICAL THINKING

So, after years of experiencing self-doubt about the quality of my old-fashioned teaching, I began to alter my pedagogical strate-

Teaching Sociology, 1996, Vol. 24 (April: 189-194) 189



190 TFACHING SOCIOLOGY

gies. I asked myself, "Just what do I want to accomplish in my courses? How can I con- struct a strategy for accomplishing my goals?" Broadly speaking, I wanted to con- struct a course in such a way that at the end of the year the students would be intellectually equipped to evaluate social problems. What could I leave with them that they could use and develop as they confronted the social issues of the future? Surely they would soon forget the content, definitions, theories, and principles of the textbook and lectures. What might be more lasting and more useful? In my view the answer was (and still is) the critical analysis of social problems. This analysis emphasizes learning and being inclined to apply specific critical thinking skills in assessing issues, such as the ability to identify and evaluate assumptions, evidence, reasoning, and cause-and-effect arguments. Equally important is an atti- tude--a commitment to the search for truth. This commitment is fostered by a deep belief in intellectual values, notably skepti- cism, fair-mindedness, integrity, and humil- ity (Weast 1991).

While I was developing my own strategies for teaching effective thinking, I came across two books that I found most helpful: Baker and Anderson's (1987) Social Prob- lems: A Critical Thinking Approach and Browne and Keeley's (1981) Askingthe Right Questions. I have used these texts every semester since they were first published. Both emphasize what Browne and Keeley call the "panning-for-gold" approach to learning. They prefer this approach to the traditional "sponge" method of rote memorization because it emphasizes an active role for the learner in acquiring knowledge. As Browne and Keeley explain,

The panning-for-gold approach requires that the reader ask himself a number of questions, to clarify logical steps in the material and help identify important omissions. The readerwho uses the panning-for-gold approach frequently questions why the author makes various claims. He writes notes to himself in the margins indicating problems with the reasoning. He continually interacts with the material. His intent is to critically evaluate the material and formulate personal conclu- sions based on the evaluations (1990:4).

I have incorporated this approach in all of my classes. The students focus on socio-

logical concepts, theories, and principles, as well as on various types of qualitative and quantitative studies-but they study this content through the lens of critical thinking.

All too often we sociologists try to accomplish too much with too little plan- ning. Faced with a large textbook that su- perficially discusses numerous complex social issues, combined with classes with very large enrollments, we often feel over- whelmed. It is impossible to cover the field adequately, and we cannot rely on the textbook to do it for us. In fact, as Hedley and Taveggia show, we cannot even rely on the accuracy of the textbook in reporting and interpreting original studies (Hedley and Taveggia 1977:108-16).

Rather than yielding to the demands of the standard textbook, which attempts to cover every conceivable theory, principle, and subject, I decided to be much more selective. My premise is that it is better to cover a few essential elements well than to cover many things poorly. For example, my students choose only four social problems to study throughout the semester. They are expected to do extensive library work in gathering information on the perceptions, interpretations, and explanations of these problems from three perspectives: common sense-the views of laypeople as illustrated by letters to the editor in magazines and newspapers; journalism- editorials and es- says by professional journalists; and sociology-both scholarly and popular writings by social scientists (Baker and Jones 1981:126-38). At the end of the semester, the students will have collected at least 45 articles. Every four weeks they are required to submit typewritten critical analyses of three of these articles, each selected from one of the three different perspectives. I promptly read these analyses and return them with constructive comments.

In addition to the library work, each classroom session is designed to foster active participation by the learner. Before class, students must have read an assigned article or must have completed sample exercises from their textbooks. During class I call on them to evaluate these materials.

The written evaluations of the library articles, as well as the classroom assign-



ALTERNATIVE TEACHING STRATEGIES 191

ments, incorporate the model of critical thinking found in Asking the Right Questions (Browne and Keeley 1990). This model in- volves asking a series of questions that em- ploy critical thinking. Some of these questions, for example, help learners identify and evaluate key phrases, assumptions, evidence, cause-and-effect arguments, and controver- sies based on conflicting values.

My role in the students' learning process is to help them understand and apply these skills by giving them constant written and oral feedback. The whole process can be likened to the relationship between a coach and his players. I help teach the skills, and then we practice, practice, practice: "Mary, what are the main issue and conclusion in Charles Murray's essay, 'The British Under- class'?" "John, what reasons and evidence does Murray give to support his conclusion?" "Nancy, do you think these reasons

adequately support the conclusion?" "Frank, I see you shaking your head. Appar- entlyyou don't agree with Nancy. Why not?" "Gloria, can you identify any value assumptions made by Murray? Do you think his values have affected the way he presents his arguments? In what way?" "Dora, we also have just read an article by Wacquant and Wilson, 'Poverty, Joblessness, and the Social Transformation of the Inner City.' Do you think these authors would have any dis- agreements with Murray? Why?"

As the semester proceeds, I see improvement in students' performance. Their participation in the class, combined with extensive writing and reading assignments, pays off as their writing and their oral presenta- tions become more thoughtful and more coherent.

Am I deluding myself? Do students really improve, or am I seeing what I want to see? To help answer this question, I con- ducted a study that compared the critical thinking abilities of students in my social problems course with those of students in introductory sociology. The latter were taught in the traditional way by my col- league, Professor Mansour Haghighatian.

This study rests on the assumption that the key overriding independent variable is the explicit teaching of critical thinking. Other independent variables, such as famili-

arity with sociological content, are assumed to have little impact. This assumption is supported by research (Annis and Annis 1979; Browne et al. 1977; Keeley, Browne, and Kreutzer 1982). In fact, Logan (1976:36) found that freshman and sopho- more sociology students outperformed graduate students and teaching assistants in evaluating social issues.

The fact that introductory and social problems classes were compared in this study should not matter. Although the courses may not be identical, they discuss similar topics such as overpopulation, status inequalities, and ethnic conflict. Both stress the importance of scientific reasoning in assessing these issues. For example, the text used in Professor Haghighatian's class de- votes an entire chapter to principles and procedures of the scientific method (Ma- cionis 1989:29-59).

Again, however, course content should not make a difference in the ability to evaluate controversial topics. The important con- sideration is how the material is taught. Teaching students to memorize content teaches them what to think; teaching them skills and intellectual attitudes teaches them how to think. (Logan 1976:41).

PROCEDURE

At the first session of the semester, I gave the students in the two classes a pretest to measure their critical thinking abilities. The students' backgrounds were similar in that both classes had a preponderance of first-year, traditional students. Neither of the classes required a prerequisite. I presented the students with an essay taken from an early edition ofAsking the Right Questions (1986). This essay is antagonistic toward affirmative action. It is also seriously flawed: among other faults it contains unwarranted assumptions, ambiguous language, spurious evidence, and significant omissions. In my study I was concerned about whether students could identify these faults and take them into account in their assessment of this essay. I gave the students the following instructions: "Critically evaluate the essay be- low. That is, write an evaluation of how well



192 TEACHING SOCIOLOGY

you think the author supports her conclusion." The students were allowed the full class period to write their critique.

At the end of the semester, I asked the students again to write a critical evaluation of this essay on affirmative action. We never discussed the essay between the time of the pretest and the posttest. The subject of affirmative action itself was given minimal and relatively equal attention in both classes. The social problems class briefly discussed the standard arguments about affirmative action. The introductory students read one page from their textbook, which also gave arguments for and against affirmative action (Macionis 1989:301). None of this minimal content should make a difference in students' ability to spot errors in the essay they were asked to assess.

After the posttest papers were completed, I selected a random sample of papers from the introductory class in order to ob- tain an equal number of students (N=38) from each class. Then I distributed the papers randomly between myself and two col- leagues for rating. Each of the judges rated one-third of the papers. The ratings were 'blind' in that the judges did not know from which of the classes the papers were drawn.

To enhance uniformity in rating, we used a template developed by Browne and Keeley (1986:182-83). This template pro- vides a model critique of the essay on affirmative action; it discusses the many flaws in the essay as they relate to several dimensions of critical thinking. The raters' instructions were to evaluate, on a scale of 0 to 5, how well the students performed on the following dimensions: 1. Identifying the author's conclusion; 2. Identifying the reasons and the evidence; 3. Identifying vague and ambiguous lan-

guage; 4. Identifying value assumptions and value

conflicts; 5. Identifying descriptive assumptions; 6. Evaluating statistical reasoning; 7. Evaluating sampling and measurements; 8. Evaluating causal explanations; 9. Evaluating logical reasoning;

10. Identifying omitted information; and 11.Articulating one's own values in a

thoughtful, fair-minded way.

RESULTS

The three judges were not uniform in their ratings of students' performance, but their differences in scoring did not compromise the overall results. None of the judges found much difference between the classes on the pretest scores, but they consistently gave higher scores on the posttest to the students in the panning-for-gold class than to the students in the sponge class.

To measure whether thinking abilities can be enhanced, one must correct for un- equal skills and then measure the amount of improvement. Accordingly, I performed a univariate analysis of covariance with pretest scores as a covariate for each of the 11 dimensions of critical thinking listed above.

Table 1 presents the means adjusted for the pretest covariate as well as the percentage of students who did not score any points on a dimension. The panning-for-gold class did much better than the sponge class. I ob- tained significant class effects (at the .05 level) for total score, F(1,71)=56.2; identifying reasons and evidence, F (1,71)= 17.15; identifying ambiguous language, F(1,71) =30.97; identifying value conflicts and assumptions, F(1,71)=28.12; assessing adequacy of sampling and measurements, F (1,71)=8.94; assessing statistical analysis, F (1,71)= 18.28; identifying alternative causal explanations, F (1.71)=6.96; identifying errors in logical reasoning, F(1,71)=21.02; and identifying omitted information F (1,71)=14.47.

The superior performance of the panning-for-gold class is even more apparent when cumulative grades are taken into account. As Table 2 shows, this class outperformed the sponge class at each level of grade-point average. The differences were statistically significant (p=<.05). Even more impressive, the panning-for-gold students with the lowest GPA did significantly better than the sponge students with the highest GPA (p =<.05). This finding dem- onstrates that high achievers are not neces- sarily competent critical thinkers.

On the other hand, those students with the highest GPA in the panning-for-gold class also had the highest critical thinking scores. Apparently, they have developed



ALTERNATIVE TEACHING STRATEGIES 193

Table 1. Means, Adjusted for Correlation with Pretest Scores for 11 Dimensions of Critical Thinking

"Sponge" Class "Panning-for-Gold" (N=38) Class (N=38)

Percent Percent Scoring Scoring No No

Dimension Mean Points Mean Points

1. 3.25 16 3.53 3 2. 2.94 11 4.17* 3

3. 0.39 87 2.00* 26 4. 0.18 92 1.88* 34 5. 0.46 92 1.26 45 6. 0.16 92 1.00* 61 7. 0.10 92 1.15* 45 8. 0.08 97 0.62* 71 9. 0.51 84 1.89* 32 10. 0.29 87 1.29* 42 11. 1.59 50 1.86 39 Total 10.32 19.85*

*p<.05 level

abilities which enhances their capacity to learn and apply critical thinking skills. It may be, for example, that high achievers have a better command of language than those with a low GPA. If true, they may be able to critically assess the more subtle and complex arguments about affirmative action. In sum, high educational achieve- ment as measured by GPA may be a neces- sary, but not sufficient, condition for critically evaluating sophisticated discourse about social problems.

DISCUSSION

On the pretest both classes generally were impressed favorably with the arguments by the critic of affirmative action. After a semester of instruction, however, the results were much different. The panning-for-gold class now found numerous flaws in the arguments and were no longer impressed. In contrast, the sponge class did not change: students in that class still found the arguments persuasive. This finding is significant: students in Introduction to Sociology had been "sponging up" sociology for 15 weeks, and yet still were impressed with a seriously flawed article on an important, sensitive issue. What does this say about the educa-

Table 2. Total Means for Critical Thinking Score, by Four GPA Levels

"Sponge" "Panning-for-Gold" GPA Class Mean Class Mean 3.00-4.00 10.89 (n=9) 26.65 (n=7)* 2.50-2.99 9.92 (n=9) 20.98 (n=1 5)* 2.00-2.49 9.69 (n=l 1) 16.67 (n=10)* 1.00-1.99 10.30 (n=9) 20.71 (n=5)* *p<.05 level

tional value of learning sociology in the traditional way?

Of course background knowledge is important in evaluating social issues. For example, it is improbable that one can adequately assess the value of affirmative action without an understanding of how it evolved in the context of a history of discrimination, in- cluding laws as well as remedial policies designed to foster equal opportunity. More- over, without extensive reading the learner would not knowwhether the author is omit- ting significant information or whether she is presenting all sides of contentious issues. But the important point to emphasize here is that absorbing knowledge and critical thinking are not mutally exclusive:

The sponge approach emphasizes knowledge ac- quisition; the panning-for-gold approach stresses active interaction with knowledge as it is being acquired. Thus, the two approaches can comple- ment each other. To pan for intellectual gold, there must be something in your pan to evaluate. To evaluate arguments we must possess knowledge (Browne and Keely 1994:3).

The problem with the traditional (sponge) way of learning is that it is not integrated with critical thinking. Therefore, the learner is not intellectually equipped to determine what to accept or reject about controversial arguments. In my study the vast majority of the sponge students simply ac- cepted the reasons and evidence given to attack affirmative action. In contrast, the panning-for-gold students were not so gullible. Having been taught to challenge reasons and evidence in terms of their validity and soundness, they were more inclined to be skeptical ofunsubstantiated claims and thus were more sensitive to discovering flaws.

The fact that the panning-for-gold class outperformed the sponge class is heartening and reinforces my belief that students can be



194 TEACHING SOCIOLOGY

taught to think more analytically. Yet it is also evident that neither class did especially well. A large percentage of students from both classes failed to score any points on several dimensions of critical thinking, especially those which involved identifying and/or assessing adequacy of assumptions, sampling and measurements, statistical reasoning, and alternative explanations.

The findings of this study illustrate the difficulty of effectively teaching critical thinking skills in the social problems course. After all, my students had spent an entire semester learning and practicing these skills. Certainly they did do better than the students taught in the traditional manner. Also, in general, they improved between the pretest to the posttest. Even so, their difficulties in certain areas (e.g., identifying assumptions and assessing statistical reasoning) sug- gest that more time and effort need to be spent in devising strategies for teaching these more complex skills of critical thinking. This is easier said than done, but the goal of helping students to become more independent, more competent thinkers about social problems justifies the effort.

REFERENCES

Annis, David and Linda Annis. 1979. "Does Philoso-

phy Improve Critical Thinking?" Teaching Philoso-

phy 3(2):145-52. Baker, Paul J. and Louis E. Anderson. 1987. Social

Problems: A Critical ThinkingApproach. Belmont, CA:Wadsworth.

Baker, Paul J. and Janet S. Jones. 1981. "Teaching Rational Thinking in the Social Problems Course." Teaching Sociology 8:123-47.

Browne, M. Neil, Paul H. Haas, Karl E. Vogt, and James S. West. 1977. "Design and Implementa- tion of an Evaluation Procedure for an Innovative Undergraduate Program." College Student Journal 11:1-10.

Browne, M. Neil and Stuart M. Keeley. 1981. Asking the Right Questions. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Pren- tice-Hall.

,? 1986. Asking the Right Questions. 2nd ed.

Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. , 1990. Asking the Right Questions. 3rd ed.

Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Hedley, R Alan and Thomas C. Taveggia. 1977.

"Textbook Sociology: Some Cautionary Re- marks." American Sociologist 12:108-16.

Keeley, M. Stuart, Neil M. Browne, and Jeffrey S. Kreutzer. 1982. "A Comparison of Freshmen and Seniors on General and Specific Essay Tests for Critical Thinking." Research on Higher Education 17:139-54.

Logan, Charles. 1976. "Do Sociologists Teach Stu- dents to Think More Critically?" Teaching Sociol-

ogy 4:29-48. Macionis, John J. 1989. Sociology. 2nd ed. Englewood

Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Weast, Don. 1991. "Critical Thinking and Social

Problems: The Primacy of Intellectual Values." Intellectual Skills Development Association Journal 4:25-34.

Don Weast is a professor of sociology at UWC- Waukesha. He teaches the social problems and criminal justice courses with an emphasis on critical thinking. Address correspondence to Don Weast, Department of Anthropology/Sociology, University of Wisconsin Center-Waukesha, 1500 University Drive, Waukesha, WI 53188; e-mail: [email protected]. EDU.



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Alternative Teaching Strategies: The Case for Critical Thinking