Developing students’ thinking skills is at the heart of the Tasmanian Curriculum and an important goal of a balanced, quality education. Students that think well across the curriculum are better equipped for their personal, educational and career pathways and able to take their place as informed and active citizens in the Tasmanian community.
Every teacher is a teacher of thinking. The skills of thinking are best taught explicitly, using the content, processes and skills of each curriculum area. Students also benefit from opportunities to demonstrate thinking across the curriculum, using ICTs and from schools building a culture of thinking in the school community.
All curriculum areas:
- take students’ thinking to a higher level using the content, skills and processes of the curriculum area
- are explicit about the thinking requirements of the curriculum
- emphasise personal and shared inquiry
- enable students to monitor and evaluate their own learning and thinking.
Syllabus and support materials for each curriculum area detail specific thinking skills. They demonstrate how different skills are developed in each area of the Tasmanian Curriculum.
English-literacy (LOTE)
English–literacy enables students to use logical, critical, creative and reflective thinking skills. Students critically analyse ideas, information, issues, and form opinions based on reasoned judgements. They use their imagination and creativity to express different perspectives, approaches and ways of considering alternate possibilities. Students reflect on their learning and evaluate their thinking processes.
Literary inquiry is an important part of the English-literary curriculum where students investigate texts and language using inquiry processes. They learn to frame and explore significant questions. They set goals, plan and follow a course of action that involves gathering information, thinking about possibilities, making decisions and justifying conclusions.
Literary inquiry encourages students to enjoy, explore, appreciate and value texts for study, life and work.
LOTE
Communicating in another language requires a broad range of thinking strategies, including classifying, predicting, analysing and applying language rules.
Students develop ways of thinking about and describing their language use.
As students use and experience different languages and cultural practices, they reflect on their learning and are challenged to consider their own identities and perspectives. They gain new ways of thinking about their world and their place within it.
For more information about teaching Languages and thinking, visit the Languages (LOTE) website.
Mathematics-numeracy
Thinking in mathematics–numeracy involves problem solving, communicating and reasoning. Students use and apply mathematical skills and concepts in familiar and unfamiliar situations, test, generate proofs and hypotheses and examine them for validity and accuracy. When students think and work mathematically, they also make decisions and choices about the use of texts and ICTs.
Positive attitudes and dispositions towards mathematics learning and active engagement with mathematical tasks are integral to thinking, acting and working mathematically. Such attitudes and dispositions are developed through student engagement in mathematical investigations relevant to a range of situations from life-related to purely mathematical.
When making sense of life experiences or seeking solutions to problems, students:
- recognise when mathematics is required
- plan, investigate, conjecture, justify, think critically, generalise, communicate and reflect on mathematical understandings and procedures
- select and use relevant mathematical knowledge, processes, strategies and technologies to analyse and interpret information.
top
Science
Scientific inquiry is central in the Science curriculum. Scientific inquiry encourages students to pose questions, plan and conduct investigations, collect and analyse evidence and communicate their findings. It is also concerned with evaluating investigations and claims and drawing valid conclusions. Scientific inquiry recognises that scientific explanations can change as new or different evidence becomes available.
Whilst fair testing and controlled experiments are emphasised in many scientific inquiries, students should also experience other forms of individual and collaborative investigation such as field work, the use of models and simulations, examination of second-hand data or information research.
Society and History
Thinking is central in the Tasmanian Curriculum. A key purpose for education in Tasmania is ensuring students are learning to think, know and understand. An important goal for students is that they are able to reason, question, make decisions and solve complex problems. Students provided with opportunities to develop thinking skills across the curriculum are better equipped for their life, education and personal pathways and able to take their place as informed and active citizens in the community.
Every Society and History teacher is a teacher of thinking. The skills of thinking are best taught explicitly, using the content, processes and skills of Society and History. Thinking is embedded in the Society and History curriculum through the learning opportunities described for each of the performance criteria. Teaching thinking skills effectively in Society and History involves:
- taking students’ thinking to a higher level using the content, skills and processes of each strand
- being explicit about the thinking requirements and skills of each strand
- using recognised inquiry approaches in each strand, and specifically involving students in historical and philosophical inquiry
- providing opportunities for students to monitor, regulate and evaluate their own learning and thinking in each strand through the use of reflective thinking.
top
Health and wellbeing
Thinking is central in all areas of the Tasmanian Curriculum. Thinking is embedded in the Health and wellbeing curriculum through learning opportunities in each strand. Every Health and wellbeing teacher is a teacher of thinking. Thinking in Health and wellbeing involves:
- taking students’ thinking to a higher level using the content, skills and processes of the curriculum
- using effective reflection and inquiry approaches, and
- students monitoring, regulating and evaluating their own learning and thinking.
Thinking in Health and wellbeing develops understanding of physical, mental, emotional, social and spiritual health.
It focuses on how to develop balance and integration in all dimensions of health. Students think critically about how to make informed health choices, solve problems and contribute positively to the wellbeing of themselves and others.
At all standards and stages, sample learning opportunities that build thinking skills are clearly marked in the Health and wellbeing K-10 syllabus and support materials as in the example below.
Standard 3 – Skills for personal and social development – Identity
use a thinking strategy to reflect on how personal attitudes have changed during their lifetime on a particular issue eg. I used to think … but now, I think T, L
top
Arts
Arts provides many opportunities for students to develop thinking skills.
Cognitive learning is central to all art forms – perception, creativity, logical thinking, metaphoric thinking, question formation, decision making, critical thinking, concept formation, memory and reflective thinking are all developed and deepened by participation and focused teaching through the arts. Artistic thought sometimes occurs in tacit, intuitive, emotional or subconscious ways but good teaching in the arts provides students with opportunities to reflect on this thinking.
All arts forms can inform, teach, persuade and provoke thought. They can reinforce existing ideas and values, challenge them, or offer new ways of thinking and feeling. They can be a powerful means of bringing about change. The arts have traditionally had a vital role in shaping our understanding of ourselves as individuals and members of society, and our understanding of our world. Through the arts, students learn to critically reflect, make personal meaning and show enterprise and initiative.
The arts promote creative problem solving, self-expression and the use of the imagination. The opportunity for creativity in the arts develops students’ abilities to plan, experiment, try different approaches, solve problems and make decisions in situations in which there may be no standard answers. The arts provide a vehicle for the growth of self-esteem and positive, personal satisfaction, group cohesion and sheer enjoyment! All arts forms can play an important part in developing students’ emotional intelligence and skills in logical, reflective and intuitive thinking.
Vocational and Applied Learning
In development – syllabus available June 2008.
ICT
Draft – subject to consultation – syllabus available June 2008.
Thinking is central to the Cross Curricular ICT Guidelines and support materials.
The strand ‘Inquiring’ involves students reasoning, questioning, making decisions and problem solving.
Thinking is also embedded in the other strands of Communicating, Creating and Operating in the cross curricular sample learning opportunities.
Students use ICTs to analyse and critically interpret information. They are encouraged to apply ideas creatively and evaluate and reflect on their learning. Thinking tools and strategies help students to connect and compare ideas, classify and organise concepts and pose and answer questions using ICTs.
top
