Steve Higgins and Nick Packard

The inclusion of thinking skills in each of the subjects of the National Curriculum 2000 was a welcome step. It acknowledges that in an age when access to information is easier through computers, databases and the Internet it is vital that learners are given the skills to think through the appropriateness and quality of this information. A curriculum that includes teaching thinking is also about developing children's understanding of what they are learning rather than focusing on their entitlement to receive or have delivered to them a particular body of knowledge. Teaching thinking also has another, more ambitious, aim. It seeks to enable children to become more effective learners and to develop responsibility for and self-regulation of their own learning through explicit discussion and review of how they have learned particular content.

Teaching thinking is not new. The idea that thinking is central to learning has a long history, some would argue its pedigree goes back to Socrates in ancient Greece! There has however been increasing interest in teaching thinking in recent years, culminating in the UK in Carol McGuinness report for the DfEE and the inclusion of thinking skills in the National Curriculum. There are a wide range of published schemes, materials and approaches often developed by charismatic individuals. It is also not without its critics. Some argue that it is not possible to teaching thinking skills unless they are taught in a specific context, and that the details of this context then prevent the thinking becoming more generally applied.

Teaching Thinking and 'Thinking for Learning' in the North-East of England

In the Northeast of England we have taken a more pragmatic approach. The Thinking Skills Research Centre at Newcastle University began by examining what happened in classrooms when thinking skills programmes and approaches were used. There was clearly something of interest in that teachers talked positively about the programmes or materials and pupils seemed to be more engaged and involved in thinking skills lessons. One of the challenges in using published programmes is that teachers need to find time in an overcrowded curriculum to fit them in or 'bolt on' the thinking skills lessons to what is taught already. At the same time we developed a range of thinking strategies with teachers that could be integrated or infused into everyday lessons that seemed to help to create some space in classrooms for talking and thinking about both the content of lessons and the process of learning. Since then, and with the support of enthusiastic teachers and schools across the North East and the support some of the LEAs in the North East, particularly Northumberland and Sunderland, literally hundreds of schools have become involved in using both the 'bolt-on' programmes and the 'infusion' approach using teaching thinking strategies. Thinking for Learning, as it has developed in the region, is about supporting teachers in developing pupils' thinking and understanding of what they are learning. Some principles of teaching thinking emerged from our work that seem to apply whatever approach is taken.

Clear purpose

The purposes of tasks are made explicit and these aims are understood by pupils. This helps to provide pupils with specific goals that they can achieve and can reflect on. It is about helping pupils to understand not just what they have to do, but why they are doing it.

Articulation

Pupils talk about their work and are encouraged to describe and articulate their thinking. This has several benefits. From the teacher's point of view, you get a chance to see how pupils are thinking as they explain their reasoning. This is an opportunity to address any misconceptions or develop their thinking. For the pupils, talking is usually seen as 'easy', but they get the chance to change their minds in the light of what others say.

Mediation

The teacher intervenes to discuss the learning that is taking place (and perhaps involves pupils in this through modelling and collaborative work). In this way the teacher 'mediates' the learning. This includes whole class explanation and discussion as well as direct teaching.

Connecting Learning

The teacher and pupils make connections both within the tasks, between tasks and with their wider experience. This is sometimes described as 'bridging' of learning by the teacher or 'transfer' of learning for pupils. Evaluation
Pupils evaluate their own performance. Only once the purposes of tasks are meaningfully understood, can pupils start to evaluate how successful they have been and then identify why they were successful or unsuccessful.

Metacognition

The teacher and pupils discuss and evaluate the learning that has taken place. This supports pupils in seeing themselves as successful learners and able to learn rather than just accepting that they are either good at it or not. It also helps to develop an understanding of learning strategies, styles or approaches that may help them in future learning.

ICT and teaching thinking

Compared with teaching thinking, ICT is (relatively) new. It offers a range of ways that can help teachers and learners in the classroom and school. It is possible to develop resources and present information in engaging ways to learners, whether this is by desktop publishing materials, developing a Powerpoint presentation or web-based resources with video clips and contextual help. From this perspective, ICT is a powerful tool for teachers to help with the preparation and delivery of lessons. Computers are also a tool for learners. They can provide an effective focus for discussion and help to structure pupils talking, thinking and reasoning. Neil Mercer, Rupert Wegerif and a team at the Open University have shown just how effective this approach can be (see Section 1 of the focus pack for more details). Specific software can also support children's thinking, whether this is in a game environment, such as those involving the Zoombinis, or in concept or mind mapping software (Section 2). Other ICT based activities can be given a thinking skills emphasis, if the principles above are used to guide the process. Children can develop their own presentation, or use information taken from the Internet as a focus to developing their thinking (Section 3). The examples in this pack are intended to offer some ideas about the way that thinking skills and the use of ICT can be developed together. It is inevitably only a partial view, but one which we hope will provide a flavour of the exciting work happening in schools.

We were fortunate in the Northeast in that five local Leas, Newcastle University and a locally based company, Knowledge Management Software formed a consortium to deliver NOF training. The consortium, GridREF 2000, was unusual in that the prime focus was to provide face-to-face training for primary schools. Its success locally enabled the development of a thinking skills version of the training which was adopted by some of the Leas involved and which has supported a number of teachers in developing thinking skills strategies supported by ICT.

Some challenges

We also need to add a health warning here. It is hard, particularly at first, to focus on making the thinking explicit and developing specific skills and knowledge required by the curriculum. This is where some of the published thinking skills programmes or teaching thinking strategies can help, as they guide you through the first stages of the process in trying something new in the classroom In our experience it is twice as hard to do thinking skills work in the ICT room! The pressure is on to make the best use of the time allocated for the computers. In teaching in this context it is usually necessary to focus on some aspects of either ICT skills or the particular piece of software being used. It is hard to leave time at the end of the session for effective review and discussion. It may be easier to do this back in the classroom, either just after the activity, or just before the next session. Getting the balance right between individual practice and skills development and paired or small group discussion is a real challenge. Again the pressure is on for children to develop individual skills in the ICT room. If you have your computers in the classroom it is no easier. By the time everyone has done the activity, it is no longer fresh in the minds of those who did it first. We are convinced, however, of the importance of such review and discussion. It is vital to provide feedback to you as the teacher about how the children's understanding of what they are doing is developing. It is also important for the children to make the connections with what they have done and their wider learning. Without this part of the process the lessons may well be enjoyable, but they will not help to develop children's learning beyond the separate activities that they undertake.

Further information
Carol McGuinness' (1999) report for the Department for Education and Employment has proved to be a significant step in making thinking skills more explicit in the curriculum. It is entitled From Thinking Skills to Thinking Classrooms: a review and evaluation of approaches for developing pupils' thinking (London: DFEE Research Report RR115 (ISBN 1 84185 013 6)). It is (or was) available on the web at: http://www.dfee.gov.uk/research/report115.html . A copy is included on the CD.
A database of National Curriculum thinking skills objectives that can be searched is located at http://www.nc.uk.net/# .

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