A Miniature Guide for Those Who Teach on How to Improve Student Learning (Thinker's Guide Library)

This guide provides 30 practical ideas for the improvement of instruction based on The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking Concepts and Tools. These ideas are based on the goal of teaching all subjects so that, as a consequence, students take ownership of the most basic principles and concepts of the subject. Most of its suggestions represent possible teaching strategies. These strategies are based on a vision of instruction implied by critical thinking and an analysis of the weaknesses typically

found in traditional didactic lecture/quiz/test formats of instruction.

The authors begin with two premises:

■ that to learn a subject well, students must master the thinking that defines that subject, and

■ that instructors, must design activities and assignments that require students to think actively within the concepts and principles of the subject.

This guide is based on the premise that students should master fundamental concepts and principles before they attempt to learn more advanced concepts. The specific suggestions offered by the authors represent methods and strategies they have developed and tested with their students.

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About the Author

A former producer of The Diane Rehm Show, Richard Paul is an award-winning independent public radio documentary producer whose work includes Race and the Space Race, about the first African Americans in the space program. Paul was the 2012–2013 Verville Fellow in Space History at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. His feature stories have appeared on NPR’s Morning Edition and PRI’s Studio 360.