Developing

Thinking Skills
in the
Young Learner
Classroom
Peter Lucantoni
Overview
• What does ‘think’ mean?
• What are thinking skills?
• Can thinking be taught?
• What is the teacher’s role in
teaching thinking skills?
• Activities
• Conclusions
What does ‘think’ mean?

• Think about the word ‘think’.

What does it mean to you?
• Make a list of at least five
synonyms for ‘think’
• Draw a picture to represent
‘think’
What does ‘think’ mean?
Discuss these questions with your
partner:
1.How did you approach the
previous activity? What did you do
first, and how did you continue?
2.Were you successful? Why/not?
3.Did you enjoy the activity?
Why/not?
What does ‘think’ mean?

• Look at Handout 1
• Complete each of the ten synonyms
using the correct vowels
• Are any the same as the ones from
your own list?
What does ‘think’ mean?
Discuss these questions with your
partner:
1.How did you approach the
previous activity? What did you do
first, and how did you continue?
2.Were you successful? Why/not?
3.Did you enjoy the activity?
Why/not?
What are thinking skills?
• Children need more than curriculum
knowledge
• Important for them to develop
problem-solving and decision-
making skills at an early age
• Need to assess new information
and understand unexpected
problems, and find solutions and
evaluate their success
• [Adapted from: Teaching Young Learners to Think, Puchta & Williams,
Helbling Languages, 2011]
What are thinking skills?

• Thinking Skills are the mental

processes we use to: solve problems,
make decisions, ask questions, make
plans, pass judgements, organise
information, create new ideas, etc
• Often we are not aware of thinking - it
happens automatically
• [Adapted from:
http://www.thinkingclassroom.co.uk/ThinkingClassroom/ThinkingSkills.aspx]
What are thinking skills?

• Look at Word Trees Handout 2

• What is the language focus?
• Which age and level do you think the
activity would be appropriate for?
• Which thinking skills are practised?
• How could you vary/extend the activity
for different teaching/learning contexts?
• language focus?
• age / level?
• thinking skills?
• vary / extend?

Teaching Young Learners to Think, Puchta & Williams, Helbling

2011
What are thinking skills?

• But if we think about thinking, then

we can become more efficient and
more creative with our minds
• Researchers at Newcastle University
in the UK identified over 50 different
classifications of thinking skills:
• [Adapted from:
http://www.thinkingclassroom.co.uk/ThinkingClassroom/ThinkingSkills.aspx]
What are thinking skills?

information
understanding
basic
gathering
thinking
productive
 What are thinking skills?
Cognitive Thinking Skills
Information Basic Productive
Gathering Understanding Thinking
Organising Creating, Forming
gathered deciding, concepts
information analysing, Sensing: seeing,
Linking ideas evaluating hearing,
together Using touching
information and Retrieving:
understanding memory skills

[Adapted from:

http://www.thinkingclassroom.co.uk/ThinkingClassroom/ThinkingSkills
 What are thinking skills?
Cognitive Thinking Skills
Information Basic Productive
Gathering Understandin Thinking
g
Sensing: Organising Using
seeing, hearing, gathered information and
touching information understanding
Retrieving: Forming Creating,
memory skills concepts deciding,
Linking ideas analysing,
together
[Adapted from:
evaluating
http://www.thinkingclassroom.co.uk/ThinkingClassroom/ThinkingSkills
What are thinking skills?

• How does the theory work in practice?

• Look at these examples from Super
Minds 2 (Cambridge University Press,
2012)
• Notice how the examples move
through the stages of information
gathering, basic understanding
and productive thinking
 Information
Gathering

Sensing: seeing,
hearing, touching

Retrieving:
memory skills

Super Minds 2
 Basic
Understanding

Organising
gathered
information

Forming concepts

Linking ideas
together
Super Minds 2
 Productive
Thinking

Using information
and understanding

Creating, deciding,
analysing,
evaluating

Super Minds 2
Can thinking be taught?
• Yes!
• Carol McGuiness (1999) working for
the Department of Education,
England, concluded:
‘Pupils benefit from being coached in
thinking … success was due to
good teaching methods … learning
thinking works well when
supported by the teacher …’
[Adapted from: Teaching Young Learners to Think, Puchta & Williams,
Helbling Languages, 2011]
What is the teacher’s role?
• Value ALL ideas and where necessary
help the learners to express their
ideas
• Accept everything from everybody:
Albert Einstein, Leonardo da Vinci,
Henry Ford, Oprah Winfrey, Steve
Wozniak, …
What is the teacher’s role?

• Obviously, your role is crucial

• Encourage free, ‘off-the-wall’, creative
thinking, without criticism
• Do not allow learners to feel inhibited
due to lack of language confidence
• Errors are part of language learning
process
What is the teacher’s role?

• Give learners time to think about

what they are doing, to study the data,
to plan an approach …
• Quick-fire responses can lead to
impulsive guesses or simplistic answers
rather than creative solutions
• Important for teacher to remind
learners to take time to think
What is the teacher’s role?

• Take all answers, ideas, suggestions

from learners seriously
• Use challenges: Why do you think
this?, How do you know?, How did you
get this answer?, Where did you look?,
Does everyone agree with you?
• Aim of thinking class is to seek ‘best’
answers and not always ‘right’ ones
What is the teacher’s role?
• Set real tasks – learners use data,
planning, explanation
• Get reflection on thinking strategies
used – What caused difficulties? How
were you successful?
• Establish learning points – learners
give general advice on how to succeed,
strategies used and naming them
• Build a bridge – apply to other contexts
Did we …
… decide what ‘think’ means?
… discuss what thinking skills are
and if they can be taught?
… look at the teacher’s role?
… did we do some activities and
make some conclusions?
 Any
questions?
 plucantoni@cambridge.org

www.cambridgeenglishteacher.org

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