The objective of this article is to demonstrate how the development of critical thinking skills in a learner may provide a creative atmosphere of openness and responsible cooperation in the English classroom.
The relevance of the topic is due to the fact that developing such skills as flexibility, fluency, complexity, originality, curiosity, risk taking, elaboration and imagination are important for the development of learner’s creativity. Challenging questions or open-ended questions alongside with choosing appropriate strategies and teaching techniques with various games and activities, short-classroom ones in particular, develop critical thinking and creativity that gives a rise to individual ability to think and make correct decisions independently.
The basis of any education is a human language development. A foreign language has unlimited opportunities for humanitarian upbringing of learners and thus involving them to a foreign language culture. Nowadays a foreign language is both a source of receiving professional information and providing communication. But the communication is considered to be effective when a human has got and transmitted information correctly. Thereby, a communicative language competence is effective when a human possesses critical thinking. Modern school is aimed at having a habit of every learner to actively take part in important team decision making, to form, express, defend his/her own point of view and respect that one which differs.
Critical thinking as information-based thinking, conscious perception of the learner`s own intellectual activity and the activities of other people, contributes to the development of learners' ability to logically analyze educational information and use their personal approach, the ability to raise new questions, find arguments, and make independent thoughtful decisions aiming at achieving understanding, and evaluating different perspectives, and solving problems.
Critical thinking makes the process more enjoyable and the course more meaningful for the learners. They are becoming much more motivated and inspired by the lesson.
In relation to learners, the use of critical thinking technology allows:
• to increase the efficiency of information perception;
• to increase interest, both in the studied material and in the learning process itself;
• to be able to think critically;
• to highlight causal relationships;
• to be able to work in collaboration with others;
• to reject unnecessary or incorrect information;
• to understand how different pieces of information relate to each other.
Using critical thinking technology regularly, the teacher:
• knows how to create an atmosphere of openness and responsible cooperation in the classroom;
• uses a learning model and a system of effective methods that contribute to the development of critical thinking and independence in the learning process;
• becomes a practitioner who knows how to competently analyze his/her activities.
Games are effective tools for learning because they offer students a hypothetical environment in which they can explore alternative decisions without the risk of failure. Thought and action are combined into purposeful behavior to accomplish a goal. Playing games teaches us how to strategize, to consider alternatives, and to think flexibly. Providing a constructivist classroom environment through games, learners and their learning are becoming central.
It should be emphasized that people who think critically try to live reasonably, rationally and empathically. By thinking about everything objectively, they are able to easily solve complex problems and tasks, process information, and take opinions into account. Language is not only grammatical structures and vocabulary; it is the embodiment of cultural and national values. Thus, languages are culturally determined. Since cultures are different, traditions and mentalities are reflected in the language, its vocabulary, grammatical structures, modality, etc. You cannot think in the language you are learning the same way as in your mother tongue. People with critical thinking are used to confusing switching between languages.
The formation of critical thinking includes the following stages:
1) updating knowledge, arousing interest in the topic, setting goals for a particular material;
2) understanding new information, critical reading and writing;
3) reflection, forming personal point of view on the material being studied;
4) generalization and evaluation of information (problems), identification of ways to solve it, identification of one’s own capabilities.
Educational and cognitive activity of a learner based on critical thinking is considered as an important didactic direction, the dominant of which are: search for a clear question, justification, approval, formation of alternatives; striving for maximum subject reliability; using sources or linking to them; following the main goal; holistic consideration of the situation; keeping the focus of the original (main) task; choosing a point of view, personal attitude and its change if there are sufficient grounds; consistent consideration of parts of a complex whole; influence of worldview and tolerance to other feelings, level of knowledge and depth of judgment, predisposition to use critical thinking skills in life.
When teaching learners critical thinking the teacher helps them look at any life situation from different points of view by asking questions: Why is this so? Who is favored in this situation? What can one find out? What can one do? The critical learner does not complain about the problem, but tries to solve it.
Methods of critical thinking form the ability to work in pairs, small groups, quickly and efficiently process any text, and flexibly enter the situation. The creative problem-based nature of English language teaching contributes to the development of imagination and a sense of novelty.
I am confident that it is very important how a teacher starts the lesson. The beginning of the lesson is the activation of the thinking process. Learners' understanding of what they will do in the classroom and how well they will do it depends on how the educational goal is set. The teacher should use the methods that allow them to set their own goal based on the topic of the lesson. Here I suggest using such methods as «brainstorming» and «forecasting». I believe that a teacher should use various methods creating the atmosphere of openness and responsible cooperation in the classroom, from the simplest to the most complex: from those that involve working in a team to those that require a certain level of self-organization, when learners first work with the teacher as a partner, and then in groups on their own. For example, when in team groups I offer «hints» that relate not only to the content, but also to the procedure. Using the «gallery overview», learners develop their skills of linking new information with the products of their activities. The game «Magic Microphone» teaches express a positive or negative reaction when conducting a discussion on a burning topic or problem. Having a certain life experience and a point of view on the world around them, learners can implement their ideas through creative projects. The implementation of the project helps them analyze new information, read additional literature, train and show their leadership skills. To make an interesting and exciting project, you need to think critically, respond quickly to opponents' questions, and take an active public position. The following are examples from my practice on working with certain topics:
Learning Foreign Languages:
• Make a list of ideas on how you can make learning English more like learning your own language.
• Make up a project «What makes a good teacher of a foreign language».
School Life:
• Agree or disagree with the following statements: «Classmates are of more important influence than parents on a child’s success at school»; «When you are having a fun you are not learning»; «All you need is ignorance and confidence then success is sure» (Mark Twain); «Success makes life easier, it doesn’t make living easier» (Bruce Springsteen).
Crime and Punishment:
• Do you agree or disagree with the following sayings: «Punishment should fit the crime», «An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth»?
Leadership:
• Create a portrait of a leader as you see him/her to be. Explain your choice.
• Discuss with your partner who can be a leader in your class. Give reasons to support your answer.
Thus, one can conclude that interactive methods alongside the implementation of critical thinking in the educational process allow to intensify the process of understanding and creative use of knowledge in solving practical problems; learners form productive approaches to mastering information; establish friendly relations with the teacher; increase motivation in solving the problems discussed; give an emotional boost to their research activities. Moreover, in an interactive open atmosphere, each learner is successful, benefits from the result of teamwork, and the whole process becomes interesting.
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