Higher order thinking (HOT) is thinking on a level that is higher than memorizing facts or telling something back to someone exactly the way it was told to you. HOT takes thinking to higher levels than restating the facts and requires students to do something with the facts — understand them, infer from them, connect them to other facts and concepts, categorize them, manipulate them, put them together in new or novel ways, and apply them as we seek new solutions to new problems.

Parents and teachers can do a lot to encourage higher order thinking. Parents and teachers can do a lot to encourage higher order thinking, even when they are answering children’s questions. According to Robert Sternberg, answers to children’s questions can be categorized into seven levels, from low to high, in terms of encouraging higher levels of thinking.

Here are some ways to help foster children’s complex thinking. Teach students about higher order thinking and higher order thinking strategies. Help students understand their own higher order thinking strengths and challenges. Teachers should make sure students understand the critical features that define a particular concept and distinguish it from other concepts. When teaching abstract concepts, the use of concrete materials can reinforce learning for both young and old alike. If a person is able to state an abstract concept in terms of everyday practical applications, then that person has gotten the concept. Teachers should be sure that students have mastered basic concepts before proceeding to more sophisticated concepts. Parents may include discussions based on concepts in everyday life at home. The subject matter need not relate directly to what she is studying at school. Teachers should lead students through the process of connecting one concept to another, and also putting concepts into a hierarchy from small to large. The student should be encouraged to engage in elaboration and explanation of facts and ideas rather than rote repetition. His teachers and parents could have him relate new information to prior experience, make use of analogies and talk about various future applications of what he is learning. Students should be encouraged to make a visual representation of what they are learning. They should try to associate a simple picture with a single concept. A specific strategy for teaching concepts is conceptual mapping by drawing diagrams of the concept and its critical features as well as its relationships to other concepts. Graphic organizers may provide a nice beginning framework for conceptual mapping. Students should develop the habit of mapping all the key concepts after completing a passage or chapter. Some students may enjoy using the computer software Inspiration for this task. Divergent questions asked by students should not be discounted. When students realize that they can ask about what they want to know without negative reactions from teachers, their creative behavior tends to generalize to other areas. Many students who exhibit language challenges may benefit from cooperative learning. Cooperative learning provides oral language and listening practice and results in increases in the pragmatic speaking and listening skills of group members. Cooperative learning requires that teachers carefully plan, structure, monitor, and evaluate for positive interdependence, individual accountability, group processing, face to face interaction, and social skills.

 

By: Priscila Concepcion | Master Teacher I | MNHS – Poblacion | Mariveles, Bataan