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Chapter 1: On Improving Thinking Through Instruction

There is great interest among researchers and educators, at the present, in the teaching of thinking. There are differences of opinion, however, as to what thinking means in this context, why it is necessary or desirable that people be taught to do it, how such teaching can be accomplished, and even whether it can be done. In this chapter, I will review some of the work that has been done recently—primarily in the last couple of decades—on the question of how thinking might be improved through classroom instruction. "Instruction" will be taken to include not only overt instructional activities, but attitudes and values that are projected or reinforced in the classroom as well as other factors that help define the instructional scene. Before turning to the review proper, I will comment on why the teaching of thinking deserves special attention and on how the term thinking is being used in this context.