title: An approach to teaching for critical thinking in health education.
abstract: Teaching for critical thinking represents a vital and emerging priority in school health education. A variety of conceptions of critical thinking and approaches to teaching for critical thinking exist in the literature. This paper explores the relevance of Richard Paul's concept of critical thinking to health education. Paul's work on critical thinking has been widely disseminated and features three inter-related components called the elements of reasoning, intellectual standards, and intellectual traits. Each component appears highly relevant to health education. Paul's approach is also based on natural rather than technical language which improves its utility in learning. Unanswered questions about the approach concern the degree to which the thinking skills and traits can be transferred to health instruction and the lack of evaluation research demonstrating its efficacy. Further inquiry into the applicability and efficacy of the approach is needed.
authors.affiliation: Illinois State University, Normal 61790, USA. jtbroad@ilstu.edu
authors.forename: J T
authors.initials: JT
authors.lastname: Broadbear
authors.forename: B B
authors.initials: BB
authors.lastname: Keyser
mesh_terms: D006266:Health Education; D006801:Humans; D013663:Teaching; D013850:Thinking