No Mind Left Behind: Teaching Every Student to Think Critically

1. No Mind Left Behind: Teaching Every Student to Think Critically Larry W. Howard, Thomas Li-Ping Tang, and Jill Austin Department of Management and Marketing Jennings A. Jones College of Business Middle Tennessee State University Tennessee Board of Regents Diversity Conference April 7, 2010 Nashville, TN

2. Larry W. Howard, Thomas Li-Ping Tang, and M. Jill Austin .

4. Outline • Theory of Critical Thinking and Creativity • Research Question—Improving Critical Thinking Skills (CTS) • Does a case-based critical thinking module make a difference? • Are there race/gender differences? • What factors are related to CTS improvements? • Method • Results & Discussion *Paper Accepted for Presentation at the 27thInternational Congress of Applied Psychology, July 11-16, 2010, Melbourne, Australia

5. Importance of Critical Thinking • The US has dominant economies in the tertiary (service) and quaternary (intellectual service) sectors of industry. • Intellectual services—health, education, culture, research, and entertainment. • For decades, higher education in the US has been the envy of the world.

6. OECD: Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development • Every three years, beginning in 1997, member countries of OECD participate in a data collection program • “Programmefor International Student Assessment” • Sample: In 2006, 400,000 students in 57 geopolitical entities (PISA, 2009). • Population: 20 million 15-year-olds

7. PISA, 2009: The USA • Ranked 20th in Science • Ranked 31stin Mathematics • For the past two decades, MNCshave outsourced production and R&D in other countries around the world (e.g., China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, South Korea, and Viet Nam) • We need a workforce with high creativity and innovation to compete successfully in the 21st century • Have serious concerns regarding students’ critical thinking skills.

8. Researchers and Educators • Have investigated various approaches to enhance critical thinking skills in general (e.g., Baron & Sternberg, 1987; Carrithers & Bean, 2008; Krueger, 2001; Peach, Mukherjee, & Hornyak, 2007) • and the efficacy of teaching business students’ critical thinking skills in particular (Sternberg, 1985). • President G. W. Bush’s Legislation in 2001: No Child Left Behind • No Mind Left Behind: Critical Thinking Skills in Higher Education

9. Bloom’s Cognitive Complexity: • 1. Knowledge, • 2. Comprehension, • 3. Application, • 4. Analysis, • 5. Synthesis, and • 6. Evaluation Bloom, Engelhart, Furst, Hill, and Krathwohl (1956)

10. Anderson & Krathwohl(2001) • Changed the original Taxonomy of Cognitive Complexity from 6 Nouns to 6 Verbs: • 1. Remember, • 2. Understand, • 3. Apply, • 4. Analyze,  Critical Thinking • 5. Evaluate, and  Critical Thinking • 6. Create.  Creativity

11. Teresa Amabile (1998) • Creativityis not enough in business. • To be creative, an idea must also be appropriate—useful and actionable. • It must somehow influence the way business gets done—by improving a product, for instance, or by opening up a new way to approach a process (HBR, 1998: 78). (HBR: aha and so-what)

12. The Creativity and Innovation Model: 5 Environmental Factors • 1. Encouragement of creativity, • 2. Autonomy or freedom, • 3. Resources, Enhance creativity • 4. Pressures, and • 5. Organizational obstacles  Reduce creativity (Amabile, Conti, Coon, Lazenby, & Herron, AMJ, 1996)

13. Creativity: Amabile (HBR, 1998) • 1. Expertise, • 2. Creative-Thinking Skills, and • 3. Motivation

14. 1. Expertise • Objective Measures: • 1. ACT • Curriculum-based achievement test (at the HS level) • High ACT scores (math and science scores) contribute to students’ success in college. • 2. GPA • Academic performance (at the College level)

15. ACT • Asian American: 22.6 • Caucasian: 22.1 • American Indian: 18.9 • Hispanic: 18.7 • African American: 17.0 • Males: 21.2 • Females: 21.0

16. 2. Creative-Thinking Skills • Problems-Solving Skills Can be Taught • Case-Based Critical Thinking Module • Understand the Logic of Critical Thinking • 4 Performance Levels (i.e., 100%, 85%, 70%, and < 50%) • 7 Performance Dimensions: Indentifies concepts, Describes concepts, Provides examples, Provides analysis of case evidence, Provides evaluation of case issues, Proposes creative responses, and Provides writing proficiency.

17. 3. Motivation • Goals for academic pursuits: 1. Mastery-Approach, 2. Performance-Approach, 3. Mastery-Avoidance, and 4. Performance-Avoidance (Felder & Silverman, 1988) • Taking in information: 1. Visual (V), 2. Auditory (A), 3. Reading-Writing (R), and 4. Kinesthetic (K) (Lovelace, 2005)

18. Hypothesis • Students’ Abilities and Motivation are related to the Improvement of Critical Thinking Skills.

19. Method: Participants • 659 Business students • Gender: Male (1) = 390 (59.2%), Females (0) = 247 (37.5%) • Race: Caucasian = 472 (71.6%), African American = 107 (16.2%), Asian or Pacific Islander = 27 (4.1%), Hispanic = 11 (1.7%), and American Indian/Alaska Native = 4 (.6%)).

20. Solomon Four–Group Design • Pre-test Intervention Post-test Sample Size Group 1 O1 X O2 276 Group 2 O3O4 312 Group 3 XO5 17 Group 4 O6 54 • X = Case-based critical thinking module (intervention), • O = CTA (Watson & Glaser, 1980)

21. 2 x 2 ANOVA Design • Intervention • Yes No • _____________________________________________ • YesO2O4 • Pre-test • No O5O6

22. Measures • Data From 3 Sources (Common Method Variance): • 1. 40-item Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal (Watson & Glaser, 1980) (CTA) • 2. Demographic and Objective Measures: Age, Gender, Race, ACT (English, Math, Reading, Composite), GPA, and Total Credit Hours (Record Office)

23. Measures • 3. Attitudinal Measures (Online Survey) • Motivational Goals (Van Yperen, 2006) • Academic Motivation (Vallerand et al., 1992) • VARK (e.g., visual (V), auditory (A), reading-writing (R), and kinesthetic (K)) (Lovelace, 2005) • Learning Styles (e.g., sensing (S), intuitive (I), active (A), and reflective (R) (Felder & Silverman, 1988)

24. Results CTA 1 CTA 2 • Age .04 .05 • Gender .14** .07 • Race .24** .28** • ACT English .45** .45** • ACT Math .40** .41** • ACT Reading .46** .45** • ACT Composite .51** .50** • GPA .13** .12** • Credit Hr. .13** .12** • CTA 1 (Pre-test) 1.00 .70** • CTA 2 (Post-test) 1.00 **p < .01

25. ANOVA Results on CTS 2 • Solomon Four–Group Design: Between-Subjects • Main Effect of Intervention: ns • Main Effect of Pre-test: ns • Interaction (Intervention x Pre-test): ns • No significant results • Male • Female • White • Non-white

26. Within-Subjects Differences • Improvement--Pre-test (CTA 1) to Post-test (CTA 2) • Sample: Significant Improvement • The Whole Sample: Yes • Group 1 (With Intervention) Yes • Group 2 (Without) Yes • Gender • Male: No • Female: Yes • Race • White: Yes • Non-White: No

27. Changes of Critical Thinking Skills: Objective Data • Overall Change of CTS • CTS 1, ACT Composite • Change of CRT: Better (Whole, Groups 1 + 2) • CTS 1, ACT Composite, Age, GPA • Change of CRT: Better (Group 1) • CTS 1, ACT • Change of CRT: Better (Group 2) • CTS 1, GPA, Age, Gender • Change of CRT: Worse • CTS 1, ACT Composite

28. Changes of Critical Thinking Skills:Attitudinal Variables • Changes of CRT: Better (Whole, Groups 1 + 2) • Performance Avoidance (-.158), Better than Average Students • Changes of CRT: Worse(Whole Groups 1 + 2) • Master Approach (-.275), Worse than Myself • Reflective • Kinesthetic

29. Discussion • Performance depends on both “can do” (ability) and “will do” (motivation) in a given situation. • Students can notfake good on an ability, aptitude, or achievement measures, but can fake bad easily. • Students’ worse performance may be caused by time pressure, stress, and low interests in answering the CTA carefully at the end of the semester. • We conclude that the best predictors of future performance (CTA 2) are the past performances in this study (ACT, GPA, and CTA 1).

30. Discussion • It appears that male students do not answer their CTA questions carefully, whereas female students take their CTA measures seriously, carefully, and consistently overtime (Tang & Tang, 2010). • Those who want to “outperform the average student” improve their critical thinking scores. • Their achievement orientation at the beginning of the semester (online survey) predicts the improvement of their critical thinking skills (objective measure).

31. Limitations • Although the process was similar across courses, thecontent of our case-based critical thinking module was not exactly the same in management, marketing, and production management classes that were taught by different professors. • The pre-test sensitizes students and professors reflecting the self-fulfilling prophecy (Merton, 1968).

32. Implications • Expertise (abilities) and motivation contribute to the improvement of their critical thinking skills (Amabile, 1998). • Educators and executives must create a sea change of cultures and behaviors in our academic and business environments, instill these values in students and managers, set higher goals, and motivate students and managers to perform better, and improve their critical thinking skillsin order to compete successfully in the volatile and changing global market in the 21st century.

33. Thank YOU Very Much! DankeСпасиб Dankeshenありがとう Grazie 너를 감사하십시요 Merci 謝謝谢谢 MuchasGracias Obrigado Takk Deg