In teaching and learning, critical thinking is the one element that makes the difference and yet is not as wide-ranging as school management would wish. A teacher, whose practice is driven by the skill of critical thinking, empowers their students in a manner that they eventually become independent learners. Learners, who have developed the art of critical thinking will ask questions and employ a variety of methods to solve problems. Hence it doesn’t surprise me that critical thinking is integrated in the SHS English curricula that I have scrutinized and those that I have taught like the IGCSE and the IB Diploma. The IB Diploma Program which has Theory of Knowledge at the centre of its hexagon of subjects for me epitomizes the practice of getting 17 and 18 year olds to think. In that program part of what they learn is to distinguish fact from opinion and to make cross curricular references to buoy up their arguments. Indeed we are all thinking beings but the invitation to think critically suggests that our thought processes can be biased and misinformed, narrowed and even muddled at times. For those of us who belong to the school community, the processes of examining the structure of arguments in detail or of conducting experiments on phenomena around us in order to respond to a task means that critical thinking is a habit to cultivate. For those in the corporate world, their search for critical thinkers is equally legitimate. They need a team who can read between the lines and see beyond the obvious, synthesize many variables and act to win in their fast-paced and competitive industries. Developing the Skill If critical thinking plays a pivotal role in the workplace and in schools which prepare students for life, ideally it should come as a matter of course. Like mathematical formulae, it should be learnt and when needed, the variables fitted in, the calculation done and the sum obtained. Unfortunately this is not the case as critical thinking is developed and nurtured over a considerable period of time. So how does this much-needed quality of education become second nature? I will not pretend to know it all but having watched teachers and students transform their classes into thought provoking sessions, there are a few indicators I can point to. Questioning and plumbing deeply into what we see and hear is one way of becoming critical. If a teacher got a standard response of “I’m fine thank you” from a sad-eyed youth and did not notice that there was something wrong with him, then that lack of sensitivity indicates how un-critical this teacher is. Reading between the lines, detecting similarities and contrasts in what we read and in what is around us are also reliable indicators of critical thinking. Active listening is a skill that may not be often considered but its effectiveness finds expression in that ability to identify and to deal with the important strands of what one hears. Reading is perhaps the greatest way to becoming a thinker and a critical one for that matter. What it does for readers is to present them with a rich table of contents from which experiences can be drawn, references made and ideas adapted into other relevant areas. These suggestions are by no means exhaustive but form the bases of a critical aptitude. Features Logic is part of the tools we need in the kit when we deploy our critical faculties. Time and again when arguments are presented, they are evaluated on how tightly woven they are. The claims are weighed against the premises on which they are based and if they make sense, we say a silent touché to the opposing side. Even if the claims are not true, the force of logical argument renders it valid. Again in a paragraph, the topic sentence which sets the tone becomes useful only when the supporting details consistently develop the main idea in it. Closely associated with logic is clarity. Clarification may take the form of elaboration in which illustration furthers understanding, restating ideas by putting them in other words and by summarizing. Summary in this instance may provide a quick fix of understanding in which the whole text is condensed into a few words or the highlights are selected. In both cases it calls for the use of another set of words to convey meaning and counts in the search for the critical thinker. Recognizing what is significant in a passage or a story problem or even in a film is one of the steps to discernment. With this, learners know the portions to spend time on. The teacher who has to research a topic does not waste their time poring over pages and pages, but can skim through them and isolate the facts she needs and then determine which ones deserve her attention. In unraveling significance, the mind that is critical looks at what is ordinary and gives meaning to it and this would be developed fully in the second part of the topic. The quality of the critical thinker obviously goes further than what has been outlined here. Those of accuracy and precision, of measuring depth and breadth and determining what is fair and just may be the keystones of our invisible personality. But like the proverbial genie, he may just jump out of the lamp and tell us that it is all about intuition! Richard Laryea, (Director) Resource Link Centre Academic Support Facility resourcelinkcentre@gmail.com