Creating a thinking classroom

Rebecca Davies

My name is Rebecca Davies and I am a teacher in the western suburbs of Melbourne, Victoria. I have my Master of Teaching (Primary) from the University of Melbourne, and teach primary and middle years students (Prep to year 9). I have taught in PYP and mainstream schools. In 2013 I am teaching year 7 at Manor Lakes P-12 College, a school known for integrating technology into classrooms.

I am passionate about educational technology and how it can engage students, making their learning personalised and relevant to their lives. I blog about how I use technology in my classroom, research and trends in education (such as the flipped classroom and project-based learning) and am currently writing a series for graduate teachers.

I am currently studying for my Master of Education (Information Technologies) by distance. I often present at the ICTEV Conference and Victorian TeachMeets.

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Website: rebecca-davies.net/ Email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

As my teaching has developed over the past two years I have focused more and more on creating a thinking classroom. Beginning with learning mind maps in my first school to reading everything from Buzan to DeBono to Bloom to Costa, is it now a staple of my teaching. It is hard to believe anyone teaches without teaching critical thinking.

The longer I teach, however, the more I realise that not everyone is comfortable teaching these vital higher order thinking skills. As a result, I have found myself showing a number of other teachers how to implement thinking tools in the classroom. Of course, most people have heard of the Six Thinking Hats, or Mind Mapping, or the Habits of Mind, but not everyone is confident in using them effectively. Below are the ways that I use various thinking tools in my classroom, and have found successfully improve students’ critical thinking skills.

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