CRITICAL THINKING IN THE AGE OF THE INTERNET

February 15-16, 2008
Sheraton Bloomington Hotel, Bloomington, Minnesota

OPENING SESSION Friday, 10:45 a.m.-12:15 p.m.

CREATING CRITICAL CLASSROOMS: How Teachers Model Critical Thinking for Students Stephen Brookfield Distinguished University Professor University of St. Thomas Critical thinking has long been touted as a generic purpose for higher education and an unchallengeable virtuous idea. Yet how teachers from different disciplines interpret this idea varies greatly. Not surprisingly, the different understandings of critical thinking can be confusing to students. In this session Stephen Brookfield will draw on his books Developing Critical Thinkers (1987), Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher (1995), and The Power of Critical Theory (2004) to explore how students learn to think critically and what role teachers play in that process. He will focus specifically on the importance of teachers modeling the process for students and consider how this might be done in classrooms from large lecture halls to small seminars. Stephen Brookfield holds the title of Distinguished University Professor at the University of St. Thomas. Since beginning his teaching career in 1970, he has worked in a variety of college settings, including 10 years as Professor of Higher and Adult Education at Columbia University. He has written ten books on adult learning, teaching, critical thinking, discussion methods, and critical theory, four of which have won the Cyril O. Houle World Award for Literature in Adult Education. He also won the 1986 Imogene Okes Award for Outstanding Research in Adult Education. In 2001, Brookfield received the Leadership Award from the Association for Continuing Higher Education (ACHE) for "extraordinary contributions to the general field of continuing education on a national and international level."

CLOSING SESSION: Saturday, 11:15 a.m. - 12:30 p.m.

RECOGNIZING THE VISIBLE EVIDENCE OF INVISIBLE LEARNING Randall Bass, Associate Professor of English and Executive Director, Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship Georgetown University One of the consequences of the “learning paradigm” has been to unleash an expanded range of learning far broader and more complicated than higher education is prepared to recognize. Much of this learning is elusive, if not invisible, in traditional assessments. This is especially true of learning that results from emergent pedagogies, including those with digital media. This session will pose a series of questions about what we recognize as learning, and especially the ways that new media pedagogies and literacies compel us to expand our recognition of learning and critical thinking. Whether or not we in higher education are able to thrive in the age of the Internet depends on our ability to respond to learning that is too often invisible or undervalued in higher education and to rethink some of our biases about knowledge and expertise in the undergraduate curriculum. Randall Bass is Assistant Provost for Teaching and Learning Initiatives at Georgetown University, Associate Professor of English, and Executive Director of Georgetown's Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship (CNDLS), a campus-wide center supporting faculty work in new learning and research environments. He has been working with a number of pedagogy and technology projects since 1986, including serving as Director and Principal Investigator of the Visible Knowledge Project, a five-year scholarship of teaching and learning project involving 70 faculty members on 21 university and college campuses. He is also a Consulting Scholar for the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, where he served, in 1998–99, as a Pew Scholar and Carnegie Fellow. In 1999, he won the Educause Medal for outstanding achievement in technology and undergraduate education. Bass is the author of Border Texts: Cultural Readings for Contemporary Writers (Houghton Mifflin, 1998) and co-editor of Intentional Media: The Crossroads Conversations on Teaching and Technology in the American Cultural History Classroom (double issue of Works & Days). He is currently co-editing a volume of essays and findings from the Visible Knowledge Project entitled, The Difference that Inquiry Makes.

FACULTY DEVELOPERS' BREAKFAST SESSION Saturday, 7:30-9:15 a.m. -- Separate registration required. PROMOTING CRITICAL THINKING ON YOUR CAMPUS Phyllis Worthy Dawkins, Interim Vice President for Academic Affairs Eugene Hermitte, Dean, Freshman-Sophomore Learning Johnson C. Smith University This session is intended for faculty developers and those involved in promoting teaching and learning on their campuses. Join your colleagues for an information discussion on ways to promote the teaching of critical thinking skills on your campus. Discuss and brainstorm ways to provide critical thinking training and incorporate critical thinking rubrics into lesson plans and syllabi. This session will also include time to share your own experiences and develop next steps that best meet your campus’ needs.

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PLANNING COMMITTEE
Tim Barrett The Collaboration	Mark Johnson North Iowa Area Community College
Lesley K. Cafarelli The Collaboration	Doug Noyes Oglala Lakota College
Lois Bollman Minneapolis Community and Technical College	Dean Pape Ripon College
Krisma DeWitt Mount Marty College	Debra Pitton Gustavus Adolphus College
Joan Hawthorne University of North Dakota–Grand Forks

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CONCURRENT SESSION DESCRIPTIONS

IA ENRICHING LEARNING WITH PODCASTING: From Concept and Production to Delivery and Evaluation Chris Gehrz, Assistant Professor, Department of History Sam Mulberry, Instructor, Academic Enrichment and Support Center Bethel University This is a hands-on workshop in which participants will interact with the podcast as a supplemental instructional technology. The presenters' experiences with weekly podcasting in two different European history courses will serve as a jumping-off point for a series of small group activities. Participants from a wide range of disciplines will design, record, and edit their own podcasts and reflect on how they may best be delivered to students and then evaluated. (Laptop computers with recording/editing software will be provided for the session's activities.) The participants will consider how podcasting may promote deeper learning and greater intellectual curiosity among students, help them understand the relevance of course content to their lives, and help to build a learning community among instructors and students.

IB Bringing Visual Intuition And Experimentation To Mathematics Janet Burgoyne, Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science Travis Kowalski, Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science South Dakota School of Mines & Technology Students dislike mathematics because of its static presentation as an endless list of rules and formulas. To break this paradigm, this session discusses a method for presenting math topics in an interactive, visual manner designed to encourage critical thinking skills. The presenters will outline a rubric for introducing math topics using a software-assisted guided-discovery activity. Using Maple, a popular computer algebra system, participants will take part in a sequence of graphical experiments including several group activities to illustrate this rubric. Participants will play the roles of students, devising hypotheses about different calculus concepts and testing them with the help of peers and presenters, and will discuss ways to customize and generalize this approach to other topics. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IC CONVERSATION WITH STEPHEN BROOKFIELD AND RANDALL BASS Join us for an informal conversation with our major speakers during this concurrent session. Bring your questions and comments to contribute to this discussion.

ID SHOULD WE OR SHOULDN’T WE? Applying Technology in the Classroom Daniel C. Moos, Assistant Professor, Department of Education Gustavus Adolphus College Computer-based learning environments are becoming commonplace in the college classroom. Recent technological advances have produced environments that allow learners to pursue personal goals and solve challenging problems, yet despite these tantalizing promises, concerns remain as to how to best apply these tools. Understanding these challenges better enables educators to more appropriately integrate technology into their teaching. In this session, the presenter will highlight several critical aspects of using technology, including the unique challenges some learners face. This presentation is intended to target audience members who use (or would like to use) technology as part of their instructional method and would like to participate in a discussion concerning related issues. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IE USING CONTEMPORARY VIDEO TO ENHANCE CRITICAL THINKING Michele Neaton, Director, Center for Teaching and Learning Pakou Vang, Instructor, Department of Communication Century College Television, films, and YouTube are a part of today’s students’ daily lives. Why not tap these resources to encourage engagement in the classroom and enhance students’ critical thinking? This interactive session will explore the use of contemporary video as an instructional tool. Participants will examine a video clip using a sample critical thinking exercise, then brainstorm potential critical thinking activities or assignments that incorporate films, TV shows, or YouTube for their classes. Participants will have ample opportunity to exchange ideas for incorporating video in a variety of courses and will take away a guide for using video effectively in the classroom.

IF NAVIGATING THE INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY: Building Critical Thinking into Online Assignments Deana Hueners, Instructor, Department of English Maureen Murphy, Assistant Professor, Department of English Risë Smith, Professor, Library Department Dakota State University The presenters will demonstrate a framework as well as practical approaches for helping students apply critical thinking skills to research projects that use online sources. This presentation addresses student problems of finding too much information, evaluating Internet sources, and avoiding plagiarism by building critical thinking into classroom research and information literacy assignments. Participants will learn and apply a model of critical thinking to design and evaluate actual assignments. They will take part in hands-on activities they can take back to their classrooms to engage students in thinking critically about online sources. Participants will also identify ways they can apply the critical thinking framework in developing their own classroom assignments. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IG USING ONLINE DISCUSSIONS TO PROMOTE CRITICAL THINKING IN THE COMPUTER-MEDIATED CLASSROOM Elizabeth Tolman, Associate Professor, Department of Communication Studies South Dakota State University Participants will learn ways to create learning networks and facilitate interaction between students in online classes. This session will include discussion on how to promote critical thinking by developing effective discussion questions that foster application and higher level thinking. Emphasis will be placed on creating opportunities for student interaction in the online classroom, such as posting content beyond exams and lectures. Topics include enhancing student interaction, research findings about creating collaborative learning environments, and assessment of online discussions.

IIA ROOTING CRITICAL THINKING IN PLACE Ken Emo, Assistant Professor, Department of Teacher Education Mary Moeller, Assistant Professor, Department of Educational Leadership Larry Rogers, Professor, Department of Teacher Education South Dakota State University Participants will consider rooting critical thinking in their particular places (or in other particular places that offer rich opportunities for analysis, synthesis, and evaluation) by analyzing a particular issue (railroad expansion) in a particular place (Brookings, South Dakota). Participants will share resources for creating a curriculum of place that will require critical thinking skills, and will consider a range of Internet-based resources for supporting a curriculum of place. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IIB USING STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS IN THE CLASSROOM Judy Vondruska, Instructor, Department of Physics Shouhong Zhang, Manager, Instructional Design Services South Dakota State University Student Response Systems (SRS), also known as clickers, are wireless response systems that allow instructors to assess student understanding of material by having students enter responses to questions with a clicker. A histogram of the responses can then be viewed by the entire class. SRS have been used in higher education for more than a decade, and research indicates they promote active learning, improve student engagement, and increase student attendance. The potential for transforming traditionally large, passive lecture classes into stimulating interactive classes is great based on South Dakota State University faculty members’ experience. This session will provide more details on this technology and share stories from SRS users.

IIC EXPLORING DIGITAL PEDAGOGIES Randall Bass, Associate Professor of English and Executive Director, Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship Georgetown University This session will look at ways to think about digitally-enhanced pedagogies, including shifts in time and space of learning activities. In particular, participants will explore the impact of new media environments in making intermediate thinking processes visible to students and their teachers. Examples will come from a range of disciplines and contexts, and the session format will include presentation and discussion. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IID PROVEN STRATEGIES FOR GUIDING THE GROWTH OF CRITICAL RESEARCH SKILLS Nancy G. Moose, Professor, Department of English John Nelson, Associate Professor, Department of English Dan Weinstein, Associate Professor, Department of English Dakota State University Using three sample assignments, the presenters will demonstrate activities that help teach students to critically filter and apply information to their own projects of interpretation and understanding. The first assignment will help basic writers understand and apply source materials in the context of a project of limited scope. In the second assignment, more advanced writing students are led to contextualize, with material they research, their interpretations of a political cartoon. In the third assignment, advanced writing students are taught to build persistent personal learning environments that help them remember the research and interpretive strategies they have learned and apply these and other strategies to new projects. Participants will have the opportunity to try simulated assignments in each of the three presentations.

IIE GET A SECOND LIFE: Critical Thinking in Cyberspace Dean Pape, Assistant Professor, Department of Communication Ripon College In this session, participants will explore the virtual world of Second Life, an environment in which participants communicate through the use of visual representations of themselves. Users interact with these visual figures, known as avatars, in a variety of different "real" public and private spaces, including stores, streets, and classrooms. Participants will learn how to get started with Second Life, develop methods for working with students in the environment, and apply critical thinking models to enhance the experience. Participants may view Second Life through the lenses of various fields, including history, sociology, and economics. This workshop is designed for those with no or little experience with Second Life. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IIF WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE: Bringing Critical Thinking Traditions to Technology “Experts” Kevin Moberg, Writing Center and Supplemental Instruction Coordinator, Academic Success Center Josh Nichols, Student Support Specialist, Academic Success Center Dickinson State University Perhaps it seems impossible to teach today’s students sound critical thinking skills when the deliberate search for relevant information simply means “Googling;” when the careful weighing of evidence in a debate means battling via anonymous comments on blogs; when the process of reconsidering and revising one’s stance is limited by the compulsion to “multitask.” Yet there are ways to bring critical thinking to Net Gen students, or vice versa, beyond simply putting lessons on a Web site. The presenters will highlight learning preferences and the features of effectively teaching critical thinking, and participants will leave with a plan for integrating technology with critical thinking research to take advantage of how the current generation of “traditional age” students learns best.

IIG BLENDING VISUAL LEARNING AND COLLABORATION STRATEGIES OF EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES Mark Geary, Assistant Professor, Department of Education Gabe Mydland, Assistant Professor, Department of Education Dakota State University Learn how to join two emerging technologies in education to create a “Force More Powerful.” This workshop will demonstrate emerging research from concept mapping and digital media production and show how the two can be simply joined by combining media software freely downloaded. By using a multimedia/multimodal approach combined with the effectiveness of non-linguistic representations (Marzano, et al.), the presenters were able to measure the results of this combined approach. Participants will gain a deeper understanding of how the software tools C-Map and PhotoStory3 can be combined to create a richer, more educational multimedia experience for the digitally experienced.   Back to Concurrent Sessions

IIIA DEVELOPING INFORMATION AND QUANTITATIVE LITERACY SKILLS THROUGH CRITICAL THINKING EXERCISES Jim Rife, Associate Professor, Department of Chemistry Terry Salerno, Associate Professor, Departments of Chemistry and Geology Minnesota State University, Mankato The goal of this session will be to provide participants with the tools needed to help students successfully increase their information literacy, quantitative literacy, and critical thinking skills. The presenters will illustrate some of the problems encountered in teaching critical thinking to introductory science students through problem-solving literature-based team exercises. Because critical thinking is difficult, a “stepwise” approach with multiple exercises and feedback helps students to understand the process. This includes the need to identify assumptions, to find reliable evidence, and to look critically and quantitatively at the design and data. This session is designed for participants who are interested in teaching critical thinking skills in a format requiring thoughtful retrieval of evidence from online library databases.

IIIB PROMOTING CRITICAL THINKING IN CYBERSPACE: We Have Lift-Off! Jane M. Schreck, Associate Professor, Department of English Bismarck State College Online technology gives students and educators new learning opportunities. Whether in an online course or a Web-enhanced on-ground course, the Internet offers the promise of possibilities for promoting critical thinking, but it can also be as flat as the monitor screen. Well-crafted threaded discussion assignments can give online education the interactive dimension that connects students to classmates, teachers to students, and everyone to the course material. This session examines effective use of threaded discussions and guides participants through the development and review of questions for their own disciplines. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IIIC THE CRITICAL THINKING TOOL BOX: A Method For Thinking The Unthinkable James Burnett, Instructor, Department of Sociology and Corrections Bill Wagner, Instructor, Department of Sociology and Corrections Minnesota State University, Mankato This session offers a "tool box" from which one can pull useful insights and techniques to soften concretized thought that can block new and possibly helpful ways of looking at problematic issues. Participants will engage in critical thinking exercises that can be used with students in the classroom to "see through" modes of thought that support racist, sexist, and other forms of discriminatory behavior, and that can be generalized to other issues. Expect to participate in hands-on exercises, discussion, and humor to reach surprising realizations. A packet of student-friendly materials will be available.

IIID PLANTING SCIENCE: Connecting Your Student’s Inquiry, Research, and Online Mentors Donna Hazelwood, Professor, Department of Biology Dakota State University Use the power of the Internet to transport students outside the walls of the classroom and into the application and practice of a chosen discipline. The PlantingScience program successfully connects students from grades 7–16 with online mentors and thus serves as a model of inquiry-based learning which can be used in different ways and by different disciplines. Guided by mentors, students engage in hands-on investigations, build collaborations, and engage in critical thinking; classroom teachers interact with mentors and supplement curricula; and mentors engage in meaningful outreach and share insights. Mentors help guide students through inquiry units designed to integrate classroom learning with national standards and expand the classroom through online mentoring, active engagement, and critical thinking. Participants will observe this successful program, work in groups to brainstorm activities, and then adapt the process of online mentoring to discipline-specific creative applications for the classroom.   Back to Concurrent Sessions

IIIE ENHANCING THE LEARNING EXPERIENCE THROUGH FACULTY AND STUDENT-CREATED PODCASTS Bob Hoar, Professor, Department of Mathematics Kelly Holmstadt, Fourth-year Student, Mathematics Education Jennifer Kosiak, Assistant Professor, Department of Mathematics Maren Lau, Fifth-year Student, Mathematics Education Rebecca LeDocq, Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics Kristin Radermacher, Third-year Student, Mathematics Education University of Wisconsin - La Crosse This session discusses two projects that utilized video podcasts to enhance undergraduates’ critical thinking skills. With advancements in screen and voice capture technology and the explosion of portable media players, podcasts will substantially impact teaching and learning for the twenty-first century. Podcasts can be used in any discipline to introduce concepts, remediate misconceptions, or allow students to review course presentations. Through faculty-created podcasts, students can evaluate another’s problem-solving process and become active learners by creating content-specific podcasts. Participants will be introduced to the process and technology involved in video podcasting.

IIIF HOW TO SPOIL TELEVISION FOR YOUR STUDENTS: A Departmental Focus On Critical Thinking Amanda Harsin, Fourth-year Student Rebecca Martin, Assistant Professor Virginia Norris, Professor Brady Phelps, Professor Department of Psychology South Dakota State University Teaching a science involves teaching critical thinking skills. Students often compartmentalize these skills so that critical thinking is used when scientific topics are addressed in the classroom but not when applied scientific topics are encountered. The Psychology Department at South Dakota State University strives to extend students’ critical thinking skills to issues encountered in their daily lives. The goal is to encourage students to question information, whatever the source. Students no longer sit down to enjoy an evening of television or of Googling the Internet. Now they ask, “Why do they say that?” and “What evidence do they have?” In this session, participants and presenters discuss the structure and the content of this endeavor using activities to demonstrate the methods used. Particular attention is paid to thinking about unverified material presented via a variety of mediums. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IVA DUST (Did You See That)? USING VISUAL LITERACY TO DEVELOP CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS IN THE NET GENERATION Diane Veale Jones, Professor, Department of Environmental Studies Jean Lavigne, Assistant Professor, Department of Environmental Studies College of Saint Benedict/Saint John’s University Facing an ever-changing audience of students, we need to develop and share innovative strategies for teaching critical thinking. In this session, the presenters share successful strategies that play directly to the strengths of Net Generation students, using visual literacy as an entryway for the development of critical thinking skills. Visually-oriented class sessions are starting points in a systemic progression of techniques that teach critical reading, thinking, and analysis. First, analyzing image-laden texts teaches students to critically examine the content and meaning of texts they might otherwise view as value-neutral. Second, pictorially representing concepts or terms assesses and improves student understanding of information. Third, applying these techniques to reading assignments aids the development of further critical reading and thinking skills.

IVB INTRODUCTORY TECHNOLOGIES FOR TEACHING CRITICAL THINKING ONLINE Tom Petz, Director, Office of Online Learning Linda Wiechowski, Chair and Professor, Department of Finance and Economics Walsh College Online courses should be highly motivating to the students. This workshop will provide an introduction to creating online courses that promote critical thinking. The presenters will discuss a variety of best practices and supporting technologies for online courses that help stimulate students’ intellectual curiosity and aid in fostering critical thinking. Participants will receive a CD with several of the examples used in online courses and some instruction guides for several of the technologies. Back to Concurrent Sessions

IVC PRACTICAL STRATEGIES FOR ENCOURAGING CRITICAL THINKING Stephen Brookfield. Distinguished University Professor University of St. Thomas Becoming aware of and challenging our assumptions is rarely easy and is often only undertaken after a crisis forces this process on us. Exploring alternatives to current ways of thinking and acting is difficult when we live our lives within regulated networks, surrounded by like-minded peers. This session looks in detail at how students learn critical thinking and how it can be encouraged. As well as considering the role of teachers’ modeling critical thinking, the session explores different discussion-based approaches to developing critical thinking and outlines an incremental approach to introducing the process in college classrooms.

IVD A STUDENT-OPERATED INTERNET SITE FOR UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH Glen L. Thompson, Professor, Department of History Jeremy Zima, Graduate Student, Department of Music Wisconsin Lutheran College How can educators use the technical knowledge of students as an entrée into critical thinking about the Internet and to encourage serious undergraduate research? During 2006, the presenter and a team of undergraduate students developed a Web site on the history of the fourth century. Students did the site design and elaborated the site principles. Student research projects then supplied much of the site’s contents. This presentation will describe the process and explain the site’s usefulness for promoting student critical thinking about the Internet, for encouraging undergraduate research, and for the modeling of faculty research.   Back to Concurrent Sessions

IVE DEVELOPING A RICH LEARNING INTERNET-BASED SIMULATION William J. Brennan, Assistant Professor, Department of Economics Minnesota State University, Mankato This session will describe a portfolio-picking project used in a principles of macroeconomics class and help to develop other rich-learning classroom exercises for other disciplines in the spirit of L. Dee Fink’s Creating Significant Learning Experiences (Jossey-Bass, 2003), Pair-share groups will develop rich-learning projects to help students decipher large bits of information from the Internet for application in their personal lives. The presenter will encourage participants to think about how the classroom can be a simulation to aid students in future life-changing choices where they might have to process a large amount of information. Decisions in areas such as medical services, consumer products, voting, professional conferences, new businesses, or new hobbies could be a starting point for new classroom Internet-based projects. At the end of the session, the participants will have delved into a rich learning model of critical thinking in the age of the Internet.

IVF FOSTERING SIGNIFICANT LEARNING ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB Katherine W. Hirsh, Teaching Specialist, College of Continuing Education–Personal Enrichment Programs University of Minnesota - Twin Cities In this energizing workshop, participants will explore fostering the six categories of learning identified in L. Dee Fink's Taxonomy of Significant Learning (2003). Topics will include fostering sophisticated Internet search, promoting critical evaluation of Internet sources, and establishing significant learning goals for Web-focused assessments. Participants will articulate their goals for student Internet use in terms of Fink's taxonomy, and discussion will focus on methods for crafting Internet-based assessments that both appeal to students and engage them in learning activities that strengthen skills in critical thinking, evaluation, and synthesis. Participants will come away with a self-assessment tool suitable for classroom use, several sample assignments based on the Fink taxonomy, and a workshop pathfinder/webliography.   Back to Concurrent Sessions

IVG PHUN WITH PHOTOSTORY 3 Mark Geary, Assistant Professor, Department of Education Gabe Mydland, Assistant Professor, Department of Education Dakota State University PhotoStory is an online program that offers educators and students a new multimedia method of sharing in the classroom. In this session, participants will be able to see varied examples of how the instructors use this free software as a presentation tool. With a little practice in the workshop, each participant will have a sample movie to take back to their classroom. Back to Concurrent Sessions