Critical thinking is a 21st century skill that has been around for thousands of years. There are records of Socrates using critical thinking skills in his teaching in 4th century BC Greece. In recent years though, critical thinking has again become more prominent in education.
Critical thinking requires students to do more than remember and repeat information. Instead, it encourages them to analyze, examine, evaluate and use their problem-solving abilities through questioning, theorizing and rationalizing to have a deeper understanding of the world around them, both inside the classroom and beyond.
In the past, success in education was largely based on the ability to remember facts and figures. However, the skills which our students need today go further than memorization. With our rapidly evolving technology, the internet, and the bewildering amount of information online, it is essential that our students can use higher-order thinking skills to analyze and assess the information they are presented with.
We all know the importance of looking ahead and planning for the future. We can encourage this skill in our students and directly relate it to their learning.
At the start of the course, take a moment to chat with each student individually and ask them to identify an objective for the first part of the year. You may like to brainstorm possible objectives as a class first, but it’s important for students to determine their own personal objectives, rather than imposing objectives on them.
During the first half of the year you can talk to each student about their progress and ask them to assess to what extent they’re achieving their goals.
The key point comes at the end of the semester when students evaluate their progress and set a new objective for the following one.
The ability to analyze options, risks and opinions will help your students in the future in many situations, including when they decide which course to take at university or which job to take.
You can practice this skill by providing students with relatable situations and asking them to analyze and compare the options.
For example:
Imagine you are taking a trip with some friends this summer. You have a number of different options and want to discuss them before finalizing your plans. Talk to a partner about the different trips and decide which would be best:
Students also need to have an awareness of the consequences of their actions; this is a skill which is transferable to making business decisions, as well as being important in their everyday lives.
To practice this skill, put students into small groups and give them the first part of a conditional sentence. One student completes the sentence and then the next student adds a consequence to that statement.
For example:
Student A: If I don’t study for my English exam, I won’t pass.
Student B: If I don’t pass my English exam, my parents won’t let me go out this weekend.
Student C: If I can’t go out this weekend, I’ll miss the big football match.
Student D: My coach won’t let me play next year if I miss the big match.
By giving students more responsibility and having them feel invested in the development of the lesson, they will be much more motivated to participate in the class.
Occasionally, let students discuss the content of the day’s class. Give them a list of tasks for the day, including how long each will take and allow them to discuss the order in which they’ll complete them. For larger classes, first have them do it in pairs or small groups and then vote as a whole class.
Write on the board:
The following tasks can be done in the order you decide as a class. You have five minutes to discuss and arrange the tasks as you choose. Write them on the board in order when you’re ready.
Take this one step further by asking your students to rate each activity out of 10 at the end of the class. That way, you’ll easily see which tasks they enjoy, helping you plan more engaging lessons in the future.
English is one of the most widely-spoken languages in the world, but how much do you know about the language? Here are 11 facts about Englishthat you might not know.
Students all over the globe learn English for many reasons. Some of these motivations may come from the students themselves – perhaps they are learning because they are travelling to an English-speaking area, or they want to be able to converse with English-speaking friends and colleagues. Other reasons for learning could include meeting school requirements, studying abroad, or progressing their careers.
As well as different reasons to learn English, there are also different goals. Many students are still focused on becoming fluent in English, and we are seeing an increase in people who want to learn the language for specific reasons. For example, immersing themselves in a particular culture or simply being able to order from a menu while travelling abroad.
Teachers are focusing on these personal needs to help students achieve their actual goals. It’s likely you’ve already spoken to your students about why they want to learn English. Understanding this is important as different motivations can influence a student’s attitude towards learning the language – and it may be necessary for you to adapt your teaching strategies for different groups of learners.
Let’s meet some different groups of students, learn a little more about their motivations and explore whether different motivations alter how students learn English. You may recognise some of these learners in your classes.
These students are learning English for pleasure or personal reasons. It might be because of travel, social or family reasons or perhaps because a better grasp of English might assist them with their careers. There are also adult learners who could be learning English as an immigration requirement.
For example, 23-year-old Alice decided to learn English so she could meet people and have more meaningful interactions with her English-speaking neighbours. She says: “I was very shy and not very confident in speaking to people, but learning English helped me connect with others and meet new people. I have changed a lot.”
A motivation like Alice’s requires strong teacher support and peer motivation woven into structured learning. Alice can set her goals and with the GSE Learning Objectives map out what she needs to do to achieve them. Teacher encouragement and personal support – and easy access to digital coursework, a social community of others all learning English, and small classes that emphasise conversation – keep people like Alice engaged and motivated to achieve her language goals. “I cannot do it without them”, she says.
These learners are typically in a more formal type of English programme and are learning the language to achieve specific career milestones, such as a promotion. Their employer might even be paying for their learning or they might be reimbursed for the cost of their lessons.
Vincenzo is 33 and works as a Product Manager in Milan for an international organization with offices around the world. He says: “I asked to take English classes as part of my professional development. My company chose an English provider and gave me a choice of group or one-to-one classes. I chose one-to-one classes as I’m easily distracted.”
Professional learners like Vincenzo succeed using a blended learning model of learning in class and at home that they can tailor around their lives. They have a strong motivation to succeed – that’s why learning at home works for them – but step-by-step progress provided by the GSE Learning Objectives is also important to keep this motivation alive. “I met with my teacher once a week where we would work on mistakes I would make while speaking English. He would also give me extra practice materials, like interesting games and videos to listen to in my own time, to help me really get a better understanding of the language,” Vincenzo says.
Learning English is a requirement for many school programmes and students will continue this at college or university. Many of these students will be learning English with a formal course that offers practice tests for high-stakes exams.
Seventeen-year-old Subra is from Malaysia and learns English at school. Some of her family live in Australia and she is considering studying abroad to attend a University that specializes in health care. When she was young, she learned in a traditional classroom backed with tests that helped her see how she was progressing. Now she uses technology, such as her Android Huawei phone to practise her English but still needs the validation of regular testing to know she is on track.
Subrasays: “I am used to studying for tests as I prepared hard for exams to get into middle school and senior school, which was totally determined by test results.”
Academic learners like Subra need to see demonstrable results to help them stay motivated and guide them to the level of English they need to achieve to get the required score on high-stakes tests. With the clear GSE Learning Objectives and a placement test, academic learners can map out where they are right now and where they need to be in order to reach their academic goals. These learners need encouragement and validation of their progress from their teachers to help keep them on track.
Understanding student motivations will help you teach to their specific needs, thus helping them to stay focused and motivated in achieving their goals.
AI is revolutionising every industry, and language learning is no exception. AI tools can provide students with unprecedented access to things like real-time feedback, instant translation and AI-generated texts, to name but a few.
AI can be highly beneficial to language education by enhancing our students’ process of learning, rather than simply being used by students to ‘demonstrate’ a product of learning. However, this is easier said than done, and given that AI is an innovative tool in the classroom, it is crucial that educators help students to maintain authenticity in their work and prevent AI-assisted ‘cheating’. With this in mind, striking a balance between AI integration and academic integrity is critical.
Generative AI tools such as ChatGPT and Gemini have made it easier than ever for students to refine and develop their writing. However, these tools also raise concerns about whether submitted texts are student-produced, and if so, to what extent. If students rely on text generation tools instead of their own skills, our understanding of our students’ abilities may not reflect their true proficiency.
Another issue is that if students continue to use AI for a skill they are capable of doing on their own, they’re likely to eventually lose that skill or become significantly worse at it.
These points create a significant ethical dilemma:
There are many ways in which educators can integrate AI responsibly, while encouraging our learners to do so too.
No task can be completely ‘AI-resistant’, but there are ways in which teachers can adapt coursebook tasks or take inspiration from activities in order to make them less susceptible to being completed using AI.
For example:
Depending on the policies in your institution, if you can use AI in the classroom with your students, they will see that you know about different AI tools and their output. A useful idea is to generate a text as a class, and have students critically analyse the AI-generated text. What do they think was done well? What could be improved? What would they have done differently?
You can also discuss the ethical implications of AI in education (and other industries) with your students, to understand their view on it and better see in what situations they might see AI as a help or a hindrance.
Sometimes, students might turn to AI if they don’t know where to start with a task or lack confidence in their language abilities. With this in mind, it’s important to help your students understand where their language abilities are and what they’re working towards, with tangible evidence of learning. This is where the GSE Learning Objectives can help.
The Global Scale of English (GSE) provides detailed, skill-specific objectives at every proficiency level, from 10 to 90. These can be used to break down complex skills into achievable steps, allowing students to see exactly what they need to do to improve their language abilities at a granular level.
