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Teaching Critical Thinking without (Much) Writing: Multiple‐Choice and Metacognition
Author(s) -
Bassett Molly H.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
teaching theology and religion
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.165
H-Index - 11
eISSN - 1467-9647
pISSN - 1368-4868
DOI - 10.1111/teth.12318
Subject(s) - metacognition , critical thinking , mathematics education , psychology , multiple choice , space (punctuation) , pedagogy , cognition , computer science , linguistics , philosophy , reading (process) , neuroscience , operating system
In this essay, I explore an exam format that pairs multiple‐choice questions with required rationales. In a space adjacent to each multiple‐choice question, students explain why or how they arrived at the answer they selected. This exercise builds the critical thinking skill known as metacognition, thinking about thinking, into an exam that also engages students in the methods of the academic study of religion by asking them to compare familiar excerpts and images. As a form of assessment, the exam provides a record of students' knowledge and their thought processes, and as a learning strategy, it encourages students to examine the thought processes they use to understand religion(s) and its many manifestations.