Higher Order Thinking Skills and Discovery Education's- Educational Partner's Challenges

I had originally posted this within in the Discovery Education's Online Community, but thought I would share it here too.

The thing I love most about the many Discovery Education Corporate Partners are the contests they hold. The beauty of many of these contests is their focus on solving real world problems. If students are encouraged to focus on the process of solving a real world problem, rather than just focusing on a solution, exponentially higher order thinking skills can be honed. Though the end result is what is ultimately judged, I am convinced that by solely focusing on outcomes, valuable learning and growth will go unrealized.  

In solving any problem, it is always important to dig deep, explore and thoroughly define the issue at hand. In my experience, this is an area most of my students and, quite frankly, some adults would rather skip right over. For whatever reason, students seem to prefer having problems defined for them, but defining the problem is a valuable step that is chalked full of higher order thinking skills. By giving time for students to process and completely define problems they are required to question and analyze deep with a topic by using Spotlight on Strategies (CDN).  For example, if I were starting a challenge with students, a modified version of the S.O.S. "Think-Puzzle-Explore" (CDN) could be used to open up students' thinking and put them in the driver seat. This S.O.S allows students to record what they already know, record any questions they might have and create a plan as to how they will explore a specific topic.


Another way to ensure students are honing their higher order thinking skills is by guiding students to utilize each contest rubric and/or checklist which will help guide and refine their work. I am a firm believer that I should not do anything for students that they can do for themselves; this includes reading and analyzing contest guidelines. In my experience, introducing these tools to students early allows them the opportunity to refer back to them on a regular basis and helps guide their projects. The number of times my students ask if things are good enough or if projects contain enough details have greatly reduced. It has been nice to watch as these topics have become conversations students are having amongst themselves. This has also meant the process of revision is slowly becoming a student endeavor and proves rubrics and checklists should not be utilized as simple tools in a very real and purposeful way.

   

Finally, I am a firm believer the best way to teach problem solving is by giving students the opportunities to attempt to solve actual problems we find in the world today. Thanks to Discovery Education and their Educational Partners we have been given several opportunities to do just that across just about every subject area.