Lesson Planning for Critical & Creative Thinking
Teaching Critical & Creative Thinking, Semester 4 - August 2021
PART 1 - LESSON PLAN
Date: Term 1
Year level: 9
VC level: 9 & 10
Lesson duration: 50 minutes
Title of Lesson: Understanding art by understanding ourselves
Link to Victorian Curriculum: https://victoriancurriculum.vcaa.vic.edu.au/critical-and-creative-thinking/curriculum/f-10#level=9-10
Learning Area 1: Critical and Creative Thinking capability
Strand:Questions and Possibilities
Suspend judgements to allow new possibilities to emerge and investigate how this can broaden ideas and solutions (VCCCTQ044)
Challenge previously held assumptions and create new links, proposals and artefacts by investigating ideas that provoke shifts in perspectives and cross boundaries to generate ideas and solutions (VCCCTQ045)
Learning Intent
By the end of the lesson, students will be able to
Recognise how their own life experiences influence their thinking processes
Demonstrate flexible thinking skills to alter their perspective when new information or interpretations are provided
Reflect upon changes in their thinking processes
Link to Victorian Curriculum: https://victoriancurriculum.vcaa.vic.edu.au/the-arts/visual-arts/curriculum/f-10#level=9-10
Learning Area 12 Visual Arts
Strand: Respond and Interpret
Analyse and interpret artworks to explore the different forms of expression, intentions and viewpoints of artists and how they are viewed by audiences (VCAVAR045)
Analyse, interpret and evaluate a range of visual artworks from different cultures, historical and contemporary contexts, including artworks by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to explore differing viewpoints (VCAVAR045)
Learning Intent
By the end of the lesson, students will be able to
Explore and organise interpretations to both unseen stimuli and artworks with context provided
Reflect on how interpretations are altered once context is provided
Assessment of Student Learning
The purpose of this assessment is to support student learning in recognising what they understand and what they need further assistance in, therefore informing future teaching practices. Student data will be used to determine zones of actual development and proximal development, student groupings, learning goals, as well as allowing future lessons to be adapted and scaffolded to allow students to successfully access the content.
Students will be assessed in this lesson on their:
Ability to recognise factors that lead to their interpretations
Ability to adapt their perspective as new information or arguments are provided
Participation in community of inquiry
Informal formative assessment for and of learning
Observations of students in class discussion / community of inquiry context
While the teacher will have no issue observing students who are confident with expressing their ideas verbally, shy or anxious students may not be able to present their knowledge for informal observations. Therefore, another assessment method must be used in conjunction with observation.
Formal formative assessment for and of learning
Written thoughts and reflection via a scaffolded worksheet in students' Visual Diaries (Appendix 1.)
PREREQUISITE KNOWLEDGE / CONCEPTS / SKILLS / VOCABULARY REQUIRED
Prior Knowledge
This lesson will be the introduction to a unit of critical analysis.
Basic understanding of artwork analysis from Year 8 (VCAA, 2017).
Expectations for group discussions
Skills
Active listening
Confidence to voice ideas
Grouping/s and Physical Space
Tables will be arranged in a U shape, opening to the teacher and board at the front of the classroom. This allows students to be able to easily see both the teacher and board, as well as other students during the Community of Inquiry.
EQUIPMENT / RESOURCES REQUIRED
Equipment
Laptop
Projector or Smart board connection
Whiteboard or Smart board
Pens / pencils
Resources
A3 Question and Reflection worksheet for each student
A3 Visual Diaries
Digital images of artworks
Attachments
Positionality Example (Appendix 1.)
A3 Questions and Reflection worksheet (Appendix 2.)
Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh (Appendix 3.)
Majority Rule by Michael Cook (Appendix 4.)
Guernica by Pablo Picasso (Appendix 5.)
LESSON OUTLINE
INTRODUCTION
[5 minutes] Introduction to positionality
Through a constructivism (Piaget, 1976) class discussion, teacher introduces concept of positionality and epistemology - how who you are affects what you think (Takacs, 2003).
Why do we think what we think?
If two people with different life experiences looked at the same artwork, would they have the same reaction to it? Why?
These conceptually open questions are very broad as a way to introduce the big ideas of the lesson. Students may be overwhelmed with the openness of these ideas, however their purpose is only to encourage students to think open-mindedly in preparation for more directed critical and creative thinking throughout the lesson.
Teacher addresses learning intentions of lesson.
[10 minutes] Mapping positionality
Teacher directs students to write, map or draw factors of their own positionality in their Visual Diary, such as their interests, socio-economic status, personal experiences, etc. Teacher provides a worked example (Appendix 1.).
MAIN COMPONENT OF LESSON
[15 minutes] Questioning preferences
Teacher hands out worksheet to each student and directs them to paste it in their visual diary opposite their positionality list / map / drawings.
Teacher presents two artworks on the board (Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh; Appendix 3.; Majority Rule by Michael Cook; Appendix 4.) and asks students to write down on their worksheet the name of the one they like the most and what factors drew them to that artwork.
Teacher asks Student A who picked Artwork 1 to describe why they liked it, and similarly with Student B and Artwork 2.
Teacher inquires to the class:
If both of these factors are reasons to like one artwork more than the other, than why does Student A think the factors for liking artwork 1 are greater than the factors for artwork 2, and vice versa?
What is influencing Student A to like those factors more than the factors proposed by Student B?
These conceptually open questions uses students from the class as examples to allow them to see how the idea of positionality from the previous activity is applied in real life situations. Authentic learning, derived from Constructivism (Piaget, 1976) allows students to relate learning back to their own lives, therefore making the content more meaningful for the learner (Donovan, Bransford & Pellegrino, 1999).
Teacher prompts students to think about their reasoning by looking at list / map / drawings relating to their positionality and writing this on the worksheet.
Teacher goes around class and assists students individually by using Socratic Questioning (Padesky, 1993) to expand upon their thinking
[10 minutes] Community of Inquiry
Teacher directs students back to board and presents another artwork (Guernica by Pablo Picasso; Appendix 5.).
Teacher prompts students to write initial thoughts and interpretations to artwork on worksheet.
Teacher facilitates Community of Inquiry (Garrison, Archer & Anderson, 2000) where students are able to construct meaning through "sustained communication" (Garrison et el, 2000) while learning from one another through listening, building on and respecting one another's ideas, and providing evidence and reason (Gardner, 1996).
Do you like this artwork? Why / why not?
What do you see?
Why do you think the artist included those elements?
What do you think the artist is trying to say?
Teacher provides context / background to the artwork
Does that information change the way you see the artwork? Why?
How has your thinking changed? What do you think of the artwork now?
Are both interpretations valid? Is one more 'correct' than the other?
Using a combination of conceptually open and closed as well as grammatically open and closed questions throughout the Community of Inquiry, the teacher is able to direct students' thinking and focus to certain ideas before encouraging further expansion and critical thought.
Teacher prompts students to write new thoughts and interpretations on worksheet.
ENRICHMENT AND SCAFFOLDED ACTIVITIES (LINKED TO AND EXTENDING ON THE LEARNING INTENT)
Due to the nature of Community of Inquiry, both high-achieving students and those with learning difficulties can be guided to reach the learning intentions of the lesson. As the facilitator, the teacher can use questioning to promote higher order thinking in high achieving students, as well as providing additional guidance and clarification for those who need more support. Additionally, through peer learning (Griffiths, Housten and Lazenbatt, 1995) with a Constructivist (Piaget, 1976) approach, students learn from and with each other in both formal and informal ways (Boud, 2002), allowing those who are high-achieving and those who need additional support to work together to achieve the learning intentions.
LESSON CONCLUSION
[10 minutes] Reflection
Teacher prompts students to complete the reflection on the worksheet using the questions provided as a guide and referring back to the learning intentions.
PART 2 - JUSTIFICATION
This lesson uses Critical and Creative Thinking within the Visual Arts by encouraging students to think about the reasons they view artworks in a certain way. By using artwork analysis, knowledge which students previously have, as the vehicle for critical and creative thinking, students are able to focus on obtaining new skills while in the comfort of their developed ones. Students begin the class by critically reflecting on themselves and their own lives, therefore cultivating a positive critical thinking mindset (Facione, Gittens & Facione, 2016) for the following activities. Dialogic approaches within the Community of Inquiry allows students to participate in democratic action (Hajhosseiny, 2012), as well as promoting student participation in their own learning. Based on the methods of Socrates (Fisher, 2003), using dialogue as a teaching method allows students to search and construct their own knowledge using reasoning and the perspective of others, therefore allowing for critical self reflection on what one knows. By concluding the lesson with meta-cognitive self-reflection, students are able to consolidate and identify how their thinking processes changed throughout the lesson. From shifting the reflection from content to thought, students are able to put themselves back in the centre of the learning process, re-imagining what happened in both the third and first person with the perspective of what happens after.
While I believe this lesson could be very successful and allow students to reach the learning intentions through student participation, there are potential 'blockers' from critical thinking that could occur. A successful Community of Inquiry requires students to be confident in expressing their ideas and being non-judgmental of others. However, personal biases of students may inhibit them from being fair and open minded during the Community of Inquiry, as well as students' confidence, fears or anxieties about being wrong or judged. In order to 'enable' critical thinking for these students, expectations for class discussions would previously need to be clearly outlined and modelled by the teacher, surrounding ideas of respect, reasoning, valuing all ideas and emphasising that there are no incorrect responses in a Community of Inquiry. Structuring the lesson through the scaffolded worksheet, learning collaboratively and using questioning and meta-cognitive strategies are all evidence-based high impact teaching strategies identified by Hattie (2009) that also act as 'enablers' to achieving the learning intentions. Additionally, providing students time to fill in aspects of the worksheet with their interpretation prior to the class discussion, or providing 'wait-time' (Rowe, 1972) allows students to formulate and organise their ideas, therefore increasing student participation in the discussion (Stahl, 1994).
APPENDIX
Appendix 1.
Positionality Example
Appendix 2.
A3 Questions and Reflection worksheet
Appendix 3.
Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh
Appendix 4.
Majority Rule by Michael Cook
Appendix 5.
Guernica by Pablo Picasso
REFERENCES
Donovan, S., Bransford, J., & Pellegrino. (1999). How People Learn: Bridging Research and Practice. National Academy of Sciences.
Facione, P. A., Gittens, C. A. & Facione, N. C. (2016). Cultivating a Critical Thinking Mindset. Measured Reasons. http://go.roguecc.edu/sites/go.roguecc.edu/files/users/MWeast/Cultivating+A+Positive+Critical+Thinking+Mindset_0.pdf
Gardner, S. T. (1996). Inquiry is No Mere Conversation (or Discussion or Dialogue): Facilitation of Inquiry is Hard Work! Analytic Teaching, 16(2), 102–111.
Garrison, R., Anderson, A. & Archer, W. (2000.) Critical Inquiry in a Text-Based Environment:
Computer Conferencing in Higher Education. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(23), 87-105. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1096-7516(00)00016-6
Hajhosseini, M. (2012). The Effect of Dialogic Teaching on Students' Critical Thinking
Disposition. Procedia - Social and Behavioural Sciences, 69(2012), 1358-1368. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2012.12.073
Hattie, J. (2009). Visible Learning: A Synthesis of Over 800 Meta-Analyses Relating to Achievement. Routledge.
Padesky, C. A. (1993, September). Socratic Questioning: Changings Minds or Guiding Discovery? European Congress of Behaviour and Cognitive Therapies. London.
Piaget J. (1976) Piaget’s Theory. In: Inhelder B., Chipman H.H., Zwingmann C. (Eds.), Piaget and His School. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-46323-5_2
Rowe, M. B. (1972). Wait-Time and Rewards as Instructional Variables, their Influence in Language, Logic and Fate Control. National Association for Research in Science Teaching. Chicago.
Stahl, R. J. (1994). Using "Think-Time" and "Wait-Time" Skillfully in the Classroom. ERIC Digest. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED370885
Takacs, D. (2003). How Does Your Positionality Bias Your Epistemology? Thought & Action, 27. https://repository.uchastings.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2260&context=faculty_scholarship
VCAA. (2021). Critical and Creative Thinking: Levels 9 and 10. https://victoriancurriculum.vcaa.vic.edu.au/critical-and-creative-thinking/curriculum/f-10#level=9-10
VCAA. (2021). Visual Arts: Levels 9 and 10. https://victoriancurriculum.vcaa.vic.edu.au/the-arts/visual-arts/curriculum/f-10#level=9-10