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The ability to approach problems with a critical eye and open-minded perspective is something which will benefit your child throughout their life. With good critical thinking skills they’ll be able to overcome obstacles and feel confident in their problem-solving abilities. Your child will develop critical thinking skills at school, but you can support their learning at home in various ways. Here’s some tips from a preparatory school in Richmond on how you can help your child develop these important skills.
Resist solving
For your child to learn how to tackle problems using their own decision-making skills, they need to be left alone to experience frustrations and overcome them independently. Try to resist the urge to jump in and save them when they’re struggling with something, even if the solution to a problem seems obvious to you. Every time your child has to think for themselves and draw on their own experience and skills, they’ll develop their critical thinking skills for the future.
Ask questions
When your child is finding something difficult, ask them questions about what they’re experiencing to get them thinking and coming up with innovative solutions. This will also get them into the habit of questioning and assessing situations, while stimulating their natural curiosity about the world around them. Asking why something has happened will encourage your child to find reasons for things rather than simply accepting them for what they are.
Explore consequences
Critical thinking involves thinking something through all the way to a conclusion. To develop this ability, your child will need to learn to identify the implications of situations they encounter. You can help them by asking them to think about what might or might not happen as a result of something else; for example, when reading a book or watching a film you could ask them what they think might happen to a character after a certain incident.
Extra-curricular activities
You might be able to find clubs or activities your child can participate in to help develop their critical thinking skills, such as debating or philosophy clubs. Through this they’ll learn to question the status quo and tolerate other people’s ideas and opinions on topics – an essential aspect of thinking critically. They can then put into practise what they’ve learned in their everyday life.
Developing good critical thinking skills will enable your child to make sense of the world around them and make judgements independently. It will also help them feel confident in their ability to tackle challenges head on.
