Critical thinking 1
Running head: CRITICAL THINKING AND SCIENCE EDUCATION
Thinking Like a Scientist in Elementary School
Jessica Zulawski
Cornell University
Critical thinking 2
Abstract
This study evaluated how the critical thinking skills of young elementary school children
can be enhanced through the Thinking Like a Scientist curriculum. Critical thinking skills
were defined as the ability to utilize the scientific method and apply it to various
scenarios encountered in real-world decisions. This approach is referred to as a domaingeneral teaching style, in which students are expected to transfer the skills learned in one
area, as opposed to domain-specific, in which students are expected to retain specific
facts and figures. The curriculum engages students in discussion and activities to help
them understand how they can generalize the scientific method. Participants were a class
of nineteen second graders (Mage=7.2 years, SD=0.67), ten females and nine males. The
results showed improvement in student responses following the instruction with the
curriculum, suggesting that the Thinking Like a Scientist curriculum was effective and
that this type of program may be successful and replicable in other classrooms.
Critical thinking 3
Thinking like a Scientist in Elementary School
According to Eisenberg (2008), one of the greatest challenges to American education
in the information age is “curriculum information overload.” Eisenberg (2008) further
contends that because the textbook is no longer the primary source of information for
students it is necessary to teach information literacy and critical thinking skills to navigate
this digital era. The ability to use these skills allows students to consume information in a
more conscientious manner and evaluate information effectively. As Roger Benjamin (2008)
explains, “while students still need to acquire a body of knowledge, it is equally, if not more
important for them to master the higher order skills they will need to access, structure and
use information” (p.51). The ability to effectively synthesize information and realize that the
world can be viewed in both an objective and subjective manner allows individuals to make
well-informed decisions.
After graduation, students should have the abilities to distinguish biased from unbiased information, evaluate the credibility of various sources and develop effective
solutions to problems. A survey conducted by Weiler (1999) surveying college students
found that 29% accepted information from the internet without assessing its validity, and
only 34% even considered additional verification of data from other sources important.
This finding suggests that roughly a third of these students would even consider checking
the validity of their sources. In a similar vein, Graham and Metaxas (2003) asked students
at Wellesley College to list three major innovations developed by Microsoft over the past
15 years. The researchers found that 63% of students used only the Microsoft website,
12% checked several sources and the remaining 22% fell somewhere between those
Critical thinking 4
extremes. These findings suggest the majority students failed to think critically and
consider the potential bias in the Microsoft website. Quitadamo et al. (2008) claims only
a “small fraction of college graduates can demonstrate the critical thinking skills
necessary for academic and professional success.” This observation is harrowing, because
these skills are necessary in everyday contexts, from deciding what kind of medicine to
take, to choosing healthy foods, or making the right decisions for one’s children. A
wealth of information is becoming increasingly accessible through the media and
internet, and students should be equipped with the reasoning tools necessary to filter
through books, articles, advertisements, websites and television shows to make effective
decisions.
Though a compelling case can be made for teaching students these skills, there is
a lack of empirically tested research in this area (Williams, 2002). This dearth in research
is mainly due to the fact that most theory-based research is difficult to translate from the
laboratory to the classroom. The lack of classroom-oriented research makes it difficult for
teachers to use effective methods to increase critical thinking skills. It is therefore
imperative to conduct research on critical thinking programs in a classroom setting.
Classroom-oriented research, provide suggestions, for engaging students in
critical thinking. Barak, Ben-Haim, and Zoller (2007) argues that if teachers purposely
and persistently practice higher-order thinking, presenting in class real-world problems,
and encouraging open-ended class discussions, critical thinking skills will increase.
Similarly, Frijters, ten Dam, and Rijlaarsdam (2008) conducted a study in which they
split secondary school-age biology students into two groups, dialogic and non-dialogic
groups. The program intended to foster more fluency of reasoning and quality of value
Critical thinking 5
orientation in the dialogic group relative to the non-dialogic group, which had been
garnered through class discussion. In both of these cases, researchers suggest specific
things teachers could do in their classrooms to help facilitate critical thinking.
Defining Critical Thinking
The first step to increasing empirically tested research on critical thinking is to
outline clearly what constitutes critical thinking. Research in this area has adopted several
definitions of critical thinking. For example, Sezer (2008) states that many educators are
tempted to equate critical thinking with higher order thinking skills within the last steps
of Bloom’s taxonomy: analysis, synthesis and evaluation. However, it appears as if there
is no consensus on this definition within the scientific community. According to Halpern
(2003), critical thinking is best described as “cognitive skills and strategies that increase
the likelihood of a desired outcome…thinking that is purposeful, reasoned and goaldirected-the kind of thinking involved in solving problems, formulating inferences,
calculating likelihoods, and making decisions.” While conducting her research, she
developed a four-part model of factors which induce critical thinking ability. These
components are: 1)dispositional component (i.e. a willingness to engage in the task); 2)
instruction in the skills of critical thinking; 3) training in the structural problems; and 4)
arguments to promote transcontextual critical thinking skills and a metacognitive
component to check for accuracy and monitor progress (Halpern, 1998). This process of
critical thinking can then be adapted to several different modes such as: verbal reasoning,
argument analysis, skills of thinking in terms of hypothesis testing, likelihood and
uncertainty.
Critical thinking 6
Kuhn and Pearsall (2000) suggest a slightly different process of critical thinking,
which entails three requirements for identifying evidence. First, the theoretical claim
must be considered potentially false. Secondly, evidence must be used as a means of
falsifying theories. Finally, theory and evidence must be recognized as distinct
epistemological categories. Although none of these definitions is all-encompassing, the
information gained from all of these studies contributes to the existing conceptualization
of critical thinking.
The work conducted by Kuhn, Pearsall, Sezer, Halpern and others can then be
translated into ways to facilitate critical thinking in the classroom. According to Brown
and Freeman (2000), characteristics of a critical-thinking inducing classroom include the
following: frequent questions, developmental tension, and fascination with the
contingency of the conclusions. These tactics incorporate both Kuhn and Pearsall’s
(2000) work and Halpern’s (1998) research as they ask students to evaluate the
relationship between theories and evidence and delve beyond basic rote memorization.
Critical Thinking Programs
There are a fair number of critical thinking programs in existence for students at
various age levels. For example, Chaffee (1988) describes that at LaGuardia Community
College many students are not leaving college with “the intellectual understanding and
depth of insight supposedly symbolized by their degrees”( p.3). In light of this,
LaGuardia Community College developed a course entitled “Critical Though Skills”
aimed at developing students’ writing, reading skills, address basic thinking, reasoning
and problem-solving skills; and encourages students to explore their attitudes towards life
Critical thinking 7
and education. The college enrolls 700 students in the course every year, and researchers
have seen gains in all of the areas targeted for improvement.
Noting the lack of fully developed critical thinking skills at the college level,
several researchers have developed programs aimed at increasing critical thinking skills
for younger children in attempts of early intervention. One program developed in the
Netherlands by Hamers, deKoning, Sijtsma and VerMeer (2002) had two separate
intervention programs for third graders and fourth graders. The third grade intervention
used visual information to increase critical thinking ability whereas the fourth grade
intervention used textual information. The program was taught over a span of two years.
The researchers found that the group which had both grade levels of instruction showed
the greatest improvement in inductive reasoning skills taught, relative to the other groups.
This study has shown that even at younger ages, students can benefit from these types of
interventions.
Additionally, Mercer, Wegerif, and Dawes (1999) recognized that students can
benefit from self-directed dialogue in terms of improving their critical thinking skills.
Sixty British primary school children and their teachers participated in an experimental
teaching program, designed to improve the quality of children’s reasoning and
collaborative activity by developing their awareness of language use (i.e., offering
suggestions and reasoning for what would happen) and promoting certain ground rules
for talking together. After the teaching program, the researchers found the experimental
group improved in terms of performance on Raven’s matrices, which is a test of abstract
reasoning in which the participant is required to identify a missing portion of a larger, all
encompassing pattern. This research suggests that the exploratory talk used by the
Critical thinking 8
children helps the students think and explain what may or may not happen in certain
experiments and situations.
Berland and Riser (2009) conducted a study to evaluate what strategies are best to
help students understand and explain scientific concepts, and concluded that the most
effective strategies were using evidence to make sense of phenomenon and articulating
those understandings.
In the United States, a team of researchers (Williams, Blythe, White, Li, Gardner,
and Sternberg, 2002) developed Practical Intelligence educational program. This
curriculum has five themes: Knowing why, Knowing self-knowledge, Knowing
Differences, Knowing process and Revisiting. The researchers used a pre-post test design
and found that middle-schoolers who received the Practical Intelligence curriculum
improved in all areas of the curriculum significantly more than the control group, which
did not receive instruction from the researchers’ lesson plans.The Practical Intelligence
for School project demonstrated that the skills essential to school success can be defined
and taught in the Practical Intelligence for School (Williams et al., 2002). With a program
like the Practical Intelligence for School project, students learn the meta-cognitive
abilities needed to assess their own study skills and use this information to improve their
academics.
Thinking Like a Scientist (TLAS), the basis for the current study, is a project
which examines critical thinking through the lens of scientific reasoning and builds upon
the Practical Intelligence for School project. The TLAS project aims to help students
from disadvantaged backgrounds apply the scientific method to everyday life (Williams,
Papierno, Makel, & Ceci 2004). The curriculum in this experiment uses a domain-general
Critical thinking 9
approach to scientific teaching. Zimmerman (2000) states this approach “includes the
general skills implicated in experimental design and evidence evaluation, where the focus
is on the cognitive skills and strategies that transcend the particular content domain to
which they are being applied.” Other science programs have used a more domain-specific
approach, which teaches specific information and concepts about science (e.g., the
mitochondria are part of a cell; Zimmerman 2000). The goal for this project is to promote
critical thinking in young, school-age children, so that they are able to finish high school
with these skills intact.
The hope is that although students will be able to utilize a scientific method when
it comes to everyday decision-making even if they are unable to retain all the specific
information learned in science class. These skills were measured by open-ended
questions about different scenarios in which scientific thinking could be applied, as
demonstrated in questions like: “In the month of July both crime rates and ice cream sales
increased in New York City. Should the mayor close down ice cream shops in order to
decrease crime?” The students’ answers were then scored on a Likert scale of 1-5. A
response earning a score of 1 (“I don’t know”),-5 (a response with an elaborate
demonstration of mastery of the concept).
The current study seeks to adapt the high school curriculum used in the TLAS
project to a level appropriate for elementary school age children. According to a study by
Ash and Torrence (1993), it is from age six to seven that children begin to use evidence
in creating beliefs and processing information about the world around them. The
elementary program was created with information and principles from previous studies in
this research area in mind. In addition, a local elementary school teacher served as a
Critical thinking 10
consultant, in order to develop a curriculum appropriate for a second-grade class.If
children from age six to seven can begin to use evidence in making decisions and
developing theories, then there is a possibility that a critical thinking curriculum can and
should be implemented in elementary schoool. The present study evaluated whether a
modified version of TLAS for the elementary school level yields positive gains in
domain-general scientific reasoning.
The measures developed for this experiment were based on open-ended questions
designed to evaluate the students’ ability to utilize domain-general scientific reasoning.
This format was chosen for the current study because it allows for evaluation of the
children’s reasoning skills and ability to draw connections between the curriculum and
the scenarios presented in the assessment. We hypothesized that the lessons on critical
thinking presented in the program would be effective in increasing these particular skills
and assessment scores within the students.
Participants
Nineteen second graders from Cayuga Heights Elementary School participated in
the experimental program. Cayuga Heights is a public school in New York State.Nine
children were male and ten were female. The mean age of the students’ was 7.2 years of
age (SD = .67 years) at the beginning of the study. Selection for this study was based on
observations of various teachers to ensure the selection was appropriate; the teacher who
joined the research team and led the classroom portion of this study was interested in
incorporating science instruction into her curriculum teacher interest in participating in
this study.
Critical thinking 11
Materials
For this study, the researchers developed three homologous versions of a
scientific reasoning test, versions A, B and C. This test mirrored the one developed by
Williams et al. for the high school Thinking Like a Scientist implementation. Version A
was a pretest designed to obtain baseline data, version B was given 2.5 months after the
first assessment to capture any possible maturational effects due to being in school with
this particular teacher, and to evaluate acclimation to the testing process and familiarity
with the measure. The third measure, version C, served as a post-test to measure gains in
domain-general scientific reasoning as a result of the program; it was administered 2.5
months after version B, after the introductory module had been completely taught. (see
Appendix A).
The measures developed for the current study is comparable to measures used in
previous TLAS studies. The current assessment included seven questions, each testing a
different aspect of scientific thinking covered in the program. An example of a question
included on the assessment is: “Kyle picks a brand of granola bar because the TV
commercial has a famous movie star in it, is this: Good Thinking, Not-so-good thinking,
or Don’t Know.” One student at a time was pulled from the classroom to a separate work
station. Each question was read to the student two times and then the research assistant
administering the assessment then prompts the student to provide his or her own
reasoning for their response of whether he or she thought it was “Good thinking” or
“Not-so-good thinking.” The answers were then recorded on paper by the research
assistant. The measure at the next assessment time would ask a question similar to this in
context and difficulty, but different in content in order to measure the change in quality of
Critical thinking 12
student response to that particular concept rather than mastery of the answer to that
particular question. Each question tested for a particular concept such a correlation vs.
causation or determining good sources from bad sources.(see Appendix A) This
assessment aims to evaluate this transfer of skills by rating the students’ open-ended
responses on a scale of 1-5. The rating system used in the current study is the same as the
one used in the high school level TLAS study.
Procedure
An elementary school version of the original Thinking Like a Scientist curriculum
was implemented between the testing at time B and time C . The curriculum included a
set of six in-depth lessons covering the essence of the scientific method and how to eply
it to solve real-world problems.This curriculum included lessons to link the scientific
method into real world issues appropriate for 7-8 year olds (e.g., making healthy
decisions about food and exercise). The first five weeks of the program introduced basic
concepts such as “Biased sources,” and “How to create a hypothesis.” The sixth and final
week of the program included a lesson which culminated the previous five lessons (see
Appendix B).
Participants were first given a pretest, to measure their baseline level of scientific
reasoning. To administer the pre-test, the students were tested individually by a research
assistant who read the questions aloud to them; the students were then asked to tell the
assistant the answer which seemed to be the best and their responses were recorded. Two
months after the initial assessment, the students completed a similar assessment to
account for changes in responses due to student maturity. Tests for differences in student
maturity were measured because a control classroom was not available for the evaluation
Critical thinking 13
of the TLAS curriculum. Following this, children were taught the Thinking Like a
Scientist curriculum once a week by their teacher, for ten consecutive weeks. In the
middle of the ten weeks, after the sixth week, a third test, with questions similar to that of
the first test and second test was given to monitor the students’ progress.
Coding
The coding system was based on a 1-5 scale depending on how much they apply
the scientific method in their responses. A response devoid of any scientific thinking was
rated a score of a 1, whereas a completely developed elaborate answer using the
application of the scientific method was awarded a 5. For a complete description of how
responses were rated, see Appendix C.
Results
Results from this study are based on students in the classroom (N=19, nine male,
ten female). At each testing period, one student was absent each time. For these three
students, only two sets of data were available. The data was evaluated in two ways. First,
we examined students’ improvement on the assessment as a whole. For the analysis of
total assessment scores, all three of the absent students were omitted, leaving a subsample of sixteen students (seven male, nine female). Secondly, we studied trends among
questions. For the question by question analysis, all of the original nineteen students were
kept in the sample. Question 7 was omitted from the final data evaluation at all three
testing points; it was originally designed to encourage students to tell researchers a more
personal connection they might have with thinking scientifically, but ultimately confused
the students.
Critical thinking 14
The student responses were scored by two independent raters in order to minimize
rating bias. The Cohen’s kappa measure of reliability was used to account for levels of
agreement between raters k=0.61. Raters resolved many of their discrepancies through
discussion.
At the baseline the per-item mean was 1.86(SD=.386). At the second data point,
scores increased (M=1.94, SD=.484). Upon the third data collection, scores increased
even further (M=3.03, SD=.870). (See Table 1; Figure 1).A within-subjects repeated
measures test was conducted to test the changes from each testing point on the total
student assessment scores. These changes were shown to be significant, F (2,15 )= 41.6,
p<.05.
Pairwise comparisons using the Bonferroni correction for multiple comparisons
were used for further exploration of these results. From time 1 to time 2 the change in
student scores were found not to be significant p=.531. However, differences were found
to be significant between both time 1 and time 3 p= <.05 and time 2 and time 3 p= <.05.
Additionally, a paired t-test was used to analyze the data question by question,
from time 1 to time 2 and time 2 to time 3. During time 1 to the time 2, which measured
effects due to student maturation, the differences between time 1 and time 2 were not
significant with the exception of questions 5, t (17)=2.29, p=.035, and 6a t(17)=-2.20,
p=.042 (See Table 2; Figure 2).
When a similar analysis was used to examine the results from time 2 to time 3
All of the differences were significant except for question 1, t(17)=-1.96, p=.067 ,
question 3 t(17)=-1.47, p=.160, and question 6a t(17)=-1.53, p= .144 (See Table 3; Figure
2).
Critical thinking 15
Overall, scores seemed to significantly increase after implementation of the
curriculum from time 2 to time 3 for total assessment scores, while there was no
significant change for these scores from time 1 to time 2. Results from individual
questions show similar trends. With the exception of questions 5 and 6a, average student
scores essentially stagnated between time 1 and time 2. Between time 2 and time 3, the
average student response score increased for all questions other than 1, 3 and 5 (See
Table 4).
Discussion
Program Effects
The results suggest that the effects of the curriculum after six weeks of
instruction, significantly showed an increase in the average rating of student responses.
Since the curriculum in this experiment is designed to foster discussion of scientific
concepts it is possible this could have contributed to the increase in student response
ratings. This would be congruent with studies showing that classroom discussion is
integral for the comprehension of critical thinking skills (Barak, Ben-haim & Zoller,
2007; Frijters, ten Dam & Rijlaarsdam, 2008).
Although student performance improved overall, there were several questions
which did not show significant improvement. For question 1, student scores improved,
but insignificantly. Question 1 asked whether a child should figure out if he or she is
allergic to various things by trial and error. A common response among students was that
this is a bad idea because it will cause more allergic reactions. This response is more
concrete than the more hypothetic-deductive response of: “he or she should find out if
there is anything he or she is not allergic to.” That response would have given them a
Critical thinking 16
higher rating. According to Piaget (2003) children at the age tested in this study are more
likely to think at the concrete level, rather than the more abstract, hypothetic-deductive
level. However, Piaget (2003) also contends that if students have experience with the
concept, they will able to understand it better. Students who scored well on this item
might have experienced a friend or relative coping with allergies and therefore had more
knowledge on the subject, which would most likely cause them to receive a higher rating.
For question 3, it appears as if students consistently scored well on this item
throughout the course of the study. When averaging scores for all three testing points, this
question had the highest overall average (M=2.73, SD=1.40). This suggests that students
understood the question before the curriculum, so when re-tested after instruction, it
showed minimal impact.
Question 5, the last question which did not show significant change from time 2
to time 3, is an interesting case. It showed a significant change from time 1 to time 2
however, it was the only question to show a decline in average student rating from time 1
to time 2. Question 5 asks students whether or not an authority figure took an appropriate
course of action, after falsely mistaking correlation for causation. An example of such a
question is:
Children at Sunshine Valley daycare love eating pretzels. Their teacher notices that when
they have pretzels for a snack, some children will come down with a cold that week. The
teacher decides not to have pretzels for snack anymore, so that fewer kids will get colds.
The teacher is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-so-good thinking
Don’t Know
In this question, students are asked to consider multiple perspectives, something
in which Piaget (2003) claims children are not particularly proficient until they reach
Critical thinking 17
adolescence. It is possible that this could have attributed to poor student response on this
question.
In regards to the drop in performance on this question at time 2, it is possible
that the content in the question could have affected student response. At times 1 and 3,
this question linked poor student health and food, as demonstrated in the prior example.
At the second assessment point, question 5 reads:
Most kids at Red Creek elementary school love playing soccer. They play soccer about 23 times a week during recess. The teacher also notices that a lot of other students are
absent on days they play soccer. He decides to tell the kids to stop playing soccer in so
fewer students will skip school. The Director is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good-Thinking
Don’t Know
It is possible it was more difficult for the students to relate to the soccer-school absence
connection which could explain the drop in student scores on this question. Questions
were more similar in content at time 1 and time 3, which could have explained these
results.
Student Maturational Effects
Though differences due solely to student maturation were minimal, the results
also suggest that there was improvement between the first two points of data collection
due to student maturation for several questions. According to Kuhn (1999) children at age
six begin to differentiate theory and evidence, but only in a very limited sense and set of
contexts. Since the average age of the students in this experiment was 7.2 years at the
beginning of data collection, it could be possible that these students were expanding the
set of contexts in which they are able to differentiate theory and evidence. Alternatively,
this improvement seen for these questions could be a result of carryover effects. Though
Critical thinking 18
they varied in content, the questions tested the same concepts which could have been
learned on the prior assessment.
One limitation of this study is that it is an intensive study of only one classroom.
Thus, it is difficult to generalize the findings of this study to other classes. There is little
room for comparison of whether other teachers may be more or less effective at
presenting the material to students. Ideally, this study would be performed with other
classrooms, including a control classroom, to serve as comparisons and account for
potential differences between teachers and schools. Though the measurement from time 1
to time 2 served as a check for improvement due to student maturation, the comparison
for student maturation between time 1 and the end of the program cannot be fully made.
This study only analyzes within-subject performance and therefore differences
between various demographic groups (e.g. gender, ethnicity, socio-economic status) were
not examined. It is possible that some students’ performance may have been affected by
the influence of belonging to one these demographic groups however this was not
accounted for in this study.
All of the measures of improvement were based on open-ended responses. Openended questions were, in part, chosen because allowing students to create their own
dialogue in relation to the application of scientific concepts was proven in several studies
to be an effective means for students to grasp these skills (Berland & Riser, 2009;
Mercer, Wegerif, & Dawes, 1999). While this was a good strategy to better capture
student reasoning, the ratings were not as objective or concrete form of measurement, as
for example a multiple-choice assessment or questions with a specific right or wrong
answer.
Critical thinking 19
For future research, this program should be distributed to more classrooms and
comparisons between classrooms running the program at the same time should be made.
this program might benefit from an evaluation measure which examines both open-ended
student responses as well as more objective student responses
It would be interesting to evaluate correlations between the students’ academic
performance and participation in the program, relative to students who did not receive the
program. The researchers involved in the Practical Intelligence for School project suggest
that programs like this help facilitate meta-cognitive abilities, which in turn, can improve
academic performance. It would be useful to note if this program and similar programs,
can enhance academic performance at the elementary age level.
Overall, the implications of this study are promising. The results discussed in this
paper suggest that it is possible to teach critical thinking skills at second grade level. If
this program, as well as similar programs can accomplish this, fewer students will
graduate without critical thinking skills intact.
Critical thinking 20
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Critical thinking 21
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Table 1. Average Total Assessment Scores for Each Assessment Time
Mean
SD
N
T1
16.8
3.48
16
T2
17.5
4.37
16
T3
27.3
7.91
16
Overall
20.5
7.32
48
Table 2. Paired Samples Test-Time 1 to Time 2: Question by Question Analysis
Pair 1
Pair 2
Pair 3
Pair 4
Pair 5
Pair 6
Pair 7
Pair 8
Pair 9
Q1t1ave-Q1t2ave
Q2t1ave-Q2t2ave
Q3t1ave-Q3t2ave
Q4t1ave-Q4t2ave
Q5t1ave-Q5t2ave
Q6at1ave-Q6at2ave
Q6bt1ave-Q6bt2ave
Q6ct1ave-Q6ct2ave
Q6dt1ave-Q6dt2ave
M
-.389
-.472
-.306
.028
.611
-.444
-.147
.209
-.294
SD
1.48
1.22
1.24
1.05
1.13
.856
1.30
1.13
.587
Sig.(2-tailed)
.281
.118
.310
.912
.035
.042
.646
.915
.154
Table 3. Paired Samples Test-Time 2 to Time 3: Question by Question Analysis
Pair 1
Pair 2
Pair 3
Pair 4
Pair 5
Pair 6
Pair 7
Pair 8
Pair 9
Q1t2ave-Q1t3ave
Q2t2ave-Q2t3ave
Q3t2ave-Q3t3ave
Q4t2ave-Q4t3ave
Q5t2ave-Q5t3ave
Q6at2ave-Q6at3ave
Q6bt2ave-Q6bt3ave
Q6ct2ave-Q6ct3ave
Q6dt2ave-Q6dt3ave
M
-.528
-1.08
-.667
-1.08
-.667
-.528
-.1.00
-1.12
-.706
SD
1.14
1.50
1.93
1.52
.970
1.46
1.58
1.41
1.26
Sig.(2-tailed)
.067
.007
.160
.008
.010
.144
.019
.005
.035
Critical thinking 24
Table 4. Average Scores of the Class by Question for Each Assessment Time
T1 M(SD)
Q1
Q2
Q3
Q4
Q5
Q6a
Q6b
Q6c
Q6d
2.06(.616)
1.58(.862)
2.28(.911)
1.67(.618)
2.28(1.06)
1.42(.772)
2.21(1.09)
1.79(.920)
1.53(.780)
T1
N
18
18
18
18
18
18
17
17
17
T2 M(SD)
2.42(1.35)
2.05(1.29)
2.58(1.39)
1.64(.682)
1.67(.594)
1.86(.837)
2.35(1.51)
1.76(1.12)
1.82(.967)
T2
N
18
18
18
18
18
18
17
17
17
T3M(SD)
2.94(1.39)
3.00(.970)
3.22(1.59)
2.72(1.45)
2.33(.970)
2.44(1.29)
3.29(1.31)
2.71(1.26)
2.41(1.42)
T3
N
18
18
18
18
18
18
17
17
17
Overall
M (SD)
2.57(1.24)
2.28(1.29)
2.73(1.40)
2.07(1.18)
2.15(.952)
1.97(1.14)
2.62(1.40)
2.16(1.21)
1.93(1.13)
Critical thinking 25
Figure1.
Figure 2.
4.5
Average per-item Student Rating at each Assessment Point
Average Student Responses for Each Question
4
Average Student Rating
Average Student Rating
6
3.5
5
3
4
T1
2.5
3
T2
2
T3
3.03
2
1.5
1.86
11
1.94
0.50
0
Q1
Q2
Q3
T1
Q4
Q5
Q6a
Q6b
Q6c
Q6d
Question Number T2
T3
Assessment Time
This figure shows the difference in per-item rating from Time 1, when baseline data was
collected to time 2, which checked for maturational differences. The difference from time
2 to time 3 shows changes on assessments scores upon completion of the program.
Figure 2.
Average Student Responses for Each Question
Average Student Rating
6
5
4
T1
3
T2
2
T3
1
0
Q1
Q2
Q3
Q4
Q5
Q6a
Q6b
Q6c
Q6d
Question Number
This figure shows differences in individual questions from the baseline period to the
checkpoint for maturational differences to the completion of the program
Appendix A
Critical thinking 26
FALL 2008R-Version A
NAME: _______________________________________________
Gender: F M
Age: _________
INSTRUCTIONS: CIRCLE THE BEST ANSWER TO EACH QUESTION.
1. Marta wants a dog of her own. Her mother says “No,” because Marta is allergic to
dogs. Marta decides to try petting different types of dogs to see if they all make her
sneeze. Marta is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests whether students can recognize the child is using an experiment to find if there are
any he or she is not allergic to)
2. Karl picks a brand of granola because the TV commercial has a famous movie star in
it. Karl is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if the child can differentiate between good and bad sources of information)
3. Kim’s parents bought a new kind of bird seed. Kim wants to see if the birds like the
new kind as much as the old kind. One morning, she counts the number of birds that
come to the feeder when the old seed is inside. When the old seed is gone, she puts in the
new seed, then she counts the number of birds that come to the feeder. Kim is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if the student can recognize the child in the question is using an experiment
in order to make a good decision)
4. Steve used to drink a lot of water, then he stopped. Steve notices that he is not growing
as fast as he used to. He wants to grow faster, so he starts drinking a lot of water again.
Steve is showing:
Good Thinking
Why?
Not-So-Good-Thinking
Don’t Know
Critical thinking 27
(Tests to see if students know the difference between correlation and causation)
5. Most kids at Big Bear summer camp love ice cream. They eat ice cream every day all
summer. The Camp Director also notices that a lot of kids also catch poison ivy. He
decides to stop serving ice cream so the kids will not catch poison ivy anymore. The
Director is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good-Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know the difference between correlation and causation)
6. Robby wants to do an experiment to see which drink kids like more, Coke or Pepsi.
Every day, he invites one friend over to his house. Without letting his friends see, he
pours a sip of Coke into a red cup and gives it to his friend. Then he pours a sip of Pepsi
into a blue cup and gives it to his friend. His friend tastes both and tells Robby which one
is better. Robby writes down the answer. After three weeks, Robby has tried the
experiment with 15 friends. The first ten liked Coke more. The last five liked Pepsi more.
Robby decides that kids like Coke more than Pepsi.
a. Robby always used red cups for Coke and blue cups for Pepsi. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know that experiments need everything except for the
experimental variable to be controlled )
b. Robby doesn’t let his friends see which is Coke and which is Pepsi. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know whether or not participants should be blind to the brand
name)
c. Robby has all of his friends taste both Pepsi and Coke. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know participants should try each to make an appropriate
decision)
d. Robby uses only his friends in his experiment. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know that testing only friends might be a biased sample)
Critical thinking 28
7. In your own life, name one time you showed good thinking:
February 2009R-Version B
NAME: _______________________________________________
Gender: F M
Age: _________
INSTRUCTIONS: CIRCLE THE BEST ANSWER TO EACH QUESTION.
1. Peter puts on a sweater, feels really itchy and gets a rash. His mother thinks he might
be allergic to all things that can be used to make sweaters. Peter decides to try putting on
different types of sweaters to see if they all cause him to get a rash. Peter is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests whether students can recognize the child is using an experiment to find if there are
any he or she is not allergic to)
2. Jaime picks a brand of cereal because in the TV commercial it shows the box has a
picture of a famous athlete. Jaime is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if the child can differentiate between good and bad sources of information)
3. Kami’s parents bought a new kind of fertilizer. Kami wants to see if as many seeds
will sprout with the new kind as much as the old kind. She decides to split her family’s
garden and half and use the old fertilizer on one side and the new fertilizer on the other
and count how many seeds sprout on both sides. Kami is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if the student can recognize the child in the question is using an experiment
in order to make a good decision)
Critical thinking 29
4. Seth used to eat a lot of crackers, then he stopped. Seth notices that he is not sleeping
as well as he used to. He wants to sleep better, so he starts eating a lot of crackers again.
Steve is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good-Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know the difference between correlation and causation)
5. Most kids at Red Creek elementary school love playing soccer. They play soccer about
2-3 times a week during recess. The teacher also notices that a lot of other students are
absent on days they play soccer. He decides to tell the kids to stop playing soccer in so
fewer students will skip school. The Director is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good-Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know the difference between correlation and causation)
6. Anna wants to do an experiment to see which chocolate bar kids like more, Hershey
chocolate or Dove chocolate. Every day, she invites one friend over to her house.
Without letting her friends see, she wraps the Dove chocolate into a red napkin and gives
it to her friend. Then she wraps the Hershey’s chocolate into a blue napkin and gives it to
her friend. Her friend tastes both and tells Anna which one is better. Anna writes down
the answer. After three weeks, Anna has tried the experiment with 20 friends. The first
twelve liked Dove more. The last eight liked Hershey more. Anna decides that kids like
Dove more than Hershey.
a. Anna always used red napkins for Dove and blue napkins for Hershey. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know that experiments need everything except for the
experimental variable to be controlled )
b. Anna does not let her friends see which is Dove and which is Hershey. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know whether or not participants should be blind to the brand
name)
Critical thinking 30
c. Anna has all of her friends taste both Dove and Hershey. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know participants should try each to make an appropriate
decision)
d. Anna uses only her friends in her experiment. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know that testing only friends might be a biased sample)
7. In your own life, name one time you showed good thinking:
April 2009R-Version C
NAME: _______________________________________________
Gender: F M
Age: _________
INSTRUCTIONS: CIRCLE THE BEST ANSWER TO EACH QUESTION.
1. Maria notices that sometimes when she eats fruit, she gets a rash. Her
mother tells her she is probably allergic to fruit. Since Maria likes its taste, she decides to
try one type of fruit each day to see if they all give her a rash.
Maria is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good-Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests whether students can recognize the child is using an experiment to find if there are
any he or she is not allergic to)
2. Hayden picks a certain brand of macaroni and cheese because the box has
stickers with his favorite cartoon character inside. Hayden is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-So-Good-Thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if the child can differentiate between good and bad sources of information)
3. Kayla wants to know where in the room plants grow best. She puts 10 seeds in one pot
and puts it by the window. She puts another 10 seeds of the same type in another pot and
Critical thinking 31
puts it in the corner. After giving both plants equal amounts of water, Kayla waits two
weeks. Then she counts the number of sprouts in each pot to decide which location is
better. Kayla is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-so-good thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if the student can recognize the child in the question is using an experiment
in order to make a good decision)
4. Michael notices that when he wears red sneakers to baseball games, his favorite team
always wins. One day, his mom decides to throw away his old sneakers because they are
worn out. Then, Michael’s favorite team loses their next few games. Michael wants to
buy a new pair of red sneakers so his favorite team will start winning again. Michael is
showing:
Good Thinking
Not-so-good thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know the difference between correlation and causation)
5. Children at Sunshine Valley daycare love eating pretzels. Their teacher notices that
when they have pretzels for a snack, some children will come down with a cold that
week. The teacher decides not to have pretzels for snack anymore, so that fewer kids will
get colds. The teacher is showing:
Good Thinking
Not-so-good thinking
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know the difference between correlation and causation)
6.
Amanda wants to know what brand of chocolate chip cookies kids like better, Chipsa-hoy or Keebler. Every day, she invites one friend over to her house. Without letting her
friend see the package, she wraps one Chips-a-hoy cookie in a red napkin and gives it to
her friend. Then she wraps one Keebler cookie in a blue napkin and gives it to her friend.
Her friend tastes both and tells Amanda which one is better. Amanda writes down the
answer. After three weeks, Amanda has tried the experiment with 16 friends. The first
nine liked Chips-a-hoy more. The last seven liked Keebler more. Amanda decides that
kids like Chips-a-hoy cookies more than Keebler cookies.
a. Amanda always uses red napkins for Chips-a-hoy and blue napkins for Keebler.
Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know that experiments need everything except for the
experimental variable to be controlled )
Critical thinking 32
b. Amanda does not let her friends see which cookie is Chips-a-hoy and which is
Keebler. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know whether or not participants should be blind to the brand
name)
c. Amanda has all of her friends taste both Chips-a-hoy and Keebler. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
Why?
(Tests to see if students know participants should try each to make an appropriate
decision)
d. Amanda uses only her friends in her experiment. Is this a:
Good Idea
Bad Idea
Don’t Know
(Tests to see if students know that testing only friends might be a biased sample)
Why?
7. In your own life, name one time you showed good thinking:
Critical thinking 33
Appendix B
THINKING LAURIE RUBIN, GRADE 2
LIKE A SCIENTIST--INTRO LESSONS
(December 2008)
Lesson 1. What is Science?
Lesson 2. Define the Problem--See Many Sides
Lesson 3. Know Fact vs. Opinion
Lesson 4. Weigh Evidence and Make Decisions
Lesson 5. Move From Science to Society
Lesson 6. Bringing It All Together
Lesson 1: WHAT IS SCIENCE?
Close your eyes for a second. Think of what kind of picture shows up in your head when
you think of what someone doing science might look like?
Ok, open your eyes, now what did you see?
*solicit answers from students*
Many of you probably imagined a bunch of adults in white lab coats with test tubes,
right?
Scientists don’t have to wear a white lab coat to use scientific thinking. In fact, many
different types of people can act like scientists…even you!
One of the most important ways which help us think like a scientist is to try to figure out
the right answer by finding out which answers are definitely wrong. For example if we
want to figure out what spot in the classroom is best for plants to grow, we would each
one in a different spot in the classroom and measure which one grew the tallest. We
would call the spot the tallest plant grew in the best place to grow plants unless someone
else comes along, proves us wrong and finds an even better spot to grow plants.
That is also an example of science that you guys can perform without being in a lab.
But science goes even further than that.
Did you know that in most grocery stores, bread and milk are on opposite sides of the
stores because grocery store owners make more money when they are on opposite sides?
This is also an example of scientific thinking since a researcher used to find out what
store set-up made the most money. He tried to find the right answer by deciding which
answers were wrong because he found out stores that have milk and bread near each
other is the wrong way to make more money. We know right now that having milk and
bread on opposite sides of the store is the best way to make money unless someone else
proves another way is better than that.
Critical thinking 34
Pair/Share,or Small Group activity or Class Discussion:
You try!
Say for example your brother or sister tells you that “everyone thinks chocolate ice cream
is the best ice cream.” You can find out whether not your sibling is right by giving
different flavors of ice cream to a bunch of different people and asking them which they
think is the best. If one person says chocolate is NOT their favorite then your sibling was
wrong. At this time, scientists like to make what is called a hypothesis, which is basically
a prediction of what they think will happen in the experiment. In this example, if you
thought your sibling was wrong, your hypothesis would be “I expect that more students
would not suggest chocolate is not the best ice cream.
All of these situations are examples of using science and scientific thinking.
Activity: Think of a question similar to “Which ice cream is the best flavor, chocolate,
vanilla or strawberry?” Another example is “What animal do you like better, dogs or
cats?” Think about which answer other students would be more likely to respond with.
Then go around the room for five minutes to ask other students what they think and
record their answers and see if what you thought about how everyone would answer is
correct.
Critical thinking 35
Lesson 2: DEFINE THE PROBLEM--SEE MANY SIDES
Have you ever wanted to solve a problem? To get to a good solution, you first need to
know what exactly the problem is. You need to define it. Otherwise, you may solve the
wrong problem!
Examples:
Remember from last week when we discussed how science can be used in many different
situations? How there were many different problems that needed to be solved?
Well the first step to fixing any type of problem in science is figuring out exactly what is
the problem. This is called a definition of the problem.
Can you remember from last week when we talked about how you could prove whether
or not your sibling was right when he or she said “everyone thinks ice cream is the best
ice cream flavor?”
First we have to figure out how we will define the “best ice cream flavor”
In the case from last week, we defined the “best ice cream flavor” as which one most
people liked. But this is not the only way to define it.
We could define the best ice cream as the one with the most toppings mixed in.
Or
The one that sells the most at the store.
Or
The one which has the healthiest nutrition facts.
Pair/Share or Small Group Activity or Class Discussion: How would you define the best
ice cream?
Critical thinking 36
Lesson 3: KNOW FACT VS. OPINION
Say you hear about a great new toy on television. You ask your parents to buy it for you
next birthday, and they do. You are so excited to open the box! Then you get a bad
surprise. The toy does not look the way it did on T.V. and it does not work, either. The
commercial on T.V. made it look great. But in real life, it is not so great.
In daily life, you take in lots of information. It comes from many different places.
Scientists call these places sources. There are good sources and bad sources, there are
sources you can trust and sources you should never trust. Understanding the difference is
very important. To think like a scientist, you need to know what information you can
trust.
Think back to the commercial for the toy on television. Who do you think made that
commercial? Why would the company want their toy to look better on the commercial
than it does in real life?
Chances are the toy company is biased. This means that the toy company wants you to
do what’s best for them, not necessarily best for you. The company wanted to sell you
their toy, so they made it look better on TV than in real life so your parents would buy it
for you. They did not give you an honest representation of the toy.
Here’s another example. Say for example you’re trying to decide whether or not to go to
McDonald’s. The commercial makes their food look really tasty and mentions how some
of their foods are actually healthy.
Your doctor on the other hand, tells you that food from McDonalds is not very healthy
for you and that what health information they said in the commercial is not true.
Which source do you think is more biased?
McDonald’s is trying to sell you their food, so they might make it look tastier and
healthier than it is in real life.
Your doctor wants to make sure that you are healthy and he has no reason to change the
information he is providing you with.
Chances are, McDonalds is more biased because they want you to buy their food. Your
doctor does not want you to buy anything so he will just tell you whatever information
necessary to keep you healthy.
In this case, your doctor is a good source and McDonald’s is a bad source.
Pair/Share or Small Group or Class Discussion: Pretend like you trying to decide whether
or not you should buy a skateboard, but your mom is not sure whether it is safe. You
want to gather information about the decision to help you and your mom decide whether
or not it is safe. Can you name one good source of information for this topic and one bad
source of information for this topic?
Critical thinking 37
Lesson 4: WEIGH EVIDENCE AND MAKE DECISIONS
Let’s say you are trying to solve a problem. You gather lots of different information from
different sources. This is similar to what you did last week when you tried to identify
which sources were good and bad in regards to your decision about whether or not to eat
at McDonalds. Once you decide what are good and bad sources, you need to figure out
how to put all that information together, and make a decision based on it. This is called
weighing the evidence.
Let’s try an example similar to last week: Let’s say your friend tells you to try eating a
piece of candy before soccer practice. But your doctor says fruit is a much better choice.
Your mother agrees with your doctor. You want to play really well. Which should you
try—fruit or candy?
We now have to look at what piece of evidence each source contributes and decide which
sources are most useful for making our decision
The evidence:
Your friend says that before the last soccer game he ate a piece of candy and he scored 2
goals.
Your doctor says candy is not a healthy choice for you, since it only gives a short spurt of
energy from sugar, whereas fruit gives you longer lasting energy. Candy most likely
wouldn’t help you during the soccer game.
Your mother says that a ton of professional soccer players like to eat oranges before
games because it gives them extra energy.
Which piece of evidence do you think is the most convincing? Why?
Your friend has an interesting statement. He ate a piece of candy and then scored two
goals. But did eating the candy cause him to score to two goals? It is unlikely. The two
separate things, eating the candy, and scoring the two goals probably had nothing to do
with each other. Also he is the only person you know who scored two goals after eating a
piece of candy. This might only happen with your friend, you don’t know how eating
candy might affect your other teammates.
Your doctor says that fruit will give your body more energy than candy. You need energy
to be able to play soccer. Your doctor also probably knows a lot about your body. In
order for him to become a doctor, he had to spend a long time in school studying the
body so that he would be able to tell people what is and isn’t healthy for their bodies.
Chances are your doctor is a good source of information.
Your mom has a strong argument. She says that eating fruit seems to be a popular
decision among professional soccer players. Professional soccer players have been
Critical thinking 38
playing soccer for a really, really long time, so chances are, they have a good idea about
what foods may or may not be good for them before the game. Also more than one soccer
player seems to think this is a good idea, evidence is more convincing when more than
one person believes that it is true.
Pair/Share, Small Group work, or Class Discussion:
What decision would you make? Would you eat candy or fruit based on this information?
Why?
Critical thinking 39
Lesson 5: MOVE FROM SCIENCE TO SOCIETY
When scientists make decisions and solve problems, their job is not yet done. Now they
need to tell other people about what they found. Sometimes, they tell whole countries of
people, or even the whole world. Their goal is to use new information to help people
solve problems and live better lives.
Let’s say for example that in your cafeteria you usually grab a lunch tray, put your food
on it and then go sit down.
A group of scientists do an experiment to see if not using lunch trays helps reduce the
amount of water used when washing dishes after all of the students eat lunch. In their
study they find that not using lunch trays helps conserve a lot of water which is good for
the environment.
Then some people in the government who make laws see the results of this experiment.
They decide that all elementary schools in New York State should remove lunch trays in
order to save more water to help the environment.
The next day during lunch you go to pick up a lunch tray and it is not there. Instead you
grab your food and carry it directly to the table.
That is one of many, many examples of how science can affect society.
Here is another one.
You are playing at the playground and you go down the slide. After you go down the
slide, Billy falls off the slide then breaks his arm.
Billy’s mom then complains to the town council that this slide is dangerous. The council
members look at a study which shows that there are a significant amount of injuries due
to slides in many parks throughout the United States.
Later that month, the slide is gone from the park.
Pair/Share, Small Group Activity or Group Discussion: Do you think Billy’s mom and
the town council made the right decision about taking away the slide? What about the
government’s decision to remove trays? Can you think of other similar examples to
these?
Critical thinking 40
Lesson 6: BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER
We have been talking about what science is and what scientists do. We have talked
about:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
what science is, and what it isn’t
how to define problems so you can solve them
how to know facts and tell the difference between facts and opinions
how to weigh evidence and make decisions
how science can be used to change society.
Now we are going to bring these ideas all together and see how they help us understand
how people behave.
The topic we are going to focus on is something everyone knows about—food and
eating!
{Pick lesson from remainder of booklet to begin now.}
Critical thinking 41
APPETITE AND VISUAL CUES: ELEMENTARY LESSON #1(Additonal
Lessons)
Source: Wansink, Brian 2004. “Environmental Factors that Increase the Food Intake and
Consumption Volume of Unknowing Consumers.” Annual Review of Nutrition. 24 p.455479.
Vignette: Evan has been sitting in front of the TV with a bowl of chips next to him. He
reaches in the bowl to grab for more chips and then realizes the bowl is empty. He had
not intended on eating that many chips and wonders if he would have eaten this much if
they were not so close to him.
1. What is Science?
Scientists and researchers have to test to see which of these answers are wrong.
Scientists use experiments to become closer to the right answer. When scientists don’t
know the right answer, they get rid of the ones they think are wrong.
2. Define the Problem-See Many Sides:
Professor Brian Wansink thinks that sometimes people can eat too much, when they are
not thinking about what exactly they are eating. This is kind of like what happened with
Evan. He wondered if the bowl of chips would have motivated him to eat just as much if
they were in a different place. Professor Wansink has performed many studies about
ways we might eat more without realizing it.
In order to find out whether or not this was true, Professor Wansink decided to use the
scientific method. The first thing he had to do was define the problem and figure out what
and how exactly he wanted to test to see if his idea was right. There are many ways that it
could be tested. The way in which a scientist decides to test if their idea is correct is
called a method.
Insert Activity here:
This is an example of one of the ways Professor Wansink tested whether or not it was
true that people sometimes eat more without realizing it.
Instructor holds up two jars of identical size. One jar has seven different colors of M&Ms
and the other has ten different colors of M&Ms( type of food and amount of colors can be
altered as long as the size of the jars are the same and the amount of colors in each jar is
different)
In science, when people try to make a guess about what will happen during an experiment
this is called a hypothesis. During this experiment, he defined the problem as trying to
figure out if people eat more if there were different amounts of colors of M&M’s.
Ask the students if they think they would eat more from Jar 1 or Jar 2, or if they think
they would eat the same amount from both. This is their hypothesis. The way that
Professor Wansink decided to use jars of M&M’s to test his idea is an example of a
method.
Critical thinking 42
Report that Professor Wansink found that people ate 43% more from the jar with ten
different colors than the jar which contained seven different colors over the course of an
hour. This means that if each of the jars had 100 M&M’s, and someone ate 20 M&M’s
from the jar with only seven colors, they would eat 63 M&Ms from the jar with ten
colors. Professor Wansink thinks that if we have more choices of food available, then we
will eat more.
3. Fact vs. Opinion
Knowing about Professor Wansink’s studies can help us decide whether certain things are
facts or opinions. Some people might think like to believe certain things affect their
eating, but it might not be true. When people have a certain preference for a specific
outcome, or thing it is known as bias.
Let’s Practice!(Class Discussion)
1. Steven noticed that everyone in his family drinks skim milk at dinner.
Answer: This is a fact, because Steven can see that his family drinks skim milk
2.Anna believes that her dinner tastes better if she plays some music while eating it.
Answer: This is just an opinion; it is what Anna thinks about her food.
3. Harriet thinks that snacks should always be served in green bowls
Answer: This is an opinion because this is what Harriet thinks without little scientific
reasoning.
4. Weigh Evidence and Make Decisions
“Can you guys think of any other reasons we would eat more than we should?”
Other reasons found by Professor Wansink
-Larger plates; more space on the plate means more room for food
-Comfortable eating areas; if you are comfortable you are more likely to eat more
-Closeness of food. One study shows that secretaries eat more Hershey kisses when on
their desk than six feet away.
-Being able to see the food
Now that we have some evidence that being able to see food in different ways might
make us more likely to want to eat it, we can decide if certain ways food is arranged
affects our eating habits.
Pair/Share, Small Group Activity or Class Discussion Now that you’ve seen some
evidence, are you convinced that people might, without knowing it, eat more food if it is
arranged in certain ways?
5. From Science to Society:
Critical thinking 43
Why would we want to know about Professor Wansink’s studies? How will this help us
solve the problem of obesity in the real world?
(solicit responses)
Look for answers like
-Help us control eating
-Help restaurants know how to help others eat healthier
-Help us decide what kind of plates and jars to buy
Knowing this information from Professor Wansink’s study helps people to make
decisions every day. These decisions that we make every day can later affect the
healthiness of our lifestyles. This is why scientists use their experiments to try to find
solutions to larger problems in the real world.
Vocabulary List:
Hypothesis
Method
Critical thinking 44
HEALTHY FOOD: ELEMENTARY LESSON #2
Source: Dole Kids (2008).
<http://www.dole5aday.com/html/kids/Nutrition%20Database/Encyclopedia/Encyclopedi
a_New/Carrots/nutrition.html>
Let’s go back to our story about Vanessa. How many of you think she should eat the
carrots? How many think she should eat the ice cream?
1. What is Science?
Even a problem like Vanessa standing in front of the fridge trying to decide what to eat
can be traced back to scientific methods. Scientists would think that a food item is good
for you unless they have proved that it is bad for you. Assuming a food item is good for
you until you’ve be shown information that it would be bad for you would be a good way
to find the right answer by looking for the wrong ones.
Example: Instead of proving that corn is good for you, you would try to find evidence
saying that corn is bad for you. If you can’t find anything to prove that corn is not good
for you, then it is assumed that it is.
How do we know which one would be the healthy choice? What information would we
need?
(solicit responses)
Look for answers like:
-Amount of calories
-What it does to our bodies
-Kind of vitamins, nutrients
-Makes us gain/lose weight
2. Define the Problem-See Many Sides
As you guys can see by the number of answers you gave, there are many ways to define
whether or not a food is good for us. Ice cream is good for us in the sense that it tastes
good and makes us happy, but how do we know if it is healthy? We also would have to
create a definition for what is healthy. Definition means what we would label or describe
healthy. Let’s go back to Vanessa and see how many people could be involved in making
the decision:
Vanessa: She thinks that she should eat the ice cream, because it tastes good and she
knows it will make her happy.
Her Mom: Thinks that Vanessa should eat the carrots because the ice cream is full of
sugar which will make Vanessa hyper and not want to go to bed on time
Her Doctor: Vanessa’s doctor thinks that she should eat the carrots because they will help
her to stay in shape
3. Fact vs. Opinion
Critical thinking 45
When it comes to food, there can be many decisions made on opinions rather than facts.
An opinion means that it is something a person likes to believe, whether or not their
opinion is true. A fact is something that is true no matter what anyone thinks.
Let’s practice! Ask students which they think is a fact or an opinion (Class Discussion)
1.Simon thinks that blue M&M’s are better than brown M&M’s
Answer: This is an opinion because Simon believes blue M&Ms are better, but he does
not know this for certain.
2.May says that bananas are a good source of potassium.
Answer: This is a fact because May is not just sharing her personal opinion. She is
providing information about bananas
3.Andrea says potatoes taste good.
Answer: Opinion, Andrea thinks potatoes taste good, but everyone might not agree.
4. Weigh Evidence and Make Decisions
According to Dole Kids, a serving of carrots contains about 25 calories. Carrots also help
keep our eyes, hair, skin and bodies healthy.
Though it’s tasty, ice cream has 125 calories and does not do as good of a job at keeping
our bodies healthy as carrots do. Now what choice do you think she should make?
Maybe insert activity here where they make fun healthy snack like ants on a log or
something
Do you guys know of any other ways to help keep ourselves healthy? One of them is by
exercising.
Do you guys like to play outside? How much time do you spend playing outside? What
do you guys like to do outside?
How do you think we can keep track of whether or not we’ve been exercising and eating
healthy? How do we know that these things will keep us healthy?
(solicit responses)
To know whether these things keep us healthy or not we would have to test these things
over a long period of time in order to determine long-term effects?
One way of testing it, is that we could study the long term effects. We could tell one
group of people to a bowl of ice cream everyday and tell another group of people to eat
carrots for a snack everyday for 3 months and measure how it affects their weight.
(I know there would be other external factors that could interfere, but should I overlook
that considering this is designed for an elementary school group?)
5. Move From Science to Society
So what kinds of people would like to know whether carrots or ice cream is healthier?
Critical thinking 46
Examples:
Vanessa and other kids like her, it is important for children to make good food choices so
that they can grow up to be healthy adults.
Doctors, so that they can tell their patients what they should eat so that they can be
healthy
Parents, so they can tell their children what they should eat, and also make good food
choices themselves
School Officials, so they can know what they should serve in the cafeteria and vending
machines
Restaurant Owners and Food Companies so they know they are selling healthy food.
6. Review, Revisit and Reflect
Even though eating healthy food is an important way to help us keep in shape, we also
need to pay attention to other things which keep us healthy such exercise and know how
to stay healthy in the types of bodies we were born with.
Vocabulary List:
Definition
Critical thinking 47
ADVERTISING AND OBESITY:ELEMENTARY LESSON #3
Source: Brownell, K.& Horgen, K.(2004). Food Fight. McGraw Hill:
New York. p.97-127.
Vignette: Michael is watching TV. During the commercial break he sees an
advertisement for McDonalds showing that they are giving away toys from Michael’s
favorite show. Immediately, Michael yells for him mom to take him to McDonalds.
Introduction: Many companies like McDonalds team up with companies like Disney
and Nickelodeon to use characters from their movies and television shows. They know
that kids like these things and they think that if they put these characters in their ads, that
kids like you will want to eat there too.
What is your favorite TV character? Would you want to eat at McDonalds if you saw one
of their commercials with that character? Would you want to eat at McDonalds if they
were handing out calculators in their Happy Meals?
The important thing to note is that companies like McDonalds are biased. McDonalds is
a restaurant that wants to make money by selling people its food, so the information they
provide in their advertisements might try to motivate people to buy their food, whether or
not buying their food might be the best thing for those people.
According to Kelly Brownell’s book, Food Fight, the average American child sees
10,000 food advertisements each year just on television. These advertisements with
popular movie and TV characters could give children the impression that the food is good
for them.
1. What is Science?
How could we find out that these advertisements are causing children to eat more
unhealthy food?
Scientists try to explore real world problems; anything from animals, to chemicals, to
people and even advertising. However, usually, in the real world, problems like television
advertisements affecting unhealthy diets are not easy to fix. Scientists try to find out what
fixes the problem, by finding out what doesn’t fix the problem. Imagine you are doing a
puzzle and there is a hole in the puzzle and you’re not sure what piece goes there. You
can find out what piece goes there, by trying to put all of the choices in and finding out
which pieces do not fit. This is kind of like what scientists do when they try to get the
right answer by deciding which are the wrong ones.
2. Define the Problem: See Many Sides
Who would care about the effects advertising has on unhealthy diets?(This could be used
as a Pair/Share and have students talk about their thoughts before going through the
examples below).
Critical thinking 48
Advertising Companies: People who work at these companies make the commercials.
They would want to know how their advertisements are affecting others, so they can
know how good they are at selling things.
Fast Food Companies: Companies would want their commercials to work because they
would want people to buy their food. They would also want to know how it affects
people diets’ because the company is responsible for
Parents: Parents would want to know how commercials affect their children so they can
tell their children not to watch the commercials or not to go to the fast food restaurants
Researchers: Would try to study the effects of the commercials so they can report to the
fast food and advertising companies and parents how they are effecting others.
Law-makers: People in the government can make rules about what kind of commercials
are shown. If some commercials have unhealthy effects on diets, they would want to
know so they can control what kind of commercials are on TV.
It is also important to note that different researchers might have different meanings for
what is an unhealthy diet.
Examples:
-Some people might not get enough vitamins or nutrients in their diet
-Some people who eat unhealthy fast food at McDonalds 2-3 times a week
-People who consume more food than is recommended by doctors, but is also not
necessarily fast food.
In their experiments, researchers need to say in their reports what they think is an
unhealthy diet.
3. Distinguish Fact from Opinion
Since there are so many different people with different thoughts about this subject, it is
important to know which thoughts are facts and which thoughts are opinions. A Fact is
something that is known to definitely be true. An Opinion is something someone
believes is true, which could or could not be true.
Activity-Class Discussion
1. In a commercial, Batman says that McDonalds French fries are the best.
Possible answer: This is an opinion because Batman has no proof that McDonalds French
fries are the best, he is just saying what he thinks.
2. A report comes out which found in an experiment that people who ate Burger King
fries everyday for a month gained weight
Possible Answer: This is more along the lines of a fact because the people who ate the
fries serve as proof that eating Burger King fries can make you gain weight.
Critical thinking 49
3.Michelle wants to go to eat dinner at Wendy’s because their burgers taste better than
those at McDonalds.
Possible Answer: This one is kind of tricky, but probably more of an opinion since
Michelle does not really have substantial evidence that Wendy’s burgers taste better in
general.
4. Weigh Evidence and Make Decisions
There are a few ways to connect whether advertisements have an effect on what you eat.
It can be kind of tricky to see if it is only the commercials that might make you want to
go eat at that restaurant. It is possible that someone would go to McDonalds anyway
without seeing an advertisement simply because there is one down the street. It is also
possible the people would not go to eat at McDonalds whether or not they saw an
advertisement because they do not like hamburgers and French fries. Those examples
have other things influencing the person’s decision, like the closeness of the McDonalds
and their food preferences.
Some scientists have found that advertising does work on children especially when
favorite TV characters are promoting the products.
Pair/Share, Small Group Activity or Class Discussion
“What do you think about the evidence?”
5. Move from Science to Society
Think back to the puzzle we talked about before. It takes many pieces to create a whole
picture. Advertising and unhealthy diets is only a small piece of a larger picture of there
being a lot of overweight adults in America. There are many things which could be
affecting this, but scientists have yet to pinpoint exact causes.
Vocabulary List:
Bias
Fact
Opinion
Critical thinking 50
HOW OUR ENVIRONMENT STOPS US FROM EXERCISING: ELEMENTARY
LESSON #4
Source: Source: Brownell, K.& Horgen, K.(2004). Food Fight. McGraw Hill:
New York. p.69-96.
Vignette: Brian’s mom is trying to urge him to play outside more. He used to enjoy
running around outside with his friends, but ever since he got his new computer game he
has little motivation to go and play outside.
How many of you like to play computer games? Do you spend a lot of time after school
playing them? What about watching television?
Professor Kelly Brownell states in his book that more exercise leads to a longer, healthier
life, but that inventions like the computer and the television reduce the need for exercise.
When your parents were your age, there were not as many televisions or computers
around.
1. What is Science
Do you think that things like television and computer games are causing people to
exercise less or do you think that these people would exercise less anyway?
Think about those two statements. Is it likely that Ice Cream sales are because of higher
temperatures? It could also be that more people are outside in the summer because it is
hot which could motivate them to buy ice cream.
Let’s go back to the question about television and computer games and its link to
exercise.
: A higher level of television watching is related to a lower amount of exercise
Higher level of television watching causes people to exercise less
Which of those statements do you guys feel is right? Are there any other things which
might cause someone to exercise less?
Examples of Answers:
-People are too lazy to exercise
-People are too busy with other things
-They don’t have anywhere to exercise
-The weather outside is bad so they stay in and watch TV
These are examples of things other than television watching which might cause people to
exercise less.
Another reason people might exercise less is that their neighborhoods might not be
designed very well for exercise.
Critical thinking 51
2. Define the Problem-See Many Sides
How could we test any of these? When creating an experiment, scientists need to know
several things. First they need to decide on their hypothesis. A hypothesis is a guess
scientists make as to what might happen during the experiment. A second thing that
scientists would need is a clear definition of exercise. In some experiments, exercise
could mean a 20 minute walk and in others it could mean an hour-long aerobic work-out,
so scientists must be clear as to what they’re talking about. Scientists also need to decide
who they want to be their subjects. Different experiments look at how different groups of
people are affected. Teenagers might be more or less affected by television and computer
games than adults. The next step would be to develop a clear method. The method is a
procedure used to test the hypothesis. These are the building blocks of a scientific
experiment.
Activity: Have the students break up into groups of 4-5 and develop their own experiment
to test the connection between television watching and the lack of exercise.
3. Fact vs. Opinion
Another reason people might exercise less is that their neighborhoods might not be
designed very well for exercise.
How many of you or your parents drive almost everywhere? Are there many places you
can walk to in your neighborhood? What are some of those places?
In recent years, a phenomenon known as suburban sprawl has made it more difficult to
get to places by foot. Many stores, schools and businesses are more spread out than
before. However, only certain places are like this. It is likely that people who live in
different areas might have different ideas of how much this contributes to people getting
exercise. Someone who lives on a farm in a rural area might have an easier time getting
exercise without sidewalks. Some who live in a city might say that although there are
plenty of sidewalks, there is still not much exercise because the streets might not be safe.
Both of these individuals have biased perceptions. In order to get a more accurate
objective answer, we would have to examine all different types of people.
How many of your parents drive almost everywhere? Are there many places you can
walk to in your neighborhood? What are some of those places?
4. Weigh the Evidence, Make Decisions
One study conducted by Berrigan and Troiano showed that neighborhoods with older
houses tended to have more sidewalks. In addition, people who lived in these
neighborhoods walked about 20 times than people who lived in newer neighborhoods
with fewer sidewalks.
Does this mean we should put more sidewalks in neighborhoods with fewer sidewalks so
people will exercise more? How does the information from this study help us?
Critical thinking 52
Pair/Share, Small Group Activity or Class Discussion: Have the students split up into
groups and name a type of experiment they could use to evaluate how much people
exercise. It doesn’t have to be anything too specific, it could be something like, how
many times they go to the park or gym, or how often they drive their car.
5. Move From Science to Society
Studies by scientists such as Berrigan and Troiano help us decide whether or not adding
more sidewalks. This type of information is useful to different types of people in society.
What kinds of people might be interested in how sidewalks affect exercise?
Examples:
City Planners: These people generally are the ones who decide where the sidewalks are
placed and how neighborhoods are designed.
Researchers: Are interested in ways in which we can change our surroundings to help us
be able to exercise more.
Personal Trainers: These are people who help others make exercise plans. Knowing
places to exercise outside can help personal trainers design work-out plans for their
customers.
6. Revisit, Review and Reflect:
While it is possible that the amount of TV people watch and the amount of sidewalks
available in neighborhoods can contribute to the amount of exercise, scientists and
researchers still have a long way to go in trying to figure out ways of making people
healthier and more motivated to exercise. Scientists have to put together different pieces
of the puzzle like the amount of TV people watch, the amount of time spent on computers
and the lack of sidewalks to try to put together the puzzle of why people exercise so little.
Vocabulary Words:
Hypothesis
Definition
Bias
Method
Critical thinking 53
Appendix C
Sample Ratings
 Question 1: 1. Maria notices that sometimes when she eats fruit, she gets a rash.
Her mother tells her she is probably allergic to fruit. Since Maria likes its taste,
she decides to try one type of fruit each day to see if they all give her a rash.
Maria is showing:
 Good Thinking
Not-So-Good-Thinking
Don’t Know
 Why?
Rating
1
Example
“I don’t know”
2
“If she’s allergic, she’ll
sneeze for everything”
3
“Good thinking-she’s
testing to see if there’s any
she’s not allergic to”
“Good thinking because if
she tries one each day then
she’ll know which she is
and isn’t allergic to”
“Good thinking because she
might have been playing
outside or something and
got poison ivy, but then ate
fruit
4
5
Explanation
Devoid of scientific logic or
reasoning
Shows problem solving
skills but not application of
scientific method
Shows the beginnings of
application of scientific
method
Shows application of
scientific method and is
more articulate in his or her
answer than for a rating of 3
Shows a complete
understanding of the
concept and is more
elaborate than a response
with a rating of 4.
Critical thinking 54
Author’s Note:
First, of all I would like to give acknowledgement to Ms. Laurie Rubin of Cayuga
Heights Elementary School. Her support and invaluable insight were crucial to the
development of the curriculum as well as the completion of the study.
Secondly, I would like to thank Professor Wendy Williams for her assistance and
guidance as an advisor. Her availability and challenging feedback has been an integral
part of this process and an essential component of the learning experience.
Additionally, I would like to extend an appreciation for Professor Marianella
Casasola for her supervision throughout the honors thesis seminar and Professor Stephen
Ceci for his feedback and support with this project.
Finally, I would like to thank Cagla Aydin for her assistance and support with this
project.