Critical thinking and paradigm shift in education in Nigeria
As George Carlin rightly noted, “Don’t just teach your children to read...Teach them to question what they read. Teach them to question everything”. This is the purpose that the subject of critical thinking fulfills and would fulfill in schools.
That is how the teaching of critical thinking can help reform our educational system and realise a paradigm shift in learning. The Nigerian school system puts so much emphasis on note learning and memorisation. The teachers dish out information that students memorise and then reproduce during tests and examinations.
Teachers pose questions while students provide answers, as a way of testing and demonstrating knowledge and intelligence. Questions are asked for answer’s sake. The pattern of questioning is usually from teachers to students. This school culture has made teaching and learning in our schools teacher-centred; not student or child-centred. The teacher is seen as an embodiment of wisdom, not a stimulator of knowledge and understanding.
The learning power relations make students passive participants in the learning process. The learning culture in schools has made students less disposed to critical thinking and reasoned inquiry. But with the teaching of critical thinking, this culture of learning will change, because critical thinking fosters active participation of learners.
Critical thinking emphasises the ability of learners to challenge assumptions and interrogate ideas and experiences. The prevailing learning culture sees the student as a storehouse, a memory box, a producer and reproducer of knowledge and information, but critical thinking sees the learner as an interrogator, a questioner, an inquirer, an investigator, an explorer, an exerciser of curiosity and inquisitiveness.
The teaching of critical thinking will enrich and transform the school system in Nigeria. However, the potentials and promises of critical thinking will remain elusive until there is a paradigm shift in education and learning.