Critical Theory: Application In The Classroom Teaching

Now that we know what critical theory means we can look at what Professor Jansen had stated that we cannot agree with a person about everything and that it conveys the truth that we cannot think for ourselves (Jansen, 2013. pp2-3). So I believe that people should not just agree with a person they should agree with that person’s argument. By agreeing with that person argument it means that they have thought critically about the argument. This is what we want. We want people to think for themselves and to start questioning what other people tell them and not to just agree with them. This begs the question: if we as a society do not think for ourselves how are we going to reason with one another?

And that is where critical thinking comes in, we as the teachers need to teach the children of today on how critical thinking works and how to think critically. “Before the students can learn, to become critical thinkers the teachers themselves need teacher education opportunities to learn how to promote critical thinking in their students” (Franco, Vieira, & Saiz, 2017 pp4). The teachers should thus concentrate on the student’s ability to reflect, to create ideas and to make decision so that they can communicate in their own words what they think about the problem or situation. Critical theory is thus about developing problem solving skills and to think and act critically, and that it is what the students will need in their everyday life. As critical theory does not only seek to critique, it also seeks to generate emancipatory forms of knowledge to provide alternative and progressive ways of looking at the world. So for the teacher to develop the students’ critical thinking, the teacher should follow these eight steps namely “triggering activity, identifying the problem, investigate the related data, to discuss the findings, evaluate these findings, create solutions, present these solutions and lastly reflect on the solutions” (Franco, Margues Vieirs & Tenreiro-Vieira. 2018. pp 4-6) (Vong & Kaewurai, 2017. Pp 90). So the teachers can teach the students about real life experiences, problems so that they could do thing for themselves rather than to depend on someone else, so that the students can think and reason for themselves.   Critical theory also has advantages and disadvantages. The advantages would be for the students to re-examine their priorities, to re-assess their lives and also to define their own personal power and weakness (Higgs & Smith, 2015. pp 74-78). The disadvantages would be that critical theory can sometimes be too idealist, it may also lead to violence and despair and lastly critical theory can also tend to sometimes be too simplistic in its analysis of power (Higgs & Smith, 2015. pp 75-78).

Conclusion:

In this take-home exam essay I argued in favour of what Professor Jansen had stated. And on the basis of what I have summarised above, I think that for the classroom teaching the following can be implemented. That every time a teacher give class they can write the answer on the board which means that the next class cannot use that answers, which then means that the students must think outside of the box. And that is what we need to learn the student, is to think outside of the box and not just to think basic.

Thus critical theory teaches us to think more critically about everything and to question what people tell is so that we can agree or disagree with that person’s agreement. Is also teaches us to then give our own opinion about what people tell us.