Developing Critical Thinking Skills in Early Years through Early Childhood Care and Education

Abstract

Today’s children need to learn how to filter useful informationfrom a plethora of information. For this purpose they need to learn criticalthinking skill. Our educational practices do not allow children to think andexpress their ideas, as the teachers in our schools consider themselvesauthority on the knowledge. Moreover, the main purpose of teaching is tocomplete the syllabi and enable students to pass examination. The NationalCurriculum of Early Childhood Care and Education 2017 providesguidelines for developing critical thinking skills in young children. Thisstudy was an attempt to find out whether the classroom environment andinstructional strategies used at ECCE level are appropriate for developingcritical thinking skills in young children. The sample included 15 ECEclassrooms in Muzaffarabad city. These classrooms were observed andinformal interviews were taken from the teachers of these classes. It wasconcluded that the teachers at ECE level were not fully aware of animportant objective of the national curriculum suggested for this level. Theactivities and strategies required for developing critical thinking skill arerarely adopted by the teachers. Their basic focus remains on reading,writing and numeracy. Teachers mostly use the traditional methods ofteaching that make the kids passive learners.