The Canadian Reference Centre includes English and French full-text biographies, reference materials and an image collection.  This database is a great choice for students who want to keep up with current events.

Canadian Research Index includes federal, provincial, and municipal documents such as depository publications of research value issued by the federal government, the ten provinces, and two of the three territories.Please note this is not a fulltext database.

Socratic seminars are a democratic, student-centered, approach to class discussions. They can be used at any grade level with any subject area. In a Socratic Seminar, members meet in a circle and share their insights. Participants do not raise their hands or call on names. Because there’s no discussion leader, each member can comment or ask follow-up questions to one another. This approach can be empowering for participants because they own the conversation. Unlike a typical class discussion, the conversation moves fluidly back and forth rather than having to go through the teacher.

This article outlines several approaches to conducting a Socratic Seminar:
- The Giant Circle Approach
- The “Fish Bowl” Approach
- The Round Table Approach
- The Scattered Approach
- Multiple Seminars
- Online/Offline Seminars

The author also provides a sample of how to run a Socratic Seminar and tips for ensuring that all students can participate.

Instructional expert Jim Knight visits Chris Korinek to observe his social science classroom. Chris and Jim discuss scaffolding techniques, and when to use closed versus open questions.

This assignment is based on an integration of current events with an examination of indigenous cultures in North America. There are two final products involved – a presentation and a fullclass discussion.

Crash Course Kids combines the same engaging lecture-style content delivery with animated graphics that focus on grade school science.

Topics include Earth Science, Physical Science, Biology, Geography, Engineering, and Astronomy.

These videos are amazing!

Critical Thinking Cheat Sheet from Wabisabi Learning.
This great resource looks at the who, what, where, when, why and how of critical thinking.

Sun West Critical Thinking 10-12 High School Guidebook - please use the table of contents to navigate the guidebook. Also, we invite you to share resources you think would be suitable for this guidebook with any of the authors of this guidebook.

Sun West Critical Thinking Middle Years 6-9 Guidebook - please use the table of contents to navigate the guidebook. Also, we invite you to share resources you think would be suitable for this guidebook with any of the authors of this guidebook.

Sun West Critical Thinking Elementary K-5 Guidebook - please use the table of contents to navigate the guidebook. Also, we invite you to share resources you think would be suitable for this guidebook with any of the authors of this guidebook.

Set of posters and conversation starts for students to focus on Critical Thinking and Justifying their answers. Students provide the opportunity to evaluate.

This resource provides video about critical thinking (about 7 min). Students can then apply what they learn, visualize it and explore more links about it.
This is a great resourced for high school students to prepare for university!

About This Workbook
The activity pages in the Critical Thinking
Workbook are meant to be shared and explored.
Use it as an electronic document or as worksheets.
You can either print off the pages and use them as
activity sheets, or you can edit them directly right in
the document on your computer.
Enjoy these fun and challenging critical
thinking activities that will get every
student thinking critically!

My goal was to bring 21st Century Competences with the focus of critical thinking into my Gr. 2 Math classroom. I show a droodle – an abstract drawing. I ask students to take a few moments and think about what it could be. Then they can discuss with a partner, and finally share what they thought. Afterwards we have a discussion around “right” and “wrong” answers – which is a common way to think around math. No one is wrong – these are all good ideas that could answer the question: What could this be?

My goal was to have grade 5-8 students incorporate critical thinking in their reader response journals, where they respond to text read independently during Guided Reading stations. I feel reader response journals encourage students to apply strategies taught in class when reading independently to improve their understanding of a variety of text. Our SLIP goal for the past two years focused on reading strategies, so I was also trying to build on the work we were doing for the West Colony PLT.

In this specific project, the goal is to engage students in discussion and analysis of current events in a way that involved all students, regardless of confidence in speaking in front of peers. 

This resource examines what deeper learning can actually look like in a classroom. Helpful diagrams of what you will see in a classroom along the way are included.

INTRODUCTION
INSIDE THE CLASSROOM
• Applying Content Knowledge
• Working Collaboratively
• Communicating Clearly
• Thinking Critically 1
• Developing an Academic Mindset
• Learning Independently
GLOSSARY
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

ŇThatŐs my position and IŐm sticking to it!Ó After reading about the Korean War, students will take a position in response to an open-ended question, support their position, and evaluate that support.

PowerPoint and Google Slides are available as templates to create your dialogue.
This is a great way to discuss difficult and troubling topics in a safe and supportive manner - instead of avoiding them.
Run the template via Pear Deck to make it interactive.

Explicitly teach connotative and denotative language. (See notes & scanned advertisements, which are completed as a class – teacher directed - and handout, which is done in a small group and then corrected as a class). Students will then partner up, select an innocent everyday item, get it approved, and design a “safe” or “family friendly” advertisement for placement in an innocuous magazine such as Family Circle, Canadian Home Workshop, or Knitting World. Students then start thinking outside the box for what loaded language they can incorporate into their advertisement to appeal to readers’ humour and sell to a very different audience. These advertisements will be somewhat racier and more riské as they are designed to be placed in magazines such as Men’s Health, Cosmopolitan, and the like. I then encourage students to complete the ads using an appropriate computer program, but this isn’t a set requirement. Some students are very artistic and prefer to free hand their work.