5 Key Takeaways on Building a Culture of Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is having a moment in education, but in many classrooms, it is still more slogan than reality. Drawing on their district- and classroom-level work with Thinking Maps, we were joined by four practitioners who shared what it really looks like to build a culture where students—not teachers—do the heavy cognitive lifting. Here are some key takeaways from their rich discussion:

1. From Passive Compliance to Active Thinking

There is a great need to shift from students passively waiting for directions to students actively driving their own learning. Within post-COVID classrooms, learners struggle to start tasks, organize ideas, and write independently. Explicit tools for organizing thinking are needed to help them rebuild those skills and confidence. Visible thinking structures and shared cognitive vocabulary turn vague prompts like “compare and contrast” into concrete, student-owned actions, moving classrooms away from task completion and toward reasoning and sense-making.

Thinking Maps Connection: “They’d wait for that next prompt, that next question, direction, task they could just check off and move on… My primary motivation was to get them to own their own learning, and instead of being so passive in that.”- Dr. Korry Brenner

2. Making Thinking Visible, Deeper, and Transferable

How do we move beyond “surface learning” into deeper understanding? Every standard has two parts: content and the thinking required to work with that content. When students externalize their thinking through visual tools, reflection, and justification, no two products look exactly alike—and that difference is the point. Learners are expected to explain their thinking orally and in writing, use evidence to support inferences, and connect new ideas to prior knowledge and other subject areas, making critical thinking a habit they can transfer across contexts.

Thinking Maps Connection: “Our students started to understand and make that connection of, I hear ‘compare and contrast,’ I can make a double bubble map and organize my thoughts and ideas. This helped build that independence that they were … lacking, and also build that self-esteem that I think they lost a lot during COVID.”— Kim Cooper

3. Rebalancing Talk: Students as the Primary Thinkers

The sounds of the classroom become an important indicator of culture. Rather than teachers doing most of the talking, learning environments must be rebalanced, where students generate questions, challenge ideas, and sustain academic conversations without constant teacher prompting. Rich, open-ended tasks invite multiple interpretations and arguments, so learners must interrogate texts, concepts, and each other’s reasoning instead of giving one-word answers. The goal is that students, not adults, end the day mentally tired because they have done the real intellectual work.

Thinking Maps Connection:“What we should hear is a lot of student discussion… If there’s a lot of conversation, then that means … the task is challenging and engaging. … If I’m asking a question that requires deeper level thinking, then there’s going to be a lot of conversation.”— Dr. Javier Hernandez

4. Leadership, Modeling, and Structures for Sustainability

How can leaders support and sustain this culture beyond a single training session? Critical thinking practices should be  modeled in staff meetings and professional learning, so educators experience the same level of cognitive demand they are asked to design for students. Multi-year plans, on-site trainers, and differentiated professional learning can help keep the work alive and responsive rather than compliance-driven. Revisiting standards, examining data together, and asking hard “why, how, now what?” questions at the adult level create coherence and momentum for classroom change.

Thinking Maps Connection: “We have people at the district level that are trained as trainers for Thinking Maps, … so when we rolled that out, we are able to have trainers right in the building that can help with providing feedback and collecting samples.”— Suzanne Farmer

5. Bridging Everyday Thinking and Academic Language

Students already engage in complex thinking in their daily lives, and schools should build from that reality. Tools that make thinking visible serve as a bridge between everyday reasoning and the academic language and expectations of school. This is particularly powerful for multilingual learners and students developing academic English, who can use visual structures to show understanding first, then layer on the precise language needed to explain, argue, and justify. Critical thinking is then framed not as an elite skill, but as an accessible, equitable pathway for all students to own rigorous learning.

Thinking Maps Connection: “Tools that make thinking visible serve as a bridge between everyday reasoning and the academic language and expectations of school.”— Dr. Javier Hernandez

Closing Thoughts

Building a culture of true critical thinking takes more than adding new tools or tasks, it requires redefining who owns the thinking in the classroom. When students use visual frameworks to organize their ideas, engage in authentic academic conversations, and see their reasoning made visible, they begin to internalize the very habits that define lifelong learners. For educators and leaders, the work lies in modeling these same processes, sustaining collaborative inquiry, and resisting the urge to return to passive learning or one-size-fits-all instruction. As these practitioners remind us, critical thinking isn’t a slogan or an add-on; it’s the heartbeat of meaningful education—where every learner, at every level, takes responsibility for making sense of the world.

Watch the whole discussion!

Moderated by: 

• Sarah McNeil, VP of Professional Learning
• Michelle McNicholas, Strategic Partnership Executive

Panelists: 

• Dr. Korry Brenner, Director of Federal Programs and State Initiatives, Chandler Unified School District, AZ
• Kim Cooper, Elementary Academic Resource Specialist for Special Education, Fayette County, KY
• Suzanne Farmer, Chief Academic Officer, Danville Independent Schools, KY
• Dr. Javier Hernandez, English Language Arts Teacher and Special Assignment, Montebello Unified, CA