Book Review: Creating Cultures of Thinking: The Eight Forces We Must Master to Truly Transform Our Schools

Creating Cultures of Thinking; The Eight Forces We Must Master to Truly Transform Our Schools. By Ron Ritchhart. 2015. Jossey-Bass: ISBN: 978–1118974605, 384 pages.

We often refer to students’ “critical thinking” skills as something that is important for their success in both their degree program and their future careers. Many of us are actively engaged in strengthening those skills. And many of us wonder if we could do more to enhance our students’ critical thinking skills. This is especially important as we live through a pandemic and our interactions with students have undergone a major shift from primarily in-person to primarily online and via e-mail or text. How do we encourage our students to think more deeply about the material they are learning, rather than memorize a pile of facts and promptly forget them after an exam?

Creating Cultures of Thinking addresses the issue of students’ habit of memorizing and dumping surface information. The author, Ron Ritchhart, notes that this habit is an unfortunate side effect of the focus on standardized testing on K-12 education, where so much rides on a handful of (often multiple choice) exams. This focus, Ritchhart states, actually encourages memorization, rather than thinking. So how do we start moving away from, perhaps unconsciously, promoting memorization to pass exams and towards activities that encourage students to really get into material, ask thoughtful questions, and make connections between what they have learned and what they experience in the real world?

This shift requires a cultural change, Ritchhart writes, with eight major forces shaping the new culture. In order of discussion in the book, they are expectations, language, time, modeling, opportunities, routines, interactions, and environment. Expectations are what the teacher and student expect the other to do, as well as what a given effort will produce. The vocabulary used to discuss course content and actions related to the content comprise language, while time is not necessarily the course duration or class length, but the time spent on thinking. Similarly, modeling is not just the instructor telling students “do what I do,” but showing students how to approach thinking about information, questions, and problems. The instructor should also create opportunities for thinking that encourage all students to participate, regardless of ability. Routines, such as think-pair-share, help provide guiding structure to thinking exercises, allowing students to more quickly reach deep thinking without getting distracted by tangential topics. The interaction between the instructor and students is critical to thinking: who is doing more of the thinking work or more of the discussion – the instructor or the students? Promoting student thinking means that they should be doing more of the mental heavy lifting than the instructor. Finally, the learning environment should be conducive to thinking. It should be comfortable and inviting so students aren't distracted by an environment that is too hot, cold, loud, bright, dark, or otherwise uncomfortable. It should also put the focus on students as learners. For example, desks arranged in rows that face the teacher's desk focuses on the teacher, while desks arranged in small groups focus on the student group.

The book has a well-organized structure with plenty of examples to show how the forces are applied and discussion about why each is key to shaping a culture of thinking. Ritchhart opens the book with a chapter on the original purpose of K-12 schools (educating students to work in factory-type environments) and how the current culture of education in those schools developed. In the next eight chapters, Ritchhart discusses each of the forces of the culture of thinking. Each of these chapters opens with a definition of the force of focus, followed by a case study of its successful use and a discussion of how to use the force effectively when teaching. The chapters end with questions for the reader about their own practices in the area of the force, prompting them to think about their actions and what changes they might make to better utilize the force to promote cultures of thinking.

Although the focus of this book is promoting cultures of thinking in K-12 education, Ritchhart states that these forces are universal and therefore can be used to promote cultures of thinking in secondary education, workplaces, and in the general public. The key point is the culture piece of “culture of thinking”. This isn't another exercise that is handed out and completed, or another new teaching trick to tack on to an existing method. Rather, it requires a different way of thinking and acting. To actually promote thinking in the classroom, we need to be sure to give students time to do it! We also need to reward thinking, even if the effort doesn't get the student to the desired end result immediately. Our assessments and course grading structure need to reward thinking and exploration. Often, this requires a major shift in course structure. Ritchhart notes that this cultural shift can be difficult, since it is hard to give up control of the class, and to some extent, the traditional structure of coverage of material. However, the results of students thinking deeply about the material in the course, making connections to other information, and learning to ask thoughtful questions and explore topics in fine detail are highly rewarding and worth the effort.

With the general upheaval in all of education right now plus the additional stress of uncertainly of what is going to happen over the next several months to years, it can be difficult to find the mental bandwidth to make even small changes to courses, let alone major changes. But I encourage everyone to at least browse through this book and see if there is something that sparks your interest and is easy to do. The changes may be as simple as modifying instructions to an assignment or spending the last ten minutes of class discussing the topic of the day. Or even waiting more than half a second for students to answer a question. Don't worry, they will answer, if only to break the silence! These small changes over time can yield amazing results, producing students who are thoughtful, curious, and excited to keep learning. This is the kind of student we love to teach and will need even more going forward.