Analysis of Academics’ Views on Teaching Thinking Skills

The primary objective of education is to equip individuals with skills necessary to assume certain roles in changing living conditions. Thus, an educational program must be designed to include activities that help to raise individuals who are enquiring, inquisitive, creative, capable of using technology, working in groups, learning how to learn, solving problems, and taking right decisions. Given the pivotal role of teachers in education and training, raising such individuals depends on raising qualified teachers. Accordingly, qualified teachers could only be raised by academics that have all the aforesaid capabilities and are informed of teaching thinking and thinking skills. Under this perspective, the purpose of this study is to reveal the view of academics in faculties of education on teaching thinking skills. To this end, this basic interpretive qualitative study an open-ended form composed of seven questions to examine the views of academics working in the faculty of education at a university in Istanbul, Turkey, on teaching their thinking skills. The respondents were selected through maximum variation sampling that is one form of purposeful sampling. The study surveyed 19 academics ranging from instructor doctor, assistant professor and associate professor to professor. The data collected through the open-ended form was analyzed using descriptive analysis and classified into three categories including the academics’ views on teaching thinking skills, lecturers’ qualification and competence in teaching thinking skills, and the development of thinking skills. The research results indicate that courses taught in faculties of education must involve thinking skills, academics lack knowledge about thinking skills, preservice teachers must be well informed of thinking skills to keep up with the times, and preservice teachers show a poor performance in activities requiring thinking skills