Higher-order thinking is a concept of Education reform

Education reform

Education reform is the process of improving public education. Small improvements in education theoretically have large social returns, in health, wealth and well-being. Historically, reforms have taken different forms because the motivations of reformers have differed.A continuing motivation has...

 based on learning taxonomies such as Bloom's Taxonomy. The idea is that some types of learning require more cognitive processing than others, but also have more generalized benefits. In Bloom's taxonomy, for example, skills involving analysis, evaluation and synthesis (creation of new knowledge) are thought to be of a higher order, requiring different learning and teaching methods, than the learning of facts and concepts. Higher order thinking involves the learning of complex judgmental skills such as critical thinking and problem solving. Higher order thinking is more difficult to learn or teach but also more valuable because such skills are more likely to be usable in novel situations (i.e., situations other than those in which the skill was learned).

Standards based testing

Standards based tests rely on HOTS for many test items released by U.S. states such as Washington. For example, one fourth grade WASL

Washington Assessment of Student Learning

The Washington Assessment of Student Learning was a standardized educational assessment system given as the primary assessment in the state of Washington from spring 1997 to summer 2009. The WASL was also used as a high school graduation examination beginning in the spring of 2006 and ending in 2009...

 problem published in 1997 asked how to measure the height of a flagpole given a sun

Sun

The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...

, shadow

Shadow

A shadow is an area where direct light from a light source cannot reach due to obstruction by an object. It occupies all of the space behind an opaque object with light in front of it. The cross section of a shadow is a two-dimensional silhouette, or reverse projection of the object blocking the...

s, a ruler

Ruler

A ruler, sometimes called a rule or line gauge, is an instrument used in geometry, technical drawing, printing and engineering/building to measure distances and/or to rule straight lines...

 and a fire hydrant

Fire hydrant

A fire hydrant , is an active fire protection measure, and a source of water provided in most urban, suburban and rural areas with municipal water service to enable firefighters to tap into the municipal water...

. A standard solution for this problem uses similar triangles, a skill not remembered by most adults, and which does not appear on state mathematics standards until the 10th grade. However, the solution published in the Seattle Post Intelligencer does not even use this method.

Mathematics

Similarly, textbook

Textbook

A textbook or coursebook is a manual of instruction in any branch of study. Textbooks are produced according to the demands of educational institutions...

s such as Dale Seymour's Investigations omit many standard arithmetic

Arithmetic

Arithmetic or arithmetics is the oldest and most elementary branch of mathematics, used by almost everyone, for tasks ranging from simple day-to-day counting to advanced science and business calculations. It involves the study of quantity, especially as the result of combining numbers...

 methods, instead relying on students to construct their own ways to compute average

Average

In mathematics, an average, or central tendency of a data set is a measure of the "middle" value of the data set. Average is one form of central tendency. Not all central tendencies should be considered definitions of average....

s, and perform multiplication

Multiplication

Multiplication is the mathematical operation of scaling one number by another. It is one of the four basic operations in elementary arithmetic ....

 and division

Division (mathematics)

right|thumb|200px|20 \div 4=5In mathematics, especially in elementary arithmetic, division is an arithmetic operation.Specifically, if c times b equals a, written:c \times b = a\,...

. Teachers are directed to discourage students who may have been taught how to regroup or take a sum and divide by the number of items to compute an average.

External links

• Learning Domains or Bloom's Taxonomy