Research Question & Needs Assessment
Research Question:
Will a curriculum focusing on the improvement of critical thinking skills such as analysis, interpretation and comparison and the inclusion of realia enable students to better understand events and situations from others' cultural perspectives?
Needs Assessment
High school students are increasingly expected to understand world events from various perspectives. It is no longer sufficient to look at events and situations from their hometown view. They must also be able to understand why people from other cultures react in specific manners. This critical thinking skill is difficult for many to achieve. They have limited knowledge of and contact with people from other cultures. Through foreign language classes and traditional textbooks, students regularly compare items such as daily life patterns. While this activity is valuable, it does not allow the students to fully understand the feelings and cultural influences felt by others. Therefore, the students are unable to comprehend why those from other cultures react in different ways to the same situations.
Research such as Project Intelligence conducted through Harvard by Herrstein, Nickerson and others indicate that it is possible to teach in ways that help students become better thinkers (Riedel, S., et al, 2001, July). Teachers can enhance students' abilities to see the events of the world through both their own eyes and the eyes of other cultures. This task can be accomplished by enabling students to have increased contact with other cultures and specifically focusing on things such as the interpretation of film situations, the analysis of situational responses, and newspaper articles.
North Newton students' test results indicate that they lack the ability to use critical thinking and higher level thinking skills at desired levels. A comparison of the sixth and eighth grade standardized test scores of the class of 2006 (figure 1) indicates that in sixth grade 61percent had mastered the cause and effect portion and in eighth grade 75 percent had mastered that portion of the test. The school improvement goals are based on a 3 percent increase in these scores in each of the next three years.
In house assessments used to evaluate essay content, also indicate that students have difficulty in putting their thoughts together in a cohesive manner. The following graph (figure 2) from 2001-2002 illustrates the lack of content in eleventh grade (class of 2003) essays.
