Abstract:
Critical thinking is an often-stated educational objective in gifted education as
well as general education. Yet for all the attention that 21st Century education has placed
on thinking skills, including critical thinking, methods of assessing critical thinking are
not well-developed or widely used. This study investigated the critical thinking skills of
upper elementary students using two tests of critical thinking. Participants (n =208) were
fourth grade students in a suburban school district in North Texas. Participants
completed both the Cornell Critical Thinking Test and the Test of Critical Thinking.
Existing data was collected from the school district, allowing for analysis of the
relationships between critical thinking, cognitive ability, student achievement, and
demographic variables. As part of the study, critical thinking skills were compared
between identified gifted students and general education students. First the study found
there was a significant relationship between the two measures of critical thinking (r =.60).
Second, identified gifted students outperformed general education students on both
measures of critical thinking (d =1.52 and d = 1.36). Third, evidence collected in the
study supported significant relationships between cognitive ability and critical thinking as
well as academic achievement and critical thinking. There was no evidence to support
gender differences in critical thinking and weak evidence to support any critical thinking
differences attributed to ethnicity or economic disadvantage. Multiple regression
analyses were conducted predicting both tests of critical thinking. Data supported that
cognitive ability and academic achievement were strong predictors of critical thinking. A
random effects analysis of variance was conducted to rule out potential random effects
associated with the participants nested in three different schools chosen at random in the
participating school district.
