Pedagogies for Critical Thinking: Innovation and Outcomes in African Higher Education

近年来，对高等教育促进经济和人类发展方式的新认识加强了在低收入国家投资高等教育的理由。这反过来又在非洲高等教育系统内引发了一波改革和振兴努力。推动这种改革的一个主要假设是，高等教育鼓励学生批判性地思考问题，并在做决定时使用证据。然而，有证据表明，学生通过大学学习提高批判性思维技能的假设在许多非洲国家可能并不成立。对非洲大学毕业生展示诸如批判性思维等“高技能”的能力的关注，促使许多非洲高等教育机构越来越多地认识到需要改变教学方式。然而，该区域高等教育政策的一个问题是，对教与学的重要性重新产生的兴趣是由有限的经验证据支持的，因为对非洲大学教学实践的有效性的分析很少。虽然有大量的文献研究了大学的学术经历如何对学生批判性思维技能的发展产生积极影响，但目前的证据大多是在其他文化背景下进行的研究，特别是美国、英国、澳大利亚，在有限的程度上，还有东亚。因此，人们对这些发现如何适用于非洲大学的情况感到关切。该项目旨在通过调查肯尼亚、加纳和博茨瓦纳当地产生的教学干预对学生批判性思维能力的影响，扩大现有的证据基础，以了解教学实践如何影响非洲高等教育机构批判性思维的发展。该研究采用混合方法设计，包括对学生成绩的纵向研究和对机构如何能够鼓励教学变革过程的定性调查。在每个国家的背景下，我们的机构样本将由六个学院组成：其中三个是由于他们试图进行教学改革而被有意选择的，另外三个“匹配”的学院与干预学院具有相似的特征，但尚未尝试任何教学干预。在每个学院，将随机抽取100名新生，在第一年开始和第二年结束时分别完成一项批判性思维评估（适用于研究环境）。评估分数的提高将在各院系之间进行比较，以调查干预院系的学生是否比没有尝试任何教学改革的院系的学生表现出更大的进步。额外的分析将调查哪些教学实践对提高批判性思维能力有最大的影响。在纵向研究的同时，将在“干预”院系内进行深入的定性案例研究，以深入了解干预的实施过程。该项目的结果将为目前在非洲大学内实施的教学干预措施的有效性提供可能具有普遍性的证据。

New understanding of the ways in which higher education contributes to economic and human development has strengthened the justification for investment in higher education in lower-income contexts in recent years. This, in turn, has prompted a wave of reform and revitalisation efforts within African higher education systems. One of the primary assumptions motivating such reforms is that higher education encourages the ability to think critically about problems and to use evidence when making decisions. However, there is evidence to suggest that the assumption that students improve their critical thinking skills as a result of university study may not be valid in many African contexts. Concern about the capacity of graduates from African universities to demonstrate 'high skills', such as critical thinking, has prompted a growing recognition of the need for pedagogical change within many African higher education institutions. A problem for higher education policy in the region, however, is that this renewed interest in the importance of teaching and learning is supported by limited empirical evidence, as there has been little analysis of the effectiveness of pedagogical practice within African universities. Although there is a substantial body of literature investigating the ways in which academic experiences at university can positively influence the development of student critical thinking skills, much of the current evidence rests on research conducted in other cultural contexts, particularly the USA, UK, Australia and, to a limited extent, East Asia. There are, therefore, concerns about how applicable such findings may be to African university contexts.This project aims to expand the existing evidence base around how pedagogical practices affect the development of critical thinking at African higher education institutions by investigating the impact of locally-generated pedagogical interventions on student critical thinking ability in Kenya, Ghana and Botswana. The study follows a mixed methods design, comprising a longitudinal study of student outcomes and a qualitative investigation of how institutions are able to encourage processes of pedagogical change. In each country context, our institutional sample will consist of six faculties: three which have been purposively selected due to their attempts at pedagogical reform, and three 'matched' faculties which have similar characteristics to the intervention faculties but have not yet attempted any pedagogical interventions. Within each faculty, a random sample of 100 incoming students will complete a critical thinking assessment (adapted for use in the study contexts) at the beginning of their first year and again at the end of their second year at university. Gains in assessment scores will be compared between faculties, in order to investigate whether students enrolled in the intervention faculties demonstrate more progress than students enrolled in faculties which have not attempted any pedagogical reform. Additional analysis will investigate which pedagogical practices have the strongest impact on improvements in critical thinking ability. Parallel to the longitudinal study, in-depth qualitative case studies will be conducted within the 'intervention' Faculties, in order to gain insight into the intervention implementation process. The results of the project will provide potentially generalisable evidence of the effectiveness of pedagogical interventions currently being implemented within African universities.