Calling All Critical Thinkers
Posted March 7, 2009
Following is the history of the Critical Thinking Education Group to shed some light on what I am asking you to join…
At last year’s Amaz!ing Meeting (TAM6), the annual meeting hosted by the James Randi Educational Foundation, a few skeptics who value education asked the teachers in the room to stay after school for a little bit to discuss the needs of educators. These passionate and productive individuals sowed the seeds and a few of us (including yours truly) took advantage of their initiative (i.e., jumped on their bandwagon!).
Within a few days, the “sowers” formed a Google Group — Critical Teaching — and its members began some very productive discussions. We quickly adopted a name and a mission statement. We seeded a library of resources including original works and links to existing material. We developed a community whose members support one another through encouragement, collaboration, networking, sympathy/empathy, sharing of resources in addition to our library, and simple discussion among like-minded individuals.
The group now has nearly 60 registered members.
To facilitate more active discussion and make room for the growth expected from active promotion this year, we have moved to a new domain and set up a bulletin board-style forum. At some point in the future, if the endeavor continues to grow, we will establish a non-profit organization to pursue our mission on a larger scale.
Everyone is welcome. Some of the active members are teachers, some are studying to be teachers, some work in curriculum development or policy-making, and some are simply advocates for critical thinking education working in similar fields or promoting skepticism on their own time.
Please accept this invitation to join us in working toward promoting a global society of critical thinkers through education. Contribute to our library or just our discussions. Make friends and challenge ideas — someone else’s or even your own. Make a difference!
Oh, and spread the word, too, if you don’t mind!
2 Comments
thoughtcounts Z on March 7th, 2009 at 15:18
I poked around the site a bit. Looks really interesting! Very busy with schoolwork right now, but once the load lightens up, you’ll probably see me around the forum.
Administrator on March 8th, 2009 at 12:43
AWESOME! You’d be a *insert witty synonym for great here* addition.
Comments for this page are closed.
