Sustaining critical minds: How classroom learning cultures shape student thinking dispositions and practices

Abstract

Critical thinking is routinely identified as a goal for student learning in higher education. Critical thinking, however, is difficult to define or teach, often left as an educational aspiration that is challenging to operationalize and assess. Therefore, many interventions targeting critical thinking are isolated and tend to focus on the development of cognitive skills, providing less attention to students’ dispositions toward applying these skills to different situations. In this study of a redesigned course at a research-intensive university, we query what a dispositional view of thinking can reveal about students’ understanding and experience in an active learning environment. Drawing on student reflection journals and semi-structured interviews with 13 students from two cohorts of the course, we trace how students decide when and how critical thinking is necessary and suitable, as well as when it is perceived to be too demanding or out of place in the classroom. The course included newly introduced, ill-structured problems aimed at competency development. We note that although students employed many critical thinking skills to complete these tasks, the uncertainty related to applying critical thinking to ill-structured problems often conflicted with students’ expectations of classroom instruction. When adapting to unfamiliar instructional practices, students were largely successful in using different approaches to solve problems. However, students’ sensitivity to error and tendency toward familiar ways of being students were barriers to the solidification of critical thinking habits. We argue that to foster long-lasting critical thinking skills and dispositions, education interventions need to shift from the course to the program level and move toward the development of broader cultures of thinking.

Introduction

Critical thinking is widely touted as a central focus of higher education, being generally considered essential for student success (Abrami et al., 2008; Puig et al., 2019). Despite its stated importance for higher education, scholars have repeatedly indicated that the concept of critical thinking remains an unclear construct (Abrami et al., 2008; Andreucci-Annunziata et al., 2023; Puig et al., 2019). Policy and institutional documents similarly reflect this tension. For example, the transnational Bologna Process has put forward that quality in higher education should focus on student-centered and lifelong learning. It indicates that critical thinking and critical reflection are key competencies for achieving these learning goals, arguing that students should be active participants in their own education and should develop transferrable competencies such as critical thinking, problem-solving, and reflective thinking (ESU, 2015, 2020). However, critical thinking or critical reflection are not defined in such documents. For scholars and teachers alike, this ambiguity creates empirical and pedagogical challenges where critical thinking is clearly desired but difficult to define and identify in practice.

Challenges in defining and measuring critical thinking have resulted in a focus on products over processes (Gunawardena & Wilson, 2021). Additionally, the tendency to understand critical thinking as skill—something that can be learned and deployed in a straight-forward manner—often overlooks the dispositional and processual character of thinking (Huber & Kuncel, 2016) and tends to ignore the existing motivations and commitments of thinkers (Perkins et al., 1993). Many instructors who attempt to teach and evaluate critical thinking are left underwhelmed by the results and point to student-related issues as explanation for the lack of critical thinking development (Bezanilla et al., 2019; Gunawardena & Wilson, 2021; Thorndahl & Stentoft, 2020). Puig et al. (2019) point out that many interventions aimed at fostering critical thinking focus on isolated, short-term approaches, which makes it difficult to assess lasting impacts and transferability to different contexts.

Looking at critical thinking through a dispositional lens (Dunne, 2018; Facione, 2011; Perkins et al., 1993; Tishman et al., 1993), however, can help elucidate the kinds of thinking habits and tendencies that encourage students to broadly apply critical thinking skills in distinct situations. Tishman et al. (1993) illustrate the importance of dispositions with this analogy:

Can you play the piano? Do you play the piano? These are different questions, and your answer may well be “yes” to the first and “no” to the second. The first question is about ability: if you sat down in front of a piano, could you play a tune? The second tacitly asks much more—it goes beyond ability and asks about inclination: Are you disposed to play the piano? Do you like to play? Do you play regularly? (p. 147)

This passage indicates that educational interventions need to consider more than just skills and work toward developing the kinds of inclinations that lead students to be habitual critical thinkers, including the dispositions that help students think critically beyond the conventional structures of the classroom.

In this article, we take a more holistic approach to critical thinking, considering dispositional and contextual factors in addition to skills. Examining interviews and students’ written reflections, we analyze their associations and problematizations to explore deeper, more intricate layers of meaning about thinking critically in academic and professional settings. Our study is grounded in two exploratory research questions: (1) What can a dispositional view of thinking tell us about how students employ critical thinking to approach problem solving in a novel active learning environment? (2) How can single course interventions contribute to students’ development of critical thinking skills and dispositions?

Theoretical framework

The dispositional view of thinking

Inquiry into critical thinking often differentiates between the cognitive and dispositional dimensions of critical thinking, although these facets are interconnected (Dunne, 2018). The dispositional aspect represents one’s consistent motivation and willingness to use these abilities (Dwyer, 2017). Scholars highlight how one can develop higher-order cognitive skills related to critical thinking (such as inference, analysis, and evaluation of information), yet fail to transfer them to distinct situations (Halpern & Dunn, 2022; Perkins & Ritchhart, 2004). The dispositional view of critical thinking has been particularly useful to educators and educational researchers because it has allowed for deeper insights into students’ thinking habits (Ku & Ho, 2010; Wangensteen et al., 2010). Further, it is useful for understanding how students are socialized by classroom cultures (Gila & Ela, 2015; Rabello-Mestre & Otondo, 2021). The dispositional view thus provides a useful lens to understand how students experience teaching practices aimed at developing their critical thinking skills and agency. In this study, we use a dispositional lens to analyze students’ reflections and discuss how focusing on thinking dispositions may help educators better support students in navigating uncertain and complex learning environments.

We use Perkins et al.’s (1993) definition of thinking dispositions as the “tendencies toward patterns of intellectual activity that condition and guide cognitive behavior” (p. 6). We take these general attitudes to be both malleable and inextricable from the thinkers’ goals and epistemic values (Aston, 2024; Stanovich, 2002). Following Perkins et al. (1993), we understand dispositions to encompass not only the abilities required to perform a given task, but also the sensitivities and inclinations that indicate the propensity to do so. While ability is understood here as having the capacity to perform a task, sensitivity, and inclination are defined respectively as the “alertness” that calls one to perform an action and the “felt tendency” toward carrying it out (Perkins et al., 1993, p. 4). In our analysis, we examined the data to note where different abilities, sensitivities, and inclinations appear and, together with descriptive codes, developed larger themes to discuss students’ attitudes toward problem solving in an active learning classroom.

Methods

Course design

This study centers on two consecutive iterations of a semester-long course at a research-intensive Norwegian university during Fall 2020 (13 students and 5 teachers) and Fall 2021 (20 students and 4 teachers). The two main teachers were constant, while the teaching assistants differed in 2020 (n = 3) and 2021 (n = 2). This mandatory STEM course was redesigned in 2019 to include active learning strategies, lab-based teaching, a series of activities using real-life data, and reflections about learning. The general language of instruction was Norwegian. Aimed at mirroring professional settings where critical and computational thinking, self-efficacy, and collaboration are crucial to address ill-structured problems, the instruction and assessments diverged from the traditional lecture and final exam approach prevalent in the program. During the 13 weeks of the course, students completed five programming activities, two group presentations, four quizzes, two reading and writing tasks, one semester-long group lab experiment, and nine individual written reflection exercises. Task-specific rubrics communicated the evaluation criteria for each activity. Instructors offered individual written feedback after each task. In class, students could ask questions and request help from the instructors as needed. Although every activity was evaluated, students did not know their grade until the course was completed. Despite wanting students to focus less on grades, the instructors only disclosed grades at the end of the course due to the cumbersome complaint procedures at the institution. All assignment evaluations were consolidated into a single letter grade at the end of the semester. Students could benchmark their performance, however, through the rubrics and feedback.

Structure of Activities

The tasks were organized around retrieving and analyzing real data through programming activities created in programming notebooks (interactive files that allows the mixing of executable code, visualizations, links, and descriptive text). In this case, the instructors composed the notebooks with text and code cells which they intended to facilitate the interchange between explanations, tutorials, examples, and coding tasks. The students completed the activities within the notebooks. The instructors created specific explanations, tutorials, and examples for the notebooks and directed students to external sources. They purposefully left gaps that the students had to fill with the aim of encouraging autonomy, critical thinking, and collaboration. This goal was communicated to students in writing and orally at the beginning and throughout the duration of the course.

The course redesign includes reflections on learning—informed by scholarship that indicates engaging in reflective activities can foster critical thinking, self-awareness, and metacognitive skills in students (Chan & Lee, 2021; Radović et al., 2023). It can also strengthen students’ self-awareness, problem-solving skills, and the ability to transfer knowledge to new contexts (Aston, 2024; Coulson & Harvey, 2013; Guo, 2022; Salgado Ramírez et al., 2020). The course redesign thus asked students to engage in reflection about their thinking and learning following each activity. The reflections were organized in a learning journal, separate from the notebooks, accessible only to the individual student and the instructors. In Fall 2020, the instructors created a set of base questions to guide critical reflection. In Fall 2021, these questions were revised, with more specific questions added to better scaffold student reflections (Thorpe, 2000). The intention was that these reflective activities could support students with processing and deriving meaning from their learning experiences (Hailikari et al., 2022). In both semesters, students were encouraged to use the journals to share reflections on learning, discuss their thinking approaches and learning strategies, and respond to explicit requests for feedback on the course materials. The journals were evaluated holistically as part of each activity and marked in the rubric as complete or incomplete.

Data collection

The dataset for this article is part of a larger research project on changes to teaching and assessment methods in higher education and the impact of those changes in the instructors’ and students’ understanding of learning. We have previously addressed instructors’ experiences with navigating differing expectations from peers and students related to learning and course design (Darcie et al., 2025).

Thirteen student participants (seven in 2020; six in 2021) consented to the collection and analysis of their reflection journals and an individual interview at the end of the course. Students were selected for the interview aiming for maximum variation of study approaches, course enjoyment, performance, and overall experience as self-reported in their learning journals. We were mindful of gender and age distribution in recruitment; however, to preserve anonymity participants’ gender/age are not reported. The interviews addressed: students’ experiences with the learning activities, their perceptions and observations about learning, and how they navigated the teaching and assessment methods. The learning journals provided insight into their experiences and attitudes during the course period. The interviews provided an opportunity to look back at their experience in the course.

Each interview lasted approximately 1 hour, was conducted and recorded online in Norwegian by a trained interviewer. The interviews were subsequently transcribed verbatim and analyzed in Norwegian. The learning journals consisted of written text and images. For this article, we focus only on written text. The texts were written in Norwegian, English, or both. Any direct quotes that were originally in Norwegian were translated by the first author and checked with a third party for accuracy. The data collection took place during the COVID-19 pandemic, and students were asked about their experience with the pandemic in their learning journals and interviews. The Fall 2020 cohort experienced many periods of online instruction. The Fall 2021 cohort did not have online instruction but was also affected by other special circumstances (e.g. limited access to campus spaces).

Researchers’ Participation in the course design

Author 1, as a member of an academic development unit, was approached by the main instructor of this course for consultation about course design. It was under this context that research was proposed on instructors’ and students’ experiences navigating changes in the course. Author 1 has held both the roles of researcher and external consultant during the course redesign. They participated in course planning meetings, held observations of the course, contributed to the design of reflection activities, and conducted minimal in-class facilitation (limited to instruction about the learning journals and clarifying expectations about the reflections). Author 1 commented on the learning journals during the course, along with other instructors, but was not involved in any evaluation; students were informed of this arrangement from the outset. This proximity to the research site has enriched the analytical work for this study.

Analysis

We performed a reflective thematic analysis (Braun et al., 2019) combining a priori, provisional, and inductive codes (Saldaña, 2016). A priori codes were theory-driven, devised by the first author based on the thinking dispositions framework while provisional codes were drawn from previous analyses in the project. These initial codes were complemented by inductive codes developed throughout the analysis. The analysis followed three steps. First, the coding focused on identifying instances pertaining to the thinking dispositions defined by Perkins et al. (1993) and descriptive provisional codes related to tensions, disagreements, and confusions in the classroom, as well as students’ understanding of learning. Second, each instance referring to a thinking disposition was subcoded as inclinations, sensitivities, and abilities according to a pre-defined criteria table. For example, the dispositions to be broad and adventurous was subcoded with generate multiple options, identify the need for alternative perspectives, and apply different options to solve problems to map into inclinations, sensitivities, and abilities respectively. In this stage, inductive codes were introduced. Learning journals and interviews were coded iteratively, also alternating between participants from the 2020 and 2021 cohorts to guarantee a maximum amount of contrast and variety of concepts (Jackson & Bazeley, 2019). Steps 1 and 2 were conducted by the first author. Last, the inductive and provisional codes were synthesized into larger categories, including trial and error, recalibrating old strategies, autonomy/agency, and collaboration. The thinking disposition codes were then analyzed in contrast with these categories to develop the main themes. At this stage, all three authors worked in partnership and adjusted the coding according to discussion and collective insight. In this article, we focus on the themes of uncertainty about content and uncertainty about context, which provide insight into how the evidence of thinking dispositions was elicited in the materials and how the students have approached learning in a new environment. Instances related to pandemic-induced uncertainty were carefully observed and cross-referenced between the two cohorts to differentiate them, when possible, from general course-related uncertainties.

Findings

In this section, we present instances of the interplay between inclinations, sensitivities, and abilities in students’ thinking to show how they sought to reconcile the challenges presented by a new and unfamiliar approach to teaching. Our findings are organized around two interrelated dimensions of student experience connected to uncertainty: (1) tackling a new kind of course activity, which illustrates the tensions in student thinking when they faced ill-structured problems, and (2) participating in a new classroom culture, which highlights how students reflected on the learning environment and how it affected their approach to learning.

Tackling a new kind of course activity

Course activities were designed to challenge students with ill-structured problems characterized by the lack of predefined solutions. The problems expectedly triggered feelings of uncertainty. From the interviews and reflective journals, we observe how students dealt with uncertainty. Our data show that students employed a range of attitudes in response to these learning challenges, including trial and error and the recalibration of old strategies.

In their journals and interviews, students often detailed how they approached solving programming tasks. The trial-and-error approach was often cited as a strategy for problem-solving. Student D illustrates this by stating in their interview that:

As we’ve been told at the very beginning of the semester, . . . if you just search a bit on Google, you’ll usually come up with some kind of code that works anyway. So, it’s kind of like trial and error. . . . If you’re going to learn coding, you kind of have to, well, try and fail because it’s nothing. It’s like learning a language in a way.

This quote exemplifies some kinds of attitudes that students assumed when tackling the programming problems: they were inclined to generate multiple options, able to apply them to the problem, and sensitive to the demand for alternative perspectives. The comparison with language learning is apt. In that case, a learner tries to generate sentences using limited resources without full understanding or mastery of the mechanisms of the language. Using the language, making mistakes, and correcting errors are what lead to learning and competence. In this passage, Student D, appears to have somewhat internalized this approach to critical thinking and even relates it to the words the teachers used at the beginning of the course.

Trial and error was a common strategy employed in tackling ill-structured problems. For many students the opportunity to learn from mistakes often led to a better understanding of the problem and ultimately to better solutions. Student I wrote in their learning journal that “with a bit of trial and error plus googling, it worked in the end.” Student A wrote that “‘trial and error’ is worth its weight in gold!” and that “through trial and error, I also feel that I learn and understand a lot more.” Student H wrote that “failing makes me understand the things better, so that next time I perfectly know how, what and why.” We observe that this opportunity to fail was reflected in what students think a good university course should be. For example, Student L stated that, in a good university course “there must be room for failure. It’s very important that it must not be scary to fail. Because you learn from your mistakes.” These students shared similar perceptions that making mistakes when solving programming problems was an inherent part of the process and “nothing” to worry about.

Even as students observed that a trial-and-error approach showed good results, they often reported it could be frustrating and taxing. At times, this frustration became palpable in the journals, such as when Student F wanted a more familiar structure to the activities and wrote that “[the teachers] will have to rectify this, otherwise I’ll have less hair for Christmas!”. In those moments, students displayed different attitudes. Many wanted the familiar comfort of conventional courses, where they didn’t have to find resources and answers on their own. Voicing this frustration, Student C wrote that “it’s also stupid that we don’t have any kind of textbook and lectures.” This resistance toward open and speculative thinking shows how Student C fell back into the familiar expectation of assigned texts and lectures, as well as a pre-determined and teacher-selected source for answers. This student seems more focused on correct results, which stands in contrast with Student D, who seems to focus on process, where trial and error is essential for understanding programming. Also voicing frustration, Student K wrote in their journal that they “hope we get more lectures on these types of tasks if we are going to be solving more problems like this.” Similarly, Student F wrote that they “miss regular teaching” (i.e. lectures) and that “one learns to find information online, but I don’t feel this is worth the workload.”

While many students wanted to avoid uncertainty and return to familiar ways of working, several students felt the need to recalibrate old strategies and started forming new work habits. New routines aimed at narrowing down options and improving time efficiency became common. Student I described discerning the need to observe task prompts closely, writing that “the most effective thing for me is to read through the task carefully and try to avoid interruptions when I get an overview of the task.” They further explain that “there is a lot of help in these [task prompts]” indicating how this strategy assisted them reach well-defined answers. This approach to be more attentive to the tasks was not present in the beginning of the semester when students often missed tasks. Student A wrote in their first learning journal entry that they “struggled a bit to see the small questions hidden inside the text.” They later acknowledged the need for sharper focus, saying that “maybe [it was] a bit my own fault too, considering that I should have read more carefully.” Student B reveals how they first became inclined to be thorough with the materials by writing in their journal that “after a good deal of trial and error, I came across one of the links in the notebook,” adding “who would have thought that links posted as help would actually turn out to be helpful?”

Participating in a new classroom culture

Monitoring comprehension and adapting their strategies account for only part of how students tackled the new ways of working in this course. In our analysis, we found that students experienced uncertainty primarily in two dimensions. One related to the nature of the tasks they were assigned, the other to the novelty of the course’s design. Students were not only trying to grasp the content of the course, but also trying to make sense of the course itself, since they had not encountered these kinds of teaching methods during their studies.

Although most course activities were individual, students were encouraged to discuss the problems and help each other find solutions. For example, Student G wrote that “the opportunity to discuss the tasks within [their] group . . . made us more familiar with the different codes.” Student L explained in the interview, “I just tried to work as much as possible in class, and then I tried to help my fellow students, because it’s amazing how much you learn from helping.” Student D said that when “we [students] sit in groups and work together, then we sort of motivate each other,” adding that it was similar to when they “sat in the corridors” to work on tasks together for previous courses. This opportunity to discuss and collaborate in class allowed students to draw on previously developed critical thinking dispositions, ones they use when working together in informal learning situations. In these instances, students were inclined to share resources, ask each other questions, explain points of confusion, and try to understand concepts together.

We can see in these examples that many students seized the opportunity to collaborate and help one another inside the classroom. The students participating in this study had periods of online teaching due to the COVID-19 pandemic, especially the Fall 2020 cohort. During the period of data collection, students were particularly sensitive to the benefits of meeting in person. This sentiment appears frequently, with students mentioning that “it was much easier to work on this activity since we could FINALLY discuss physically in groups again” (Student A, learning journal), “it has been really nice to be back in school and have some time physically and not have anything [online]. It’s been so very comfortable” (Student M, interview), and “what’s really nice about being in class is that the threshold for collaboration is so low” (Student B, interview). Beyond the social aspect of being in the same room, the students observed how the classroom environment encouraged them to interact and support each other. Despite the pandemic-induced uncertainty, many students commented that the collaborative nature of the course helped with their continual engagement with the course activities. Student E commented in their learning journal that “Zoom worked well because you could share the screen and ask the teachers for help in this way.” The course structure, with breakout rooms for each group and ample opportunity to request instructor support, was flagged as an effective working method in synchronous online environments.

While collaborative processes were constructive and built on existing critical thinking habits, other dispositions played a negative role. Students were often inclined to expect recognizable dynamics and structures when getting help from the teaching staff. Many students reported feeling frustrated with the lack of direct and definite answers, despite expressing understanding of the goal of being able to find answers independently. These frustrations are understandable given that students had to solve complex problems with a programing tool they have never used before. Nevertheless, their frustrations underlined a mismatch between their expectations about learning and the learning goals set by the instructors. Students had apparent limits to how much searching was acceptable before they expected direct help. Student C suggested in their learning journal that:

In this case, I could have imagined a textbook and questions based on information found in the book. This would make the assignments easier, but it would also make it easier to learn the curriculum as you could read more about a topic in a book.

Student C points to the expectation of having well-known resources, predictable structures, and predefined outcomes. Students’ confusion and disagreement with the course structure signal underlying expectations about what teaching, learning, and the university classroom should be like.

These diverging perspectives reveal how students’ expectations often got in the way of the development of critical thinking dispositions. They seemed to lack the sensitivity to identify the appropriate epistemic goals and were not inclined to shift intellectual strategies when the context demanded it. Students often displayed confusion about exercises being embedded within the information/tutorial material, again expecting predictable structures. Student F wrote “I’ve been a bit annoyed by the structure of the exercises. Sub-tasks would have been nice instead of having a long text under the same task. It’s a bit demotivating.” Student G complained in their journal that questions and tasks should be organized differently:

I found it a bit confusing that all the tasks were called “Short task”, maybe they should be numbered? . . . Some questions were also a bit hidden in the text, but that may be because I didn’t read the text carefully enough.

These quotes suggest an expectation of separation between instructional material and assessments, where questions come at the end, after the presentation of all information. Students perceived the presence of questions within the tutorial as disorganization rather than as an integrated way of presenting assignments. As Student C put it, “it would be easier if you gave us a clearer set of tasks, preferably numbered so that it is easy to see what belongs to which tasks.” Instead of adapting, students retreated to familiar methods, wanting to answer questions with information provided by the instructors. This is at odds with open, flexible, and reflexive approaches that are hallmarks of critical thinkers.

Students’ dissatisfaction with the course structure included frustration with the intentional gaps in the tutorials. Many students expected instructors to be the source of answers. However, the instructors wanted students to develop the critical thinking abilities of searching and evaluating information sources. This level of autonomy and agency marked a departure from the students’ usual classroom experience. While many students showed some understanding about the pedagogical intentions driving these gaps and recognized the importance of these skills, they nevertheless expressed concerns about this approach. Their remarks, often noted in their learning journals while they were facing the challenges of the course, conveyed that while they were indeed looking for sources as the instructors wanted, they found the process too difficult and time consuming. Student B wrote:

Sometimes I wonder if you have actually gone through the exercises and seen how difficult it is to find information on different questions. Because what I find most difficult about these tasks is finding relevant information that is not too advanced. Of course, I manage to find answers to everything in the end, but it takes a lot of time. I wish you could possibly provide us with more articles where one could find answers to various questions, in addition to some searching. However, I assume that you are preparing us for the Master [degree] and work “life”, so it’s just a good learning experience and having to search for good and relevant answers.

This student acknowledges the instructors’ goals but disputes the appropriate level of difficulty, raising concerns that this approach is too time consuming. Many students echoed this sentiment, also mentioning that research articles were “too advanced.” Comments like these imply that the learning design reflects a lack of effort from the instructors. The students perceived the pedagogical strategy as more appropriate for those who have completed their studies. Student L wrote “I like to have someone that has a lot more experience than me in [the subject] to explain the material for me, rather than me reading some source.” They felt it is the teacher’s responsibility to curate and summarize information.

The students’ belief that their role was to receive information was very apparent when the topic of grades was discussed. Students often expected grades to reflect their ability to produce correct answers, which they had come to expect through their experience with high-stakes, end-of-term exams. Students felt uncertainty and uneasiness when these activities were graded using a comprehensive rubric, not just for correctness of the answer. Student F said:

I feel that [the course] pushes us to think for ourselves, and then [the instructors] push us to figure out how to ask questions. So, [the course] worked in that sense, but it was a bit stressful at first, because we knew that this assignment had to be handed in. We have to get a grade on it, and we don’t know what to do.

Although students were able to complete all assignments and reported that the course had a positive impact on their learning, the ill-defined nature of the problems created unease about how it would translate into a grade.

The course activities made sense to the students as something appropriate for work-life, where problems are complex, multifaceted, and continuous; however, they felt there should be clear answers in a university classroom. The teacher should possess these answers, and the students seemed unable, without a letter grade, to judge the quality of their work, or even to benchmark it against the rubrics and feedback provided. As student I explained in their interview:

I also think that in general, even though I’m personally quite happy with this course, and I think it’s been a lot of fun to work with, I definitely feel that I’ve never known where I stand . . . what if I’ve done too much or too little without knowing it? . . . I don’t have to get an A in this subject, so in a way I’m not stressed, but for others who are much more dependent on grades, it’s very negative. And I think it also affects the motivation that you don’t have [a grade].

While students partially recognized the usefulness of the course, they still struggled to accept ill-structured problem-solving as belonging in the classroom. More importantly, perhaps, these unfamiliar thinking demands and open/uncertain course activities reveal a cultural clash about when and how critical thinking is to be undertaken—a challenge that seems impossible to resolve in a single semester.

Discussion

This study set out to explore the affordances of applying a dispositional view to students’ critical thinking in an active learning environment by analyzing student reflections during and after participating in a course. While our findings do not offer prescriptive solutions to how to teach critical thinking, they pose critical questions and highlight the challenges of teaching critical thinking through careful consideration of students’ experiences. Although limited by the small sample size and the specificity of context, we trust that this work is of interest to educators and higher education leadership concerned with nurturing a culture of critical thinking. Conclusions addressing specific cultures of thinking are bound to be highly situated, even if parallels can be fruitfully drawn by researchers and educators in other contexts.

In line with previous research, the students’ descriptions and reflections of their learning strategies provide evidence of some thinking dispositions (Andreucci-Annunziata et al., 2023; Gila & Ela, 2015). The predominance of abilities over personal inclinations and ingrained sensitivities in our analysis highlights the challenges inherent in cultivating the more underlying aspects of critical thinking. Our findings show that students were able to employ critical thinking when the activities demanded, but it is less clear if they would use these skills outside of distinctly curated situations or, as similarly suggested by Huber and Kuncel (2016), after they leave the higher education environment. Critical thinking, as other school-related attributes, is contained within the specific space of the classroom. Conforming to prior empirical evidence (Aston, 2024), the students expected to develop skills for use in a course and, thus, tend to understand critical thinking as a set of tools to be used when prompted, rather than a more holistic and structural approach to problem-solving beyond the boundaries of the classroom. We find ourselves again making that crucial distinction between being able to do something and being accustomed/inclined to doing it.

Although students did display understanding of the benefits and purposes of ill-structured problem-solving and active learning, most often they resisted internalizing these ideas and persisted in acting in the same ways they do in more traditional classrooms. Generally, the dispositions that students display, be they conducive or not to critical thinking, are linked to the kinds of thinking fostered within their environment. Many of the passive learning habits that students have discussed in their reflections underscore the pervasive influence of a culture focused on testing for correct knowledge through exams. As indicated by Gunawardena and Wilson (2021), this does not prime students to navigate uncertainty as an inherent part of the critical thinking process. The fact that the students are trying to understand how the course functions in relation to their broader education, in which this course in an outlier, may explain why students tend to fall back into familiar routines, substantiating similar findings (Aston, 2024; Møller et al., 2023; Stanovich, 2002). Here, it is pertinent to consider that the isolation many students experienced in this period could be a factor in their reliance on familiar routines; however, we should also consider how students made extensive use of their peer networks to work together in informal settings, showing how being subjected to different learning situations can lead to changes in behavior, even if these are short lived.

Previous research (Møller et al., 2023; Puig et al., 2019) has already pointed to the issue that most interventions toward the development of critical thinking are isolated and that students need more frequent exposure to these kinds of courses. We argue that, if the development of critical thinking indeed matters, students need to be exposed to a much broader range of experiences that explicitly cultivate their thinking dispositions. Habits need opportunities and time to be developed. A well-developed habit of critical thinking marks the distinction between being a critical thinker and being able to think critically on occasion (Dunne, 2018). The fact that this course represents a single intervention within a curriculum that operates in a traditional lecture-exam model threatens the longevity of the attitudes that students developed and employed. We therefore echo other scholars in suggesting that a larger shift is needed if we are to move toward a culture of critical thinking (Gunawardena & Wilson, 2021; Perkins & Ritchhart, 2004).

Halpern and Dunn (2022) have pointed out that “many errors occur not because people can’t think critically, but because they do not” (p. 20). We posit that it is university programs, rather than individual courses, that must be structured in ways that develop and demand the types of thinking they hope to promote. To operationalize the development of critical thinking, both instruction and assessment strategies must prioritize critical engagement that strengthens and supports students in developing their abilities, and inclinations and sensitivities toward critical thinking. A shift in assessment culture thus demands robust faculty development and strong disciplinary teaching cultures, enabling instructors to develop teaching methods that foster both critical thinking skills and dispositions. These strategies should amount to a larger cultural shift that values not only the development of skills but also the cultivation of habits and inclination toward using them.

Implications for practice

Although a larger cultural shift is needed to fully teach students how to think critically beyond the confines of the classroom, our study shows how individual teachers should become aware of students’ thinking inclinations and sensitivities. Institutional and governmental guidelines are vital as they set the constraints for teaching and assessment. Nevertheless, these regulations are implemented by the instructors who design courses and are in contact with students. Students in this study started to try new approaches and unveil their underlying thinking tendencies. While they resisted to varying degrees, they began practicing the dispositions conducive to lasting critical approaches to thinking and learning. Our study can serve as a practical example of how individual instructors can identify students’ thinking habits, start challenging inert thinking tendencies, and foster the development of critical thinking dispositions.

Using reflective practices can be vital for educators interested in adopting a more holistic perspective on thinking. Our findings show that when students discussed the tensions, confusions, and disagreements within the course, they revealed much about their internalized thinking routines. This suggests that making space for these discussions could be particularly constructive in courses that diverge from the established culture, since tensions can help students confront their underlying assumptions and habits about learning. Reflections can also make explicit the anxieties stemming from outside the classroom and how students are coping with them. Educators informed by a dispositional perspective can analyze these tensions and purposefully bring students’ attention to inclinations and sensitivities while also helping them navigate extenuating circumstances. They can also influence larger curriculum development initiatives with insights into critical thinking development. Beliefs about critical thinking change with dissonance (Bendixen & Rule, 2004) between stated intentions and actual practices. In this study, structured reflection was instrumental in helping students identify assumptions through these tensions and consider other perspectives and ways of behaving.

This study has contributed empirical insights into the challenges of building students’ critical thinking habits. Our findings highlighted how using critical thinking skills to solve ill-structured problems, combined with being in new course dynamics, often conflicted with students’ expectations of the higher education classroom. Students often fall back to familiar routines when faced with uncertainty, underscoring that developing thinking dispositions, not only skills, is central to fostering longevity in critical thinking that can be applied to diverse situations. This study emphasizes the importance of developing cultures of thinking, where the use of critical thinking is the norm, rather than the exception.