Navigating the Digital Age: How Teaching Critical Thinking Skills Can Help Your Child in a World of Misinformation
We live in an age where perspectives abound and anyone who owns a mobile phone can be a journalist if they choose. Information spreads rapidly online, shaping opinions and actions. Misinformation and disinformation spread equally quickly, affecting interpretations and responses. From clickbait headlines to deepfake videos, from the advent of artificial intelligence and large language models to social media, today’s students must navigate an increasingly complex information landscape. It is the job of schools, then, to ensure that their students are equipped with the skills and confidence to make informed and critical discernments as they build their understanding of the world.
We aim to help children develop the ability to think critically: to absorb information, evaluate it, question it, and place it in context. At Toorak College, we seek to build our students’ digital and information literacy skills so that they are empowered to contextualise, analyse, question and assess the reliability of information. We build these skills through curriculum-based learning as well as through real-world applications that bring depth and complexity to the teaching and learning practice at the core of our community.
Why We Teach Children Critical Thinking Across the Curriculum
In Year 9 Humanities, for example, our students examine historical sources, distinguishing between primary and secondary materials while considering a range of perspectives to build their knowledge of the past. This analysis develops the critical skills necessary for evaluating bias and reliability, which are vital outside of the classroom as well as within it. By learning how to solve problems using logic, empathy and evidence, students strengthen their ability to apply knowledge in diverse real-world contexts.
The systematic and analytical approach to learning about Australian history in the classroom extends to contemporary issues beyond the school as students engage in discussions about Australia's role in the world, our heritage and identity, and the ongoing impacts of European colonisation. Through their efforts in the classroom, students can consider issues and impacts through a range of perspectives.
How Students Can Become Critical Thinkers in English and Science
In VCE English, our students engage in critical reading activities, dissecting persuasive language techniques used in articles, advertisements and social media. They explore how rhetoric can be used to shape both fictional and factual narratives, which helps them to understand how writers position their audience to interpret information in a particular way. This practice helps develop strong analytical skills, and shapes each student into a confident and independent critical thinker. Similarly, in Science, students use evidence to support their claims – they consider the value of peer-reviewed research and learn to differentiate between evidence-based findings and pseudoscience. We also encourage your child to explore big ideas and form their own conclusions by using open-ended questions that invite discussion and reflection.
As we all become more immersed in the world of digital information, we are responding to the increasing need for schools to develop their students’ research skills as an important component of both primary and secondary schooling. We require our students to participate in projects where they must verify their sources, cross-check facts, and engage with reliable databases.
By embedding critical thinking and information literacy skills across our curriculum, we are not only supporting the development of digital literacy in our students – we are preparing students to navigate a dynamic information landscape. With the skills learnt in the classroom, our students become informed and responsible citizens who engage meaningfully with local and global issues, adapt and consider the impact of new technologies and advances, and make well-reasoned decisions in an evolving world.
Visit our Junior School and Senior School pages to learn more about how we are supporting our students to thrive.