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Free non-tracked shipping included. International residents will need 2-3 weeks for delivery time.
Learn more about our WHOA cycle below
What Truly Makes a Family?
Explore with Jada and her friends as they consider and test out what truly makes a family. Chapter book for 6-9 year olds. $15.99
Resources
In conjunction with Jada Mei Mathews' Plan: Perfect this Bundle Pack supports reading comprehension and extended activities.
Hands-on activities perfect for free time, after school clubs, rainy days and lesson starters. $10.90
Art: Explore the power of WHOA! Follow this simple Critical Thinking Cycle. Tie it into a literacy lesson, explore mystical beasts, the power of persuasion or the intrigue of dragons.
Critical Thiking Skills
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H
O
A
Wonder – experience, question, and connect.
By creating the habit of wonder and providing unique experiences, we engage students in the learning process. We help them connect their existing knowledge and consider what further information is needed to understand, create and solve.
Harness – apply the skills and power of gathering and analysing data.
By outlining what we know and what we need to know we begin to research, interview, gather, and analyse data. We consider what sources are credible, experiment, develop surveys, and create prototypes.
Open – we consider other people’s views and challenge our own biases.
We are innately uncomfortable with being wrong and therefore tend to look for evidence to support our own views. By helping students to recognise this and be open to discussions we can learn about others’ perspectives can consider our own possible bias.
Arrive at a possibility, offer a solution, innovate a product or create.
This accumulation of wondering, formulating questions, gathering, testing and analysing data as well as being open to new ideas concludes the cycle. We arrive with a solution, creation or innovative idea based on what could be possible.
It is important to understand that intelligence and critical thinking are not the same thing.
Intelligence is the ability to learn and acquire knowledge and to form judgements based on reason and opinions. It’s affected by each person’s mental processing power and ability to move information from short term to long term memory.
Critical Thinking, however, is the ability to think objectively without the influence of your own opinions, biases, prejudices and feelings. It’s the ability to form a conclusion based on facts and evidence and to apply that understanding to a variety of possibilities. It is the essence of originality, problem-solving and innovation.
The digital age our children have entered may be full of possibilities. Knowledge acquisition can be directly linked to how fast our fingers can type on a smart phone and how quick we can read. They can become “experts” in a matter of minutes, watch stimulating and quick videos on any topic, jump into DIY and cooking programs, and get caught up on the latest social trends before we have even finished our morning coffee.
What this age doesn’t allow for, however, is the ability to make sense of it all. It doesn’t guard them from acquiring information from unreliable sources, it doesn’t help them to understand the skills and knowledge enough to be able to transfer it elsewhere, it doesn’t give them an opportunity to explore different perspectives, and it doesn’t give them the opportunity to create.
For example: Reading a recipe on how to bake a cake will provide the information and maybe even some knowledge about baking, and can ultimately turn out a very decent cake… but then what? Without sharing the experience with others, it reduces the opportunities to perfect the craft. Without understanding the chemistry of the ingredients and the importance of temperature it will be much harder to problem-solve when your cake isn’t rising or is too dry. Without applying the knowledge to other ingredients no new cakes or deserts would ever be created. Without Critical Thinking Skills the Great British Bake Off would never have been born.
