Hudds partners University of Helsinki on critical thinking
Wed, 23 Dec 2015 14:10:00 GMT
BERG researchers Wilma Teviotdale and David Clancy unite with Finnish colleagues on a project into critical thinking in the classroom
► Pictured (l-r) are David Clancy, Dr Liisa Postareff, Wilma Teviotdale and Dr Heidi Hyytinen
WHY is critical thinking so important and how can lecturers encourage or enhance this within their students? To find answers an international research partnership has been forged between the Business Education Research Group (BERG) and the University of Helsinki’s Centre for Research and Development of Higher Education (YTY).
BERG is a research group based in the University’s Business School. Its group leader, Head of the Department of Accountancy Wilma Teviotdale, alongside BERG research colleague David Clancy, will be working with researchers at the University of Helsinki on a programme of research entitled Development of Student Intellect and Education (DESTINED).
“There is a lack of real-time data in the area of education, because of the ethical and other issues which can arise when trying to record what happens in a classroom,” said Wilma Teviotdale. “Here, at Huddersfield, we have already made steps in obtaining empirical research and we are delighted the University of Helsinki are working with us,” she said.
Links began with the world-leading research centre in Helsinki after two of their researchers, Dr Liisa Postareff , Assistant Professor of Higher Education, and Lecturer Dr Heidi Hyytinen, met with David Clancy at an international conference in 2013. David has already presented a paper at an international conference in 2014 with Dr Liisa Postareff and Professor Sari Lindblom-Ylänne – the Director of the Centre for Research and Development of Higher Education (YTY), and President of the World Education Research Association (WERA); and David and Wilma recently submitted a co-authored article with Sari and Liisa.
In the seminar, Dr Heidi Hyytinen described the concept of four types of critical thinkers and said it was yet to be applied in practice. It is envisaged that the data being collected for the DESTINED project will give the researchers at Huddersfield and Helsinki the ability to test her theory resulting in an evidenced-based conclusion as well as a theoretical one.
“There is often call for empirical research by educational theorists,” said Wilma Teviotdale. “By working with the University of Helsinki, we are responding to that demand by collecting the data to investigate some of these interesting hypotheses,” she said
The project is ongoing and their findings will be presented in July at the 2016 European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) Higher Education Conference in Amsterdam, following a planned visit to Helsinki by David and Wilma in May 2016.
