Learning through Mother Tongue affects thinking skills 

SUMMARY

Existing Knowledge:

1. Thinking skills in education are often classified using Bloom’s Taxonomy, which organizes cognitive tasks from lower to higher-order skills, such as remembering, understanding, and creating.

2. Mother tongue curricula traditionally emphasize fundamental language skills, prioritizing basic comprehension and memorization over critical thinking or creativity.

3. Most educational programs place a heavier focus on lower-order thinking skills, often neglecting the development of analytical and creative abilities in language learning.

New Insights from this Study:

1. This study highlights an imbalance in mother tongue curricula, revealing a significant emphasis on lower-order thinking skills like remembering and understanding.

2. Higher-order thinking skills, such as evaluation and creation, are underrepresented in the distribution of learning outcomes, limiting students' cognitive development in language learning.

3. The research suggests a gap between the intended educational goals of fostering well-rounded thinkers and the actual focus on lower-level cognitive tasks within the curricula.

Putting Research into Practice:

1. Curriculum developers should incorporate a more balanced distribution of learning outcomes, including activities that promote higher-order thinking skills such as analyzing and creating.

2. Teachers should design lessons that challenge students to move beyond basic comprehension, encouraging critical thinking and problem-solving in language-related tasks.

3. Educational policymakers should revise mother tongue curricula to better align with modern cognitive development theories, ensuring that all levels of thinking are equally nurtured.

REFERENCE:

Article Title: The Distribution of the Mother Tongue Curricula Learning Outcomes Based on the Thinking Skills

Authors: Emel Bayrak Özmutlu

Journal: Çukurova Üniversitesi Eğitim Fakültesi Dergisi Year: 2020