Author ORCID Identifier
Document Type
Dissertation
Date of Award
2024
Degree Name
Doctor of Education (EdD)
Department
Education
First Advisor
Vassa Grichko
Abstract
Despite the plethora of research and literature regarding the relationship of critical thinking and its key role in promoting learning, little research investigated the teaching of critical thinking to pre-service teachers in their coursework along with how they facilitate it in their students. As future teachers worked towards completing their teaching degrees, student teaching permitted them to work in live classroom settings with veteran teachers as mentors. Markedly, scholars argued that future teacher programs needed to understand the importance of critical thinking and utilize facilitation strategies in classroom settings. In this way, the live classroom setting could then create students who would be critical thinkers. A qualitative study was conducted with five pre-service teachers in three rural Midwest universities. With human coding and AI, how critical thinking was taught to pre-service teachers during their collegiate coursework was better understood. The results of the study indicated that critical thinking had a multilayer definition which included several factors, such as prior knowledge and real-world applications. Further, pre-service teachers had a fair mixture of content, though it was highly variable across instructors and courses. Beyond this, pre-service teachers learned to foster critical thinking in their students through: (a) modeling critical thinking; (b) active learning engagement; (c) real-world content application; and (d) cultivating soft skills. This was partially achieved by how they learned to spark critical thinking in their own collegiate coursework. Finally, these findings were re-examined with the assistance of AI. The joint doctoral student-advisor, co-constructed knowledge lens allowed for a reflexive look into how the machine altered human conceptualizations of the qualitative study along with their understanding of themselves as researchers and, further, cyborg researchers. Interestingly, AI coding and qualitative analyses allowed for more critical thinking for the doctoral student and advisor, but reflexivity was core to the process. Collectively, these articles provide a broader understanding of how rural pre-service teachers are taught and transfer critical thinking. Alongside this, how AI changed the conceptualization of critical thinking for pre-service teachers was better understood.
Subject Categories
Education | Higher Education | Teacher Education and Professional Development
Keywords
Artificial Intelligence, Critical Thinking, Education, Human Skills, Pre-Service Teaching, Pre-Service Teaching Courses
Number of Pages
101
Publisher
University of South Dakota
Recommended Citation
Shonerd, Tiffany, "Critical Thinking Skills in Pre-Service Teachers and Their Coursework: Investigating the Preparation of Teachers in the Rural Midwest with Humans, AI, and Cyborg Researchers" (2024). Dissertations and Theses. 220.
https://red.library.usd.edu/diss-thesis/220