Critical thinking in E-learning environments

One of the primary aims of higher education in today's information technology enabled classroom is to make students more active in the learning process. The intended outcome of this increased IT-facilitated student engagement is to foster important skills such as critical thinking used in both academia and workplace environments. Critical thinking (CT) skills entails the ability(ies) of mental processes of discernment, analysis and evaluation to achieve a logical understanding. Critical thinking in the classroom as well as in the workplace is a central theme; however, with the dramatic increase of IT usage the mechanisms by which critical thinking is fostered and used has changed. This article presents the work and results of critical thinking in a virtual learning environment. We therefore present a web-based course and we assess in which parts of the course, and to what extent, critical thinking was perceived to occur. The course contained two categories of learning modules namely resources and interactive components. Critical thinking was measured subjectively using the ART scale. Results indicate the significance of "interactivity" in what students perceived to be critical-thinking-oriented versus online material as a resource. Results and opportunities that virtual environments present to foster critical thinking are discussed. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.