Study of formation and development of critical thinking dispositions: By making a new inventory of critical thinking dispositions for high school students

The main purpose of this study is to examine the formation and development of the critical thinking disposition of Japanese high school students.Therefore an inventory to measure the critical thinking disposition of high school students and junior high students was made. Each question item was chosen after having been based on general ideas of critical thinking, and they were examined by factor analysis. In the end, five factors were chosen. They were "Expert Thinking", Uneasy Thinking", "Unsociable Thinking", "Deception Thinking, and "Curiosity Thinking". Gender difference and Grade difference were also considered. Next, using this inventory, connection between the critical thinking disposition and the expression disposition/the comprehension skills/was examined. Based on the results, a practice study to develop the critical thinking disposition for high school students was performed.By the results of this study, formation of the critical thinking disposition became clear, and a reference of practices to develop good thinking skills and dispositions were established.