Thinking skills may be instruments for meaningful learning and academic achievement (Akınoğlu & Karsantık, 2016). Also, they are indispensable components of 21st century competencies (Bayrak Özmutlu, 2020; P21 Framework, 2009) and workforce (Dilekli & Tezci, 2016). Current policies in Turkey emphasize developing students’ thinking skills; however, the problem that Beyer (1984) highlighted long ago still exists in the educational policies. That is, they do not specify and define what thinking is and set its indicators. For example, it may not be clear what higher order thinking skills are for some practitioners. There are also some inconsistencies in different documents. For example, the basic law of national education highlights scientific thinking while teacher competencies framework underlines analytical thinking. The curriculum, on the other hand, highlights metacognitive skills. These divergencies might be tolerated only when teachers are knowledgeable about various forms of thinking and prepared to teach thinking skills.
The role of teachers develop students’ thinking is crucial (Dilekli & Tezci, 2016). They indeed, need to know about thinking skills and how to teach those skills. Those teachers are also aware of the difficulties that students may experience; therefore, they should know methods to still enable students become thinkers (Akınoğlu & Karsantık, 2016). However, a literature review for Turkish pre-service teachers’ perceptions, experiences, or proficiency with thinking skills between 2019-2022 revealed a lack of research. Indeed, this resonated what Dilekli and Tezci (2016) argued previously. They stated that research on thinking skills is limited in Middle East (Dilekli & Tezci, 2016). There were few studies done before 2018 (e.g., Akınoğlu & Karsantık, 2016; Dilekli & Tezci, 2016) and they highlighted that pre-service might not feel competent with thinking skills and teaching them.
In relation, an analysis of teacher education programs offered by the Higher Education Council was conducted and it revealed that the program does not offer much for pre-service teachers’ explicit practices of thinking skills or teaching thinking skills (Yüksek Öğretim Kurumu, 2018). There is one elective course on thinking skills: analytical and critical thinking skills. However, this class may not be available for all pre-service teachers at different departments and universities. Also, this class may not focus on teaching analytical and critical thinking skills. Moreover, while the programs offer some must courses (i.e., philosophy of education, language skills on the first year) whose descriptions highlight thinking, pre-service teachers might practice various forms of thinking if only tasks are offered by the faculty. Finally, there is another elective course (i.e., history and philosophy of science) where the content might focus on various schools of thought.
Moreover, national curriculum and materials (i.e., books) may present potentials for thinking skills. However, few research was conducted on the analysis of coursebooks or curriculum, i.e., English and Turkish language materials. Yüce and Emir (2020) found that activities and expressions presented in the 8th grade English language book may run the risk to support a culture of thinking. Similarly, the Turkish language curriculum (Bayrak Özmutlu, 2020) and textbooks (Karadağ & Tekercioglu, 2019) are limited regarding thinking skills.
The scarcity of opportunities regarding thinking or thinking education may relate to the socio-cultural elements of the context. Thinking might be impacted by the social signs (Vygotsky, 1978) and individuals tend to employ the cognitive tools of their social environment (Sternberg, 1997). Thinking is, indeed, a social construct and children internalize many of the observed attributes (Sternberg, 1997). In this sense, thinking may also reflect cultural reminiscences (Özer, 2016). In his thematic analysis, Özer (2016) found that Turkish proverbs that relate to thinking may reflect it as a negative or problematic concept.
This research employed a qualitative methodology: phenomenology. Phenomenological research focuses on the meaning of experiences and it “seeks to describe the essence of a phenomenon by exploring it from the perspective of those who have experienced it” (Neubauer et al., 2019, p.91). As this study aims to describe participants’ experiences of thinking and social reactions to their thinking, Husserlian phenomenology was employed. In this sense, this study will answer the following question:
What are the lived experiences of pre-service teachers when they said, “I am thinking”?
To understand their experiences, what thinking is for pre-service teachers, and which proverbs pre-service teachers remember hearing the word “thinking” was also investigated, respectively.
Data were collected via focus group interviews. The interviews began with a social conversation and participants were informed to feel free to communicate their experiences. Seven focus group interviews of 5 to 7 participants were conducted. Each interview lasted around 17-22 minutes. During the interviews, participants described (1) thinking, (2) talk about the reactions they got when they say, “I am thinking”, and (3) state the proverbs when they hear the word “thinking”. I collected data till saturation was reached (30- to 90 min.; Mapp, 2008) and then, data were transcribed verbatim.
To analyze the data, I employed bracketing (Neubauer et al., 2019; Wilson, 2015; Yüksel & Yıldırım, 2015). Then, I did a phenomenological reduction of the raw data to clear out all elements that are not directly related to the experience (Yüksel & Yıldırım, 2015). At this stage, horizons (codes, units of meaning) that represent the textural description of the phenomenon (Neubauer et al., 2019) were created. Then, I analyzed data for structural themes that Moustakas (1994) called imaginative variation. During the task of imaginative variation, a researcher seeks meaning by employing polarities. Following these procedures, data were synthesized to describe the reactions to thinking. To ensure validity, bracketing, member check (Neubauer et al., 2019), and analyzing the data at two different intervals was used.
Participants (N=42) came from a state university on the west coast of Turkey. They studied at the department of English Language Teaching. They were 18-32 years old. Those participants were invited to the study via convenience sampling method and the ones who had no hesitation of sharing previous experiences were purposefully recruited for data collection. The sample was composed of freshman, sophomore, and juniors.
Participants’ definitions of thinking were analyzed in two; the nature and functions of thinking. Individual and universal characteristics as well as various skills were identified for the nature and functions of thinking, respectively.
There were 56 responses for the reactions of thinking, and these were categorized into three: positive, negative, and neutral. 80% of them were negative reactions. These negative reactions highlight that thinking occurs when there is a problem ,thinking takes too much time, thinking makes one vulnerable to the personal attacks, others may be indifferent to thinking, actions matter rather than thinking. Neutral reactions (8%) simply focused on the stimuli or the object of thinking and the other party asks the thinker about it. On the other hand, positive reactions (12%) focused on sharing the ideas; however, they assume that the thinker has a problem, and the listener is there to support him/her.
Participants also highlighted fourteen Turkish proverbs or idioms. 2 were positive and they were related to being smart. Neutral (N=5) reactions pertained to that thinking takes time. Half of the proverbs or idioms highlighted negative connotations. These were related to having a problem or bad intentions and spending too much time for thinking.