Problem çözme yoluyla eleştirel düşünme becerilerinin gelişim sürecinin incelenmesi

Today, one of the most important problems of education is the problem whether we can teach our students the ways of thinking or not. The obligation to store information in our minds has been overcome in parallel with technological developments. Therefore, to teach more profound and complicated ways of thinking will cause a problem of accomodation with the world in the future. With this aim, many innovative methods are tested. This aim includes the teaching of critical thinking.This study is the one in which problem solving is used in the instruction of critical thinking. In order to reach this aim, for the sample, four students are chosen among the first-year students of the department of mathematics of faculty of education of a State University. Faculty of education of a State University constructs the sample of this study . Four students chosen from the department of mathematics in primary education form the sample of this research .This research is a qualititive one. In this study, the accumulation of data is achieved on the basis of negotiation with the students to a great extent. Moreover, the observation of students? behaviors is done and in oder to get feedback from them, some written documents are asked and these documents are assessed, too. In this study, the questions used for the negotiation are compiled from an international brochure that is published by NPEC in 2001. At the end of the reserach, the accumulated data are analyzed in compliance with phenomenographical technique.At the end of the research, some behaviorial changes in students and development in skills are observed. Consequently, it has been believed that some developments can be achieved both in conceptual terms and procedural terms when the teachers employ some methods of questioning in crtical thinking .Words: critical thinking, phenomenography, problem solving.