Higher-order thinking skills from teachers’ perspectives in 21st-century Türkiye: Skill priorities, student profiles, and developmental factors

Abstract

This study aims to identify teachers’ perceptions of students’ higher-order thinking (H-OT) skills, the characteristics of students who demonstrate these skills, and the factors that foster their development. It also examines whether teachers’ rankings vary by sex, professional seniority, and school type. A sequential exploratory mixed-methods design was employed. In the qualitative phase, semi-structured interviews informed the development of a ranking-judgment scale. In the quantitative phase, data were collected from 405 teachers working in Türkiye and analyzed using the rank-order judgment scaling method. The findings indicated that creative thinking was ranked as the most important H-OT skill, followed by critical thinking, metacognitive thinking, problem-solving, and analytical thinking. Teachers described students with H-OT skills mainly as multidimensional thinkers, inquisitive, self-confident, and articulate. Parental attitudes, student personality, and social environment emerged as the most influential developmental factors. Group comparisons showed that teachers’ views differed only in selected skills, student profiles, and developmental factors. These findings may inform classroom practices, teacher education, and policy efforts aimed at promoting H-OT skills through inquiry-based learning, school–family cooperation, and enriched learning environments.

Keywords

• Higher-order thinking skills
• Creative thinking
• Multidimensional thinking
• Parental attitudes
• Ordinal scaling method

Ethical Statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest. This research study complies with research publishing ethics. Ethics committee approval was obtained in accordance with institutional regulations. Ethics Committee Number: Erciyes University, 22.02.2022-95.

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