CONTRIBUTION TO THE DEFINITION OF A CRITICAL TECHNOLOGY

Being able to value critical thinking skills represents a necessary way to face the urgent need of renewal and innovation in education, if we want to establish policies, aiming at increasing social welfare. As Paul and Elder (2002, p. 230) states, “everyone thinks, it is our nature to do so. But much of our thinking, left to itself, is biased, distorted, partial, uninformed or downright prejudiced. Yet the quality of our life and that of what we produce, make, or build depends precisely on the quality of our thought. Excellence in thought, however, must be systematically cultivated”. The research, to be developed at the DIPED – Dipartimento di Progettazione Educativa e Didattica (Department for Educational Design) – Università Roma Tre – is set in this context and, besides being carried out in higher education, aims at projecting its results on different settings, so that the results collected could contribute to improve other areas, such as continuing education, enhancing development in various fields of knowledge.