Thinking Skills, Mediation for Thinking Development and Transdisciplinary Teaching

Throughout the previous chapter, the concept of transdisciplinary teaching and learning was examined from different perspectives, aiming to present the advantages and challenges educators may have while planning and executing their transdisciplinary work. The chapter also presented the core elements to be implemented in order to develop efficient transdisciplinary teaching and learning that motivates the continued development of transdisciplinary teaching. Among these elements, researchers emphasize the significant role proper development of thinking skills plays on efficient learning. This chapter aims to introduce the readers to the core knowledge regarding the meaning of thinking skills, their contributions to learners’ development and their inclusion in society and efficient mediation methods that can be used in order to facilitate the development of those skills among different learners. As presented later in the chapter, there are different approaches towards the definitions of thinking skills and mediation. However, the common points of agreement are based on one important understanding that all forms of efficient thinking should share the three-stage foundation of input, elaboration and output (Flavian, 2019; Kaniel, 2003). While educators cannot observe the elaboration processes, they can learn from the results of the thinking, which are presented in the output. Therefore, educators must plan their teaching carefully in order to allow proper input procedures that will influence the unseen elaboration and later the visible output. Additionally, the mediation approach presented in this chapter offers a practical method to promote thinking skills within transdisciplinary teaching that is applicable to all learners.