What is Structured Devil’s Advocacy

Critical thinking pedagogy is usually conceived as a solo teacher working with multiple students. Yet, if we take seriously the finding that students benefit enormously from seeing their instructors model critical thinking in front of them, and telling them that this is what they are doing, then team teaching represents a missed opportunity in this pedagogy. Instructors teaching as part of a team can show students how to ask questions of each other, how to disagree without condemning a peer, how to open each other up to multiple perspectives, and how to point out assumptions that each other holds. When all members of a teaching participate in all planning, instruction and evaluation, then students can see a critical dialogue unfolding before them. After laying out research on how students learn to think critically this chapter outlines the benefits of team teaching for both students and faculty members.