Heard Rush talking about this today.
Critical thinking is the practice of making judgements ( < Greek "kritikos" = "able to discern or judge" ) about what you read or hear. To do it, you need to know three things: grammar (how language is used to express thought), logic (how arguments are constructed), and rhetoric (how arguments are presented). These three subjects are what used to be called the Trivium — the "trivial" stuff you had to learn before you got into "real" subjects.
Nowadays, we have "outcome-based education" and "Common Core", meaning, everybody is educated (read: "trained") to come to the correct (read: "PC") conclusions without any idea how they got there, and especially with zero hint that other conclusions might be possible.
Our taxes at work....
Outcome-based is a communist approach:
Equality (uniformity) of outcome, not equality of opportunity.
To do it, you need to know three things: grammar (how language is used to express thought), logic (how arguments are constructed), and rhetoric (how arguments are presented).
Not quite...
The things you read or hear have to be TRUE!!