Pedagogical methodologies in teaching critical thinking skills to basic police recruits at Madison Area Technical College

Abstract

Police officers working in the year 2000 have a much different job than those working a few short years ago. In the 1960s, despite the threat of faster response times and more officers on the street, crime rates continued to rise. To address this, police agencies developed community relations units to improve their image (Gaines, 1991). The focus of the police, as "crook catchers" and responding when called, was gradually transferred into preventing crime. This was the beginning of Community Policing. Community Policing requires officers to be pro-active in their function, rather than the time honored re-active. To be successful, officers must be able to solve problems using higher level thinking than was traditionally required. This higher level of problem solving necessitates that officers possess critical thinking ability. The research hypotheses of this study was that a majority of the instructional methodology used during the Madison Area Technical College Law Enforcement Basic Recruit Academy does not encourage critical thinking and problem solving skills in its graduates. The subjects for this study were adults accepted into the 69th Basic Police Recruit Academy of the Madison Area Technical College (MATC). The instrument chosen to test the level of critical thinking skills for this study was the California Critical Thinking Skills Test (CCTST). The instrument, as a pre-test, was presented to the subjects during their first week of training. A consent form along with a short demographic questionnaire accompanied the instrument. A post-test was presented to the subjects during their last week of training. Accompanying the post-test was a short questionnaire asking the respondents to identify the methods of instruction used during the training period and to estimate the percentage of time each of the methods were used. A similar survey was sent to instructors who presented material during the training, asking that they identify topics covered, time allowed for each topic, and methodologies used. The lecture method of teaching was by far the most often used methodology during the 69th Class of MATC’s Basic Recruit Academy. To learn critical thinking skills, trainees are best taught using interactive methodologies. Pre and post-test data collected indicated that the graduates of the 69th Class of MATC’s Basic Recruit Academy did not gain in the area of critical thinking skills.