This strategy builds critical thinking by encouraging students to review examples and develop criteria; they apply inductive reasoning. In addition, it allows students to work cooperatively, contributing to co-construction of knowledge in small groups.

Get at least four examples of a class of items (e.g., letters, brochures, an art form, a lab report, equations, etc.)

Students are given examples of the item studied. In small groups, they review the examples and rank them, best to worst. Next, they identify why they classify some criteria as better or worse. Students record the criteria in small groups. As a large group, compare the criteria.

This is good for any topic that requires the student to create a work that has to meet particular criteria. Rather than the teacher telling them what is good or bad, students use induction to arrive at criteria.

For example, a task such as writing a letter would begin with samples of letters with students applying induction to determine the parts of a letter and criteria for good and bad letter content.

Variation: Provide a placemat to guide their induction (e.g., parts of a letter, effective elements of a composition, ineffective elements, etc.).