Start with Bloom's Taxonomy. Explain the lower level skills of knowledge, comprehension and application. Have students give you medical examples of these skills--recalling information on medications, understanding the meaning of tests and using a new concept in admissions procedures--to demonstrate that they understand the basics.
Move on to analysis. At this level, nursing students have to understand how to separate concepts into components and how to distinguish between facts and inferences. Have them troubleshoot a piece of medical equipment--an oxygen mask that isn't working--and see if they can figure out the problem.
List the key words for the analysis level of critical thinking: deconstruct, distinguish, identify, selects and infers. Have your nursing students give you examples of how they use analysis during their work on the ward. Record the examples on the whiteboard.
Teach the concept of synthesis. Explain that to be able to synthesize, they have to be able to take diverse elements and assemble them into a new form or structure. Review a hospital operations manual. Have your nursing students identity the diverse range of people, facilities and structures that are required to run a medical operation.
Concentrate on key vocabulary words for synthesis, such as create, compose, generate and summarize.
Focus on evaluation, the highest level thinking skill in the taxonomy. Give your students a medical situation where they have to select the most effective solution. It could be, for example, a triage setting where there are three patients all needing attention--one with a broken leg, another with a stab wound and the third with chest pain--and they have to identify which one they would treat first.
Review the key concepts and vocabulary of evaluation. Stress that the key words for this level of thinking include words such as explain, interpret, justify and criticize.