Logic puzzles are a very common critical thinking skills activity that many children encounter in school. Logic puzzles have their origins in the field of mathematics. Completing a logic puzzle on the weekends or during school breaks is an amazing way parents can help children to develop critical thinking skills. Logic puzzles will give your child a situation, and the child will use logic in order to solve the problem. This critical thinking activity will help your child develop the skills necessary to make complex decisions later on in life. Successful completion of logic puzzles will also boost your child's self-esteem by making your child realize that he is smart enough to solve even the most complex problems.
Critical thinking skills often go hand in hand with creativity. Having a child write a story or poem serves as a great way to foster critical thinking skills. Give younger children a picture and have them write a story that fits the picture. Give older children a snippet of a news story and have them write their thoughts about the matter. Another writing activity that fosters critical thinking is to have children write about what a song or poem means to them. Hand out the lyrics to a popular song or a poem and let the children read it. Then, they can tell you what it means to them.
Building models out of various mediums such as clay is an excellent critical thinking activity for children. Children love to play with modeling clay and other means of building things. Hand out a scaled diagram of an object and have your child or students build a model using the diagram. This will help brush up math skills and foster creative thinking. Lego kits are another way to encourage children to use instructions to build or assemble objects when you are unable to draw a diagram of what you want built.