Centre for Critical Thinking and Ethics

Every school strives to educate its students, to provide opportunities to learn broadly and deeply. When we established our Critical Thinking and Ethics Quarters in 2022, our programmatic commitment to critical thinking – the capacity to question, listen, explore, shift and perhaps change your view – really took shape. The Centre for Critical Thinking and Ethics is now central to the provision of the fearless liberal education we offer at Newington College.

Our bespoke critical thinking program, a progressive and spiralled program of lessons, is delivered by experts to students in years K–10. Behind the scenes, pedagogy and sequencing are being reviewed together with our subject experts to make sure lessons encourage students to think with open minds and clear eyes. Challenging accepted positions and ideas with rational and considered arguments isn’t just accepted; it’s encouraged.

We have partnered with the Association for Philosophy in Schools NSW to offer professional learning courses to teachers to support and develop students’ critical thinking across all subjects and all year groups. These, and our other professional learning workshops, are open to all NSW teachers.

We are a hub of critical inquiry, having established inter-school events which bring students from schools across NSW together in collaborative discussion, such as our annual Meeting of Minds and the Sydney Philosothon. And we look forward to developing our programming further. 

The Centre for Critical Thinking and Ethics serves the Newington community. As leaders in this space, we proudly share our resources and programs with others in order to increase and improve critical thinking in as many classrooms as we can. Our very popular ethics lecture series – a feature of the College’s outreach to the wider community for over a decade – continues to be an integral part of our work. 

 In short, we aim to exhibit best practice in nurturing critical and creative thinking, building capacity both in and beyond Newington College.