Depth of Knowledge (DoK) in critical thinking refers to the level of cognitive complexity required to perform a task or understand a concept, particularly within the context of assessment and learning standards.
Depth of Knowledge (DoK) is a framework designed to categorize the cognitive demand of tasks and assessments. As referenced, Depth of Knowledge or DoK is another type of framework used to identify the level of rigor for an assessment. It was developed by Dr. Norman Webb in 1997 to categorize activities according to the level of complexity in thinking. The creation of the DoK stemmed from the alignment of standards to assessments. While not exclusively focused on "critical thinking" itself, DoK provides a valuable structure for understanding the varying levels of cognitive processes involved, many of which are integral to critical thinking.
Understanding Depth of Knowledge Levels
DoK typically consists of four levels, each representing increasing cognitive complexity:
- DoK 1: Recall and Reproduction: Requires recalling facts, terms, concepts, or performing simple procedures. This level involves basic memorization and retrieval.
- DoK 2: Skills and Concepts: Involves engaging mental processing beyond recalling facts. It requires using information or conceptual knowledge to solve problems, make decisions, or perform tasks that involve more than a single step. Examples include comparing, classifying, summarizing, or estimating.
- DoK 3: Strategic Thinking: Requires deep understanding, complex reasoning, and planning. Tasks at this level involve analyzing information, drawing conclusions, citing evidence, or solving non-routine problems. Students must go beyond recalling or applying prior knowledge; they need to engage in abstract reasoning and metacognition.
- DoK 4: Extended Thinking: Demands significant cognitive effort and is typically required to complete complex tasks over an extended period. This involves synthesizing information from multiple sources, designing experiments, conducting investigations, creating products, or solving multifaceted real-world problems. It often requires integrating knowledge from various content areas and demonstrating complex reasoning, planning, and synthesis.
DoK and Critical Thinking
Critical thinking is the process of analyzing and evaluating information objectively to form a judgment. The various levels of DoK align well with the progression of critical thinking skills:
- DoK 1 involves foundational knowledge necessary for critical thinking (recalling facts or definitions).
- DoK 2 involves applying knowledge and understanding concepts, which is a step towards analytical thinking (comparing viewpoints, explaining cause and effect).
- DoK 3 aligns closely with core critical thinking processes such as analysis, evaluation, and synthesis to solve problems or make arguments (evaluating evidence, justifying conclusions, analyzing complex texts).
- DoK 4 represents the highest level of critical thinking, where learners apply their analytical, evaluative, and creative skills to conduct original research, solve complex, ill-defined problems, or produce significant work (designing a study to test a hypothesis, critiquing a major policy based on evidence).
Practical Application: Critical Thinking Tasks by DoK Level
Categorizing critical thinking activities using DoK helps educators design tasks that challenge students appropriately.
| DoK Level | Associated Critical Thinking Actions | Example Task |
|---|---|---|
| DoK 1 | Recalling definitions, identifying facts | Define the term "bias." |
| DoK 2 | Summarizing, comparing, classifying, explaining cause/effect | Compare and contrast two different arguments on a topic. |
| DoK 3 | Analyzing, evaluating, synthesizing, reasoning, hypothesizing | Analyze the reliability of a historical source and explain your reasoning. |
| DoK 4 | Designing studies, critiquing, synthesizing multiple sources, creating | Develop a plan to investigate the impact of a policy change on a community. |
By understanding and applying the DoK framework, educators can ensure that assessments and learning activities require increasingly complex levels of thinking, thus fostering deeper and more sophisticated critical thinking skills.
