Parents, today’s generation has a hard time answering ‘why’ questions. Critical thinking is deteriorating because we fail to be inquisitive.  We think that we need more hours during the day to foster critical thinking in our children when we just need time to conversate with them.  We just have to start being more conscious of asking them why- “why do you think”, “why did you…”, etc.  During a conversation, ask questions so they’re forced to think deeper than what they already know and go beyond their obvious senses.  We cannot guarantee that school will be the primary source where they will learn this skill, because this generation, more likely than ours, just take everything quickly through their senses.  They’re blasted with information, with lightning speed, without the downtime for them to meditate on it, for them to question it, challenge it, dissect it, process it.  We have to remind them to think about how to think.  We cannot tell them how photosynthesis works without understanding why it’s needed and the grander scheme it plays in the ecosystem. Without the why, there is just a presence of fact and absence of reason.