Key Takeaways

• THINKING PRO offers 20 self-paced, interactive videos that teach reading and critical thinking skills side by side.
• The suite includes seven reading videos, eight critical thinking videos, and five advanced critical thinking videos.
• Every video follows the "I do, we do, you do, and transfer" modeling sequence and ties reading and thinking to the writing process.
• Historical news articles about familiar events, such as the sinking of the Titanic, keep the focus on skill development instead of unfamiliar background knowledge and vocabulary.
• Embedded gamified activities give students instant feedback and a proficiency score, and students can retake videos to raise it.
• Federally funded research found more than 84% of students using THINKING PRO Essentials reached proficiency in reading and critical thinking strategies.

Reading scores have been falling, and they are not bouncing back. On the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress, the average fourth-grade reading score fell two points from 2022 and five points from 2019, and about a third of eighth graders missed the NAEP Basic benchmark — the largest share on record. Teachers know the pattern in their own rooms: students who can decode a passage but cannot tell a claim from an opinion, or spot what a source left out.

Critical thinking is the second half of the problem, and it is just as measurable. When the Stanford History Education Group tested 3,446 high school students on their ability to evaluate digital sources, the results were troubling. When shown a grainy video that was actually shot in Russia, 52% treated it as strong evidence of voter fraud in a US election. Of the more than 3,000 students evaluated, only three students actually tracked down the real source of the video. Additionally, two-thirds of students could not tell sponsored content from a news article.

Fluent readers, in other words, are not automatically careful ones. Evaluating evidence, weighing sources, and recognizing a counterclaim are separate skills, and they have to be taught.

THINKING PRO was built to fill both gaps at once.

What the Interactive Video Suite Covers

The heart of the THINKING PRO program is a set of 20 short, student-paced videos. Seven cover reading strategies, including using text structure, reading with context clues, monitoring attention, and making inferences. Eight cover core critical thinking strategies such as identifying claims and evidence, separating facts from opinions and explanations, evaluating trustworthiness, and writing a summary. Five advanced videos push further into source evaluation, counterclaims, and competing explanations.

Each video teaches one strategy, then connects it to writing, so students are putting newfound skills to work and producing something deliverable.

Modeling First, Independence Second

The videos move through the sequence most teachers already trust: I do, we do, you do, and transfer. That progression comes from the gradual release of responsibility framework, a staple of teacher preparation for more than two decades.

Voice-over and animation in THINKING PRO videos include this modeling. Instead of a dense unfamiliar text, students work with historical news coverage of events they already know something about — the Titanic disaster, the Wright brothers' first flight, and other well-documented moments. Because the background knowledge is already in place, students can spend their attention on the strategy itself rather than decoding new content and vocabulary at the same time.

Adaptive Practice With Instant Feedback

Gamified activities are embedded throughout, giving students room to practice and see how they did right away. Two things happen:

• The video adjusts: Proficient learners get randomized prompts with light guidance, while developing learners get structured cues and guided explanation.
• Students get a proficiency rating: Each video ends with a visual score, and students can revisit the lesson to strengthen their work.

Then comes the part that matters most: transfer. Students apply the same strategies to current informational texts they run into at school, at work, and in daily life — news coverage, workplace documents, and the kind of online claims that warrant skeptical reading.

How THINKING PRO Can Support Your Students All Year

Flexibility is the point. Teachers can:

• Sprinkle THINKING PRO Essentials through existing units for targeted upskilling, which works well for students with reading gaps or unfinished learning from the pandemic years.
• Run a THINKING PRO Curriculum Unit as a high-dosage, high-impact block of 5 to 12 weeks, or stretch it across the full school year as a parallel intervention.

An Evidence-Based Approach

Federally funded research found that 88% of students using THINKING PRO Essentials achieved proficiency in reading strategies and 84% in critical thinking strategies.

A randomized controlled study of the five-week curriculum unit with 229 students produced substantial, statistically significant effects in reading, writing, mathematics, and science — all from five weeks of instruction and a program that can be adapted to various subjects and student circumstances. Whether you’re teaching multilingual learners, preparing adult learners for college, or boosting high school social studies skills, THINKING PRO delivers.

Development and evaluation have been supported by the U.S. Departments of Agriculture, Defense, Education, and State.

Bring THINKING PRO to Your Students

If your current materials are not moving the needle on reading comprehension or critical thinking, THINKING PRO is worth a look. Watch a demo video today, book a live walkthrough, or license a classroom set for up to 100 students. There are also funding options to explore if you need help covering the cost.

Here at Thinking Habitats, we use thinking tools to empower young people to lead successful lives and contribute to the well-being of their communities. Our online platform has helped students improve their critical thinking, reading comprehension, and news media literacy, and has had significant individual and community impacts. Get THINKING PRO today and enable students to feel more empowered in decision-making, more mindful of their news engagement, and more connected to their local community!

References:

Breakstone, J., Smith, M., Wineburg, S., Rapaport, A., Carle, J., Garland, M., & Saavedra, A. (2020). Students’ civic online reasoning: A national portrait. Stanford Digital Repository. https://purl.stanford.edu/gf151tb4868

Explore Results for the 2024 NAEP Reading Assessment. (n.d.). The Nation’s Report Card. https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/reports/reading/2024/g4_8/

Fisher, D., & Frey, N. (2025, October 1). Revisiting the rules of gradual release of responsibility. ISTE+ASCD.
https://www.ascd.org/el/articles/revisiting-the-rules-of-gradual-release-of-responsibility

The nation’s report card shows declines in reading, some progress in 4th grade math. (2025, January 29). National Assessment Governing Board. https://www.nagb.gov/news-and-events/news-releases/2025/nations-report-card-decline-in-reading-progress-in-math.html