AUTHOR=Puig Blanca , Blanco-Anaya Paloma , Pérez-Maceira Jorge J. TITLE=“Fake News” or Real Science? Critical Thinking to Assess Information on COVID-19 JOURNAL=Frontiers in Education VOLUME=6 YEAR=2021 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/education/articles/10.3389/feduc.2021.646909 DOI=10.3389/feduc.2021.646909 ISSN=2504-284X ABSTRACT=
Few people question the important role of critical thinking in students becoming active citizens; however, the way science is taught in schools continues to be more oriented toward “what to think” rather than “how to think.” Researchers understand critical thinking as a tool and a higher-order thinking skill necessary for being an active citizen when dealing with socio-scientific information and making decisions that affect human life, which the pandemic of COVID-19 provides many opportunities for. The outbreak of COVID-19 has been accompanied by what the World Health Organization (WHO) has described as a “massive infodemic.” Fake news covering all aspects of the pandemic spread rapidly through social media, creating confusion and disinformation. This paper reports on an empirical study carried out during the lockdown in Spain (March–May 2020) with a group of secondary students (