Critical thinking is, essentially, the art of evaluating information as opposed to storing or using it.
Many students quickly become experts at assimilating information, a necessary and useful skill.
The root of science, however, lies not in absorbing data but in interpreting it. The answer depends on which thinking skills you are applying to it. The data have been assimilated but not put to any active use. Next we bring forward a student who has learned the scientific method but is not yet skilled in critical thinking. This is where critical thinking comes in.