Social scientists often use case study exercises to foster this critical thinking. A teaching strategy pioneered by the Harvard Business School, case studies are used to measure the utility of a theory against the reality of an event. I combine case studies and minute writing in a lesson on the sources of American violence. I then give each student an newspaper article about a massacre, riot, or gunfight. Students break into groups, discuss the article, then write a paragraph about which theory, if any, best explains the source of the violence.
Some students find that the case fits a theory nicely.
Others are dissatisfied with all of the theories and offer their own explanation. We interrupt this program . . . Aldous Huxley imagined a brave new world of happy amusements that would disable our most human characteristic, our capacity to reason and think. Play a history video for your class and watch that Huxleyan nightmare. Brains shut down in a stupor as the tube entertains.