It is now widely advocated an education in science and mathematics with a perspective of literacy which enables every one to contribute to the improvement of the quality of life for all and to a sustainable environment for current and future generations. In this line, together with the fact that critical thinking emerges as prominent and closely linked to scientific literacy and numeracy, this article focuses on studies developed by its authors in order to bring clarity and intelligibility to this field, establishing a framework which can be used to guide teacher education and education in science and mathematics for children and young people. The framework presented here is configured as a support for teachers to construct clear ideas about scientific literacy / numeracy / critical thinking, which can be molded congruently in developing teaching materials and practices essentially oriented to promote students' critical literacy.
scientific literacy; numeracy; critical thinking; teacher education; education in science and mathematics
