Understanding and teaching critical thinking—A new approach

•Phenomenography is suggested as a way to handle problems in critical thinking research.•Phenomenography shows potential as a pedagogy for critical thinking based on students understanding.•Phenomenography shows potential to give such a pedagogy a solid theoretical base. Developing students’ critical thinking is a major educational goal in societies around the world. In spite of this, the research community has had serious problems handling this highly prized goal. In reference to these problems, several issues have been discussed, one being the theory issue, where the theoretical development has been pointed out as insufficient, especially theory concerning the learning experience connected with the development of critical thinking. This article introduces the use of the phenomenographic theoretical approach in the field of critical thinking. Taking an empirical study as an illustrative example, the article shows how phenomenographic theory, in a promising way, could be used for understanding concrete expressions of critical thinking and designing teaching to develop students’ critical thinking.