Shaping critical thinkingas a contemporary challenge of education for safety

<ns3:p>Shaping critical thinking is a particular challenge faced by contemporary education, aimed at shaping future generations ready and able to build the foundations of a relatively safe social reality. When responding to the threats emerging at the threshold of the 21st century, when thinking about education, it is impossible to ignore its references to broadly understood security, its recognition and establishment, and this entails the need to include in education systems the development of the ability to think critically, which may constitute the basis for better understanding threats and facing them. This article attempts to demonstrate the importance and role of critical thinking in education in the context of its contemporary challenges, particularly those related to broadly defined human security. Starting from an understanding of issues related to human safety in the world facing contemporary challenges, while simultaneously drawing on the experiences of the past century, the authors invoke the concept of security, outlining its possible meanings. In the presented study, the indication of safety as a value is the starting point for presenting education as an area of human activity that should be particularly concerned with shaping attitudes towards building a safe space for people to live. Education focused on safety (education for safety), in order to best respond to the identified needs, should be coupled with the development of critical thinking skills, which is and should be one of the key tasks of pedagogy.</ns3:p>