Cultivating Higher-Order Thinking in Islamic Education: A Systematic Review of Pedagogical, Curricular, Assessment, and Institutional Pathways Deny Haryadi, Wahyu Widada
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Background: Higher-order thinking had become a central concern in Islamic education, but evidence on its development remained fragmented across pedagogy, curriculum, assessment, teacher capacity, and institutional conditions. Objective: This review examined how these pathways jointly shaped critical, creative, and related higher-order thinking. Methods: Scopus was searched for articles published from 2021 to 2026. Of 188 records identified, 101 remained after database filters and 43 passed scope screening. Five secondary or conceptual records were reclassified as contextual literature, leaving 38 primary empirical studies for thematic synthesis. Results: Active, inquiry-oriented, reflective, collaborative, and problem-centred learning generally supported higher-order cognition when cognitive demand, teacher facilitation, and assessment were aligned. Faith integration was most productive when it structured authentic reasoning rather than functioning as symbolic content. Teacher competence, assessment literacy, leadership, resources, and institutional culture explained substantial variation in implementation. Conclusion: Higher-order thinking in Islamic education was best understood as an alignment problem across four interacting pathways. The evidence remained limited by Scopus-only retrieval, a 2021–2026 window, heterogeneous measures, and geographically concentrated studies.
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