ICTEF｜10/31-11/1｜台北松山｜植境plantārium
About ICTEF | About the International Critical Thinking Education Forum
Tomorrow requires critical minds.
Are we prepared?
In Asia, awareness of the importance of critical thinking is gradually rising, but a significant gap remains between recognizing its value and actually bringing it into education, family life, organizations, and daily life. Many people agree that critical thinking matters, but lack the opportunity to truly understand it; they want to start practicing it, but lack the methods, resources, and community to exchange ideas with.
99%
believe critical thinking is very important
vs
9%
believe existing training is sufficient for teaching critical thinking
Our mission is to narrow the gap between the 99% and 9%.
Helping more people understand critical thinking and know how to start
The International Critical Thinking Education Forum (ICTEF) is hosted by Lead For Taiwan and held in Taipei every two years. We invite educators, scholars, youth, parents, business leaders, and social changemakers from across Asia and around the world to gather and explore the intersection of "Critical Thinking × Education × Sustainable Future."
Here, we explore global shifts in education, exchange cross-cultural critical-thinking practices, and bring real, frontline challenges into thought-provoking discussions. Through global perspectives and stories, immersive exhibitions, and practical strategies, we invite participants to rediscover critical thinking through active questioning, listening, experiencing, and shared dialogue.
Our goal is to help more people move beyond simply "knowing that critical thinking is important" toward truly understanding, experiencing, and putting it into practice.
As more experiences are seen, more methods are shared, and more people willing to take action find one another, critical thinking can gradually grow from an individual skill into a shared culture of education and society.
Those with ideas and are putting them into practice
Across Asia, quiet pioneers are already reshaping how we teach, opening space for real dialogue, and nurturing the next generation's minds. We want their stories seen, shared, and carried forward to inspire society.
Those who with interest but don't know how to start
From understanding critical thinking to sensing where the world is headed to holding a method in your own hands. We want every idea to find its first real step into practice
Those who are already on the path of change
Meeting people across countries, fields, and generations, exchanging ideas on the change already underway, questioning our own methods anew, and finding companions for the long road ahead.
Making those who are already changing things visible,and helping those who want to start find a way
Starting from the Four Core Pillars
Inspiration × Impact × Tool × Interaction
From seeing the world, to seeing change; from finding a method, to taking part yourself.
Bring your questions — leave with new perspectives, new methods, and new companions.
Grasping Trends
A Global View
See what's happening in the world, and rethink where we can go from here. Bringing together educators, scholars, policymakers, and voices from different fields — from AI to educational innovation to a sustainable future — to open up new ways of imagining what's next.
Real Experience
Impactful Stories
Frontline practitioners share the trials, struggles, adjustments, and results along their journey — connecting experiences scattered across different places and helping more people find their own next step.
Practical Methods
Immediate Application
Moving from "I know critical thinking matters" to "I know how to do it." Through real examples, tools, and hands-on scenarios, participants leave the forum ready to start applying what they've learned — in the classroom, at home, in organizations, and in everyday life.
Engaged Dialogue
Voicing Perspectives
Bring your own questions and viewpoints, and truly become part of the forum. Through interactive sessions, hands-on critical-thinking experiences, topic discussions, and open exchange, people from different backgrounds can question, listen, and trade perspectives with one another.
Lead For Taiwan
臺灣領導未來協會
Lead For Taiwan (LFT) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting critical thinking education. Recognizing the need for greater impact, LFT concluded that change must start at the root — within Taiwan's mainstream education system — and proposed building a critical thinking education system for Taiwan using a "train-the-trainer" model, creating a positive cycle that accelerates change and sustains its impact over time.
Since 2018, LFT has run winter and summer camps, trainer development programs, and teacher workshops, and has taught semester-long critical thinking courses in senior high and vocational schools — reaching over 7,000 young people, helping them engage deeply with important social issues and build habits of independent thinking. Ultimately, LFT's goal is to make critical thinking part of everyday life, creating a society that thinks carefully and communicates with openness.
2018
Founded
45
Schools implemented critical thinking courses
16,500+
Total people reached
