Nowadays, critical thinking stands out as one of the key competencies for developing the ability to analyze and evaluate information. It is also an essential skill that enables decisionmaking and the development of arguments and personal opinions and active participation in modern society. Previous research on teaching related to the development of critical thinking emphasizes the importance of developing critical thinking in education and highlights the role of teachers in the teaching process. However, no one questions the textbook as one of the main teaching tools of teaching methodology. The aim of this paper is to offer definitions of critical thinking by various authors, present the concept of critical thinking from Socratic times to the present day and analyze the textbook units instrumentation based on Iva Buchbergers generic model of teaching for critical thinking and its dimensions. Additionally, it aims to determine what extent the analyzed textbooks from the Croatian language influence the development of critical thinking in fourth grade primary school students and whether there is a significant difference between the reviewed textbooks. The research subject includes six most represented textbooks from the publishing houses Profil Klett, Školska knjiga and Alfa, approved for the 2023./24. school year. The analysis showed a lack of content that encourages critical thinking among students in the fourth grade of elementary school. The contents of the Croatian language textbooks clearly and concretely develop the critical thinking of the first dimension, the critical approach, and the fifth dimension, the democratic teaching environment, according to the generic teaching model for critical thinking by Iva Buchberger. However, there is noticeable absence of the development of the other three dimensions is noticeable: critical action, active teaching methods and forms of work and active evaluation methods.