The article is dedicated to development of systems thinking among the students of different specialties. Systems thinking, in modern time, becomes crucial for specialists in the fields of technic and technology, economics, environmental management, management etc. Authors propose to use cognitive modelling for development of systems thinking among the students Construction of models of complex, semi-structured systems in the form of oriented graph allows to simultaneously view the factors of different nature that are related in the considered problems. Introduction of weight coefficients, allowing to advance from verbal models to soft ones, requires from model developer deeper examination of reviewed factors, numerical assessment of their values. Usually this becomes possible when using special knowledge from different fields, received by the student during studying of different subjects and application of such methodologies as statistical analysis and expert assessment. Common discussion of developed models in student groups, allows to increase the interest to the process of work performance. During the discussions students train to avoid typical modelling mistakes, among which are following: incomplete review of system factors, incorrect understanding of mutual impact of factors etc. The article contains examples of models, constructed by the students, during the course of cognitive modelling, dedicated to different tasksfrom enterprise management to reform of education system.