...Critical Thinkers and Education A Teachers Goal Bia Mcgrue Scypion EDU372: Educational Psychology Prof. Jimletta Vareene-Thomas 2/20/2016 Critical Thinkers and Education A Teachers Goal Throughout life we are challenged and we encounter an abundance of issues or problems that we need to solve. Some problems that can be resolved effortlessly and efficiently but other obstacles may require a more critical and creative thinking to overcome. When it comes down to thinking to solve problems we depend on our thinking or give some regurgitated answer that we just read. But “much of our thinking, left to itself, is biased, distorted, partial, uninformed, or downright prejudiced” (TCTC, 2016). The purpose of critical thinking is so that we are able to not only accomplish or attain understanding but also so we can assess or check each other’s frame of reference and eventually clarify the question or dilemma at hand. Some would argue whose challenge is it to get students to move pass their beliefs and assumption. Is it on students to dig deeper to gain or find additional tools and information that leads to developing a more in depth thought process. Richard Dawkins expressed that we should “not indoctrinate your children. Teach them how to think for themselves, how to evaluate evidence, and how to disagree with you” (Dawkins, 2015). Picture a student who completes every assignment follows along attentively writes down the notes and answers the questions with the information found...
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...Critical Analysis In the article How Successful People Think, Roger Martin explores the way successful leaders come to new ideas and solutions to their problems by embracing “integrative thinking”. He explains it as having a capacity to hold two opposite ideas at once and finding a middle ground that is superior to both. Even though this article was published in Harvard Business Review and it’s target is educated audience (mostly in business field), language and style of writing are articulate and clean. Author does not use over technical words or examples that common person wouldn’t know. Title is bold, bright and hard to miss. Pictures are set up to be inviting and on the point (brain, light bulb). Writer is targeting people who have a wish to improve their leadership skills and recognizes that this quality is spread throughout all social classes and educational levels. His tone is light, supportive, conversational and readers can tell that author is personally involved in the subject: “… wisely, I might add…”,”…I have interviewed…”. In conclusion of the article Mr. Martin’s voice turns even more declamatory: “But I refuse to believe that the ability to use our opposable minds is a gift reserved for minority of people…” Roger Martin is the dean of the Rotman School of Management at University of Toronto. His passion for the subject is undeniable, but evidence he presents appears personal, weak and contradictory. He claims that “…(successful leaders) share somewhat...
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...Dakota Stephens Professor Baker English 1301 9/13/13 Our Generation on Reading, Writing, and Critical Thinking Reading and writing are things that I am very well at. The difference is, I’m stronger in my writing skills than my reading skills. The reason for this is that when I’m writing I get so into my words and imagination to where my hand with the magical pencil does the talking. My skills in reading only depend on one thing, if it catches my attention or not. Stories have to get me involved with the story somehow in order for me to get interest. If it’s not catching my attention, I’m not reading it. But most importantly, critical thinking is what ties reading and writing together. I am very picky about the books and articles I read. Stories for me have to have a mystery or even sometimes a sappy love story. Of course I’m going to love romantic books because I’m a girl, right? Yet again, some love stories bore the living hell out of me because it’s a “typical” love story. Reading books just all depends on how the author grabs his reader’s attention and how he plays the story throughout the book. When I find a book that I’m interested in, I will read the entire novel. Or even something that is scary will keep hooked on the story. Scary stories are my favorites because the story just keeps my suspense in play. Celebrity gossip is definitely something that I get into reading. There is always something new with these celebrities. Since these celebrities are well...
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...Famous Thinkers While scanning the articles of the all of the famous thinkers in the electronic reserve, I picked the two that I felt were most similar. Once I started looking at the choices we had to choose from, I told myself that I was not going to do the stereotypical thing and go with Dr. Martin Luther King. Even though I knew he was a famous thinker even before looking at the list, I chose not use his articles. On the other hand, I was disappointed that there were no articles pertaining to President Barack Obama. Knowing that he won a Nobel Peace Prize just for his ideas alone, I thought that he would be among this list. The first article that caught my attention was, “Why I am Not a Christian”, by B. Russell. The next article I chose was, “Not a Minute to Hate”, by Cornell West. Bertrand Arthur William Russell was born in 1872. He was not brought up in the traditional education forum, instead, Bertrand Russell was taught by tutors and governesses. Being taught by tutors and governesses allowed him to gain knowledge of French and German, perfectly. Bertrand Russell was very well versed in politics and philosophy. He had a very outspoken set of morals and during the years, these morals landed him in prison as he gave lectures around the country. In 1927, Russell opened a school for children, as he continued to give lectures around the country. He had over 25 principal publications published beginning in 1896. Russell also received the Nobel Peace...
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...assignment requirements from Week 5. Conduct research in the University Library to find at least three sources that are relevant for your Week 5 essay. Complete the following table for each source you have chosen. Include the original passage when you provide the summary, paraphrase, and quote. Source 1 | | | |Title of the article |Setting goals | |Why did you choose this article? |It helps to touch on the point of how setting goals can lead to success | |Is the article credible? How? |The article was published May 2014 under a noted publishing company | |Is the author biased? How do you know?|No, the author is in agreement that setting personal goals can lead to success | |Is the article relevant? How? |It discusses results that can be obtained through appropriate goal setting | |Find a passage you might use and |When working to obtain your goals you need to revisit them to further help you to understand what| |summarize it. |you are striving for. It keeps things in perspective | |Find a passage you might use and |Goals are lacked in movement...
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...“Outside-In vs, Inside-Out Thinking,” and “The hardest thing we have to do in business is to see yourself as others see you” have an interesting outlook on what it means to be in charge of employees or quite simply be a manager. All three bring up valuable points but at the same time have some differences that make them unique from one another. “The enemy within” talks mainly about the importance of treating your employees well, however only from a standpoint of protecting yourself and the company. The article mainly discuses the idea of treating employees well to avoid disgruntled employees who give the company a bad name. This is a tactic that I do not necessarily agree with because it is not authentic in nature. It may seem better than treating your employees badly or with little respect, but forcing yourself to treat them well is similar. Therefore, I do not agree with the views of this article because I feel if a manager is going interact with his co-workers he should genuinely have respect for them instead of faking it to safe the company from possible embarrassment in the future. “Outside-In vs, Inside-Out Thinking” is more about a manager and a companies way of thinking toward their clients. The first is Inside-out thinking which means that your focus is on processes, systems, tools, and products that are designed and implemented based off internal thinking and intuition. While customers needs and perspectives do not play a part in their thinking, and basically are not...
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...captions but never through long articles or even books. In his article The Literacy of Long-Farm Thinking, James Patterson presents the problem of not reading enough which causes for lack of patience, short attention span, and lack of long form thinking is presented and is very agreeable. One of the effects of not reading or barely reading is the lack of patience. If you are not bothering to even read an hour a day then you would not have the patience to do many other tasks. The article has a great example, “. ....
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...relations with children and knew the core of the problems and report to their supervisors. Supervisor were told basically to carry information from management to the teachers. Supervisors main task was to make sure the teachers were only doing what manager wants them to do and not otherwise. This system worked like a robot house. But children are not robots they do have different attitudes, needs, and learning abilities etc. Teachers and supervisor were feeling the pain and seeing what needed to be different around but they were not given freedom to do improve the quality in the organization. There were many different issues during day to day business. In order to solve the problems management needed to change the way of thinking. Implementing the Systems Thinking and changing the role of management would have worked better at this organization. Linda Hill (2004), talks about new managers’ attitude of focusing on the authority and power they have and measuring success with their reports also adds that...
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... 2012 Critical thinking is the process of thinking that questions people’s assumption. When using critical thinking you are trying to determine if a claim is true or false or halfway true. It’s good to know how to read and even better when you think critically while reading. When I read and think critically I have an open mind and help me to have a better and deeper understanding on what I am reading. I can process Information better and get good meaning of information when critically thinking. Critical thinking is good when writing it makes me have more than just one point of view on the topic being discussed or the way something occurs. When thinking critically I will be able to write where I express my opinion and try to get my point across to others. My writing will be more logical and explanatory also using critical thinking. Like mention above processing information with critical thinking makes information to have deeper views. It’s best to use critical thinking when reading an article because many authors write articles to try to inform you of something and a lot of them enforce their own opinion on things that may or may not be true. When looking at an article you can determine if sources are accurate by critical thinking or whether information can be helpful. Now dealing with advertising critical thinking is well needed to help a person determine whether the way they suggest products will influence many to buy or try product. Critical thinking will help you to determine...
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... Rwanda is thought to have hazy mountain rain forests which are beneficial for mountain gorillas that dwell on them. Now, these gorillas are endangered because of illegal hunting. People seem to think that nature’s wonders and resources are so abundant that their existence would last a lifetime. Anyone who thinks like this can be deemed as immature. This kind of thinking is just unacceptable. The wellbeing of every country has an effect on the wellbeing of the whole planet like the way a few harmful cells can contaminate the whole condition of the human body. This is what the article generally talked about. It further supposed that if we want the world to continue its natural course then we should be mindful of the harmful effects of what we do to the surroundings not just in places like Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Rwanda but also in other places as they are all equally significant. What we do to our environment could bring about destructive consequences all over the planet. The article also cited the harmful effects of deforestation and illegal dumping of toxic materials. The article was truthful in saying that deforestation only causes some lands to be infertile. It is inevitable for the rain to fall down on the deforested mounts. What happens is that lands get enveloped...
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...Decision Making: It’s Not What You Think Decision Making: It’s Not What You Think Henry Mintzberg, MIT Sloan Management Review (2001) This essay’s purpose is to summarize Henry Mintzberg’s and Frances Westley’s article about decision making and possible approach methods that individuals and organization can choose to be used in problem solving depending on the nature of the issue. The first part will sum up the main ideas of the article, including main theories and practical advises that the authors are recommending. The second part of the essay will present some criticism towards the article and its theoretical framework and arguments. Main ideas and a summary of the theory Decision Making is a traditional area of interest in every business school and company. How are decisions actually made? Are they rational or just products of individuals’ personal opinions? Should they even be based on what is called as rational thinking? Henry Mintzberg and Frances Westley tried to tackle this problem of how decisions should be made in their essay Decision Making: It’s Not What You Think, published in MIT Sloan Management Review (2001). They challenge the traditional approach of logical problems followed by step-by-step solutions. The researchers argue that there are a whole bunch of different types of problems in need of different approaches. The common type of decision making follows a clear pattern. First step would be defining the problem. Secondly, one needs to diagnose the...
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...content: 1. Article one : Team management skills 2 1.1 strengths 2 1.2 weakness 3 2. Effective teamwork: practical lessons from organizational research (3rd edition) 3 2.1 strength 4 2.2 weakness 4 3. 12 tips for team building 5 3.1 weakness 5 4. Vital factors for building an effective team 6 4.1 strength 6 Implementation and reflection 6 1. Goals 6 2. Time line 6 3. Implementation 7 4. Reflection 7 1. Article one : Team management skills This article ‘ The management skills - The Core Skills Needed to Manage Your Team’, Mindtools (2014) discuss the some of the key points about how to be a team managers and how to do can thrive and succeed. These range from deciding who does what and how to choosing the right people also to developing , motivating people and with the developing. In addition, this article also cover the most common pitfalls to be avoided. The article is related to the my topics ‘team and teamwork’. However, it is not useful source for my topic due to limited relevance, minimal development of ideas. 1.1 strengths This article is relate to the assessment task on team and team work. Mindtools (2014) notes that doing the team work be a good team leader it is very important and give some main point • Importance of delegation • Motivating • Development team • Communication and work with team Under these four points this article give some...
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...Sophist vs Socrates During class, we were presented with an article called “The Ivy League, Mental Illness, and the Meaning of Life,” written by William Deresiewicz, a former Yale English professor. In this article, Deresiewicz explains how an elite education can lead to a cycle of grandiosity and depression in adolescents. He believes the nation’s most prestigious schools are full of “excellent sheep” because they just follow instructions without thinking why they are doing it. They have not been given the opportunity to find their own path in life. Deresiewicz thinks these schools are flawed and that we are creating a society where some kids are animals in a scientific experiment. People may argue that this article can be similar to Sophist or Socrates teachings. To begin with, Socrates was a Greek philosopher, who cared nothing for appearance and was only interested in the mind. His face was unbelievably ugly and disproportionate but it did not matter to Socrates. He was disliked because he challenged the people and the state where he lived. Socrates was known for questioning assumptions and challenging the way things are. He believed “the unexamined life is not worth living,” so people should always find out the reason why they do certain things in their life. This seems nothing like the students Deresiewicz described in his article. None of the students examine their life like Socrates would want them to, they just follow instructions. Since the students are nothing like Socrates...
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...Reflection on Nacirema "Body Ritual among the Nacirema" is a paper by Horace Miner that describes the Nacirema tribe’s culture in a unique way. A substantial part of the tribe’s lives are spent on unusual rituals and customs to improve conditions of the body that are filled with magical components. As I first read this article I was taken back. The article intrigued me. I had to think really long and hard about what was being done in their culture. While I was thinking about how I perceived this article I started thinking that everything may not be as far out there as I originally thought. So I read the article again with more of an open mind. Even though this article may seem to be odd there are points that I myself see very similar to the way our society does things. Starting with a brief history of how the nation became the way it is, with Notgnishaw cutting down the cherry tree. Even today young children know this idea of cutting down the tree may seem familiar, and it should because George Washington cut the tree down. Miner talks about the need for our bodies to be "perfect" in order to attract friends and mates. He says that the Nacirema "perform a mouth-rite" every day because the mouth is the source of all things good and evil (kissing, talking, eating, decay) this is true everything that we do involves our mouths. He then goes on to talk about our need to stay young. I believe that our society worries too much about how old they look. Our society is always...
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...that an academic essay is structured as an argument. This means you cannot just list facts or points, rather you must use them as essential parts of an overall argument. An academic essay also requires you to produce reasons/evidence for any arguments you make. Therefore, essay assessment allows you to come to grips with complex ideas and concepts and to display your knowledge of them. A critical essay both displays and extends your analytical skills. Most students find it difficult to write an assignment. If you feel confident in your ability, you still need to use this guide to check you have the techniques required for a university level assignment. If you do not know how to write an assignment, read through this guide carefully. Keep it by you as you prepare for and write each assignment. However, remember this is just one recipe for 'How to Write'. Many students will still need personal help in writing. Your tutors will be ready to discuss ideas, plans or other matters with you. LAS (the Learning Assistance Service) is also available to give students free assistance. LAS is situated on the second floor of the library. What is critical thinking? "Little evidence of critical thinking" is a frequent comment on student essays. But what is critical thinking, or critical analysis? Briefly, critical thinking means thinking well and applying sound intellectual standards to your thinking. You should be prepared to consider all aspects of an issue before making up...
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