1 / 13

The Elements of Critical Thinking

Establish a shared vocabulary to enhance mindful thinking, identify barriers, demonstrate fair-mindedness, and utilize tools for analysis. Implement key terms to express thoughts and process effectively.

drysdaler
Download Presentation

The Elements of Critical Thinking

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. The Elements of Critical Thinking Task 1: Establish a Shared Vocabulary

  2. Why does identifying elements help you think mindfully? • Makes you really LOOK—fights habitual and enculturated patterns, autopilot thinking • Allows you to identify barriers, filters, impediments, biases, predispositions—yours AND others’ • Gives you more tools to analyze an issue • Helps you demonstrate fair-mindedness

  3. WA uses three key terms based on what you DO with your thinking • The “pitch”—the position you are trying to sell to your audience (often expressed in a THESIS) • The “moment”—the context, relation of you to audience, etc. • The “complaint”—what impels you to make your pitch

  4. Ch. 3 of WA gives you a toolkitto use to express your thinking process • Paraphrase x 3—makes you clarify and restate so you’re sure you’ve got it (p. 33) • Notice & Focus—lets you pick out, prioritize, and refine ideas (p. 35) • “The Method”—lets you play with binaries, oppositions, threads that emerge (p. 37) • Focused freewriting—lets you gather ideas on a slice quickly (p. 44)

  5. Nosich focuses not on the writing that comes out but on the thinking that leads to it • Purpose: p. 52 • Question at Issue (q at i): p. 53 • Assumptions: p. 54 • Implications, Consequences, Outcomes: p. 55 • Information: p. 57 • Concepts: p. 58 • Conclusions, Interpretations, Decisions: p. 60 • Point of View (p.o.v.): p. 61 • Alternatives: p. 64 • Context: p. 66

  6. Nosich’s Circle of Elements

  7. Two ways to see the elements (from Richard Paul, Nosich’s teacher)

  8. Or, from your point of view:

  9. Additional Terms You May Use • Reasons/Reasoning—describes the process of thinking • Claims (theses based on your assumptions that you try to prove) • Arguments (pitches made with theses and support) • Hypotheses (assumptions based on evidence & testing that you prove or disprove) Most of these terms are involved with what we call a deductive or thesis-driven way of thinking—one that attempts to eliminate possibilities. Initially, we’re going to avoid them.

  10. Thinking critically is messy, non-linear, and recursive Purpose Conclusions,Interpretations,Decisions POV Assumptions Information Alternatives Concepts Q at I Implications,Consequences,Outcomes Barriers, FiltersBiases,Pre-dispositions

  11. Going around the circle • Can start on any slice • Gets easier as you repeat it • Often shows you which areas will be most productive to work with (not always the ones where the answers come most easily!) • Generates lots of raw material to draft from—gives you luxury of selecting the best

  12. What does ‘marriage’ mean to you?—prewriting for paper 1

  13. To master these concepts… • Practice, practice, practice till this starts to feel comfortable to you. • Try exercises 2.1, 2.2, 2.3 in your thinking • If there’s an element you have trouble with, do the corresponding exercise at chapter’s end in your thinking notebook. • Look at p. 80 as a self-test.

More Related