How can personal discipline help with critical thinking?

From your perspective what are the characteristics of a critical thinker?

What are some ways individuals can develop their critical thinking skills?

One can support student problem solving skills by helping the student improve his/her analytical skills. This seems to be accomplished must successfully by providing problems/scenarios to the student and helping the student progress through the critical thinking steps to solve the problem.

I think case studies work really well in this instance. I put students in small groups and have them work together to analyze a problem. That way they can look as a group and also see that others had different approaches. We then get a thorough assessment and can analyze solutions to the case. They get practice and can hone their skills without fear of judgement.

My definition of intelligence in relation to my career area is basic: intelligence is the ability to learn; different individuals learn at different speeds and understanding, but they can learn. Individuals who have a higher IQ and learn quicker, have the ability to analyze situations quicker; however, IQ will not necessarily help them solve the problem, just reach a conclusion quicker.

It aids in the critical thinking skills. It requires the students to think and reflect on the issue. Most of the students are afraid to think and put ideas out there. they have not had the coaching in either their family unit or previous schooling. In the medical field they need to use reflective thinking to solve the issues that can come up in the office

Reasoning plays an important role in that there isn't a concrete right or wrong, it is based on common sense. Common sense is an important element in our lives because not only can it help solve problems and come to conclusions, it often keeps us safe from harm.

Well, critical thinking is not just thinking, but thinking which entails self-improvement. This improvement comes from skill develooped in using standards by which one appropriately assesses thinking. Discipline? As an instructor I want students to try to reason things out on the basis of evidence and good reasons.Finding evidence takes discipline. Good reasons must be deveoped from a thorough process which also requires discipline. Therefore in order to teach critical thinking I have to teach discipline. To think well is to impose discipline and restraint on our thinking-by means of intellectual standards — in order to raise our thinking to a level of "perfection" or quality that is not natural or likely in undisciplined, spontaneous thought. The dimension of critical thinking least understood is that of "intellectual standards." Most teachers were not taught how to assess thinking through standards; indeed, often the thinking of teachers themselves is very "undisciplined" and reflects a lack of internalized intellectual standards. Question: Could you give me an example? Paul: Certainly, one of the most important distinctions that teachers need to routinely make, and which takes disciplined thinking to make, is that between reasoning and subjective reaction. If we are trying to foster quality thinking, we don't want students simply to assert things; we want them to try to reason things out on the basis of evidence and good reasons. Often, teachers are unclear about this basic difference. Many teachers are apt to take student writing or speech which is fluent and witty or glib and amusing as good thinking. They are often unclear about the constituents of good reasoning. Hence, even though a student may just be asserting things, not reasoning things out at all, if she is doing so with vivacity and flamboyance, teachers are apt to take this to be equivalent to good reasoning. This was made clear in a recent California state-wide writing assessment in which teachers and testers applauded a student essay, which they said illustrated "exceptional achievement" in reasoned evaluation, an essay that contained no reasoning at all, that was nothing more than one subjective reaction after another. (See "Why Students-and Teachers-Don't Reason Well") The assessing teachers and testers did not notice that the student failed to respond to the directions, did not support his judgment with reasons and evidence, did not consider possible criteria on which to base his judgment, did not analyze the subject in the light of the criteria, and did not select evidence that clearly supported his judgment. Instead the student: described an emotional exchange asserted-without evidence-some questionable claims expressed a variety of subjective preferences The assessing teachers were apparently not clear enough about the nature of evaluative reasoning or the basic notions of criteria, evidence, reasons, and well-supported judgment to notice the discrepancy. The result was, by the way, that a flagrantly mis-graded student essay was showcased nationally (in ASCD's Developing Minds), systematically misleading the 150,000 or so teachers who

Someone who doesn't take things at face value, that takes time to reasearch facts and think about the pros and cons of the decision and how it will ultimately affect them.

As an insructor this is probably our biggest challenge. I try to come up with office scenarios that have happened in order to get them to think about what they would do in that moment. They tend not to believe us when we tell them attention to details. They also think that everything coming from the computer is gospel. I will continue to give scenarios and point out areas where they might have choosen a different way to look a the information

example from daily life example from their work example deals with particular section of population

As teachers we hope that every word that comes out of our mouth, is on a powerpoint, or a note on the white board is relevant; but from the students' perspective, this is just not true. One one way I have used to sum up the important points, that helps with the decoding/recoding/application process, is to create colorized flowcharts for many of the most important topics covered in class. Additionally, I try to demonstrate the relevancy of each box on the flowchart with either an in-class demonstration or hands-on mini project. Fortunately, my program is a very hands-on, software-based program. In many situations, I can sum the main points of a 50-page unit (and subsequent 30-slide powerpoint) down to a 3-4 condensed flowcharts! I love the the idea of guided notes! I do upload all of the class Powerpoints to the school's online portal at the beginning of the term, and some students choose to print them out 3-to-a-page with note-taking space; but I had never thought about guided notes before. I think this is a great idea because it allows the students to take less notes, and pay more attention in class, rather than being buried in their notebook, trying to keep up with what they are writing, rather than fully absorbing the material.

I have three points here: We all already know that the best way to reinforce newly acquired knowledge is to immediately apply it in someway -- whether that be a short in-class project, lab, or assignment. The idea of a 20 minute lecture discussion + 30 minute project + 20 minutes of additional lecture and wrap-up is great if you teach a typical 1 hour class 2-3 times a week for 16 weeks. At one of the schools I teach at, we hold class for 4-4 1/2 hours ONCE a week. I have found it incredibly difficult to maintain the students' attention and keep them excited about the content. I also have taught morning classes (8am) afternoon classes (1pm) and night classes (6pm) -- I've found that each section, depending on when it is held, prefers a different approach to the material. The morning classes tend to want about 30 minutes of introductory lecture/discussion and then immediately move into a hands-on project, then we wrap up the class with mostly lecture/discussion/demonstration/review. The afternoon classes tend to enjoy breaking up the material into smaller chunks 30 minutes of lecture/discussion, 30 minutes of hands-on, repeat. The night classes tend to like to get all of the lecture/discussion done first, then spend the second half of class with hands-on work. Fortunately, I work in a very hands-on, software based program, so it is very easy to give lots of hands-on mini projects. My second point was that I always try to bring in real-world examples for my classes. I teach in Audio Production, so I try to bring in real-world recording sessions that I have worked on, and let the students do the same work that I had done (with appropriate copyright clearance of course). One thing that has constantly eluded me is that even after I give them real-world examples, there are still a few that fail to see the relevance as to how this practice is important. I sometimes feel like some students see graduation as the end point, rather than looking past that. Any feedback/experiences are appreciated. And lastly, I disagree with the author that we should review before a test. I always review the previous week's material at the beginning of the next class; I always make it a point to review at the tail-end of topics before moving on to a new one; but I can't help but feel like I'm just giving them the answer if I review right before a test?

In looking at the topics of this module I am seeing more indepth means to retain information through the use of visual learning aids. In a technical school where hand and eye coordination is paramount the inclusion of learning scaffolding strengthens the retention of most of your students. Where I see the adult learning having difficulty in this process is in the recoding. They simply think they need to remember it all and most instructors think they should as well. This to me is the farthest from the truth, we need to remember how to remember key elements.

very smart, organize, use analytic process in dealing with any issue

i believe the human IQ not always reflects the individual inteligence because in any giving time this individual can show social and reflective inteligence that cant be mesure by Iq

I am just womdering how critical thinking can be a result of brain storming

make the class material easier, allow students to fully engage in class, prevent distraction

what a means by engauging your students, keepin it real. Often in career colleges we see students referring to the "real" world vs. the Utopia of the learning environment. This is very relevent to this module. Without seeing the connection between these two worlds the student will seek their knowlege elsewhere, thats bad for admissions and retention rates. So how does one make the connection? In my trade it means keeping current in industry standards and trends. It means I have homework and must keep abreast of changes even before they become popular in the industry. Once a trend takes hold if you are teaching to that level then you are teaching outdated materials to the students. By the time students enter the real world that trend is done and gone leaving our students struggling to learn the next trend. In all honesty, it is teaching our students about life long learning and it is done so by example of the instructor.