Reference no: EM131821988

Elements of Critical Thinking

Review your classmates' posts, and respond to your peer. When responding to your classmate, please provide feedback on their examples of good and poor critical thinking skills. Discuss additional ways one can think more critically.

Discussion response

Critical thinking is crucial in developing thinking skills. The first critical thinking element that I found is Effective speaking to the audience but the most significant factor is excellent listening skills. This will help in understanding questions and helping in answering them in the correct manner. The second element is respect. Respect shared between the speaker or author and the audience.

Critically thinking people are of their own partialities and can set their emotional needs aside, to look at the facts without prejudice, and with a generally neutral attitude ( Plencher, 2014)The other element is embracing each other's thoughts and opinions. This helps in understanding other people's actions and why they feel the way they feel. Accepting criticism which is the most important in critical thinking.

Just because they have some differences does not mean that either person is wrong. If the opponent had carried out adequate research and fact-finding to disapprove your opinion you may need to change it. In the article "Specific Differences in the Educational Outcomes of those Students who are Homeschooled Vs. students in a Traditional School Setting." that I feel expresses critical thinking skills in that it debated on homeschooling versus public schooling.

The author describes homeschooling to have become increasingly popular and he talks about the benefits if children who have schooled at home compared to those of public schooling. After reading the article, I understood the various differences between the two. The author made the necessary research that is needed for the findings providing factual statistics, as well as references, the peer-reviewed material in the article.

In the following article "The False Promise of Sanctuary Cities" the author does write about the sanctuary cities and the opinion that the public holds on them. He states that the sanctuary cities are not doing much good in protecting the illegal immigrants from anything.

Since the Republicans have taken charge, the author has a feeling that the cities are mainly being controlled by Democratic representatives who are wrongly labeled as not following national immigration laws. I have a feeling that the author did not employ critical thinking skills as the story is single sided and there is a lot of finger pointing against progressive mayors of these cities.

References

Denvir, D. (February, 17, 2017). The False Promise of Sanctuary Cities. Moreau, K. (November, 27, 2012).

SPECIFIC DIFFERENCES IN THE EDUCATIONAL OUTCOMES OF THOSE STUDENTS WHO ARE HOMESCHOOLED VS. STUDENTS IN A TRADITIONAL SCHOOL SETTING. Plencner, A. (2014).

Critical thinking and the challenges of the Internet. Communication Today, 5(2), 4-18.

Gen 499: General Education Text:Bhargava, V. K. (2006). Introduction to global issues. In V. K. Bhargava (Ed.), Global issues for global citizens: An introduction to key development challenges