According to the authors, Paul & Elder there are five elements of thought; they are: The best thinkers think to some purpose, the best thinkers take command of concepts, the best thinkers assess information, the best thinkers distinguish between inferences and assumptions, the best thinkers think through implications. My choice out of the five is “the best thinkers think to some purpose.”. My choice is Option B: Problem-resolution paper.
My rationalization or reason and explanation for my choice of this issue, as it relates to a Masters-Degree in Post Secondary Education and the importance, the necessity, criticality, in order for one to be an effective educator, one has to be able to resolve within oneself, and identify, become aware first, of ones own problems in ones own thinking, before one can teach anyone, anything, one must have clarity in ones own mind, free oneself of ones own insecurities, baggage from past hurts, stop looking backwards so that one can move forward, know who he/she is, have the confidence in ones own abilities, the skills necessary in order to be a “far-minded thinker”, a “critical thinker”, as a teacher, realizing ones strengths and weakness, goals, directions and thus strive to develop “countervailing traits”. .
As a future educator, it will be my duty to promote “thinking to some purpose”, to build my students knowledge base, based upon my own knowledge base, “activated knowledge”, and “intellectual confidence in reason”, and my willingness to be open-minded in order to bring about change, and new ideas to the field of education as it relates to “principles that will enable one to analyze, the decision one makes, assessing ones beliefs through ones own experience, “intellectual perseverance”, that where ones position or status in life today is because of ones on ability to shape, frame or pattern ones life are basically formed on ones own thinking and behavior.
In order to improve ones thinking or develop within ones students “critical thinking skills”, one has to possess, as a teacher, those skills and abilities oneself, “intellectual fair-mindedness”, in order to accomplish the end results.
Normally, it is always the norm, to assume or gravitate to the familiar, old ways of doing things, “something we previously learned”. To be honest, there is no excuse for being uninformed in this day and time intellectually. But when we began to think logically, with the availability of information as it exist today; therefore, the excuse one does not know will not fly, an analogy “that dog won't hunt”, so to speak. Ignorance in this day and time simply will not work in the 20th or 21st century.
After doing some literary review on how teachers should teach critical thinking, there was an interesting study done by Debra Connerly, entitled, Teaching Critical Thinking Skills to Fourth Grade Students Identified as Gifted and Talented.
According to the author, she had “an interview with Richard Paul in the Fall 2005 issue of Compass Points, a journal from the National Association for Gifted Children, which intrigued her to learn more about critical thinking skills”.
What was interesting to me was the grade level of this study, because one would assume it would seem more appropriate that this type of study would have taken place on the high school level starting with the 9th grade. She went on to say, “her observation lead her to believe that primary grade students are excited to learn why and how things happen. As they reach 4th and 5th grades.” When one assess this observation on the study, one has to agree that children are eager to learn and learning is exciting for them and the importance of teachers to take advantage of that energy and teach critical thinking skills to children/students while they are in their developmental stage is very crucial.
According to Paul, “because of their brightness and the fact that they often are praised for what they say and do, they often become flashy rather than deep. They often develop quickness over depth, fluency over richness. To enhance critical thinking, students must move from a passive to an active state”. Teachers must aid students to move them from “passive to an active state,” by applying fair-minded thinking skills when students are being praised for their accomplishments or reward them for positive and discipline behavior because it reinforces motivation in them and the ability for the teacher to recognize acceptable behavior rather than arrogant behavior is very crucial in teaching critical thinking skills to their students.
This particular literature review as the author states, focuses on three main areas as follows: First, the study discussed why critical thinking skills are needed for all learners with an emphasis on the gifted and talented populations. Second, since the topic of critical thinking is too large to completely cover within the confines of this study, which she describes later in the study. Lastly, how both “teaching of thinking” and “teaching for thinking” are necessary. It is so amazing, that this type of teaching, critical thinking, is something that very few people have heard of. Is it because one would assume one lives in a vacuum?
