Critical thinking

1. CRITICAL THINKING, READING
AND WRITING
Welcome to the Critical Thinking Class!
I am Peter Daniel Kamara (Mr.)
Master’s Degree- International Relations, Law Degree (LLB Hon.), Diploma in
Law, Diploma in Cyber policy

2. What is the hardest task in the world? To think.
(Ralph Waldo Emerson)

3. Topic: What is Critical Thinking?
At the end of this study, students will be able to:
• Define Critical Thinking,
• Characterize Critical Thinking,
• Understand the Objectives of Critical Thinking and;
• Know the Importance/Relevance of Critical Thinking.

4. What is Thinking?
Thinking is a purposeful,
organized
cognitive/Intellectual
process that we use to
make sense of our world.

5. Thinking and Reasoning Skills denotes both critical thinking skills and a wider set of thinking skills. The
critical thinking skills include skills of analysis, skills of evaluation and skills of synthesis.
The wider thinking skills include conceptual thinking skills, information processing and problem solving
skills and creative thinking skills.
The diagram below illustrates how the ten thinking skills identified in the specification form a family of
Thinking and Reasoning Skills.
Thinking and Reasoning Skills
Critical Thinking Skills Wider Thinking Skills
Analysis Evaluation Synthesis Conceptual Thinking Information Processing & Problem Solving Creative Thinking

6. Brief Quotations
What is the hardest task in the world? To think. (Ralph Waldo Emerson )
In all affairs it’s a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long
taken for granted. (Bertard Russell)
Explanation pp. 44-45 (Merrille, 2013)

8. What is Critical Thinking?
“Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined
process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing,
applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or
evaluating information gathered from, or generated
by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning,
or communication, as a guide to belief and action. “
- Michael Scriven & Richard Paul

9. What is Critical Thinking?
Critical thinking is an intellectual model for understanding issues and
forming reasonable and informed views on them. It embodies a set of
reasoning skills that, when properly applied, can help us determine
what we should believe and how we should act.
Critical thinking is the art of thinking about thinking while thinking in order
to make thinking better.
Critical thinking comprises three interlinking dimension:
1. Analyze one’s own thinking - breaking it down into its component parts.
2. Evaluate one’s own thinking - identifying its weaknesses while
recognizing its
strengths.
3. Improving one’s own thinking - reconstructing it to make it better.

10. Definition of Critical Thinking
…Critical Thinking implies evaluation of thoughts, ideas or judgments with awareness,
creativity and refinement of these processes as needed. (Linda M. Murawski)
The above definition denote three important key terms:
1. Evaluation- this is the systematic determination of a subject’s merit, worth and significance,
using criteria governed by a set of standards.
2. Creativity- is a phenomenon whereby something new and somehow valuable is formed.
3. Refinement- is the construction that checks the irregularities.

11. Brief History about CRITICAL THINKING
Brief History about Critical Thinking

12. Critical thinking is an essential subject in college and university settings today. Frequently taught as a way to “improve”
thinking, the art of critical thinking involves an approach to thinking more importantly to learning that embraces
changing how one thinks about thinking.
Critical thinking incorporates how learners develop and apply thought to understand how thinking can be improved.
Typically, a person is deemed a critical thinker to the extent that he or she regularly improves their thinking in an
intentional manner. The basic idea undergirding the study of critical thinking is simple to determine strengths and
weaknesses in one’s thinking in order to maintain the strengths and make improvements by targeting the weaknesses.
(Linda M. Murawski)
Critical thinking has its roots in the work of such notables as Socrates, Thomas Aquinas, Francis Bacon, Rene Descartes,
John Locke and Sir Isaac Newton in its earliest times.
More modern contributions can be attributed to John Dewey, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Jean Piaget among others. Work
completed by Robert Ennis in the 1960s gave rise to critical thinking skills taught in the classroom and reflected in the
workplace. Ennis focused on critical thinking as a learned skill that could be transferred to the workplace if taught and
practiced. As a result of many years of research, analysis, teaching and practice, Ennis concluded that critical thinking is
“focused on deciding what to believe or do,” (Ennis, p. 10).
John Dewey (1910: 74, 82) introduced the term ‘critical thinking’ as the name of an educational goal, which he identified
with a scientific attitude of mind. More commonly, he called the goal ‘reflective thought’, ‘reflective thinking’ ‘reflection’
or just ‘thought’ or ‘thinking’.
Critical or reflective thinking originates with the sensing of a problem. It is a quality of thought operating in an effort to
solve the problem and to reach a tentative conclusion which is supported by all available data. It is really a process of
problem solving requiring the use of creative insight, intellectual honesty, and sound judgment. It is the basis of the
method of scientific inquiry.

13. Vincent Ruggiero writing in The art of thinking: A guide to critical and creative thought describes thinking as
“any mental activity that helps formulate or solve a problem, make a decision, or fulfill a desire to understand.
It is searching for answers while reaching for meaning” (Ruggiero, 2012 p. 4). He notes that thinking may not
always be a conscious effort. There are forces at work beneath the surface so to speak within the unconscious
that dictate one’s overt thinking. An example might be driving to a daily destination such as work without
consciously remembering each landmark along the route. This type of thinking occurs without much critical
thought at all. Indeed, the brain seems to be on auto-pilot in this situation. Critical thinking according to
Ruggiero is more at tuned to thinking that occurs to solve problems, analyze issues or make decisions. Staying
with the aforementioned example, if the road normally driven is blocked or closed, the driver would need to
critically think about an alternate route. Which route is shortest to the destination? Which route might not be
blocked like the one encountered? What could happen if that route were taken? All these questions are
examples of critical thinking based on a problem needing to be solved. Problem solving is the ultimate intent
of critical thinking for many scholars who study the phenomenon. Skills in problem solving, issue analyses and
decision making are increasingly expected of employees. Evidence is growing that critical thinking is
“expected” in the workplace. More than 400 senior HR professionals were asked in a survey to name the most
important skill their employees will need in the next five years. Critical thinking ranked the highest – even
more than innovation or the application of information technology. This response reflects how the nature of
work and the skills required have been changing dramatically (Society for Human Resources Management,
2006). (Linda M. Murawski)

14. Characteristics of Critical Thinking
This Photo by Unknown
Author is licensed under
CC BY-SA

15. Characteristics of a Critical Thinker
Critical thinkers are those persons who can move beyond “typical” thinking models to an advanced way of thinking.
Critical thinkers produce both more ideas and improved ideas than poor thinkers (Ruggiero, 2012).
They become more adept in their thinking by using a variety of probing techniques which enable them to discover new and often improved
ideas.
More specifically, critical thinkers tend to see the problem from many perspectives, to consider many different investigative approaches, and
to produce many ideas before choosing a course of action.
In addition, they are more willing to take intellectual risks, to be adventurous, to consider unusual ideas, and to use their imaginations while
analyzing problems and issues.
Critical thinkers test their first impressions, make important distinctions among choices, and base their conclusions on evidence rather than
their own feelings. Sensitive to their own limitations and predispositions, they doublecheck the logic of their thinking and the workability of
their solutions, identifying imperfections and complications, anticipating negative responses, and generally refining their ideas.
Critical thinkers learn to focus.
They do not experience fewer distractions than others do; they simply deal with them more quickly and more effectively than ineffective
thinkers do. There is no magic in what effective thinkers do. T
hey practice their skills much like any learned skill. Critical thinkers typically (Ruggiero, 2012):
• Acknowledge personal limitations.
• See problems as exciting challenges.
• Have understanding as a goal.
• Use evidence to make judgments.
• Are interested in others’ ideas.
• Are skeptical of extreme views.
• Think before acting.
• Avoid emotionalism
• Keep an open mind
• Engage in active listening

16. Conversely, non-critical thinkers, typically (Ruggiero, 2012):
• See a limited number of perspectives (sometimes just one)
• Take the first approach that occurs to them
• Judge quickly—maybe too quickly and not critically
• Fail to listen actively
• Think their ideas are the best--all others are less
• Resist change
• Think in stereotypes
Deceive themselves often

18. Types of Thinking
Problem Solving
Decision Making
Critical
Thinking
• Analyzing
• Evaluating
•Reasoning
New
Ideas
Creative
Thinking
Right
Left
Explanation

19. The goals and objectives of
Critical Thinking?
Critical Thinking helps people to:
• Effectively identify, analyze, and evaluate arguments.
• Discover and overcome personal prejudices and biases.
• Formulate and present convincing reasons in support of
conclusions.
• Make reasonable, intelligent decisions about what to
believe and what to do.

20. Critical Thinking entails
CRITICAL
THINKING
SKILLS
Analyzing
Reasoning
Evaluating
Decision Making Problem Solving

21. Logic
• Does this really make sense?
• Does that follow from what you said?
• How does that follow?
• But before you implied this and now you are saying that; how can both be true?
Source: http://www.fctl.ucf.edu/tresources/content/Ruland-CriticalThinkingStandards.pdf
Logic is the science of thinking. Its chief concern is the operations of man’s prime
faculty, his reason. St. Thomas Aquinas, since the Middle Ages, advised that
“A student should address himself to logic before the other sciences, because it
deals with their common procedure.”
Aristotle, more than a thousand years before Aquinas, said “…it is absurd to seek
at the same time knowledge and the way of attaining knowledge...” (Metaphysics,
995 a 12-15).Therefore knowledge begins with logic.
When the combination of thoughts are
mutually supporting and make sense in combination,
the thinking is "logical.“

23. Importance of Critical Thinking to educated people
Academic Performance
• It helps us understand the arguments and beliefs of others
• It helps us to critically evaluate those arguments and beliefs
• It helps us develop and defend our well-supported arguments and beliefs.
Workplace
• Helps us to reflect and get a deeper understanding of our own and others’
decisions
• Encourages open-mindedness to change
• helps us in being more analytical in solving problems
Daily life
• Helps us to avoid making foolish personal decisions.
• Promotes an informed and concerned citizenry capable of making good
decisions on important social, political and economic issues.
• Helps in the development of autonomous thinkers capable of examining their
assumptions, dogmas, and prejudices.

24. As noted earlier, critical thinking is an oft-used phrase in classroom settings.
Adult learners are encouraged to develop these skills and practice them
situationally. Critical thinking means reviewing the ideas produced, making a
tentative decision about what action will best solve the problem or what
belief about the issue is most reasonable, and then evaluating and refining
that solution or belief (Ruggiero, 2012). The effects of developing keen
problem solving skills cannot be understated. Problem solving skills have the
potential to impact individuals more immediately and often with ramifications
for the future.

26. Barriers to Critical Thinking
• Lack of relevant background information
• Poor reading skills
• Poor listening skills
• Bias
• Prejudice
• Superstition
• Egocentrism
• Socio-centrism
• Peer pressure
• Mindless Conformism
• Mindless non-conformism
• Provincialism
• Narrow-mindedness
• Closed-mindedness
• Distrust of reason
• Stereotyping
• Unwarranted assumptions
• Relativistic thinking
• Scapegoating
• Rationalization
• Wishful thinking
• Short-term thinking
• Selective perception / attention
• Selective memory
• Overpowering emotions
• Self-deception
• Face-saving
• Fear of change
Common Barriers

27. Barriers to Critical Thinking
Self-centered thinking
self-interested thinking
self-serving bias
Group-centered thinking
Group bias
Conformism
Beliefs that are presumed to be true without adequate evidence or justification
Assumption
Stereotyping
Believing that something is true because one wishes it were true.
The truth is “just a matter of opinion”
Relativism
 Subjectivism
 Cultural relativism
Five Powerful Barriers to Critical Thinking:
Egocentrism and Resistance to Change
Hasty Generalizations
Ethnocentrism and Cultural Conditioning
Relativistic
Thinking
Wishful
Thinking

28. •Critical thinking demands a commitment to surmounting two barriers native to everyone:
- egocentrism - the tendency to view everything in relationship to oneself
- sociocentrism - the assumption that one’s own social group is inherently superior to all others
First order thinking
•- spontaneous and non-reflective
•- contains insight, prejudice, good and bad reasoning
•- indiscriminately combined
•Second order thinking
- first order thinking that is consciously realized (analyzed, assessed, and reconstructed)
Weak-sense critical thinking
•- ignore the flaws in their own thinking
•- often seek to win an argument through intellectual trickery or deceit
•- lacks higher-level skills and values of critical thinking
•- makes no good faith effort to consider alternative viewpoints
•- lacks fair-mindedness
•- employ lower-level rhetorical skills
•- employ emotionalism and intellectual trickery
•- hide or distort evidence
•Strong-sense critical thinking
•- defined by a consistent pursuit of what is intellectually fair and just
•- strive to be ethical, empathize with others’ viewpoints
•- will entertain arguments with which they do not agree
•- change their views when confronted with superior reasoning
•- employ their thinking reasonably rather than manipulatively
•- requires fair-mindedness combined with learning basic critical thinking skills
•Fair-mindedness is to bring an unbiased and unprejudiced perspective to all viewpoints relevant to a situation.
•intellectual unfairness feels no responsibility to represent viewpoints with which they disagree fairly and

29. The three functions of the mind are:
•- Thinking - creates meaning. It sorts events
in our lives into categories. It finds patterns in
the world around us.
•- Feeling - monitors the meanings created by
thinking. It evaluates the degree to which life’s
events are either positive or negative.
•- Wanting - allocates energy into action. It
does so consistent with how we define what is
desirable and possible.

30. Elements and Standards of Critical Thinking
•- identify the eight Elements of Reasoning and describe how they are employed
•- identify nine Standards of Critical Thinking and describe how they are applied
•- describe how the Standards apply to the Elements of Reasoning
•- outline the main guidelines for using the intellectual Standards
Elements of Reasoning
Reasoning is what you do whenever your mind draws conclusions based on reasons. The elements of reasoning are its components, also called the
parts of thinking, or fundamental structures of thought.
•- Points of view - reasoning always takes place within some point of view. It has some comprehensive focus or orientation.
•- Purpose - the goal or objective of reasoning. It describes the desired outcome or intent.
•- Question - all reasoning is directed at some question. Learn how to clearly frame the
question, problem, or issue.
•- Assumptions - reasoning begins with assumptions, and lie at the heart of arguments.
•- Implications and consequences - implications of our reasoning are what extend
beyond the position we reach.
•- Information - reasoning follows from information, so information must be accurate and
complete.
•- Concepts - general categories or ideas by which we interpret or classify information
used in our thinking.
•- Inferences - we sometimes begin with something we know and figure out something
else based on it.
How the Elements Work
•- our purpose affects how we ask questions
•- how we ask questions affects the information we gather
•- the information we gather affects the inferences we make from it
•- what we infer from the information affects how we conceptualize it
•- how we conceptualize the information affects the assumptions we make
•- the assumptions we make affect the implications that follow from our thinking
•- the implications affect how we see things, i.e. our point of view

31. Acknowledging the different sources shape point of view is not an argument for intellectual relativity (the claim
that nothing is provable because everything is relative).
Standards of Critical Thinking
Critical thinking hinges on the ability to assess one’s own reasoning. Nine fundamental intellectual standards
include:
- clarity - easily understood, enables us to see where our thinking is leading us.
- accuracy - represent something as it actually is, express how things actually are
- precision - specific, exact, and sufficiently detailed
- relevance - pertains to the problem we seek to solve
- depth - plumbs beneath the surface of a problem to identify complexities
- breadth - considers the issue at hand from every relevant viewpoint
- logic - the order in which thoughts are organized are mutually supportive and make
sense in combination
- significance - concentrate on the most important information relevant to the issue at
hand
- fairness - our thinking is fair when it is justified fairly in context

32. Revision and Brain Teaser

33. Summary
1. What is Thinking? Thinking is a purposeful, organized cognitive process that
we use to make sense of our world.
2. Types of Thinking Creative & Critical Thinking
3. What is Critical Thinking? Critical Thinking is the general term given to a wide range of
cognitive and intellectual skills needed to: Effectively identify,
analyze, and evaluate arguments; Discover and overcome
personal prejudices and biases; Formulate and present
convincing reasons in support of conclusions; and Make
reasonable, intelligent decisions about what to believe and
what to do. Critical thinking skills emphasized in this course,
include: Reasoning, Analyzing, Evaluating, Decision Making
and Problem solving.
4. Critical Thinking Standards Clarity, Accuracy, Precision, Relevance, Depth, Breadth,
Logic and Fairness
5. Benefits of Critical Thinking Academic performance, workplace and daily life.
6. Barriers to Critical Thinking Examples include Egocentrism, Socio-centrism,
Unwarranted Assumptions, Wishful Thinking, and
Relativistic Thinking
7. Characteristics of a Critical
Thinker
Open-mindedness, independent thinking, self-awareness,
passionate, insightful, honest and intellectual humility,
intellectual courage, and welcome criticism, etc.