Critical Thinking, Problem Solving, and Critical Reading JCTC-DT READING/ACADEMIC SUCCSS GOAL Use Critical Thinking and Problem Solving skills to learn and use with the content in the Study Skills/Academic Success Courses and Incorporate Critical Reading in the Reading Courses Based on

Critical thinking approaches all content explicitly as thinking. It takes thinking apart. It weaves new thinking into old. It assesses thinking. It applies thinking. It is thinking about thinking while thinking in order to make thinking better: more clear, more accurate, more relevant, more deep, more broad, and more effective. CRITICAL THINKING GE 101, DRE 015, DRE 012

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.

Problem Solving – GE 101 or DRE 015 Problem-solving: Whenever a problem cannot be solved formulaically or robotically, critical thinking is required: first, to determine the nature and dimensions of the problem, and then, in the light of the first, to determine the considerations, points of view, concepts, theories, data, and reasoning relevant to its solution.

Extensive practice in independent problem-solving is essential to developing critical thought. Problem-solving is rarely best approached procedurally or as a series of rigidly followed steps. For example, problem-solving schemas typically begin, "State the problem." Rarely can problems be precisely and fairly stated prior to analysis, gathering of evidence, and dialogical or dialectical thought wherein several provisional descriptions of the problem are proposed, assessed, and revised. Problem Solving – GE 101 or DRE 015

Critical reading is an active, intellectually engaged process in which the reader participates in an inner dialogue with the writer. A critical reader realizes the way in which reading, by its very nature, means entering into a point of view other than our own, the point of view of the writer. CRITICAL READING – RDG 010, 020, 030, CMS 185

A critical reader actively looks for assumptions, key concepts and ideas, reasons and justifications, supporting examples, parallel experiences, implications and consequences, and any other structural features of the written text, to interpret and assess it accurately and fairly. CRITICAL READING – RDG 010, 020, 030, CMS 185