Critical Thinking Essay
Ashley Howell
GEN200
Critical Thinking Essay
November 23, 2014
For most people, critical thinking is used as an everyday part of life to help us get through professional and societal responsibilities. Critical thinking can be described as “the objective analysis and evaluation of an issue in order to form a judgement.” (www.google.com). When we are faced with situations in life that could ultimately go one of two ways, good or bad, that is when critical thinking comes into play. Critical thinking helps us weigh the pros and cons of the situation, figure out what our decision would benefit or not benefit, and essentially come to the best solution.
According to psychologist Benjamin Bloom, the six steps in the critical thinking process include remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating. Remember key terms and facts, understand the idea and describe it in your own words, apply the idea to produce a positive result, divide the idea into sections or parts, evaluate the quality of the idea and give reasoning behind it, and create something new based entirely on your idea. Following these important steps will influence your decision greatly. You want to make sure that you arrive at the best possible idea. Sometimes we can find ourselves making decisions based on our emotional state at that time. When we are angry, we tend to make decisions that we would normally not make when we are emotionally stable. It’s easy to let our emotions get the best of us. In these situations, it’s important to just take a step back and take a good look at the problem at hand. Take deep breaths, count to ten, and try and clear your mind of everything that could influence your decision negatively. You don’t want to end up with results that you might regret in the future. Critical thinking helps us in our professional and societal lives because it helps us make decisions based on truth and personal experiences. According to Ellis (Becoming a master
GEN200
Critical Thinking Essay
November 23, 2014
For most people, critical thinking is used as an everyday part of life to help us get through professional and societal responsibilities. Critical thinking can be described as “the objective analysis and evaluation of an issue in order to form a judgement.” (www.google.com). When we are faced with situations in life that could ultimately go one of two ways, good or bad, that is when critical thinking comes into play. Critical thinking helps us weigh the pros and cons of the situation, figure out what our decision would benefit or not benefit, and essentially come to the best solution.
According to psychologist Benjamin Bloom, the six steps in the critical thinking process include remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating. Remember key terms and facts, understand the idea and describe it in your own words, apply the idea to produce a positive result, divide the idea into sections or parts, evaluate the quality of the idea and give reasoning behind it, and create something new based entirely on your idea. Following these important steps will influence your decision greatly. You want to make sure that you arrive at the best possible idea. Sometimes we can find ourselves making decisions based on our emotional state at that time. When we are angry, we tend to make decisions that we would normally not make when we are emotionally stable. It’s easy to let our emotions get the best of us. In these situations, it’s important to just take a step back and take a good look at the problem at hand. Take deep breaths, count to ten, and try and clear your mind of everything that could influence your decision negatively. You don’t want to end up with results that you might regret in the future. Critical thinking helps us in our professional and societal lives because it helps us make decisions based on truth and personal experiences. According to Ellis (Becoming a master