A500.5.1.RB_ WilsonLindsey_Critical Thinking Reflection

Take some time to reflect on the current state of your critical thinking competencies. Consider your thinking processes when you started the course. Have they changed at all?

I look at my critical thinking as a painting. I feel that before this class I had a good sketch of my composition, but now I can start filling in my picture with color.  Before I started this course I felt that I had a good, solid foundation in my critical thinking abilities because I would “think about my thinking while I’m thinking”. Along with this, I always try to tell myself to be practical about decisions by evaluating and balancing my emotions with facts. What has changed with my critical thinking is that while I’m thinking I will realize that a certain thought was an assumption, or an implication etc.

 I have also able to apply the elements or standards of reasoning when I am advising students. For example, sometimes prospective students come into our office and tell me, “I want a degree, which one should I pick?” This approach by a prospect use to be overwhelming to me as an advisor because I knew they hadn’t done any research about the university or what degree they were even interested in. Usually I would show them our website give some facts about ERAU and the degrees we offer, and suggested that they look into our programs first then come back if they had any questions. I was never satisfied with this approach, but I felt stuck. Now I am able to ask them questions that engage their critical thinking in order to be able to advise them better. For example, after giving them some facts about ERAU I will ask them questions like, “What do you expect to gain from a degree?” or “What are your future goals, and how might ‘X’ degree help you meet those goals?” These questions help me find assumptions made by the prospective student and force the student to apply some reason to their decision making. In general these questions create a conversation which in turn allows me to suggest one or two degrees (or a different university) to meet their needs verses directing them to our website.

Have you been able to internalize any of the techniques and concepts you have learned?

            Yes, I think I have begun to internalize several of the critical thinking concepts because as mentioned above I have been able to use some of the concepts practically. I have been finding my learning on fallacies to be helpful as well because I am able to spot them in myself and others. As a result I can either ask the person who committed the fallacy to clarify their thinking or provide more facts, or I can look at the fallacies I commit and ask myself why I am using a fallacy. I have found this especially handy when my husband says, “I’ve asked some people at work, and they say ____ so it must be true.” After further questioning I have discovered that “they” is usually one or two people and from there his argument falls apart. 

On the other hand, I find some of my learning about critical thinking to be difficult when I try to internalize the concept of critical thinking I relation to leadership. This is because I am at the bottom of the totem pole at work and I have very little management experience to apply my learning to. As a result I sometimes feel that my learning is more theoretical verses practical, and I won’t be able to internalize my critical thinking skills in relation to leadership until I move up that totem pole.

What will it take to make lasting, positive changes in the way you think?

            If someone had asked me 5 years ago if I would be working towards my Master’s in leadership I probably would have told them they were crazy. However, life as a military spouse has a way of steering me into directions that I never would have traveled before on my own. Five years ago I would have told you that I was going to stay in teaching, but as I started to asses and internalize what my goals were and what was practical for our life, so I left teaching and went into the “real world”. This is where I started to change the way I thought about my career as personal development and a journey verses a means to an end. I see my journey in relation to my career in a similar way as I see the journey into creating lasting changes in the way I think. In order to change the way I think I have to be open to new ideas and possibilities. This means I need to read more, listen more, observe more, question more and then evaluate and apply my learning.

I think there is an element of intellectual integrity with regards to changing the way I think as well. I often see so many sides to a given situation that I sometimes have a hard time knowing what I believe in, and as a result I don’t make a decision or let the wind take me where it may. To make lasting changes in the way I think, I will also have to have the intellectual integrity to truly evaluate what I believe so I can make solid decisions on a given issue, which in turn will make me a better leader.