Developing Minds

Developing Mind

       By a person third year of college one would expect them to know what, when, where, why, and how to apply critical thinking skills. I am going into my last few years of college, and getting ready to transfer from a community college to UCLA next year. I am lacking critical thinking and research skills needed in the working world and to be a knowledgeable member of society.I have just started my fall semester and taking my last English class at the community college on critical thinking and research. Critical thinking in my eyes has been judgement and disagreement.Critical thinking is more questioning and I am working on opening my eyes to see what good can come from critical thinking and not being the nice girl. I do question some of the things I am reading but only in advertisements. I never question or analyze reports in newspapers, magazines, and small articles in books.
    Teachers and peers tell me that I am very impressionable when reading reports, they always told me to work on it. Most teachers in the past told me to keep a journal of what I have been reading. When reading reports keeping a journal or not I still always try to agree with the author. Knowing that agreeing with everything to be nice is not good. For example, American Politics, agreeing with everyone is bad, very bad, and believing what everyone says is even worse. I don't want to tiptoe around picking a person to vote for I want to analyze what is going on and see who I can truly agree with. I am studying anthropology and will be reading what will feel like millions of reports and without critical thinking and research skills I will not succeed in my job. Also I will be writing reports and without critical thinking and reading skills my reports will not be respected. I want to be a respected member of the anthropological field and want to be remember for my work not for poor skills. My retirement years I wouldn't mind teaching anthropology but without having critical thinking and research skills I wouldn't be able to be a successful teacher.
       With the work place coming soon, I need to work on knowing what I am reading is real or not. I need to be able to analyzes a report and question the author. I need to work on outlining in order of importance, making sure the ideas are clear in my outlines, getting the point across, and making sure its a great summary. The most important skill I need is knowing what makes this author an authority and are the sources good ones. I feel with those skills I would succeed more in writing and reading reports. After this fall semester I will no longer be the nice girl and agree with everything I am reading. My fingers are folded in hopes to gain many critical skills in the next four months.

Thank you for your time. Shyla Mueller