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Edwynn -> RE: Given the results in the house, Obama has a clear mandate.... (11/11/2012 9:32:50 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
quote:
Don't ask them to 'critically think' it, please. Teach them how to reject it. .
That sums up the attitude of those Texas Republicans who sought to prevent kids being taught critical thinking skills pretty accurately.
I'm not sure exactly what you are describing in your post, but it doesn't resemble any academic institution I am familiar with. It may be that US universities are quite different to ours. It may be relevant that the corporate influences you mention disparagingly are absent from our largely State funded universities and public education system.
Here 'critical thinking skills' describes teaching students how to analyse and evaluate ideas for themselves. It does not include teaching any ideology - rather it teaches them how to analyse and evaluate any ideology for themselves. Students are then free to make up their own minds on any issue.
I'm happy to teach critical thinking skills to any student interested in the subject - I would be loathe to teach any ideology (including my own) to them or any one else for that matter.
I'm a bit tardy in getting back to this, thanks for the response in any regard.
The Texas Republicans have an issue with anything they suspect of being influence from Liberals, which for them includes about 90% of anything taught in schools.
What I don't understand is critical thinking as a separate entity, taught on its own. Are they telling us that all grads of the university systems have been devoid of critical thinking skills prior to that extraction? The two semesters of English comp. required for all degrees pretty much covers that, which has been the case for decades. Beyond that, most majors that require much any writing to speak of develop that further, though in a more organic and relevant way.
What I find troublesome in all this is that 'critical thinking' has effectively been neutered in the process of this academic surgical removal. Critical thing used to connote some attempt at reaching truth, whereas now it seems to have been forced into duty of merely 'making a good argument' for whatever cockamamie notion, in the spirit of 'seeing the other point of view,' etc.
I'm not interested in opinions, regardless how well stated, haven't been for years, and I think the major media push towards button-pushing and opinion seeking from the audience have not served the goal of an informed populace required for democracy very well. What interests me is understanding, and critical thinking to that purpose I'm all for, but that is not what I'm seeing from the current notion of 'critical thinking for all.' I see the current product almost as some generic brand of cleaner on the store shelves; "All Purpose Critical Thinking!"
The media and to an extent academia keep pushing the notion of 'seeing the other side' to such extent that we then are expected to accept the most inane drivel as a 'point of view' when it is in fact outright tripe and balderdash. That's what I mean when I say "don't 'critical think' it, reject it."
The last administration was well aware of the fact that reality is not merely observed, but created. They certainly knew the reality as existed at the time regarding Iraq's lack of WMD and lack of threat to anyone, but their mission was to change the former reality of lack of control over the oil fields to a new reality of control of the oil fields. The assertions of 'fighting terrorism,' etc. were patently absurd to any thinking person, but the media flooded the populace with a million 'critical thing'-styled 'debates,' in true Orwellian fashion.
Critical thinking used to be for purpose of understanding reality, whereas now it is used by politicos and the media purely for purpose of manipulating it.
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