“What Is All This
Talk about Critical
Thinking?”
By Belinda Smithey
Wilkes Community College
is going through the process
of reaffirmation of our ac
creditation through the
Southern Association of
Colleges and Schools
(SACS). A large part of
our reaffirmation centers
around the Quality En
hancement Plan (QEP) that
WCC develops to enhance student learning.
Many of you took part in our survey in Spring 2004 to
identify areas for improvement in helping students
learn. Upon analyzing those surveys, it was deter
mined that by implementing critical thinking skills
throughout the college community, which includes
students, faculty, and staff, we could effectively en
hance student learning.
So, what is Critical Thinking?
According to Dr. Richard Paul and Dr. Linda Elder,
authors of the model of critical thinking WCC is using,
“Critical thinking is that mode of thinking-about any
subject, content, or problem-in which the thinker im
proves the quality of his or her thinking by skillfully
taking charge of the structures inherent in thinking and
imposing intellectual standards about them.” In sim
pler terms, one could say that critical thinking is an
awareness of one’s thinking while being open-minded
and exploring perspectives through questioning and
gathering information.
Everyone thinks and everyone uses many of the ele
ments of critical thinking. The aim of the QEP is to
improve thinking which will in turn improve learning.
Our thinking directs what we do and don’t do. If we
can improve our thinking, then we can improve our
lives.
So, how will this take place at WCC? The details are
being worked out this spring by a 25-member QEP
Team. But overall, faculty and staff are being trained
in the model. Eventually, students will be trained in
the model and the skills will be used throughout the
campus. Class assignments, activities, and instruction
will begin incorporating the elements, standards, and
traits of critical thinking. Staff members will conduct
their work around the model. Everyone on campus
will speak the same language in regarding to our think
ing!
Critical Factors to Look for:
The move toward a critical thinking campus will take
place over a period of about three to four years. You
may start seeing some signs this spring! You may
hear instructors talk the language and notice that you
are even learning some of it. You may see some post
ers in the buildings later this semester. You will con
tinue to see articles in the Cougar Cry about critical
thinking.
In the meantime, visit the Foundation for Critical
Thinking at www.criticalthinking.org and discover
what critical thinking is about!
United We Stand
By Kelia Adams
Happy Red, White, and Blue American Val
entines Day! Valentines Day should be a day when an
American citizen thinks of one life, one love, one
thought, one feeling, one perception, one sweet emo
tion. . .United we Stand!
American citizens and all of Mother Nature’s inhabi
tants are united like a spider web of fragile love. The
spider web indicates that every being or inanimate
object has some sort of connection. Unfortunately, the
spider web of fragile love can be separated or broken.
The United States’ fragile web of relationships may be
broken due to several different types of communica
tion breakdowns.
The spider web of love has several different types of
relationships and connections. There are relationships
with Homo sapiens, relationships with the oak tree,
relationships with the geese, relationships with the
dogs, relationships with the rivers, relationships with
the biomes, and all these various types of relationships
are connected. Has mankind ever thought about what it
would be like to be a fish in a polluted river, an eagle
inhaling pollutants, a river contaminated with toxins,
or Mother Nature who has to put up with littering?
Mankind may be the ruler of the roost on the food
chain, but we are the lowest of low on the decency
chain. Man continues to kill the chickens, to kill the
cows, to cut down the trees, to pollute the waters, to
pollute the soils, to pollute the air, and to show mother
nature no R-E-S-P-E-C-T!
Are these choices a sin or just the norm of American
cultiire? What is American culture? What does the
all-American woman and the all-American man stand
for? What is the American Dream? Is the American
Dream to be united in holy matrimony forever and
always? What does it mean to be American....one
love, one life, one thought, one feeling, one percep
tion, one sweet emotion...United We Stand!!!