While attending college or university, students pick up a variety of transferable skills. College students can use critical thinking to analyze information in a way that predicts a desired outcome, allowing them to choose the best course of action. Teachers can use active learning and paired courses to incorporate critical thinking skills into their classes, giving students opportunities to practice and reinforce them.
Critical thinking is defined as an assessment of thought processes that allows the thinker to project outcomes that lead to sound decision-making. Simply put, critical thinking is the ability to look at a situation from all sides and come up with an informed solution without prejudice or bias against the information available. Students can develop critical reading skills that will allow them to select the most relevant information from a variety of sources in order to complete well-structured projects.
This way of thinking not only helps students succeed in school, but it also helps them succeed in the workplace and in life. College students learn comparative analysis through critical thinking, which will help them make informed and thoughtful decisions rather than impulsive ones. It allows them to consider ideas from various angles, which improves comprehension. This results in a level of maturity and thoughtfulness that many employers value. It’s one of the reasons why many of them prefer candidates with a college diploma: they know that people with a college diploma are more likely to have learned this type of thinking.
Another important legacy of critical thinking for college students is the ability to communicate constructively. This skill entails gathering additional information, reflecting back the original thought to ensure comprehension, and providing positive feedback rather than negative criticism. Instead of summarizing the employee’s weaknesses, a manager communicating a desire for improvement to an employee can focus on using strengths to solve the problem. Instead of getting bogged down in arguments over individual contributions or the construction of the task at hand, classmates working on group projects have a golden opportunity to practice constructive communication.
Schools have realized that teaching critical thinking to college students has a distinct advantage. In this age of technology, information changes so quickly and is disseminated so widely that sorting through it all requires some form of mental analysis. Internet knowledge sources are not always trustworthy, and they must be assessed on an individual basis. Students who learn to think critically will be able to apply what they’ve learned in class to every aspect of their lives, from purchasing consumer goods to deciding on a career path.
However, no amount of critical thinking instruction for college students can force them to use those skills. Instructors must use techniques that encourage students to practice and motivate them to do so. Quizzes and problems make active learning enjoyable and engaging. When a critical thinking course is combined with another curriculum, students are able to apply what they’ve learned right away.