Texas GOP Rejects Critical Thinking

[steff]

Feb 11, 2013 17:21:13 GMT -5 oped said:

I don't know that Islam or Hinduism ever came up in my public school education? Maybe to define them loosely and briefly? I learned about the Islamic Empire the first time I presented it to my kids, when they were about 6/8... We didn't do a lot of world, or modern, history when I was in school. They nailed our civil war though!

Kiddo got a lot of 13 colonies history because Georgia is one of them and enough Civil War history to become an expert on it.  LOL  They did world history, but it was very glossed over & rushed thru quickly. 


Seeing what he was taught & what he wasn't taught is why it's laughable that in the South, kids are being brainwashed by Liberals in school.  I can say w/o a doubt, NOT IN GEORGIA! 

[Phoenix84]

Hmmm, I guess you guys went to different public schools than I did.  We studied the Islamic empire and religion extensively my Junior year of high school. 

We never did study Hinduism much.  Though I think that was more due to time constaints.

Which is another thing to consider.  World history is vast and so are the different cultures.  People can spend their entire lives studying them.  There's only so many hours in a day, so teachers often have to pick and choose what to cover.  If given a choice, I can see why most would choose western civilization to focus on, since that has the most direct impact on how we live today. 

But that's beside the point, I think the school year should be far longer than it is. 

[Phoenix84]

Mitt is irrelevent now.  So why are you quoting him? 

And if you're that concerned in finding out what he meant, why are you asking us and not writing Mitt? 

[Sum Dum Gai]

He's the latest guy to try and become the most powerful person in the country from the Republican party.  Who should I be quoting instead to illustrate Republican ideals?

I'm not concerned with finding out what he meant.  I know what he meant.  He got asked about it constantly for weeks.  I want to know why Republicans hate the idea of public schools teaching children to question their parents, except when it comes to teaching low income kids not to make their parents mistakes.  That's the only question I want answered.  They seem to me to be contradictory ideas, so I want to know how the party prioritizes them.  Is it more important to teach kids to question their parents to stop the generational welfare, or is it more important that schools don't teach kids to question their parents, and if we get another generation of generational welfare recipients so be it?

[steff]

My son graduated last year...so the things he studied & didn't study in high school are very recent. 

[happyhoix]

Yes, teaching students that science is fallible is an important first step to critical thinking, but it isn't critical thinking ipso facto. If your teacher shows a flawed study, hands you an out-of-the-box proof of its shortcomings, and then elicits a class consensus that the research is junk, you're no better off than when you started. You've exchanged one set of conclusions for another.

Where did you get the idea she did that? She didn't hand us an out-of-the-box proof. We had to research it ourselves. We didn't all come to the same conclusions. We didn't all find the same articles related to Dr. Brainpan's discovery. We had a lively discussion in the classroom. 

That was what made her such a great teacher. She made us do the research, she made us defend our positions, she made us understand that even when you attempt to stick to the scientific method, you can err. She taught us how to think critically. 

I don't know what kind of school you went to, but mine kind of made it a point that we had to learn how to think for ourselves and not believe everything someone else tells us.

 

[Deleted]

Feb 11, 2013 17:32:47 GMT -5 Sum Dum Gai said:

He's the latest guy to try and become the most powerful person in the country from the Republican party.  Who should I be quoting instead to illustrate Republican ideals?

dark,

I don't think that's very fair statement.

[Deleted]

I know plenty now fin  

i wasn't talking Islam in general although I didn't know much about that till college. I was talking Islamic empire...I mean, Islam was bigger than Rome... Why didn't we study it?

[Sum Dum Gai]

Quoting the presidential nominee from a given party is an unfair way to illustrate that parties ideals??  Really?  When did that happen?

[Deleted]

Feb 11, 2013 17:40:54 GMT -5 oped said:

I know plenty now fin  

i wasn't talking Islam in general although I didn't know much about that till college. I was talking Islamic empire...I mean, Islam was bigger than Rome... Why didn't we study it?

I was studying a world history by age 7 , Because I was interesting in knowing. Not because someone told me to do it.

You are correct in saying, once in history Islam was much bigger.



 

[Deleted]

Feb 11, 2013 17:45:03 GMT -5 Sum Dum Gai said:

Quoting the presidential nominee from a given party is an unfair way to illustrate that parties ideals??  Really?  When did that happen?

dark,

It's history, you have to always looks forward in politic, your guys are already won.
Why bother to dig around when you have a upper hand.

You wants to understands of the cause, then looks backward.

[Phoenix84]

Feb 11, 2013 17:32:47 GMT -5 Sum Dum Gai said:

He's the latest guy to try and become the most powerful person in the country from the Republican party.  Who should I be quoting instead to illustrate Republican ideals?

I'm not concerned with finding out what he meant.  I know what he meant.  He got asked about it constantly for weeks.  I want to know why Republicans hate the idea of public schools teaching children to question their parents, except when it comes to teaching low income kids not to make their parents mistakes.  That's the only question I want answered.  They seem to me to be contradictory ideas, so I want to know how the party prioritizes them.  Is it more important to teach kids to question their parents to stop the generational welfare, or is it more important that schools don't teach kids to question their parents, and if we get another generation of generational welfare recipients so be it?

I'm a conservative and I can't answer your question because the question doesn't make sense.  Just as Virgil said, I never claimed that schools shouldn't teach critical thinking.  Maybe someone else can take a crack at it but you are in the first place assuming all republicans think X and that's just not true.  And each republican may give you a slightly different answer. 

I've never heard a republican or conservative on this board say they "hate the idea of public schools teaching children to question their parents."  I certainly never said that, hence, you putting words in my mouth.  So I don't really understand the question and can't answer it.  

All I can say is I think is that the teaching of values should be left to the parents.  I have never claimed poor people are unfit parents, or that it's the schools' job to teach kids "not to make the mistakes of their parents."  It's the school's job to teach kids the knowledge they'll need to succeed in society, math, science, language arts, history, stuff like that.  I don't like the schools teaching "values" in what's right and wrong.  

Besides, kids have no control over if their parents qualify for or pursue government benefits.  I don't see how that's relevent to the discussion on critical thinking.  And so it's not the school's job to teach kids that their parent's are right or wrong for doing so.  As I said, schools are there for teaching acadmeic skills and critical thinking, making the mistakes of their parents or not shouldn't enter into the equation at all.  

And how the hell would a school know if the parent was "making a mistake" to begin with?  And who decides what's a mistake and what's not a mistake?  Your question makes no sense.  

Let's say I lost my job and became unemployed.  I'd be pretty upset if my kid came home and said "at school, we learned today that you're a loser and I should endevor not to be like you."  But I'd also be upset if they came home and said "we read why Julia has two mommies, and my teacher says homosexuality is okay."  Because both of those are value judgements they "learned."  Values should be taught by the parents and examined by critical thinking. 
 

[billisonboard]

Feb 11, 2013 15:03:15 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

...

'Critical thought' isn't a skill that can be taught. It's an innate curiosity, and a willingness to look further into issues to resolve unknowns or contradictions that arise in our minds.

...

Critical thinking is a process. That process can be taught.

[weltschmerz]

Feb 11, 2013 16:18:35 GMT -5 Phoenix84 said:

I'm fine with sex ed, and learning about different cultures and even political science.  Anyone who is strong in their beliefs should be able to learn about different cultures, science, or evidence that doesn't agree with their own. 

But I'd get upset if my elmentary school kid came home and said they read "why does Julia have two mommies."  That's not "critical thinking." 

Why would that book upset you? Some kids DO have two mommies or two daddies. Nothing wrong with embracing diversity, is there? It's a different culture, but it's a valid culture.
Or were you only referring to Biblically-sanctioned cultures?

[Deleted]

Critical thinking

Critical thinking

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Critical thinking is reflective reasoning about beliefs and actions.^[1][2] It is a way of deciding whether a claim is always true, sometimes true, partly true, or false. Critical thinking can be traced in Western thought to the Socratic method of Ancient Greece and in the East, to the Buddhist kalama sutta and Abhidharma. Critical thinking is an important component of most professions. It is a part of the formal education process and is increasingly significant as students progress through university to graduate education, although there is debate among educators about its precise meaning and scope.^{[3]
Now, It's much better.
I don't think you can teach one's, how to think.How one's think is reflecting one's own belief system.}   

  

[Virgil Showlion]

Feb 11, 2013 17:34:27 GMT -5 happyhoix said:

Yes, teaching students that science is fallible is an important first step to critical thinking, but it isn't critical thinking ipso facto. If your teacher shows a flawed study, hands you an out-of-the-box proof of its shortcomings, and then elicits a class consensus that the research is junk, you're no better off than when you started. You've exchanged one set of conclusions for another.

Where did you get the idea she did that? She didn't hand us an out-of-the-box proof. We had to research it ourselves. We didn't all come to the same conclusions. We didn't all find the same articles related to Dr. Brainpan's discovery. We had a lively discussion in the classroom. 

That was what made her such a great teacher. She made us do the research, she made us defend our positions, she made us understand that even when you attempt to stick to the scientific method, you can err. She taught us how to think critically. 

I don't know what kind of school you went to, but mine kind of made it a point that we had to learn how to think for ourselves and not believe everything someone else tells us.

 

She certainly wasn't attending the OBE colloquium in Boston.

She taught us how to think critically.

She did not, madam. She went above and beyond in giving you tools for evaluating scientific theses, and she may even have piqued your interest in research methods, but she did not turn a non-critical thinker into a critical thinker. You would be 98% as inquisitive, logical, industrious and critical today as you would have been had she not been your instructor. If you gained anything, it was the knowledge that asking questions and doing research can be rewarding. In other words, you were engaged and she exposed you to a love of learning.

For your fellow students who didn't feel rewarded by the process, who thought of it as work, I guarantee you they left that class not a whit more willing to exercise critical thought. Critical thinking is not the art of learning to distrust authority or rejecting any conclusions placed before us, because virtually anything we can know will be 'handed' to us in some form by other people. Critical thinking is our innate passion for understanding the world around us, our willingness to put the work in to make it 'make sense', and our willingness to exercise academic diligence.

Asking questions and questioning standards is a byproduct of critical thinking, it is not the sum total of critical thinking. In may even be a barrier to critical thought if it is treated as an end unto itself. What your teacher did was give you a glimpse of something you enjoyed, and let you run with it.

[Virgil Showlion]

Feb 11, 2013 18:18:45 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Feb 11, 2013 15:03:15 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

...

'Critical thought' isn't a skill that can be taught. It's an innate curiosity, and a willingness to look further into issues to resolve unknowns or contradictions that arise in our minds.

...

Critical thinking is a process. That process can be taught.

Because a colour wheel says so?

Here's the irony: There are easily 30,000 rubrics competing with the above colour wheel as a model of 'critical thinking'. If we used the definition of 'critical thought' that most posters in this thread seem to be going by, we'd have to reject all of them prima facie or otherwise spend the rest of our lives bombarding the architects with questions.

[Deleted]

 Critical thinking is our innate passion for understanding the world around us, our willingness to put the work in to make it 'make sense', and our willingness to exercise academic diligence.

Asking questions and questioning standards is a byproduct of critical thinking, it is not the sum total of critical thinking. In may even be a barrier to critical thought if it is treated as an end unto itself. What your teacher did was give you a glimpse of something you enjoyed, and let you run with it.

Virgil,

[cereb]

Feb 11, 2013 17:07:31 GMT -5 Phoenix84 said:

Feb 11, 2013 16:51:39 GMT -5 Sum Dum Gai said:

Quoting politicians who ostensibly speak for the party is putting words in people's mouths now?  Are you saying that I made up the 47% thing?  That I coined the phrase welfare queen?  That I came up with the takers and makers terminology?  Did I also force the Republican party to use those phrases during the recent campaign season?  I sure am a powerful guy.   You'd think I'd have more money...

"You're just saying the words, parroting the phrases and not grasping the meaning behind them.  "


I'm sorry. That's the most hysterically funniest thing I have read all day.

[cereb]

Feb 11, 2013 18:18:45 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Feb 11, 2013 15:03:15 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

...

'Critical thought' isn't a skill that can be taught. It's an innate curiosity, and a willingness to look further into issues to resolve unknowns or contradictions that arise in our minds.

...

Critical thinking is a process. That process can be taught.

Exactly. Thanks for saying that. As I was reading through this thread i thought to myself...holy shit...

[cereb]

"Because a colour wheel says so? "


No, because it's true. It IS a process and components of that process are taught and learned.

[billisonboard]

Feb 11, 2013 18:35:54 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

Feb 11, 2013 18:18:45 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Critical thinking is a process. That process can be taught.

Because a colour wheel says so?
...

Actually, because you say so:

Feb 11, 2013 18:29:38 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

...

For your fellow students who didn't feel rewarded by the process, who thought of it as work, I guarantee you they left that class not a whit more willing to exercise critical thought. ... (emphasis added)

Of course you can't force a human being to engage in critical thinking.  That does not mean that it can't be taught.

[Deleted]

Feb 11, 2013 20:26:23 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Feb 11, 2013 18:35:54 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

Because a colour wheel says so?
...

Actually, because you say so:

Feb 11, 2013 18:29:38 GMT -5 Virgil Showlion said:

...

For your fellow students who didn't feel rewarded by the process, who thought of it as work, I guarantee you they left that class not a whit more willing to exercise critical thought. ... (emphasis added)

Of course you can't force a human being to engage in critical thinking.  That does not mean that it can't be taught.

That's doesn't mean it can be taught,either. billis.

[grits]

Feb 11, 2013 14:30:24 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

Feb 11, 2013 14:19:57 GMT -5 Savoir Faire-Demogague in NJ said:

which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.


The devil is in the details.... they oppose what is seen as undermining the authority of the parents

um, i PUT that "detail" in my post, SF.......i did that for a reason.

imo, what they oppose is critical thinking, which MAY undermine parental authority.

so, what that says to me is that there is a certain segment of the parental population that seems to think it is a good idea to have kids that don't question them.  personally, i think that is a terrible idea.  i want my teen questioning me.  that is what helps teens become adults.

so, effectively what the GOP is saying is that they want people to remain perpetually children, and not to question authority.

i think you can probably imagine how i feel about that.

but they also specifically mentioned challenging BELIEFS.  i can see why they don't like that.

i think the agenda is pretty clear, SF.  but you apparently don't.  must be that belief challenging thing.

It is a lot more than that. I had teachers who tried to brain wash us into what they believed. If you disagreed with them in open, you could kiss passing the class goodbye. I had an adjunct instructor who thought everybody was wrong but her. She even ignored the no smoking sign in the room, and practically dared anybody to say a word about it. I had a government teacher who was a total marxist. He tried to sway us to communism.
 Also, they do in fact belief that theories should be taught as theories, and nobody has the right to make fun of another person because of their religious beliefs.  If you are buddhist you have the right to practice it in peace.  If you are Jewish, Muslim, Christian, Hindu it is to be practiced in peace without assault from the school system.  Teachers are not there to teach someone that their beliefs are wrong.  They are there to educate you in the way the parents, school system, and state see fit.    

[grits]

Feb 11, 2013 16:13:06 GMT -5 Sum Dum Gai said:

I haven't 'bitched' about the poor being unfit parents or about doing away with public schooling for one nanosecond of my time spent on NMSNM.

But you seem like a smart guy, so I don't think you're going to say with a straight face that the Republican party at large doesn't spend a lot of time bitching about the poor, are you?  It does seem to come up quite a bit that one of the problems with this country are welfare queens, the 47%, those that are dependent on the government, or however the party wants to define them that day, raising kids that they aren't fit to raise which is breeding a generation of takers that outnumber the makers.  Any of this ringing a bell?  This is all coming from the same party that gets up in arms about schools teaching things that are the god given domain of the parents.  Right?  So, again, can you clear that seeming contradiction in party ideology up for me?

Is it the schools place to teach a third generation welfare recipient to stop listening to their whack ass parents and stay in school at 16 instead of cranking out a couple kids and signing up for welfare, or not?

The so-called 47% also included those on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, SSI, and any other entitlement program. it wasn't just about the poor.

[grits]

Feb 11, 2013 18:25:39 GMT -5 weltschmerz said:

Feb 11, 2013 16:18:35 GMT -5 Phoenix84 said:

I'm fine with sex ed, and learning about different cultures and even political science.  Anyone who is strong in their beliefs should be able to learn about different cultures, science, or evidence that doesn't agree with their own. 

But I'd get upset if my elmentary school kid came home and said they read "why does Julia have two mommies."  That's not "critical thinking." 

Why would that book upset you? Some kids DO have two mommies or two daddies. Nothing wrong with embracing diversity, is there? It's a different culture, but it's a valid culture.
Or were you only referring to Biblically-sanctioned cultures?

It would be a thinly veiled attempt to teach that homosexuality is normal. It is up to the parent to decide what they want their children to be taught about the subject.  If they think it is okay, they can teach their child that viewpoint.  If they disagree, they can teach their child that viewpoint.   The school is supposed to be providing basic education not to engage in social indoctrination.

[cereb]

"It would be a thinly veiled attempt to teach that homosexuality is normal"

I wouldn't say it's thinly veiled at all. It is normal.   "Acceptable" is the word I think you were going for.

[Phoenix84]

Feb 11, 2013 18:25:39 GMT -5 weltschmerz said:

Feb 11, 2013 16:18:35 GMT -5 Phoenix84 said:

I'm fine with sex ed, and learning about different cultures and even political science.  Anyone who is strong in their beliefs should be able to learn about different cultures, science, or evidence that doesn't agree with their own. 

But I'd get upset if my elmentary school kid came home and said they read "why does Julia have two mommies."  That's not "critical thinking." 

Why would that book upset you? Some kids DO have two mommies or two daddies. Nothing wrong with embracing diversity, is there? It's a different culture, but it's a valid culture.
Or were you only referring to Biblically-sanctioned cultures?

I don't think homosexuality, or any sexual topics of any nature are appropriate for elementary school aged kids.  I'd be happy to talk to him of the realities of sexual relationships when they get a bit older. 

And, as grits said, something that personal is based on someone's values, which need to be taught by the parents.  It's not the school's job to "take sides" on a controversial subject like same sex relationships, not a public school anyway.  Just as many feel school prayer is not okay, so is teaching anything about homosexuality not okay. 

It is kind of amusing, people get offended at Christianity, but then are confused when people get offended at things like homosexuality.  It's best of schools avoid controversial subjects and just teach knowledge kids need to succeed. 

[billisonboard]

Feb 11, 2013 20:34:50 GMT -5 @funsnowbird said:

Feb 11, 2013 20:26:23 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

Actually, because you say so:
Of course you can't force a human being to engage in critical thinking.  That does not mean that it can't be taught.

That's doesn't mean it can be taught,either. billis.

There are a number of different models involving steps for a person to take which, when taken, engage the mind in critical thinking that can be taught. You should believe Virgil. He indicated that it was a process. Okay, he attempted at first to claim it wasn't but then just naturally indicated it was as he talked about it. 

[cereb]

"I don't think homosexuality, or any sexual topics of any nature are appropriate for elementary school aged kids.  I'd be happy to talk to him of the realities of sexual relationships when they get a bit older. "

On the face of your statement, I agree with you. However, I do think it's important to help children to develop socially by exposing them to the possibility that one or more of their classmates just might have 2 mommies or 2 daddies.