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Roots Of Critical Thinking: The Roots Of Critical Thinking

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CHAPTER II 2. Roots of Critical Thinking Paul and Elder (1997) assert that intellectual roots of critical thinking are as ancient as its etymology, traceable to the teaching practice and vision of Socrates 2,500 years ago who discovered by a method of probing questioning that people could not rationally rationalize their confident claims to knowledge. Paul (1988) believed that the history of critical thinking has been given little attention. In his research, theoreticians agree that the roots for critical thinking primarily began with Scorates’ form of questioning (Lipman, 1995; Thayer-Bacon, 2000). They believed that at the heart of critical thinking is a spirit of analyzing and evaluating main ideas or beliefs to determine their quality and improve them, to discover unexamined assumptions, to focus on major concepts and analyze them, etc., all of which are …show more content…

They defined “Critical Thinking” as awareness of a set of interrelated questions, an ability to pose and answer critical questions at appropriate time and a desire to actively use the critical questions”(p.2). Although the definition they provide has some similarities in the same trend with the precedent definitions, their emphasis has been placed on questions (Cited by Feng, 2013). 2. Characteristics of Critical Thinking “A critical thinker is … one who is appropriately moved by reasons… critical thinking is impartial, consistent, and non-arbitrary, and the critical thinker both acts and thinks in accordance with, and values consistency, fairness, and impartiality of judgment and action” (Emphasis in original; Siegel, 1990, pp. 23-24). Some characteristics of critical thinking are: It is purposeful. It is responsive to and guided by intellectual standards (relevance, accuracy, precision, clarity, depth, and

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