Edward Waters College Admissions - ACT Scores, Costs...

Edward Waters College Admissions - ACT Scores, Costs... Edward Waters College Admissions Overview: Edward Waters Colleges affirmations are not exceptionally selectivestudents with strong evaluations and grades have a decent possibility of being admitted. In expansion to presenting an application (either on the web or through the mail), intrigued understudies should submit official scores from the SAT or ACT, and secondary school transcripts. For more data, make certain to visit the schools site; additionally, grounds visits are consistently welcome so imminent understudies can decide whether Edward Waters is a decent match. Affirmations Data (2016): Edward Waters College Acceptance Rate: 58%Test Scores 25th/75th PercentileSAT Critical Reading: 370/450SAT Math: 350/460SAT Writing: -/ - What these SAT numbers meanACT Composite: 15â /18ACT English: 12/17ACT Math: 15/17What these ACT numbers mean Edward Waters College Description: Edward Waters College is a four-year, private, truly dark school situated in Jacksonville, Florida. Established in 1866, it is the most established private foundation of advanced education in the state. EWC is subsidiary with the African Methodist Episcopal Church and has more than 900 understudies bolstered by an understudy personnel proportion of 17 to 1. The school offers Bachelor of Arts, Bachelor of Science, and Bachelor of Business Administration degrees in eight scholastic regions. Understudies remain dynamic outside of the study hall through taking part in a scope of understudy clubs and associations, just as intramural ball, volleyball, banner football, and Ping-Pong. The school likewise has a Greek framework with four sororities and five brotherhoods. Varsity athletic groups contend in the NAIA Gulf Coast Athletic Conference, and the college’s volleyball, softball, baseball and women’s b-ball groups have every single won title. EWC is glad for its Triple Threa t Marching Band, and The Best of Florida Schools 2005 named EWC’s Purple Thunder Dance Squad as the Best Non-Traditional Dance Squad. Enlistment (2016): Absolute Enrollment: 3,062â (all undergraduate)Gender Breakdown: 46% Male/54% Female29% Full-time Costs (2016 - 17): Educational cost and Fees: $13,525Room and Board: $7,282Other Expenses: $4,276Total Cost: $25,083 Edward Waters College Financial Aid (2015â -16): Level of New Students Receiving Aid: 98%Percentage of New Students Receiving Types of AidGrants: 97%Loans: 74%Average Amount of AidGrants: $10,791Loans: $6,281 Scholarly Programs: Most Popular Majors: Biology, Business Administration, Criminal Justice, Psychology Move, Graduation and Retention Rates: First Year Student Retention (full-time understudies): 57%Transfer Out Rate: 20%4-Year Graduation Rate: 8%6-Year Graduation Rate: 26% Intercollegiate Athletic Programs: Mens Sports: Football, Track and Field, Cross Country, Basketball, Golf, BaseballWomens Sports: Basketball, Volleyball, Track and Field, Softball, Cross Country Information Source: National Center for Educational Statistics On the off chance that You Like Edward Waters, You May Also Like These Schools: Clark Atlanta University: Profile | GPA-SAT-ACT GraphAlbama State University: Profile | GPA-SAT-ACT GraphBenedict College: Profile Albany State University: Profile University of Florida: Profile | GPA-SAT-ACT GraphUniversity of Miami: Profile | GPA-SAT-ACT GraphShaw University: Profile Savannah State University: Profile Florida International University: Profile | GPA-SAT-ACT GraphJacksonsville University: Profile Barry University: Profile

Prostate Cancer Life Experiences Health And Social Care Essay Free Essays

string(109) neoplastic infection is comprised of little unit of ammo cells, and regularly signifiers at nervus cells. Every twelvemonth in the UK around 10, 150 shakers from prostatic harmful neoplastic illness. Prostate dangerous neoplastic sickness expire rates crested in the mid 1990s and have since fallen by around 20 % . Variety in occurrence rates around the universe and inside states, recommends that danger is influenced by ethnicity. We will compose a custom article test on Prostate Cancer Life Experiences Health And Social Care Essay or on the other hand any comparative theme just for you Request Now In the UK, dark Caribbean and dark African work powers have around a few times the danger of being analyzed or perishing from prostate harmful neoplastic malady than white work powers, while Asiatic work powers all things considered have a lower risk than the national standard. The reason for this deliberate reappraisal is to set up what is implied by prostate dangerous neoplastic sickness and the educational encounters of patients with prostatic threatening neoplastic ailment experiencing intercession. To achieve these points, with the guide of the PIO designed request, look into surveies will be looked from changed databases, from expert journals, the internet, and dim writing, in-contact with scholars and from manus chasing. With the guide of two research laborers with a third individual to cover with confliction slants, informations will be extricated from the distributed surveies, which will be themed and separated with shading codifications. It will be examined subsequently with the guide of normalized signifiers. From this reappraisal, medical caretakers will comprehend what prostate dangerous neoplastic ailment offices and they will happen it simpler to cover with these patients when they are confronted with this kind of situation. Section ONE: Background 1.1 Specifying dubious footings The prostate is a secretory organ in a grown-up male ‘s generative framework. It makes and shops fundamental liquid, a smooth liquid that feeds sperm. This liquid is discharged to sort out segment of seeds. The prostate is about the size of a pecan. It is situated beneath the urinary vesica and in forepart of the rectum. It encompasses the upper bit of the urethra, the tubing that purges piss from the vesica. On the off chance that the prostate becomes unreasonably enormous, the progression of pee can be eased back or halted. To work tolerably, the prostate needs male endocrines ( androgens ) . Male endocrines are liable for male sex highlights. The main male endocrine is testosterone, which is made mostly by the testiss. Some male endocrines are created in little entireties by the adrenal secretory organs. Prostate threatening neoplastic illness is a harmful tumor that emerges in the prostate secretory organ. Likewise with any harmful neoplastic infection, on the off chance that it is progressed or left untreated in early stages, it might at long last disperse through the blood and lymph liquid to other assortment meats. Prostate dangerous neoplastic malady happens about totally in work powers over age 40 and most oftentimes after age 50. Two-thirdss of prostate harmful neoplastic infections are found in work powers over age 65. By age 70, roughly 65 % of work powers have at any rate minute grounds of prostate threatening neoplastic illnesses. Luckily, the dangerous neoplastic illness is regularly truly moderate development and more established work powers with the harmful neoplastic ailment normally kick the bucket of something different. As they accomplish for most threatening neoplastic maladies, doctors utilize the TNM arrangement of prostate dangerous neoplastic sickness stages. The prostate threatening neoplastic sickness stages are depicted using three distinct features of tumor developing and spread. It ‘s called the TNM framework for tumor, hubs, and metastasis. T represents tumor ; it depicts the size of the central nation of prostate dangerous neoplastic malady. N represents hubs ; it portrays whether prostate threatening neoplastic malady has spread to any lymph hubs and to what degree. M represents metastasis ; it implies far off spread of prostate dangerous neoplastic infection, for outline, to the castanetss or liver. There are different methods of arranging prostate dangerous neoplastic ailment, for example, the Gleason framework. Now and again, the TNM framework and Gleason mark are consolidated together to portray prostate harmful neoplastic sickness stage. In stage I, prostate threatening neopl astic ailment is found in the prostate simply. Stage I prostate harmful neoplastic infection is tiny ; it ca n’t be felt on a computerized rectal test ( DRE ) , and it is n’t seen on creative mind of the prostate. In stage II, the tumor has become inside the prostate however has n’t stretched out past it. Stage III prostate threatening neoplastic malady has spread outside the prostate, however just barely. Prostate threatening neoplastic ailment in stage III may influence close by tissues, similar to the fundamental blisters. In stage IV, the threatening neoplastic infection has spread ( metastasized ) outside the prostate to different tissues. Stage IV prostate harmful neoplastic sickness typically spreads to lymph hubs, the castanetss, liver, or lungs. Precisely setting the prostate threatening neoplastic malady stage is profoundly of import. Prostate threatening neoplastic ailment stage helps locate the ideal intercession, each piece great as conjecture. For this ground, it ‘s meriting making a trip through stretched out testing to procure the correct prostate harmful neoplastic sickness stage. 1.2 Types of prostate dangerous neoplastic malady There are numerous kinds of prostate dangerous neoplastic ailment and the status is habitually present in a wide range of parts of the prostate. The antecedent to prostate threatening neoplastic sickness is known as prostate intraepithelial neoplasia, this is other than found in a wide range of areas inside the prostate. Despite the fact that there are various sorts of prostate harmful neoplastic illness the enormous mass ( around 95 % ) are of the sort known as glandular malignant growth. As this is the most wide spread from it has gotten equivalent with the term prostrate threatening neoplastic illness. Adenocarcinoma The most widely recognized site of start of prostate harmful neoplastic ailment is in the fringe zone ( the boss glandular zone of the prostate ) . The term glandular disease can be separated to conclude its centrality. Adeno implies ‘pertaining to a secretory organ ‘ , while Carcinoma identifies with a harmful neoplastic ailment that creates in epithelial cells. The term epithelial only identifies with cells that encompass natural structure assortment meats or secretory organs. aldara and basal cell carcinoma Little cell carcinoma This kind of harmful neoplastic malady is comprised of little unit of ammo cells, and normally signifiers at nervus cells. You read Prostate Cancer Life Experiences Health And Social Care Essay in class Article models Small cell carcinoma is extremely forceful in nature and as it does non take to an expansion in prostatic explicit antigens it tends to be somewhat harder to see than adenocarcinoma ; this typically implies it has arrived at a propelled signifier after detecting. Squamous cell carcinoma This is a non glandular threatening neoplastic malady, similar to little cell carcinoma there is no expansion in prostatic explicit antigens when this is available. Squamous cell carcinoma is extremely forceful in nature. There are other, progressively uncommon, signifiers of prostate harmful neoplastic malady these incorporate sarcomas and transitional cell carcinoma ; the last only here and there creates in the prostate however gets from essential tumors present in the vesica or urethra. 1.3 Symptoms and encounters Side effects There are no notice imprints or side effects of early prostate harmful neoplastic malady. When a dangerous tumor makes the prostate secretory organ swell essentially, or one time harmful neoplastic ailment spreads past the prostate, the accompanying side effects might be available: A continuous interest to pee, especially at dull. Inconvenience get bringing down or ending the urinary conduit. A frail or intruded on urinary conduit. An agonizing or terminating esthesis during micturition or contribution. Blood in piss or seeds. Lower back harming Torment with digestive tract movement These are non indications of the harmful neoplastic malady itself. On the other hand, they are the side effects of the hindrance from the harmful neoplastic illness developing inside the prostate and environing tissues. Side effects of cutting edge prostate dangerous neoplastic infection include: Dull, perpetual profound harming or firmness in the pelvic support, lower back, ribs or upper thighs ; creaky harming in the castanetss of those nations. Loss of weight and appetency, exhaustion, affliction, or emesis. Expanding of the lower members Encounters Going up against the universe of dangerous neoplastic illness diagnosing Taking a useful segment in threatening neoplastic infection intercession Dragging out an idealistic soul, delaying genuinely, diminishing the effect of threatening neoplastic malady on others. The encounters of strict distress and the corrective methodology among persistent with prostatic threatening neoplastic malady. 1.4 Gaps inside writing Efficient reappraisals intend to place, measure and summarize the discoveries of all applicable single surveies, accordingly doing the accessible grounds progressively open to assurance shapers ( Center for Reviews and Dissemination, 2009, pv ) . So as to obtain a finishing up confirmation with this subject, a careful chase for any old reappraisals or any on-going reappraisals regarding this matter was looked from changed asset places. The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews ( CDRS ) , which comprises of the most trustworthy modern deliberate reappraisals, was looked as the main electronic database. Different assets, for example, nursing databases, specializer journals the National research vault and Google bookman chase was investigate

The Importance Of Critical Thinking In Academia

The Importance Of Critical Thinking In Academia EP 20: The Importance Of Critical Thinking In Academia How To Incorporate EP 20: The Importance Of Critical Thinking In Academia How To Incorporate Welcome to Episode 20 of the Homework Help Show! Have you ever wondered what your professors mean when they ask you to think critically? How do you learn the critical skills they are asking you to use? This week our Host and Top Writer Cath Anne discussed the importance of critical thinking in academia and gives you a series of skills you can incorporate into your learning right away! Looking for study tips, help with essay writing, or advice on how to be a better student? Welcome to The Homework Help Show, a weekly show where we teach, assist, and offer valuable insights for student life. From study hacks to writing tips, discussions about student mental health to step-by-step guides on academic writing and how to write a resume, weve got you covered. Want your questions answered? Write them below or join the conversation on social media using the hashtag #askHHG TRANSCRIPT: Cath Anne: [00:00:06] Whats up guys? Im Cath Anne and welcome to Episode 20 of The Homework Help Show. Cath Anne: [00:00:13] Im really pumped because we have changed our format up a little bit. We were doing live streams quite consistently, but now we are going to be doing a YouTube video a week and a quick Q and A on Instagram Live and Facebook Live, if you guys have any questions. So Im really excited about this new format. If youre unfamiliar with this show every week on The Homework Help Show we provide you with valuable content for your academic life. Cath Anne: [00:00:39] This week were going to discuss how to incorporate critical thinking skills into your work. Have you ever heard the phrase critical thinking? Im sure you have. If you are in university this is definitely something that gets thrown around regularly. What does it mean to you? For some people it might mean something quite negative. The word critical evokes a negative connotation. It might suggest that you have to pick things apart or deconstruct things or be really judgmental. In a way it does. Cath Anne: [00:01:14] However thinking about things critically can also help you to learn and it actually means a lot more than just being a general grump. Critical thinking is a skill that we engage in everyday. It is basically how we make a decision. We are essentially using critical thinking, every time we decide to make decision. It makes sense that this is something that we can apply to our academic career as well. Cath Anne: [00:01:43] However, in University and College critical thinking definitely has a broader meaning. Be critical means making informed, educational judgments about social issues, literature, math, and other topics that we talk about often in university. It can also mean distinguishing between facts and opinion. It also helps us to determine whether a theory is valid and how to actually apply that theory in context. Cath Anne: [00:02:17] When we make academic judgments they have to be grounded in research. As you probably know all of your profs are very consistently stringent on whether you are using appropriate academic resources or not. So critical thinking skills allow us to take that information to break it down or deconstruct it and to put it into a really well written essay or to apply it in a test or an exam. The benefit of critical thinking skills is that they allow us to consider things from all sides. So when we access all of this information it might feel a little bit overwhelming but its actually great to draw on different perspectives and different ways of knowing and different types of research in order to inform your topic. Cath Anne: [00:03:12] Critical thinking is a necessary component of academia because it is through the critical thinking process that information is actually developed and that knowledge is contributed to a particular field. So for example, when people are doing research they are looking at past research that has been done on a topic. Theyre taking all of the information theyre basically doing a literature review something that you might be familiar with. Theyre going through and theyre figuring out where the gaps in this literature and what questions can be answered in order to create new research and to contribute to the field. As a critically thinking student this is something that you are learning. Cath Anne: [00:03:58] It is important to incorporate this process into your reading, your notetaking, your essay writing, and your presentation. If you are in a professional field such as social work, nursing, or engineering. These are skills that can also apply to your future practice as you are going through school as well. Cath Anne: [00:04:20] So critical thinking. The cool thing about it is that it doesnt only apply to academia. It can also help us to navigate our daily lives as well. When we enhance our critical thinking skills if we can improve our decision-making processes and make stronger decisions based on accounting for all of the information that we take in. If we enhance our critical thinking skills, we can improve our decision-making processes and make stronger decisions based on accounting for all of the information. Remember, most of our everyday thinking are uncritical. We generally go through the days without thinking about every step, without deconstructing how we act, without thinking about societal issues, or you know gender roles or any of those topics that come up in academia. However, there is a time in a place when we can use critical thinking in our daily lives and where it can actually contribute to social change and changes in our own lives. Cath Anne: [00:05:30] Today were going to talk about how to use critical thinking in academia and how we actually learn some of these critical thinking skills and apply them to our life as a student and to our academic work. So you might be familiar with when profs give you an assignment. Perhaps your first assignment is quite small, it might be one or two pages and they ask you something pretty basic. The next assignment might build on that and then the third assignment is the final exam. That final piece is where you take all of your assignments and put them all together. That is actually called the scaffolding technique. Your prof is trying to teach you to develop critical thinking skills. It becomes a built in mechanism in academia and in the university and in college. However there are different ways of doing it and different professors and instructors will do it different ways. Cath Anne: [00:06:35] Its also really great to be working on your critical thinking skills and being aware of critical thinking skills, as a student so that you can have a one up on your academic work. Cath Anne: [00:06:46] Lets discuss one of the first tips that you can use to enhance your critical thinking skills in academia. Ask basic questions. What I mean by that is that is, as we know our social world is really complex and there is tons of information to take in. As students when were going through and sifting through research and literature it can often be overwhelming and seem very complicated and just be a little bit over our heads. However we can begin simply by asking simple questions. When in answer to a question becomes very complex we can actually lose the meaning of it. So when youre starting with an assignment it can be great just to be simple. Cath Anne: [00:07:32] Take the content that you know and work with that. Ask some of the following questions. What do you already know? If you are in an English class, maybe youve taken an English class. Ask what you already know about the topic. Draw on your existing knowledge and information. You will be surprised how much information you already have. Start by creating an outline and answer: what do you already know about this topic? Write it down from there. Ask yourself how do you know that? Maybe you think about some references that you might have had in your first year English class or when it comes to social work, as thats my background. I remember there were always some specific papers that I consistently referenced throughout my degree because they really stood out to me. What are some references that you can draw on from the past that youre really familiar with? Can you incorporate them into this work? You might not be able to do this but in this case you can also draw on the existing literature. Cath Anne: [00:08:33] So if you do have some information about a topic go ahead and do a little bit of research a little bit of digging and see why you actually know. If there is literature to back up what you already know then youre going to ask yourself: what are you trying to prove/disprove/demonstrate/critique? This process would actually be the beginning process of developing your thesis statement and framing out your assignment. Then you want to ask what are you overlooking. So are there any additional information that you should add to your outline? Cath Anne: [00:09:10] This can be good in the process of getting you to think a little bit outside the box. Getting you to think critically about the literature and helping you to engage with the literature rather than being overwhelmed. You actually do have some knowledge to contribute and this will begin your process of critical thinking. You can use this technique when it comes to studying as well. It can actually help to solidify some information in your brain when youre trying to memorize things. This is actually a really good process for either writing a paper or studying. If you have a little bit more time for that. Cath Anne: [00:09:48] As I mentioned definitely begin this process by doing an outline. This might even be a pre-outline. Just answer these basic questions and this will help you to write your paper a lot more quickly and a lot more fluidly. Engaging in a critical thinking process does not have to be complex even though the word critical can make it feel that it might be a little complex. You definitely dont have to make him overly complicated. Ask these simple questions and start where you are and then it should all flow from there. Cath Anne: [00:10:30] A second tip to developing your critical thinking skills is to question your basic assumptions. Particularly when youre writing a paper or thinking through a problem you are going to be coming at it with your own biases and analyses from everyday life. We all have these basic assumptions and thats okay. But academic quality work must extend beyond our basic assumptions towards analysis and synthesis of information. When we check our own assumptions at the door we can go into analysis with a clear head and go into research with an open mind. This can also extend beyond academia. This can apply to our mental processes as well. Cath Anne: [00:11:20] We all have ways of making life simpler. We have shortcuts in the way we do things. This is actually called heuristics, which are basically mental shortcuts. These were things that we used to when we were hunter-gatherers. It was really helpful for us to be able to make quick decisions or have shortcuts in terms of thinking. But nowadays our world is a little bit more complex than the hunter gatherer society. So we do need to be aware of those heuristics that we have built in for ourselves. Certainly they can be useful in some situations but they arent necessarily useful when youre writing an academic paper because you might take a short cut in something. Just be aware of these underlying biases. These heuristics are mental shortcuts. Maybe you write them down just so that you understand your own processes a little bit more. Cath Anne: [00:12:15] Some other tips are to read more, become more educated, and become more informed about how others think. These are three ways that we can be more aware of our own assumptions our own biases and our own mental shortcuts. Cath Anne: [00:12:39] A third tip to improve your critical thinking skills is to remember to think for yourself. Although you will evidently be drawing on academic literature and information when you do the research and write papers, it is important to remember to think for yourself. While this does not mean incorporating your own opinion or biases into your writing it does mean that you must analyze the situation through a critical lens. So go back and ask. Basic questions as we discussed. What is missing? Is there a gap in the literature? What is this research saying? Does it make sense in in relation to other research that you see on the topic? Cath Anne: [00:13:21] Think through the literature using your own power of deduction. So although you will be drawing on resources to make your point you want to make sure that youre using your own critical thinking skills because youll be increasing that critical thinking muscle. This will lead to a stronger paper and it will also show the professor that you can do more than regurgitate literature because that is what theyre looking for. Theyre looking for you to analyze and grapple with the data. So make sure that you are truly engaging with the literature and thinking through it yourself. Cath Anne: [00:13:55] So finally I wanted to give you a five step process. Weve already talked about this a little bit but this was actually developed by TED ED, TED Talks educational YouTube channel. It can help you to develop your critical thinking skills. Cath Anne: [00:14:12] The first step in the process is to formulate your question. So in an academic setting this looks like creating your thesis or writing your hypothesis. What is the question that youre looking at. Often if youre writing an academic paper, this will already be given to you in the outline provided by the professor. You will also have to enhance it and develop it yourself. Dig into the research. Figure out what there is out there on the topic and really take a few days to get engaged with the research and the literature so that you can develop your own opinion on the topic. Cath Anne: [00:14:52] Apply the information. So ask yourself what concepts are at work? What assumptions exist? Is your interpretation logically sound? Cath Anne: [00:15:01] So again this is a process of going back to your own mental biases, your own heuristics. Understanding whether your assessment of the information makes sense in relation to the literature that youre reviewing. Consider the implications of this information. So what does this research imply in terms of the world? Are they making any suggestions about how to change things? Are they making any suggestions about how this scientific research will apply to human nature? So what does this information mean? Because when youre considering that itll also allow you to develop a stronger critical analysis and understand the information in context. Cath Anne: [00:15:46] Then fifth you want to explore other points of view. This is absolutely necessary when you are writing an academic paper because you dont only want to provide one view of a topic or one analysis of some research because you want to have a well-rounded analysis. By presenting and exploring other points of view, youre also going to have a stronger argument because youre going to understand what the other person or what the other group of people will say about the topic. You will be able to therefore strengthen your own argument. Cath Anne: [00:16:29] So, guys that is it for this week. I hope this video was helpful for you. Thank you so much for tuning into The Homework Help Show. Im really excited for our new format and Im really hoping that you will join us again. Cath Anne: [00:16:44] As I mentioned on Thursday were going to be jumping on live for about 10 minutes on Instagram Live and Facebook Live just for a little Q and A session. Well also be jumping on to remind you to check out this YouTube video. So if you are interested in any more of our content we have tons of it out there please visit us on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Google Plus, YouTube, Medium. And were also on SoundCloud, Anchor, iTunes Apple podcasts, Google Play Music. If you are more of a listener. All you have to do is search for Homework Help Global and we will be there. Also just a little reminder if you did like this video please SUBSCRIBE below and give us a thumbs up. That would be great and would really help us. So if you have any other questions please leave them in the comments below and I am looking forward to seeing you again. Cath Anne: [00:17:40] Take care guys. The Importance Of Critical Thinking In Academia EP 20: The Importance Of Critical Thinking In Academia How To Incorporate EP 20: The Importance Of Critical Thinking In Academia How To Incorporate Welcome to Episode 20 of the Homework Help Show! Have you ever wondered what your professors mean when they ask you to think critically? How do you learn the critical skills they are asking you to use? This week our Host and Top Writer Cath Anne discussed the importance of critical thinking in academia and gives you a series of skills you can incorporate into your learning right away! Looking for study tips, help with essay writing, or advice on how to be a better student? Welcome to The Homework Help Show, a weekly show where we teach, assist, and offer valuable insights for student life. From study hacks to writing tips, discussions about student mental health to step-by-step guides on academic writing and how to write a resume, weve got you covered. Want your questions answered? Write them below or join the conversation on social media using the hashtag #askHHG TRANSCRIPT: Cath Anne: [00:00:06] Whats up guys? Im Cath Anne and welcome to Episode 20 of The Homework Help Show. Cath Anne: [00:00:13] Im really pumped because we have changed our format up a little bit. We were doing live streams quite consistently, but now we are going to be doing a YouTube video a week and a quick Q and A on Instagram Live and Facebook Live, if you guys have any questions. So Im really excited about this new format. If youre unfamiliar with this show every week on The Homework Help Show we provide you with valuable content for your academic life. Cath Anne: [00:00:39] This week were going to discuss how to incorporate critical thinking skills into your work. Have you ever heard the phrase critical thinking? Im sure you have. If you are in university this is definitely something that gets thrown around regularly. What does it mean to you? For some people it might mean something quite negative. The word critical evokes a negative connotation. It might suggest that you have to pick things apart or deconstruct things or be really judgmental. In a way it does. Cath Anne: [00:01:14] However thinking about things critically can also help you to learn and it actually means a lot more than just being a general grump. Critical thinking is a skill that we engage in everyday. It is basically how we make a decision. We are essentially using critical thinking, every time we decide to make decision. It makes sense that this is something that we can apply to our academic career as well. Cath Anne: [00:01:43] However, in University and College critical thinking definitely has a broader meaning. Be critical means making informed, educational judgments about social issues, literature, math, and other topics that we talk about often in university. It can also mean distinguishing between facts and opinion. It also helps us to determine whether a theory is valid and how to actually apply that theory in context. Cath Anne: [00:02:17] When we make academic judgments they have to be grounded in research. As you probably know all of your profs are very consistently stringent on whether you are using appropriate academic resources or not. So critical thinking skills allow us to take that information to break it down or deconstruct it and to put it into a really well written essay or to apply it in a test or an exam. The benefit of critical thinking skills is that they allow us to consider things from all sides. So when we access all of this information it might feel a little bit overwhelming but its actually great to draw on different perspectives and different ways of knowing and different types of research in order to inform your topic. Cath Anne: [00:03:12] Critical thinking is a necessary component of academia because it is through the critical thinking process that information is actually developed and that knowledge is contributed to a particular field. So for example, when people are doing research they are looking at past research that has been done on a topic. Theyre taking all of the information theyre basically doing a literature review something that you might be familiar with. Theyre going through and theyre figuring out where the gaps in this literature and what questions can be answered in order to create new research and to contribute to the field. As a critically thinking student this is something that you are learning. Cath Anne: [00:03:58] It is important to incorporate this process into your reading, your notetaking, your essay writing, and your presentation. If you are in a professional field such as social work, nursing, or engineering. These are skills that can also apply to your future practice as you are going through school as well. Cath Anne: [00:04:20] So critical thinking. The cool thing about it is that it doesnt only apply to academia. It can also help us to navigate our daily lives as well. When we enhance our critical thinking skills if we can improve our decision-making processes and make stronger decisions based on accounting for all of the information that we take in. If we enhance our critical thinking skills, we can improve our decision-making processes and make stronger decisions based on accounting for all of the information. Remember, most of our everyday thinking are uncritical. We generally go through the days without thinking about every step, without deconstructing how we act, without thinking about societal issues, or you know gender roles or any of those topics that come up in academia. However, there is a time in a place when we can use critical thinking in our daily lives and where it can actually contribute to social change and changes in our own lives. Cath Anne: [00:05:30] Today were going to talk about how to use critical thinking in academia and how we actually learn some of these critical thinking skills and apply them to our life as a student and to our academic work. So you might be familiar with when profs give you an assignment. Perhaps your first assignment is quite small, it might be one or two pages and they ask you something pretty basic. The next assignment might build on that and then the third assignment is the final exam. That final piece is where you take all of your assignments and put them all together. That is actually called the scaffolding technique. Your prof is trying to teach you to develop critical thinking skills. It becomes a built in mechanism in academia and in the university and in college. However there are different ways of doing it and different professors and instructors will do it different ways. Cath Anne: [00:06:35] Its also really great to be working on your critical thinking skills and being aware of critical thinking skills, as a student so that you can have a one up on your academic work. Cath Anne: [00:06:46] Lets discuss one of the first tips that you can use to enhance your critical thinking skills in academia. Ask basic questions. What I mean by that is that is, as we know our social world is really complex and there is tons of information to take in. As students when were going through and sifting through research and literature it can often be overwhelming and seem very complicated and just be a little bit over our heads. However we can begin simply by asking simple questions. When in answer to a question becomes very complex we can actually lose the meaning of it. So when youre starting with an assignment it can be great just to be simple. Cath Anne: [00:07:32] Take the content that you know and work with that. Ask some of the following questions. What do you already know? If you are in an English class, maybe youve taken an English class. Ask what you already know about the topic. Draw on your existing knowledge and information. You will be surprised how much information you already have. Start by creating an outline and answer: what do you already know about this topic? Write it down from there. Ask yourself how do you know that? Maybe you think about some references that you might have had in your first year English class or when it comes to social work, as thats my background. I remember there were always some specific papers that I consistently referenced throughout my degree because they really stood out to me. What are some references that you can draw on from the past that youre really familiar with? Can you incorporate them into this work? You might not be able to do this but in this case you can also draw on the existing literature. Cath Anne: [00:08:33] So if you do have some information about a topic go ahead and do a little bit of research a little bit of digging and see why you actually know. If there is literature to back up what you already know then youre going to ask yourself: what are you trying to prove/disprove/demonstrate/critique? This process would actually be the beginning process of developing your thesis statement and framing out your assignment. Then you want to ask what are you overlooking. So are there any additional information that you should add to your outline? Cath Anne: [00:09:10] This can be good in the process of getting you to think a little bit outside the box. Getting you to think critically about the literature and helping you to engage with the literature rather than being overwhelmed. You actually do have some knowledge to contribute and this will begin your process of critical thinking. You can use this technique when it comes to studying as well. It can actually help to solidify some information in your brain when youre trying to memorize things. This is actually a really good process for either writing a paper or studying. If you have a little bit more time for that. Cath Anne: [00:09:48] As I mentioned definitely begin this process by doing an outline. This might even be a pre-outline. Just answer these basic questions and this will help you to write your paper a lot more quickly and a lot more fluidly. Engaging in a critical thinking process does not have to be complex even though the word critical can make it feel that it might be a little complex. You definitely dont have to make him overly complicated. Ask these simple questions and start where you are and then it should all flow from there. Cath Anne: [00:10:30] A second tip to developing your critical thinking skills is to question your basic assumptions. Particularly when youre writing a paper or thinking through a problem you are going to be coming at it with your own biases and analyses from everyday life. We all have these basic assumptions and thats okay. But academic quality work must extend beyond our basic assumptions towards analysis and synthesis of information. When we check our own assumptions at the door we can go into analysis with a clear head and go into research with an open mind. This can also extend beyond academia. This can apply to our mental processes as well. Cath Anne: [00:11:20] We all have ways of making life simpler. We have shortcuts in the way we do things. This is actually called heuristics, which are basically mental shortcuts. These were things that we used to when we were hunter-gatherers. It was really helpful for us to be able to make quick decisions or have shortcuts in terms of thinking. But nowadays our world is a little bit more complex than the hunter gatherer society. So we do need to be aware of those heuristics that we have built in for ourselves. Certainly they can be useful in some situations but they arent necessarily useful when youre writing an academic paper because you might take a short cut in something. Just be aware of these underlying biases. These heuristics are mental shortcuts. Maybe you write them down just so that you understand your own processes a little bit more. Cath Anne: [00:12:15] Some other tips are to read more, become more educated, and become more informed about how others think. These are three ways that we can be more aware of our own assumptions our own biases and our own mental shortcuts. Cath Anne: [00:12:39] A third tip to improve your critical thinking skills is to remember to think for yourself. Although you will evidently be drawing on academic literature and information when you do the research and write papers, it is important to remember to think for yourself. While this does not mean incorporating your own opinion or biases into your writing it does mean that you must analyze the situation through a critical lens. So go back and ask. Basic questions as we discussed. What is missing? Is there a gap in the literature? What is this research saying? Does it make sense in in relation to other research that you see on the topic? Cath Anne: [00:13:21] Think through the literature using your own power of deduction. So although you will be drawing on resources to make your point you want to make sure that youre using your own critical thinking skills because youll be increasing that critical thinking muscle. This will lead to a stronger paper and it will also show the professor that you can do more than regurgitate literature because that is what theyre looking for. Theyre looking for you to analyze and grapple with the data. So make sure that you are truly engaging with the literature and thinking through it yourself. Cath Anne: [00:13:55] So finally I wanted to give you a five step process. Weve already talked about this a little bit but this was actually developed by TED ED, TED Talks educational YouTube channel. It can help you to develop your critical thinking skills. Cath Anne: [00:14:12] The first step in the process is to formulate your question. So in an academic setting this looks like creating your thesis or writing your hypothesis. What is the question that youre looking at. Often if youre writing an academic paper, this will already be given to you in the outline provided by the professor. You will also have to enhance it and develop it yourself. Dig into the research. Figure out what there is out there on the topic and really take a few days to get engaged with the research and the literature so that you can develop your own opinion on the topic. Cath Anne: [00:14:52] Apply the information. So ask yourself what concepts are at work? What assumptions exist? Is your interpretation logically sound? Cath Anne: [00:15:01] So again this is a process of going back to your own mental biases, your own heuristics. Understanding whether your assessment of the information makes sense in relation to the literature that youre reviewing. Consider the implications of this information. So what does this research imply in terms of the world? Are they making any suggestions about how to change things? Are they making any suggestions about how this scientific research will apply to human nature? So what does this information mean? Because when youre considering that itll also allow you to develop a stronger critical analysis and understand the information in context. Cath Anne: [00:15:46] Then fifth you want to explore other points of view. This is absolutely necessary when you are writing an academic paper because you dont only want to provide one view of a topic or one analysis of some research because you want to have a well-rounded analysis. By presenting and exploring other points of view, youre also going to have a stronger argument because youre going to understand what the other person or what the other group of people will say about the topic. You will be able to therefore strengthen your own argument. Cath Anne: [00:16:29] So, guys that is it for this week. I hope this video was helpful for you. Thank you so much for tuning into The Homework Help Show. Im really excited for our new format and Im really hoping that you will join us again. Cath Anne: [00:16:44] As I mentioned on Thursday were going to be jumping on live for about 10 minutes on Instagram Live and Facebook Live just for a little Q and A session. Well also be jumping on to remind you to check out this YouTube video. So if you are interested in any more of our content we have tons of it out there please visit us on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Google Plus, YouTube, Medium. And were also on SoundCloud, Anchor, iTunes Apple podcasts, Google Play Music. If you are more of a listener. All you have to do is search for Homework Help Global and we will be there. Also just a little reminder if you did like this video please SUBSCRIBE below and give us a thumbs up. That would be great and would really help us. So if you have any other questions please leave them in the comments below and I am looking forward to seeing you again. Cath Anne: [00:17:40] Take care guys.