Reflection Tasks Proposed by Stella Cottrell (2005) in her paper "What is critical thinking?"

EMOTIONAL SELF - MANAGEMENT.

For me, the emotions that are most difficult to manage when others disagree with me are:

At the moment of accepting other people's point of views that are different from mine, I usually feel frustration and anxiety because I think my supporting point can be insignificant and powerless.

I deal with these by:

When people contradict my ideas I have to try to calm down and understand their point of view and the evidence they present to support it because there are many ways to look at an issue and maybe we are both right even if they don't agree with me.   

INFLUENCES OF MY THINKING.

For me, the influences on my own thinking that I need to be most aware of so they don't prejudice my thinking are:

What I need the most when I am expressing my thoughts and ideas is the awareness of myself as a person and as a critical thinker, knowing myself means that I evaluate my personal motivations, interests, and the gaps in my knowledge. 

I will deal with this by:

The previous aspects influence me a lot when I am presenting my ideas because if I am not sure about why I am saying something it could lose credibility, so what I have to do is question my own point of view and check the evidence used to support it.

CHALLENGING OPINIONS.

For me, the thing that I find most difficult about challenging the opinions of other people are:

Sometimes I close myself to the idea that only my opinion is correct, it does not matter what other people think or say. However, when they base their ideas on clear and truthful evidence become easier for me to understand their point of view.

I deal with this by:

In order to be sure if a person is not wrong, I have to ask him why he think in that way and what his evidence and reasons are. I try to understand his perspective on the issue and respect his ideas. 

REFLECTION 1.

Do you recognize anything of yourself in Bodner's description of students? What effect would the approach he suggests have on your learning and understanding? 

Bodner describes students as people who "know" without understanding, also that they are not able to apply their knowledge outside the narrow domain in which it was learned. Sometimes, I as a student read and learn something by memory just to fulfill a teacher's task; not matter if it is important for me or not, even sometimes I don't mind why I am doing a task.

The approach he suggests about as students we should look for answer questions such as 'How do we know . . . ?' and 'Why do we believe . . . ?' I find really useful this approach since it is important that we as students really understand the tasks and the topic not just in the classroom but in reality.

We could learn better and become true critical thinkers if we do and replicate every new knowledge. 

REFLECTION 2.

Barriers that affect my critical thinking abilities:

After having read, I got to the conclusion that there are some barriers that not allow me to become a true critical thinker: lack of methods, strategies, and practice; mistaking information for understanding.

Consider what you could do to manage these barriers in the next few months:

I think that a way to manage these barriers is practicing much more in my academic and professional work, throughout this practice I will find methods and strategies that help me to criticize in a better and convincing way.  Also, although critical thinking can be a hard work I have to work more on it because sometimes I prefer to take a point of view from a teacher, a book, or an article as mine, while I could do that for myself through reading and got my own conclusion and ideas.