Lesson 3: Barriers in

Cultivating Critical
Thinking

Module in TNC in 21st Century

ACTIVITY I

Brainstorming

A. Answer the following logical riddles and questions.

1. What is the one thing that all wise men, regardless of their religion or
politics, agree is between heaven and earth? What is it?

2. It occurs once in a minute, twice in a moment, but never in an hour.

3. Why did the chicken cross the road?

4. What common English verb becomes its own past tense by rearranging
its letters?

Module in TNC in 21st Century

 What is Critical Thinking?

Critical thinking is the ability to think clearly and rationally, understanding

the logical connection between ideas. Critical thinking has been the subject of
much debate and thought since the time of early Greek philosophers such as
Plato and Socrates and has continued to be a subject of discussion into the
modern age, for example the ability to recognize fake news.

Someone with critical thinking skills can:

 Understand the links between ideas.

 Determine the importance and relevance of arguments and ideas.
 Recognize, build and appraise arguments.
 Identify inconsistencies and errors in reasoning.
 Approach problems in a consistent and systematic way.
 Reflect on the justification of their own assumptions, beliefs and values.

Critical thinking is thinking about things in certain ways so as to arrive at the best
possible solution in the circumstances that the thinker is aware of. In more
everyday language, it is a way of thinking about whatever is presently
occupying your mind so that you come to the best possible conclusion.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

ACTIVITY II

A. Draw an image consist of problem, thinking, and solution just

like the image in the previous page.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

 5 Barriers in Cultivating Critical Thinking

1. Trusting Your Gut

Trust your gut is a piece of advice often thrown around in the context of being in
doubt. The concept of using intuitive judgment is actually the last thing you
want to be doing if critical thinking is your goal.

2. Lack of Knowledge

Critical Thinking (CT) skills are key components of what CT is, and in order to
conduct it, one must know how to use these skills. Not knowing the skills of CT
analysis, evaluation, and inference (i.e., what they are or how to use them) is, of
course, a major barrier to its application. However, consideration of a lack of
knowledge does not end with the knowledge of CT skills.

3. Lack of Willingness

In addition to skills, disposition towards thinking is also key to CT. Disposition

towards thinking refers to the extent to which an individual is willing or inclined to
perform a given thinking skill, and is essential for understanding how we think
and how we can make our thinking better.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

4. Misunderstanding of Truth

Truth-seeking is one such disposition towards thinking, which refers to a desire for
knowledge; to seek and offer both reasons and objections in an effort to inform
and to be well-informed; a willingness to challenge popular beliefs and social
norms by asking questions (of oneself and others); to be honest and objective
about pursuing the truth.

5. Close-mindlessness

At the opposite end of the spectrum, closed-mindedness is a significant barrier

to CT. By this stage, you have probably identified the inherent nature of bias in
our thinking. Being open-minded is a valuable disposition, but so is skepticism
(i.e., the inclination to challenge ideas; to withhold judgment before engaging
all the evidence or when the evidence and reasons are insufficient; to take a
position and be able to change position when the evidence and reasons are
sufficient; and to look at findings from various perspectives).

Module in TNC in 21st Century

ACTIVITY III

Write reflection about the lesson Barriers in Cultivating Critical

Thinking. (Minimum of 100 words)

Module in TNC in 21st Century

 LESSON 4: THE
INTUITIVE AND THE
STRATEGIC THINKER

Module in TNC in 21st Century

 Strategic Thinking

Strategic thinking is a process that defines the manner in which people think
about, assess, view, and create the future for themselves and others. Strategic
thinking is an extremely effective and valuable tool. One can apply strategic
thinking to arrive at decisions that can be related to your work or personal life.

Strategic thinking involves developing an entire set of critical skills. What are
those critical skills? These are the following list of critical skills that the best
strategic thinkers possess and use every day.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

Critical Skill #1: Strategic thinkers have the ability to use the left (logical) and
right (creative) sides of their brain. This skill takes practice as well as confidence
and can be tremendously valuable.

Critical Skill #2: They have the ability to develop a clearly defined and focused
business vision OR personal vision. They are skilled at both thinking with a
strategic purpose as well as creating a visioning process. They have both skills
and they use them to complement each other.

Critical Skill #3: They have the ability to clearly define their objectives and
develop a strategic action plan with each objective broken down into tasks
and each task having a list of needed resources and a specific timeline.

Critical Skill #4: They have the ability to design flexibility into their plans by
creating some benchmarks in their thinking to review progress. Then they use
those benchmarks to as a guide and to recognize the opportunity to revise their
plans as needed. They have an innate ability to be proactive and anticipate
change, rather than being reactive to changes after they occur.

Critical Skill #5: They are amazingly aware and perceptive. They will recognize
internal and external clues, often subtle, to help guide future direction and
realize opportunities for them and their companies or organizations. Great
strategic thinkers will listen, hear and understand what is said and will read and
observe whatever they can so that they will have very helpful and strategic
information to guide them. Strategic thinkers often have those “Ah Ha”
experiences while on vacation, walking, sitting and relaxing or during many
other activities because they see or hear something that resonates and
because they are so aware and perceptive.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

Critical Skill #6: They are committed lifelong learners and learn from each of their
experiences. They use their experiences to enable them to think better on
strategic issues.

Critical Skill #7: The best and greatest strategic thinkers take time out for
themselves. Their time out may be in the form of a retreat (some prefer to call it
an “advance” since it “advances” their thinking”); a walk in a special
environment; relaxing in a comfortable chair in the lobby of an historic hotel; or
an afternoon in a quiet place with a blank sheet of paper or their lap top
computer with “their thinking caps” on.

Critical Skill #8: They are committed to and seek advice from others. They may
use a coach, a mentor, a peer advisory group or some other group that they
can confide in and offer up ideas for feedback.

Critical Skill #9: They have the ability to balance their tremendous amount of
creativity with a sense of realism and honesty about what is achievable in the
longer term. This ability to balance does not deter them in their thinking.
Sometimes they refer to themselves as realistic optimists.

Critical Skill #10: They have the ability to be non-judgmental and they do not
allow themselves to be held back or restricted by judging their own thinking or
the thinking of others when ideas are initially being developed and shared. This is
especially true during any “brainstorming” exercises to ensure a flow of great
ideas. There will be time to test the ideas AFTER the “brainstorming” is
concluded.

Critical Skill #11: They have the ability to be patient and to not rush to
conclusions and judgments. Great ideas and thoughts require time to develop
into great successes in the future to reach your defined vision.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

ACTIVITY I

I. Choose 1 of the 11 critical skills that a strategic thinker possesses

and explain it. (Use your own definition) (Minimum words of 100)

I. Give at least 5 words that can define strategic thinking.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

 Intuitive Thinking

Intuitive thinking is basically the kind of thinking that helps you understand reality
in the moment, without logic or analysis. There's no language involved in it,
either. It's entirely about signs and sensations.

The following are some well- known people of Intuition

1. Albert Einstein – There is no logical way to discover of these element laws.

There is only, intuition which help by feeling for the lying behind the
appearance.
2. John Naisbitt – Intuition becomes increasingly valuable in the information
society and precisely because there is so much data.
3. Alexis Carrel- All great men are gifted with intuition. They know without
reasoning and analysis what they need to know.
4. Henry Reed – it is as if the intuitive sense acting through the soul is what
makes the raw events into food for our soul.
5. Immanuel Kant – Intuition and concepts constitute… the elements of
knowledge.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

 6. George Crumb- In general, I feel that the more rationalistic approaches to
pitch organization.
7. Robert Graves – Intuition is the supra-logic that cuts all the routine
processes thought and leaps straight from the problem to the answer.
8. Lao Tzu- The power of intuitive understanding will protect you from harm
until the end of your days.
9. Anne Wilson Scaef – Trusting our intuition often to saves us from disaster.

Intuitive Thinking and Non-Intuitive Thinking

When working on a task it makes sense to look for the obvious solution first.

If the solution doesn’t present itself, look for the not-obvious one.

And, when attempting to answer a question look for the obvious answer first,
then look for the not-obvious one.

Keep in mind, so-called common knowledge may not be correct. Critical

thinking works best when you continually ask yourself:

* Does this make sense?

* If so, why?
* If not, why not?

Keeping an open mind to new data and options is another element of sound
critical thinking. The critical thinker tests new experiences and knowledge
against past experiences and knowledge.

If the new experience or information is consistent with what is known, he keeps

his view. If not, he strives to learn why there is an inconsistency.

Module in TNC in 21st Century

ACTIVITY II

A. Give words that connected to the word INTUITIVE.

I- ntuition

N-

T-

U-

I-

T-

I-

V-

E-

Module in TNC in 21st Century

ACTIVITY III

I. Differentiate the strategic and intuitive thinking using a Venn Diagram and
their similarities.

Module in TNC in 21st Century