1. ReflectiveJudgment Teaching Students To Think Critically In A Time Of Information Overload Adam Peck, Ph.D. Dean of Student Affairs Stephen F. Austin State University

2. Experience in student affairs and teaching. Speaker/ Consultant with APEX Educational Programs. My Background and Familiarity with this Topic I am my own test subject.

3. What is your definition of crtical thinking? A)Evaluating information to determine what You believe. Information Literacy B)Insuring that your beliefs are internally consistent with each other. Personal Epistemology C)The ability to accurately understand the point of view of those with whom you disagree. Integrative Complexity D)The ability to apply systematic reasoning to different contexts and situations. Reflective Judgment

4. Addressing Critical Thinking in the Digital Age: Why this topic is so relevant right now. How do we define Critical Thinking and Reflective Judgment? The Teacher is the Tool: Developing Your Own Reasoning Skills. Resources for Teaching Critical Thinking Inside and Outside of the Classroom.

6. TheDigitalDilemma Why Critical Thinking is imperative now. The top 10 jobs in 2010 will be jobs that did not even exist 5 years ago. Today’s students will have an average of 10-14 jobs by age 38. There are 31 billion Google queries each month. In a week of reading The New York Times, you can learn more than a person in the eighteenth century might have learned in a lifetime. As Keeling (2004) articulated in Learning Reconsidered: A Campus-Wide Focus on the Student Experience, “…knowledge is no longer a scarce – or stable – commodity. (It) is changing so rapidly that specific information may become obsolete before a student graduates and has the opportunity to apply it” (p. 4).

8. DefiningCriticalThinking And Reflective Judgment

9. How is Reflective Judgment Different from Critical Thinking? Reflective judgment is like critical thinking in that students have to critically evaluate information to understand if it is credible, but it is different in that it concerns students’ epistemic assumptions. Students have to understand what they believe and why they believe it. Students need to learn to ensure that their beliefs are consistent or at the very least know that they are inconsistent. Students have to understand how these beliefs work together as a personal epistemology.

10. What Kind of Problems Does Reflective Judgment Study? King and Kitchener describe reflective judgment as considering “how people decide what they believe about vexing problems” (King and Kitchener, 1994, p. 2).... Especially when these problems are “ill-structured” or have no simple solutions or for which conflicting evidence and opinions exist.

11. What Are the Two Most Important Assumptions Regarding Reflective Judgment? 1)That individuals' understanding of the nature, limits, and certainty of knowing (their epistemic assumptions) affects how they defend their judgments 2)That epistemic assumptions change over time in a developmentally related fashion.

12. The Reflective Judgment Model The conceptual framework for reflective judgment is that of a stage model characterized by seven distinct but developmentally related sets of assumptions about the process of knowing (view of knowledge) and how it is acquired (justification of beliefs). The seven developmental stages of the Reflective Judgment Model may be broadly summarized into three levels: Pre-Reflective Quasi-Reflective Reflective Thinking

13. Pre-Reflective Belief that "knowledge is gained through the word of an authority figure or through firsthand observation, rather than, for example, through the evaluation of evidence. [People who hold these assumptions] believe that what they know is absolutely correct, and that they know with complete certainty. People who hold these assumptions treat all problems as though they were well-structured" (King & Kitchener, 2002, p. 39).

14. Pre-Reflective Stages Stage 1 - "I know what I have seen.“ Stage 2 - "If it is on the news, it has to be true." Stage 3 -"When there is evidence that people can give to convince everybody one way or another, then it will be knowledge, until then, it's just a guess.“ Most freshmen enter the university at this stage

15. Recognition "that knowledge-or more accurately, knowledge claims-contain elements of uncertainty, which [people who hold these assumptions] attribute to missing information or to methods of obtaining the evidence. Although they use evidence, they do not understand how evidence entails a conclusion (especially in light of the acknowledged uncertainty), and thus tend to view judgments as highly idiosyncratic" (King and Kitchener, 2002, p. 40). Quasi-Reflective

16. Quasi-Reflective Stages Stage 4 - "I'd be more inclined to believe evolution if they had proof. It's just like the pyramids: I don't think we'll ever know. Who are you going to ask? No one was there.“ Most seniors graduate at this level Stage 5 - "People think differently and so they attack the problem differently. Other theories could be as true as my own, but based on different evidence."

17. People who hold these assumptions accept "that knowledge claims cannot be made with certainty, but [they] are not immobilized by it; rather, [they] make judgments that are "most reasonable" and about which they are "relatively certain," based on their evaluation of available data. They believe they must actively construct their decisions, and that knowledge claims must be evaluated in relationship to the context in which they were generated to determine their validity. They also readily admit their willingness to reevaluate the adequacy of their judgments as new data or new methodologies become available" (King & Kitchener, 2002, p. 40). Reflective Thinking

18. Reflective Thinking Stages Stage 6 - "It's very difficult in this life to be sure. There are degrees of sureness. You come to a point at which you are sure enough for a personal stance on the issue." Stage 7 - "One can judge an argument by how well thought-out the positions are, what kinds of reasoning and evidence are used to support it, and how consistent the way one argues on this topic is as compared with other topics."

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20. TheTeacherisTheTool Tools for Developing Critical Thinking In Yourself

21. Developing Reflective Judgment in Ourselves “Good teaching cannot be reduced to technique; good teaching comes from the identity and integrity of the teacher.” -Parker Palmer from “The Courage to Teach: Exploring the Inner Landscape of a Teacher’s Life”

22. Think about a theory about student development that guides your practice. It does not need to be a formal theory. When did you first come to believe this theory? Why did you believe it to be true? How often have you reexamined this belief? What prompts you to reexamine this belief? How certain are you of this belief If you are certain, then, why are you certain? Can you think of a time you learned something (either inside the classroom or outside of the classroom) that made you question this belief. How do you know what you believe?

23. Now Consider: * Looking at the reflective judgment levels, where would you place the level of reflective judgment that you demonstrated at the time that this theory became part of your belief system. How do you know what you believe? I know what I’ve seen Stage 1 If it’s on the news, it must be true We’ll know someday I need proof Stage 4 Beliefs are based on perspective Stage 5 There are degrees of sureness Stage 6 Beliefs are based on well-reasoned judgments Stage 7 Stage 2Stage 3

24. Now Consider: If you no longer held the belief that this theory was an accurate reflection of reality, what other beliefs would you need to change as a consequence? How do you know what you believe?

25. Cleaning the Filter: The Showroom Story

26. Attribution Error Confirmation Bias Certainty Source Reliability Enemies of Reflective Judgment

28. Watch ForReplace With In fact…In my opinion… The truth is…In my experience… Scientists say…According to some research I have read… In reality…From my perspective… I know…I have noticed… The right thing to do is…My instincts tell me… Watch Your Use of Language: Catch Phrases

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30. Resources Tools for Developing Critical Thinking Inside and Outside of the Classroom

31. Beyond Person-Environment Constructs The Authority Trap/An Advantage for Student Affairs - Lecture/Presentation format encourages transmission learning, not transformational learning. - Don’t be the sage on the stage; be the guide on the side. Must be Intentionally Constructed. But how? Prompting Reflective Judgment in our Students

32. Disequilibrium: An Essential Element Creating Disequilibrium/Cognitive Dissonance is essential in prompting belief change. This change depends upon four conditions that must be met, “1) a dissatisfaction with existing beliefs, 2) individuals must find new alternatives intelligible and useful, 3) individuals must find the new beliefs plausible, and 4) new conceptions must stand up to challenges and lead to new learning” (Hofer, B. K. & Pintrich, P.R., 2004, p. 203).

33. How can we encourage RJ in Co-Curricular Programs? Dialoguing on Ill-structured Problems Integrate Socratic Dialogue Use Modeling of Reflective Judgment Designing Guided Reflections Including Meta-cognitive Reflection

34. Face the Millennial Generation Challenge Make the River Run Backwards Example Program: Tunnel of Oppression Creating Disequilibrium/Cognitive Dissonance

35. We have a need for programs which prompt contemplation and discussion of ill-structured problems or important issues which have no easy solutions. We need to expose students to examine points of view other than their own. Example Program: Switch Sides Speech/Movie Discussions Dialoguing on Ill-structured Problems

36. Teach Students to Recognize Logical Fallacies Ad Hominem (Personal Attack) Bandwagon Fallacy Appeal to Antiquity / Tradition Appeal to Popularity Straw Man Argument Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc

37. Download the logical fallacy flashcards FREE at apexeducationalprograms.com

40. In the 2007 report of the National Survey for Student Engagement (NSSE), George Kuh, Executive Director of NSSE, addressed a question he is often asked, “What one thing can we do to enhance student engagement and increase student success?” He replied, “Make it possible for every student to participate in at least two high-impact activities during their undergraduate program, one in the first year, and one later related to their major field” (NSSE, 2007, p. 18). High Impact Practices

41. What are High-Impact Practices? “…teaching and learning practices that have been widely tested and have been shown to be beneficial for college students from many backgrounds.”

42. Six Conditions of High-Impact Programs (Inside and Outside the Classroom) They demand that students devote considerable amounts of time and effort to purposeful tasks. The nature of these high-impact activities puts students in circumstances that essentially demand they interact with faculty and peers about substantive matters. Participating in one or more of these activities increases the likelihood that students will experience diversity through contact with people who are different than themselves.

43. Six Conditions of High-Impact Programs (Inside and Outside the Classroom) Cont. Students get frequent feedback about their performance. Participating in these activities provides opportunities for students to see how what they are learning works in different settings, on and off the campus. Doing one or more of these activities in the context of a coherent, academically challenging curriculum that appropriately infuses opportunities for active, collaborative learning increases the odds that students will be prepared to connect.

44. Implementation Lumberjack Leadership Academy Formerly Passive Leadership Experience Now Active/Collaborative Projects Proposed by Students Participation is Consistently Higher Peer Involvement Advising Program Used to rely on Involvement Fairs Beneficial to advisor and advisee Freshman Leadership Course Formerly Non-experiential Service-Learning Format

46. Make an Impact Twenty-Four Faculty Learning Communities: Twelve faculty selected for each long semester Two faculty from each of five colleges and two from student affairs Learning about and discuss High-Impact Practices Develop discipline-specific approaches to adopting these practices in their courses Projects are developed in the long semester prior to implementation Fall projects are focused toward first-year seminar courses, Spring projects are focused on upper-division courses

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49. Resources Learning for a new Global Century (available at: http://www.aacu.org/leap/documents/GlobalCentury_final.pdf) Learning for a new Global Century http://www.aacu.org/leap/documents/GlobalCentury_final.pdf Student Success in College (this and other relevant NSSE publications are available at: Student Success in College http://nsse.iub.edu/html/pubs.cfm) http://nsse.iub.edu/html/pubs.cfm High-Impact Educational Practices: What They Are, Who Has Access to Them, and Why They Matter (available at: http://www.aacu.org/leap/hip.cfm) High-Impact Educational Practices: What They Are, Who Has Access to Them, and Why They Matter National Resources Center for the First Year and Students in Transition (at www.sc.edu/fye). National Resources Center for the First Year and Students in Transition

50. Thank you! Contact me: Adam Peck (936) 468 -7249 peckae@sfasu.edu Visit my website: ApexEducationalPrograms.com Thank you for your participation!