Critical Thinking in Academic Writing-Free-Samples for Students

Question: Discuss the relevance of critical thinking in academic writing. Answer: Introduction: Critical thinking serves to be the fundamental aspect for academic writing. It connotes to the formation of judgment through an objective analysis of facts and serves to be a very important element in all professional fields and academic disciplines. The process of critical thinking helps in the careful acquisition and interpretation of information that enables to reach to a well-justified conclusion. The thinking process delves into the clear conceptualizing, synthesizing, applying and evaluating information that is rational and open-minded and helps to get an unbiased conclusion. The disciplined process of thinking emphasizes commitment in reasoning to formulate beliefs and understanding. With reflective skepticism the process does not aim to solve problems, rather it helps to improve ones process of thinking. The concept of critical thinking has been further broadened with inclusion of concepts and processes such as reflection, empathy, imagination and others. All these aspects he lp in the critical thinking processes, however, reasoning in the thinking process serve to be the core connotation of Critical thinking. Discussion: Critical thinking for academic writing, the Concept- It is commonly considered that the evidence of critical thinking as portrayed through argumentation serves to be central to successful academic writing. The concept of critical thinking though serves to be a bit confusing at times. The nature of critical thinking is quite difficult to apprehend and many students, apart from professional writers feel it very difficult to implement a critical dimension in their writing. They have a comprehensive understanding of critical thinking that serves to be the basis of any appropriate academic writing. Insufficient subject knowledge, uncertainties in demonstrating an argument and various other issues sums to problems regarding critical thinking. However, critical thinking being the central requirement for any desired writing outcome needs all writers or students to acknowledge it for effective writings (Kettler, 2014). Academic writing has greater value for the aspect of critical writing that accounts to research and analysis that every student or writer needs to instill in order to provide a good writing. Though the definition of critical thinking has been complex over the times, it is observed as a cognitive skill relating to rational approach and judgment of a context in the broader sense, which has a greater connotation of reflexive skepticism. The process of thinking helps students and the writers engaged in academic writing to incorporate the central activity of presenting reasons to support the claim or argument that they make. This results to a logical argumentation that ensures the validity of the entire outcome. Critical thinking helps the academic writers to identify the various issues and assumptions for the matter they will be dealing with, to determine the important relationships and make the correct reference and deduce right conclusions. Importance of Critical thinking in Academic writing- Academic writing is the style of expressing ones own expertise in various subjects that define the intellectual depth of the expert as well as the discipline that he/she has been dealing with. It requires precise study and research of the particular subject for which critical thinking serves to be very effective and useful. In academic writing, one has to deal with various academic fields that include sociological thoughts, political thoughts, historical thoughts, thoughts relating to the branch of sciences and all the other fields of study (Dias et al., 2013). Thus, the principles of critical thinking are universal and applying those to a particular subject includes a process of reflection and contextualization. Critical thinking includes an elaborate understanding of the subject and thus, it easily identifies the bias, propaganda, deceptive elements, distortions and deception relating to the study (McPeck, 2016). This makes the academic writing more uplifted and free of misinformat ion. Critically thinking has been so beneficial that some educators believe that it must be taught in order to incorporate the concept in every student. This would enable them to cultivate intellectual traits in the students that would help them academically (Davies, 2013). The thinking process is based on reasons that help to culminate into a reasoned conclusion as a whole. Critical thinking for better analysis of the Academic write up- Critical thinking leads to clear understanding and clearer writing. Throughout the write up, the ideas are well informed and well addressed. The entire writing after critical thought elevates the depth of understanding of the subject and the topic by the writer that is projected in the writing (Davies, 2013). Without critical thinking, the ideas that are addressed in the writing become abrupt and unstable lowering the value of the entire project. However, if thought critically in the entire writing process, the thoughts are better expressed making the write up more usable, cohesive and concise (Candlin Hyland, 2014). In academic writing, the process of critical thinking is guided by intellectual standards. It gets greater depth, insight, accuracy, clarity and precision. Thus, there is an underlying essence of intellectual integrity in the academic writing that has been guided by proper critical thoughts. The writing with critical thinking addresses the chief purpose of the write up. It is more constructed and precisely refers to the requirement. It includes exploration of the subject with proper interpretation and right line of thinking. It helps in making assumptions in a way that leads the writer to end up to proper conclusions. Influence of critical thinking on academic writers- With critical thinking and writing accordingly with the thought, the writer becomes more engrossed and experiences self-improvement with a scrutinized self-assessment (McKinley, 2013). The various level of thinking of the writer helps him be more precise and accurate in the writing process. There is an integrity manifested in the entire write up with proper reasons backing it up throughout. Critical thinking has the prevalence of metacognition process that examines the potential weaknesses and limitations when the writer takes up a position for his academic writing (Bensley Spero, 2014). The writing that resulted out of critical thinking is explicit that enables the readers to extract the main idea that is addressed. It also enables the writer to think through various arguments that helps him to progress with the writing (Elander et al., 2016). This also ensures the validity of the argument made by the writer. With proper critical thinking, the produced writing becomes elevated beca use of the consolidated concepts it includes with multiple references to facts and opinions. Thus the entire writing becomes more organized and thus, more valid. Revising in critical thinking and its portrayal on writing- Revising serves to be a necessary component of critical thinking that enhances the writing (McKinley, 2013). After the completion of the first draft, it is very important to review the entire write up in order to ensure that the arguments made in the writing are valid and the entire thing has a continuous and concise flow. One has to be the advocate to critically evaluate the writing that has been incorporated with critical thoughts. The evidence is reviewed through this and helps the writers to reconsolidate the information that have been explored in the writing. With critical thinking and further reviewing, it becomes easier to assess the different angles of an argument made and trace out the different relationships between the constituents that frame the argument. Revising helps to project out various new relationships as well that adds more depth into the writing. If revised by another critical thinker, it helps to recognize the left out and biases that the actual writer failed t o identify. It enhances the metacognitive thinking and helps to evaluate and re-evaluate the thinking process that helped to pen down the write up (Bensley Spero, 2014). Academic writing being a vast space and full of valid information has multiple aspects and knowledge that may not be possible for one single critical thinker to encompass. Thus, getting knowledge from the critical thinking of another person helps to get a different perspective that can be used to determine the original thought process of the writer. It helps him/her to determine the tendencies and biases that he may have had in his critical thinking. It also helps him/her to judge his own thoughts to have missed out or ignored some evidences and premises that could be incorporated in the writing. Thus, it serves to be a checking procedure to reach the conclusion for the critical thinker. Getting a different conclusion from the other critical thinker and integrating his/her argument and conclusion in the final writi ng also makes it even more valid. Thus, in critical thinking and further academic writing, the writer must be open-minded and reasonable in his/her approach. Lack of awareness and narrow mindedness of the writer damages the critical thinking process that is portrayed in the final academic write up. Components of critical thinking, vital for academic writing- In critical writing, theory comprises the chief component that helps the writers to think precisely and follow the rules of concluding the writing (Halpern, 2013). Thus, knowledge of theory of the matter that the writer is dealing with serves to be the basic principle of critical thinking. Deducing the rights and errors correctly facilitates better writing that can only be ensured when the person has a depth in the theory. Practicing the writing process along the line of critically thinking also develops the way of writing that gets recognition in the further write-ups of the writers (Halpern, 2013). Moreover, one needs to have the positive attitude to engage in the process without merely scribbling down the summary (Hirvela Du, 2013). He/ she must be willing enough to be involved in discussions and debates, reaching the required conclusion through the error and learn process (Halpern, 2013). Through these three components of critical thinking, namely theory, practice and attitude, one can ensure his ability to master and excel in academic writing. Academic writing without critical thinking Writing without critical thinking results to a poor write up. For instance, in case, the thesis statement or the argument is a repetition or abrupt, the flow of the write up and its aim to reach into a point goes beyond understanding. Writing without proper critical thinking results to simple summaries written down instead of an integrative analysis. It lacks chronology and segue between paragraphs becomes unidentifiable, weakening the entire writing (Canagarajah, 2013). With use of abstractions that act like critical thinking but lacks analytical thought that is evident from the final writing. It also makes the writing sound distracted lacking a proper conclusion. Due to lack of critical thinking and accumulation of proper evidences, the writer fails to reach to a properly constructed conclusion of his/her writing. Even if the arguments made in the academic writing are true, they fail to get enough logical support that negatively affects it. Thus, the conclusion proven becomes inval id or incomplete and fails to provoke the reader with the submitted write up. Problem solving by critical thinking Every good academic writing seeks a proper critical thinking that enhances and adds enormous value to the writing. To deal with the multiple problems that arise in academic writing, relating to its relevance, authenticity, and applicability, critical thinking serves to be the rescue. For this, while selecting a topic the writer must make a planned approach. He/she must be sure of being engaged in the right topic and understand the initiatives and goals of proceeding with the topic. This makes the plan more effective with prioritizing of the concepts and arguments with an ordered chronology (Wallace Wray, 2016). The writer must be sure of collecting the right evidences and understand the material that he/she is going to deal with in the writing. They must be aware of the credibility since academic writing encompasses multiple evidences relating to a particular subject. Thus, the writer must be conscious of the usages he is going to incorporate to develop a complete and valid writing. He/she must have the potential to draw out the strengths and weaknesses of the arguments made that have enough reasons to back up. These arguments must be well supported by valid premises and the entire writing must have the constituents that serve to be the basis of developing the entire writing. All the constituents must have a relationship and connection making the writing concise and fully structured. Proper analyzing of each of the constituents, comparison and contrast, the cause and effect relations and ranking helps to denote the underlying relations between the constituents (Shamim, 2017). This aids to the summarization of the evidences correctly and helps in reaching to the right conclusion. Organizing all the critical thoughts and examining the relationships develops into a perfect academic writing as a whole. With the incorporation of critical thinking in writing, the abilities of evaluation, reflection and judgment are expressed through processes of argumentation and the production of the argument in form of essay, reports or dissertations (Bennett, 2014). Argument is the primary expression of critical thinking that is a very important aspect of academic writing. There is always an underlying argument in academic writing that cannot be reached at unless the subject or the topic has been critically thought. Critical thinking has the basic principle of being original and originality serves to be the key criterion of successful academic writing. The entire writing is equally sensitive, backed by reliable citations (Goatly, 2013). For critical thinking to be effective, the person has to properly analyze and evaluate the content knowledge selecting relevant information from the literature to support his/her argument. The writer needs to further develop a position and frame his own argument th at he/she will be dealing in the academic writing (Key Noble, 2017). Furthermore, the writer needs to establish his/her position presenting the entire writing in a coherent manner. This is very crucial since the writer has to make a logical arrangement of the different propositions that presented through the default academic genre of the writing (Bailey, 2014). Thus, critical thinking stands out to be a concept that encapsulates a cognitive operation, which is revealed in the write-ups through argumentation and constructed knowledge (Cottrell, 2017). Thinking critically means looking at things with varying perspectives in an open-minded way. It has a consistency of looking at things logically, emphasizing reasons more than emotions. There is always a logical connection between the various ideas that are shared in the academic writing. The concept has been criticized on the grounds of negatively affecting ones creativity since it depends on logic and rationality (Piniel Csizr, 2015). However, the quality of critically thinking enables one to think out of the boundaries and creativity acts as a major part of the process. Critical thinking thus, enables one to evaluate and improve his/her creativity skills largely. It also teaches how to differentiate between reason and emotion and thus helps writers to view and assess as many possibilities as he /she can address in the write up (Miletzki Broten, 2017). Apart from the enhancement of academic writing, but critical thinking is also beneficial to develop positive attitude in people t owards greater learning. It cultivates problem-solving skills in writing process, helping the writers to think critically. It equally helps to develop independence in the writing with least interference (Aull Lancaster, 2014). It does not support mere memorizing of lessons, rather encourages understanding and critically thinking on the matter that render better writing from the academic writers. Thus, it solves the various issues rightly that one faces in academic writing backed by greater logic and reliability. Conclusion: Critical thinking as a whole develops the thinking process of students and writers regarding a subject that they are or will be dealing. It has been analyzed that students lacks the ability to think clearly and form judgment due to the lack of critical thinking skills. Thus, many critics and educators have emphasized on teaching critical thinking skills in students for enhancing academic studies. Not every writer writing on a subject or a topic is supposed to learn the various information he/she gets. Rather he must be able to reflect on the topic and gradually discover their studies. It encourages the spirit of discovery and simultaneously promotes intellectual development. In completion of an academic writing, critical thinking acts as a process of error detection that has enough reasons to support the thoughts. It thus enriches the academic write up and grows greater confidence in the writers. Being a strategy that renders deeper insights and thinking, critical thinking equally se rves to be a basic as well as needed concept in academic writing. With reasons and reflections that add to the validity of the writing, critical thinking enables the writers to proceed cohesively towards a sound conclusion. Considering all the benefits of producing a well-structured and extra ordinary academic writing, the writers must engage themselves in critically thinking upon the topic that they would be dealing with. Instead of merely penning down a summary that is both improper and vague as far as academic writing is concerned, they must present the write up accordingly with the critically thinking process that would sum up to an extraordinary outcome. Thus, from the discussed essay it can be concluded that critical thinking is not only relevant in its use for writing well but also accounts to be a necessary aspect for every writers to achieve success in academic writing. References: Aull, L. L., Lancaster, Z. (2014). 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