Leonard Hoy's List: BB Critical Reading

•   critical    reader, any single text  provides but one portrayal of the facts, one individual’s “take” on the  subject matter. Critical readers thus recognize not only      what      a text says, but also      how       that  text portrays the subject matter.  They recognize the various ways in which  each and every text is the unique creation of a unique author.

  • Dear Lord, how I wish someone, SOMEONE! had given me this POV when I was immersed in the writings of the evil author, JD Salinger.
• A non-critical reader might read a history book to learn the facts of the  situation or to discover an accepted interpretation of those events. A  critical reader  might read the same work to appreciate how a particular perspective on the  events and a particular selection of facts can lead to particular  understanding.

  • Excellent compare and contrast bet. NonCR and CR.
• Notice that none of these goals actually refers to  something on the page. Each requires inferences from evidence within  the text:

  • Role of inferences in CR
• • recognizing  purpose  involves inferring a basis for  choices of content and language 
  •   recognizing  tone and persuasive elements  involves  classifying the nature of language choices 
  •   recognizing  bias  involves classifying the nature of  patterns of choice of content and language

  • Determine
    1: AU's purpose: basis for choice
    2: Text's tone and Technique
    3: Au's bias: Patterns of the above=>evaluation of motive
• These web pages are designed to take the mystery out of critical reading. They  are designed to show you    what to look for (    analysis    )    and    how to think about what you find (    inference    )    . 

    The first part —what to look for— involves recognizing those aspects of a  discussion that control the meaning. 

    The second part —how to think about what you find— involves the processes of  inference, the interpretation of data from within the text. 

  • Pages designed to SHOW WHAT TO LOOK FOR (analysis)
    and
    HOW TO THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU FIND (Inferecne)

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• Non-critical (or pre-critical) reading is concerned with recognizing what a text says about the topic. The goal is to make sense of the presentation as a sequence of thoughts, to understand the information, ideas, and opinions stated within the text from sentence to sentence, paragraph to paragraph. This is a linear acitivity.  

   Critical reading is an analytic activity. The reader rereads a text to identify patterns of elements -- information, values, assumptions, and language usage-- throughout the discussion. These elements are tied together in an interpretation, an assertion of an underlying meaing of the text as a whole.  

    Critical thinking involves bringing outside knowledge, biases, and values to bear to evaluate the presentation and decide what ultimately to accept as true.  

  • ELEMENTS
    PATTERNS OF ELEMENTS
    1. Information data
    2. Values
    3. Assumptions
    4. Language Usage (words, fig lang, metaphors, allusions,
    5. Examples, illustrations, details

  • I just noticed the term PRECRITICAL READING. I like that!!! Puts the lower voltage reading in its proper and quite useful place.
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  • • CRITICAL READING NOT AN END IN ITSELF: => CRITICAL THINKING
      
      Bring outside knowledge, biases, knowledge, biases and values to bear on what you read.
• • The existence of a beginning,middle, and end 
  • The use of illustrations to explicate remarks 
  • The use of evidence to support remarks 
  • The use of stylish language to portray topics 
  • Organization, or a method of sequencing remarks – such as whether chronological, different aspects of the topic, steps in a logical sequence

  • CR:
    structure
    tone
    persuasive elements
    supportive elements
    style options
    organizational principles
• The next step involves describing the nature of these aspects of the text, of classifying the nature of the material within the text

  • SECOND STEP: Identifying the NATURE of the aspects of the text
• The final step involves inferring the underlying assumptions and perspectives of the discussion, taking into account of all of the elements of the text being as they are throughout the text as a whole. This step is concerned less with sequential development and more with recognizing patterns of elements interwoven throughout the presentation as a whole.

  • STEPS IN CR: A process of classifying
    1: IDENTIFY the elements in the text, viewing that text as a presentation in its own right
    2: DESCRIBE those elements to determine the NATURE of the elements
    3: DERIVE patterns from the element collections
    3: EVALUATE the patterns to determine WHAT IS ACHIEVED through the use of such patterns
• Throughout, critical reading relies on abstracting, on classsifying the nature of things,

  • The reader creates patterns from the elements of structure, tone and style IN ORDER TO identify the UNDERLYING perspectives, biases, assumptions and weasely conclusions that the author would foist on the ususpecting reader.

  • CR: determining the nature of things through abstracting rom the text and classifying those elements so abstracted.

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• No one always acts purely objectively and rationally. We connive for selfish interests.  We gossip, boast, exaggerate, and equivocate.

  • Go to "Alien Hand Syndrome", Page 47, Cognitive Glitches. Use this section in connection with exercises designed to wrestle with the value set, interest in truth and biases the students bring with them.
• • Critical thinkers are by natureskeptical. They approach texts with the same skepticism and suspicion as they approach spoken remarks.
  • Critical thinkers areactive, not passive.  They ask  questions and analyze. They consciously apply tactics and strategies to uncover meaning or assure their understanding. 
  • Critical thinkers do not take an egotistical view of the world. They areopento new ideas and perspectives.  They are willing to challenge their beliefs and investigate competing evidence.

  • CRITICAL THINKERS:
    1. Skeptical
    2. Actrive thinkers
    3. NOT egotistical but OPEN to new ideas
• Critical thinking enables us to recognize a wide range of subjective analyses of otherwise objective data, and to evaluate how well each analysis might meet our needs. Facts may be facts, but how we interpret them may vary.

  • This is where the reader DEPARTS FROM THE CR process and begins his or her own discussion of the topic and the treatment of that topic by the author at hand.

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• We can distinguish between critical reading and critical thinking in the  following way: 
   
  •   Critical    reading     is a technique for    discovering     information and ideas within a text. 
  •   Critical    thinking     is a technique for    evaluating     information and ideas, for deciding what to accept and believe. 
    Critical  reading refers to a careful,  active, reflective, analytic reading. Critical thinking involves reflecting on  the validity of what you have  read in light of our prior knowledge and understanding of the world.  

  • The discovery that CR involves does involve INTERPRETATION, but INTERPRETATION of the author's intent, not a subjective response by the reader as to how he or she may interpret the assertions and conclusions associated with the topic in the text.
• We can distinguish between critical reading and critical thinking in the  following way: 
   
  •   Critical    reading     is a technique for    discovering     information and ideas within a text. 
  •   Critical    thinking     is a technique for    evaluating     information and ideas, for deciding what to accept and believe. 
• Critical  reading refers to a careful,  active, reflective, analytic reading. Critical thinking involves reflecting on  the validity of what you have  read in light of our prior knowledge and understanding of the world.

  • Role of prior knowledge: the gauge against which we measure the worth of a statement.

• For example, consider the following (somewhat humorous) sentence from a student  essay:  
   

      Parents are buying expensive cars for their kids to destroy them.   

      As the terms are used here,     critical reading    is concerned with figuring out whether, within the context of the text as a  whole, "    them    " refers to the parents, the kids, or the cars, and whether the text supports  that practice.     Critical thinking    would come into play when deciding whether the chosen meaning was indeed true,  and whether or not you, as the reader, should support that practice.

  • BEST CLEAREST DISTINCTION DRAWN BETWEEN CRITICAL READING AND CRITICAL THINKING.
• In actual practice, critical reading and critical thinking work together.

  • I want to segment the study; it seems that I have to have all oars in the water and use them with increasing compexity????

• If critical thinking and critical reading are so closely linked, why is this  still a useful distinction? 

    The usefulness of the distinction lies in its reminder that we must read  each text on its own merits, not imposing our  prior knowledge or views on it. While we must evaluate ideas as we read, we  must not distort the meaning within a text. We must not allow ourselves to  force a text to say what we  would otherwise like it to say—or we will never learn anything new!

  • Absolutely critical statement:
    Let a text say what it means to say without imposing our prior knowledge or views on it.
    Evaluate the ideas we read, read between the lines (inference) but DOT NOT DISTORT THE TEXT TO FORCE IT TO SAY WHAT WE'D LIKE IT TO SAY.

• We can  think of a writer as having taken on a job.   No matter what the topic, certain tasks must be done:  

   
  •   a specific topic must be addressed 
  •   terms must be clearly defined 
  •   evidence must be presented 
  •   common knowledge must be accounted for 
  •   exceptions must be explained 
  •   causes must be shown to precede effects and to be capable of the effect 
  •   conclusions must be shown to follow logically from earlier arguments and  evidence

  • This list would make a great rubric for writing as well as a great check list for describing a piece of writing we're reading as readers of some author who's written the writing for us to read as readers and stuff. Sorry . . . . Verbal torrent there.

  • Definition of a writer's job.
• As critical readers and writers, we  want to assure ourselves that these tasks have been completed in a complete,  comprehensive, and consistent manner. Only once we have determined that a text  is consistent and coherent can we then begin to evaluate whether or not to  accept the assertions and conclusions.

  • Reader's Job: See if the writer has made a consistent, coherent text for us to consider. THEN we can evaluate the conclusions and accept or reject them.
• To assess  the validity of remarks within a text, we must go outside a text and bring to  bear outside knowledge and standards.

  • EVALUATING THE VALIDITY OF IDEAS within a text is the province of CRITICAL THINKING

  • To evaluate the truthfulness and usefulness of a text WE MUST GO OUTSIDE THE TEXT, to our own understandings, values and observations of reality.
    
    We must already HAVE a value system, a notion of whether or not truth exists and whether or not we value it BEFORE we can evaluate anything.

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