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Developing critical thinking ability
Essays on th nature of brain plasticity
Essays on th nature of brain plasticity
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Adaptation to unpredictable conditions is a key force in driving human evolution. The ability to overcome predicaments with poise is one of the greatest assets humans possess. In “The Mind’s Eye”, Oliver Sacks recounts various perspectives of individuals coping with blindness. Each individual took a different path to becoming accustomed to their blindness and each of the case studies showed compensatory mechanism unique to the individual. Throughout the article, Sacks credits each person for playing to their assets because he views adaptability as a person’s capacity to alter their mode of thought in order to fit their circumstance. Although Sacks shows many examples of neuronal plasticity as an adaptation to blindness, he eludes to the impact …show more content…
In education, critical thinking is a student’s ability to analyze and evaluate an issue to a certain specificity in order to form a conclusion. Intelligence places limitations on self-growth but adaptability provides insurance for instances when experience have no effect because “you can count on your ability to learn, and nowhere is that more important than when what you’ve learned in the past no longer suffices for the future” (67). Teaching goes beyond reinforcing intelligence; it is also a mechanism for developing critical thinking skills. Experience and memory has its limitations in fostering systematic thinking but the addition of adaptability gives an individual the drive to go beyond their reach. Students have relatively few experiences that affect their education but has humans they have the basic need to evolve. This comes through when prior experiences can no longer influence a student’s educational progress. There comes a time when it is necessary for a scholar to think past their boundaries. Adaptability makes this possible because it allows an individual to change their mindset so that it will fit their circumstance. As a basic, human necessity, adaptation does not need to develop but a person must be placed in an environment where their adjustability can grow. Sacks discusses the memoir of Zoltan Torey, a man who was advised to take a conventional approach to blindness therapy by maneuvering his focus to an “auditory mode of adjustment” (332). Yet, rather than limit his options, Torey “had moved in the opposite direction, resolving to develop instead his inner eye, his power of visual imagery” (332). If he had been unsuccessful in his attempt, Torey would not only have lost his ability to see, but he also would have lost any chance of developing his auditory sense as a form of compensation. Placed in a situation with limited options, Torey redefined his
examines the effects of the colorblindness approach to achieving a post-racial society. Wingfield, a professor of sociology at Washington University in St. Louis and the author of numerous books and articles concerning racism in America, focuses her research around the effects of the colorblindness ideology on individual cultures and social issues. This article appears in The Atlantic, a left-leaning news source, along with a collection of Wingfield’s other articles, mostly covering issues concerning racism and segregation in America.
Colombo introduces his section on critical thinking by asking a question “Why do instructors mean when they tell to think critically?” (2). His point is that we should no just focus on the surface meaning. He uses the example of the cover of our Rereading America textbook. He says that the average student from the United States may just believe that the book only applies to the United States. When a student from anny other country in the Western Hemisphere might complain that the title reflects a discriminatory view of what it maens to be an American. Since America contains all the countries of North, South, and Central America. He goes on to explain that most think they want us to ask questions rather than just relay the text back through memorization. That kind of thinking is nearly useless in the real world. What job is there that all you do is relay data back? There are almost none of these
Colombo also asks in his article “Thinking Critical, Challenging Cultural Myths” “What do instructors mean when they tell you to think critically?” (Colombo, p. 2). In this paragraph Colombo is wanted to let the student know that the college instructors are going to let the student use her own mind and think outside the box. That being “a critical thinker cultivates the ability to imagine and see the different value points of her own- Then strengthens, refines, enlarges, or reshapes her ideas in light of those other perspectives” (Colombo, p. 2). Colombo also states that being “a critical thinker is an active learner, someone with the ability to shape, not merely absorb, knowledge” (Colombo, p. 2).
Therefore, in the reading “Education as Maturity” by Overstreet basically gives a good explanation on how human being are born with some sort of knowledge of basics such a survival skill at a very young age. This progresses as we age by the information that they have learned from people and schooling they have gotten; on the other hand, sometimes we as humans believe what comes out of people’s mouths is always true but it is not. Subjectivity and objectivity relates to this reading by showing how the rational and emotional ways of taking in information and then using them has effects on the people and their future; as a result, it shows how at such a young age people decision can impact them as they get older because of their critical thinking skills that they developed. “It is seeing which establishes our place in the surrounding world; we explain that world with words, but words can never undo the fact that we are surrounded by it. The relation between what we see and what we know is never settled…The way we see things is affected by what we know or what we believe.” This is saying that the people in this world learn based on what they hear and what they here and use that information to think critically; therefore, this information absorbed is either rational or
Together Gladwell and Sacks can show how adaptive our brains are by showing how it adapts to the environment as well as how it adapts to certain tasks that it is asked to perform.
In this paper I will detail the story, “Eyes Right!” by Dr. Oliver Sacks. This story comes from the book, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales. Dr. Sacks explains the story of Mrs. S who has suffered a massive stroke. I will begin my paper by giving a summary of the story, including the brain systems and functions that were affected. Next I will address the impact of stroke on Mrs. S occupational performance. I will then provide affective responses from Dr. Sacks, Mrs. S, and myself. Finally, I will provide a conclusion of how this story added to my learning for OT school.
If I am currently 18 years of age and will have lost my vision by the time I am 40 then it will mean, assuming I live to be 80, I will live half of my life with sight and the other half blind. I am fully aware that this change will bring hardships and challenges to my life but it will also make me appreciate what I have that many take for granted including myself. Self-reflection over the past few days have helped me not fear this illness but welcome it instead. Welcome it knowing that I know nothing about life and blindness will delve me into another realm of personal growth that I cannot fathom at the moment. As Socrates lived his life to the last second with careful examination I wish to live my life to the last minute with significant
In literature, blindness serves a general significant meaning of the absence of knowledge and insight. In life, physical blindness usually represents an inability or handicap, and those people afflicted with it are pitied. The act of being blind can set limitations on the human mind, thus causing their perception of reality to dramatically change in ways that can cause fear, personal insecurities, and eternal isolation. However, “Cathedral” utilizes blindness as an opportunity to expand outside those limits and exceed boundaries that can produce a compelling, internal change within an individual’s life. Those who have the ability of sight are able to examine and interpret their surroundings differently than those who are physically unable to see. Carver suggests an idea that sight and blindness offer two different perceptions of reality that can challenge and ultimately teach an individual to appreciate the powerful significance of truly seeing without seeing. Therefore, Raymond Carver passionately emphasizes a message that introduces blindness as not a setback, but a valuable gift that can offer a lesson of appreciation and acceptance toward viewing the world in a more open-minded perspective.
Blind is who cannot see. Blindness, unable to see, perceive the truth. You can be blind with good eyes and you can see while being blind. "The eyes are useless when the mind is blind." A blind man can make us see things we 've never seen before. The metaphor of blindness is used in literature and film to show us how blind the character is at the beginning for after changing and seeing the world the way it really is. In both,
Blindness is a state or condition of being unable to see because of injury, disease, or a congenital condition. In some cases, it is a lack of perception, awareness or judgement. Blind can also be a word to describe ignorance. We are all blind to the world around us. I have learned that it will take time for the film to shy away from our eyes and show us the agony of reality.
While critical thinking is important in all occupations, it must begin in childhood. Teachers must help their students to develop critical thinking modalities. Critical thinking helps considerably in problem solving. Without critical thinking, one must rely on old and outdated informat...
Each one of us lives in our own unique world of perception. As individuals, we may experience life in an entirely different way through our senses and life experiences. Therefore, perception can be tricky since it is very personal to each one of us. According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, perception has three meanings; (1) “the way you think about or understand someone or something,” (2) “the ability to understand or notice something easily,” and, (3) “the way that you notice or understand something using one of your senses” (2014, para. 1). C.S. Lewis said, “What you see and what you hear depends a great deal on where you are standing. It also depends on what sort of person you are” (n.d., para. 11). In other words,
Rensink, Ronald A. Change Blindness. Rep. University of British Columbia, n.d. Web. 15 April 2014. < http://www2.psych.ubc.ca/~rensink/publications/download/RR-MGY.pdf >
Sensory problems are common experiences with the older generations of the United States population today (Crews & Campbell, 2004, p. 823, Vol. 94 No. 5). Surprisingly, 18% of people report blindness in one or both eyes or other eye impairments (Crews & Campbell, 2004, p. 823, Vol. 94 No. 5). Two-thirds of these low vision patients are 65 years of age (National Institutes of Health, 2000). There are many reasons why a person may suffer from vision loss. Low vision is one of the ten most prevalent causes of disability (M. Markowitz, R. E. Markowitz, S. N. Markowitz, 2009). When vision is diminished this can be associated with decreases in activities of daily living or leisure activities (Crews & Campbell, 2004, p. 823, Vol. 94 No. 5). In this paper a better understanding of low vision, problems that may occur and what measures that are taken to help improve a patient’s quality of life will be discussed.
Throughout the eighteen years of student learner 's life, the student encounters different stages of learning: elementary school, middle school, high school, and lastly college. Disregarding both stages of elementary and middle school, a scholar starts to wonder what are the weaknesses and strengths that, this one, holds as an individual who on a daily basis attends a learning environment to ‘hopefully’ expand the amount of knowledge that can be stored in the brain. If the brain is imagined as a storage room, then the amount of space is abstractly unlimited.