Critical and Creative Thinking Reflective Essay

My critical and creative skills have always been something that I wanted to explore as I
attended college. I felt that the two artifacts in particular helped with this IAS learning objective. I
was able to obtain the skills in interpretation, analysis, argumentation, application, synthesis,
evaluation, and reflection in these assignments. The first example would come from the final
group essay that I had to write for my Critical Media Literacy class. To give a brief overview, we
had to watch episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and write about the problem presented in the show as
if we were writing a letter to the lead Doctor of the show. I had to back it up with some research
on the problem through real-life sources as well. This was a clear example of us identifying the
assumptions and problems made in the show and trying to find a solution. Since this wasn’t an
actual case of surgeon interns being mistreated, I had to look up examples that would apply to
this case. I also had to write about certain interns' perspectives based on their characters in the
show, and assume how they perceive the situation. This helped me use creative thinking by
writing how I thought the character would and also how they would respond to finding out about
real-life statistics. I was able to analyze the situation, create an argument for the characters and
then apply it to real-life situations as well. I think this assignment showed me that I can look at
the media as a creative way to discuss real-life issues and create a discussion for it.

The second article I did was my lesson plan template for my social psychology class. For
this assignment, we had to come up with a lesson plan for 6th graders and decide on a subject
that we think they would be interested in learning. Normally it is common to do a standard
presentation where we talk about facts and what we are trying to teach, but if we were doing it in
front of 6th graders, I think this wouldn't be effective. I had to decide what 6th graders would be
interested in and what would grab their attention. So instead of just planning on a standard
PowerPoint, my group and I included a fun video that was age appropriate talking about
periods, a little interactive activity, and created some homework with diagrams. I felt this really
made me have to think outside the box, especially since I have never taught a class of kids
before. Though the presentation wasn’t really in front of 6th graders, I still had to teach the class
as if it was. This assignment really helped me with finding other ways to effectively share
information in a creative manner.

Overall I think for someone to understand this learning objective they need to seek out
multiple perspectives on doing something not just what is expected. If you effectively
understand the material to the point where you then create something of your own that
incorporates it then I believe you achieved this learning objective.