Thinking Critically in College: The Essential Handbook for Student Success

By Louis E. Newman

Finally, a college prep book that actually prepares students for college!

Almost all first-year college students discover that college courses are more academically challenging than they expected, and certainly harder than classes in high school. Professors expect students not just to absorb material, but to analyze and synthesize it, consider multiple perspectives, evaluate conflicting evidence, and then apply what they’ve learned in new contexts.

Thinking Critically in College explains how to do all this and more.

Louis E. Newman draws on decades of experience as a professor at Carleton College and Dean of Academic Advising and Associate Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education at Stanford, offering the guidance you need to succeed both in college and in life post-graduation. Unique among college prep books, Thinking Critically in College builds on the latest research in learning, spells out the key critical thinking skills you need, shows you how to tackle actual college assignments, and provides exercises throughout to reinforce the lessons.
Written in a personal, engaging style, Thinking Critically in College explains how to do the work your professors will require—exactly the preparation you need, no matter what your academic background. Practical, accessible, comprehensive, and interactive, Thinking Critically in College is the definitive guide, not only for those in college or headed there, but for everyone who needs a refresher on thinking clearly.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Radius Book Group
• Release date: Mar 7, 2023
• ISBN: 9781635769388

Louis E. Newman

Louis E. Newman is the former Dean of Academic Advising and Associate Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education at Stanford University. During his six years at Stanford, he grew the advising program, promoted a holistic approach to academic advising, and advocated for liberal education. He is also the John M. and Elizabeth W. Musser Professor of Religious Studies, Emeritus, at Carleton College, where he taught for thirty-three years. During his tenure at Carleton, he also served as Associate Dean of the College and as Director of the Perlman Center for Learning and Teaching. In this role he functioned as the informal mentor to the faculty at Carleton, which is consistently rated by US News & World Report as #1 for undergraduate teaching. Throughout his career, hundreds of students and colleagues have attested to the profound impact he had on their learning and their lives—as a gifted teacher and as a trusted advisor and mentor. Louis Newman lives with his wife, Rabbi Amy Eilberg, in Los Altos, California. For more information, visit ThinkingCritically.us

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Praise for

Thinking Critically in College

There are more than a few ‘how-to-do-college’ books, but none take a deep, informative dive into what it takes for college students to thrive academically and cultivate the habits of an educated mind. Newman offers a treasure trove of helpful examples to illustrate how undergraduates need to think and what they should do to effectively meet and benefit from the range of learning challenges they will encounter during and after college.

—george d. kuh,

Chancellor’s Professor Emeritus of Higher Education, Indiana University Bloomington

"Thinking Critically in College fills a substantial need in higher education resources. The research is available, volumes have been written to support faculty in teaching students so that enduring learning occurs, and there are a growing number of how-to-learn courses in college. What’s missing is a book that speaks directly to our students as they launch their college careers. Thinking Critically in College is that needed resource. It is a must-read for beginning college students. I can’t think of anyone better positioned to write this book than Louis Newman."

—susan singer,

vice president for academic affairs and provost, Rollins College

"This book could not be more timely! At a time of increasing numbers of first-generation college students, Thinking Critically in College provides first-year college students with a playbook that will help them succeed in college and beyond. Newman’s comprehensive approach explains what many students perceive as the ‘faculty language.’ He empowers his readers with language and tools to build meaningful relationships, learn valuable skills, and unpack the academic world. For those who may question the value of a college education, they will find their answer in this book! Truly a valuable guide for all college students, especially those in their first year."

—susana rivera-mills,

provost and executive vice president for academic affairs, Ball State University

This book is an essential resource for college students, and I can’t wait to assign it in my first-year courses. Drawing on decades of professional experience and the latest research, Louis Newman is the ideal guide to critical thinking—and also to learning, writing, and the other core academic experiences in college. I particularly appreciate his invitation to ‘begin with questions’ and his ‘advice for the road ahead’ that provides concrete steps toward success. All students will benefit from reading and discussing this book.

—peter felton,

executive director, Center for Engaged Learning and assistant provost for teaching and learning, Elon University

"This is the perfect high-school graduation gift for anyone going to college. It is a gift that keeps on giving, a guide to gaining the most from the undergraduate academic experience. The book is replete with practical counsel on how to think critically and communicate well. Newman not only gives wise guidance for how to learn in college, but he also provides scores of helpful examples of that guidance applied to various assignments that college students must handle. The subtitle says it all, The Essential Handbook for Student Success."

—thomas ehrlich,

president emeritus, Indiana University;

former provost, The University of Pennsylvania

This marvelous little book is really three books in one. Its declared aim is to help students make their college years into better, more lasting, and more rewarding learning experiences. The book is also implicitly a guide for college professors on how to make their classes and assignments more supportive of real learning. And for all of us who want to continue to learn and to grow intellectually after college, this book will help us learn how to make our informal learning time more effective and rewarding.

—michael mcpherson,

president emeritus, Macalester College and The Spencer Foundation

"‘Why hasn’t anyone ever told me this before?’ That poignant observation by one of Newman’s undergraduate students captures the superb power of this gracefully written book. Written for students, it is equally valuable for their teachers and advisors. Newman focuses on the disciplines that form the backbone of undergraduate education, how to think about them, study them, and write about them. His insights will be invaluable to students and all who work to enhance their education."

—lee s. shulman,

Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education Emeritus, Stanford University president emeritus, The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching

"Almost all colleges and universities proclaim that they instill critical thinking skills in their graduates, but they all too rarely explain to students what this actually entails. Thankfully, Louis Newman’s Thinking Critically in College fills that yawning gap. Newman offers the wisest, most perceptive—and yet eminently practical—examination I have encountered of what critical thinking truly is, why it matters, and how students can hone these skills. A college or university whose students take Newman’s smart guidance to heart, and whose faculty consciously focus on imparting his lessons, will admirably live up to its aspirations."

—steven g. poskanzer,

president emeritus, Carleton College

Radius Book Group

A Division of Diversion Publishing Corp.

www.RadiusBookGroup.com

Copyright © 2023 by Louis E. Newman

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any other information storage and retrieval, without the written permission of the author.

The information and advice provided in this book, based on a lifelong career working with students in educational institutions, are intended to enrich the life of the reader. The author and publisher make no guarantees of educational outcomes, grades, grade point averages, entrance into a preferred academic institution, or any other results or rewards. Readers are solely responsible for how they choose to respond to or appropriate the content of this book.

For more information, email [e-mail].

First edition: March 2023

Trade Paperback ISBN: 978-1-63576-795-7

eBook ISBN: 978-1-63576-938-8

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Cover design by Tom Lau

Interior design by Neuwirth & Associates, Inc.

Radius Book Group and the Radius Book Group colophon are registered trademarks of Radius Book Group, a Division of Diversion Publishing Corp.

For my teachers,

who taught me how to learn,

for my colleagues,

who modeled for me how to teach,

and

for my students,

who enabled me to see how learning

and teaching transforms lives.

Contents

Foreword by Shankar Vedantam

Preface and Acknowledgments

A Word to Teachers

Introduction. Pack Your Bags: College as Intellectual Adventure Travel

Questions to Ask as You Begin This Journey

The Structure of the Book

Advice for the Road Ahead. Ask for Help

Part I.

The Basics

1. Learning How to Learn

Outline

Becoming an Effective Learner: Honing Your Study Skills

Making Your Brain Work Harder to Learn Better

Becoming an Expert Learner: Practicing Metacognition

Conclusion

Questions for Reflection

Advice for the Road Ahead. Develop a Growth Mindset

2. Critical Thinking 101

Outline

Learning to Ask Questions

Four Essential Elements of Critical Thinking

Where Does This Come From: Exploring Context

The Road Not Taken: Considering Alternatives

Making Sure You’ve Got the Goods: Weighing Evidence

What Can You Do with What You Know: Finding Implications and New Applications

Conclusion

Questions for Reflection

Advice for the Road Ahead. What to Pay Attention To in Class

3. What Am I Doing in This Class, Anyway? An Introduction to Disciplinary Thinking

Outline

What Are Disciplines, and Why Do They Matter?

Natural Sciences

Social Sciences

Humanities

Interdisciplinary Studies

Conclusion

Questions for Reflection

Advice for the Road Ahead. Join a Team

4. How Am I Supposed to Do This Assignment?

Outline

Some Practical Suggestions for Completing Your College Work

The Three Essential Components of All College Assignments

Sample Assignments

Conclusion

Questions for Reflection

Advice for the Road Ahead. Get off the Sidelines

Part II.

Critical Thinking in Practice

5. Reading 2.0: How to Read the Words That Aren’t on the Page and Really Understand the Ones That Are

Outline

Strategies for Active, Engaged Reading

Questions for Critical Reading

Reading Visual Images

Special Considerations for Internet Reading

Conclusion

Questions for Reflection

Advice for the Road Ahead. Cultivate Curiosity

6. Writing Well Is Thinking Well

Outline

Writing Is a Process of Refining Your Thinking

Three Main Stages of the Writing Process

Review the Assignment

Some Practical Tips for Becoming a Better Writer

Conclusion

Questions for Reflection

Advice for the Road Ahead. Take Risks

7. Knowing How to Count What Counts

Outline

Thinking about Data

Making Inferences about a Population from a Sample

Establishing Causality

Conclusion

Questions for Reflection

Advice for the Road Ahead. Get Engaged, Remain Detached

8. Doing Research: From Consuming Knowledge to Creating It

Outline

How to Think about Research

Types of Research

The Challenges of Research

The Process of Research: Working with Sources

Products of Research

Conclusion

Questions for Reflection

Advice for the Road Ahead. Offer Critique, Not Criticism

Conclusion. The Final Frontier: Becoming an Educated Person

Resources/Suggestions for Further Reading

Answer Key to Chapter Exercises

Permissions

Notes

Foreword

Educators often talk about the importance of critical-thinking skills. What are these skills and why do they matter? Well, let me tell you a story: The social scientist Xiaodong Lin-Siegler and her colleagues once told high school students about scientists like the physicist Albert Einstein.¹ Some students were told only that Einstein was a genius.

His thoughts were so advanced that many contemporary scientists are still working on the ideas he talked about in 450 papers he published. In 1999, Time Magazine named Einstein the man of the century.²

Others learned about Einstein’s achievements but were also told about the roadblocks he faced as he developed his theories—intellectual problems he could not solve, obstacles that had him spinning his wheels, personal struggles that prompted despondency. Lin-Siegler told me that, compared to high school students who learned only that Einstein was a genius, students who learned about Einstein’s struggles and failures were more likely to feel engaged with physics, to do better in the subject—and to believe that they had a future in science.

I reported on this study many years ago for NPR, and it has stayed with me ever since.³ Why would telling high school students about Einstein’s limitations be more inspiring, more motivating, and more engaging than just telling them about his achievements? Well, for one thing, students could relate better to Einstein when they learned his marvelous insights didn’t just pop into his head. Those discoveries took hard work and persistence—traits they could develop themselves. Humanizing Einstein undoubtedly made him more interesting.

But I believe there is a deeper truth here.

We often imagine that the purpose of education is to transfer information from teacher to student, from expert to apprentice. So much of education, even in college, takes the form of one person lecturing to others. But all of us who are a few years removed from college know that we have forgotten most of what we learned in college, and the little we remember is often rendered out of date by the progress of research. Students who learned about coronaviruses before 2019 might have to go back to school to learn all that we have learned since 2019 about the kind of virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic. If the information we learn in school is quickly forgotten or rendered obsolete, what exactly is the point of going to school?

I believe Lin-Siegler’s study hints at the answer: When we engage in the backstory of the ideas we learn, when we start to understand not just the facts, but how the facts were developed and why they look the way they do, this changes our relationship to what we study. When we learn about the struggle it took to create new ideas, we better understand how precious and hard-won ideas are. But it’s more than that: learning how facts came together, observing the missteps and mistakes, the dead-ends and false starts, is like the difference between watching a play unfold on a stage and being invited backstage. Sitting in a theater, we see only the finished play—neatly packaged, beautifully produced, and coherent. When we go backstage, however, we see how direction and acting shape the play, how lighting and sound design create moods, how choices the playwright made produce the story we hear. We start to understand that the play we are watching is only one of an infinite number of plays that could have been produced. This is a moment of revelation. In that moment, we start to ask ourselves, What if the playwright had made different choices? What if the director had the lead character portrayed by a woman instead of a man? Is this really a comedy or a tragedy? Being invited backstage allows us to see the series of steps that led to the play and to see how different steps could lead to different plays. We start to realize that we might create our own plays. In the case of education, when we are invited to understand the backstory of ideas—and this is true whether we are talking about physics or anthropology, history or neuroscience—we see how we might become explorers, not just followers. We start to perceive that we could become Einsteins ourselves.

This, then, is our answer to our conundrum: Yes, most of what we learn in college is soon forgotten, and what we learn can be quickly rendered obsolete. Our choice to major in engineering may be supplanted in a few years by life and career changes that cause us to become journalists (my own story). But if we focus our college years not on merely learning information and studying facts, but spending time backstage—understanding how knowledge was created—then it doesn’t really matter if we forget the facts. We have picked up something much more important: the real question is not will you remember what you learned in college? but will you be able to rediscover what you have forgotten and be able to sift good information from bad? If the apocalypse were to arrive tomorrow, would you and the small band of surviving humans have the ingenuity to rediscover what was lost?

Most of us, I hope, won’t have to deal with the apocalypse. But most of us—and nearly everyone who is in college today—will have multiple careers. Each of those careers will likely require not only different skills than the ones we learned in college but skills that we didn’t learn in our previous careers. Increasingly and urgently, the question we will be asked in each new career is whether we can get up to speed and make contributions of our own. If the world we formerly lived in required people to learn only a few skills and then use them throughout their lives, the world we live in today demands we repeatedly reinvent ourselves.

What are the skills, the habits of mind, that allow such reinvention? Many of them fall under the broad rubric of critical-thinking skills, which is really a fancy way of saying you know how to think for yourself. When people tell you things, you can interrogate what they say. When a manager at a new company tells you that this is the way the organization has always been run, you are able to learn the company’s history without believing it is the only way to do things. Being able to keep in mind different ideas, and different competing ideas, is a rare and valuable skill. (There are very few slam dunk answers in real life; everything has trade-offs.) Importantly, being able to think for yourself is much more than merely having opinions that clash with others. And it is not at all the same thing as imagining that everyone else’s ideas are lacking: lots of people are critical of the views of others (and many of these people spend a lot of time on social media explaining to others why they are wrong), but this is not evidence of critical-thinking skills. In fact, one of the most important critical-thinking skills is the ability to monitor your own thoughts and biases, to be wary of your own conclusions, to ask yourself, repeatedly and uncomfortably, Why do I believe what I believe? and How might I be wrong? (The physicist Richard Feynman once summed up this idea beautifully: The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.)

Louis Newman’s book is an essential guide for students who want to get the most out of their college years. It is based on his many decades of experience exploring why some students get a lot out of college, while others do not. If you read this book before you go to college and follow its precepts, you will undoubtedly get much more from your time in college than you would otherwise. But Thinking Critically in College is a book not just for college students and educators. It is a manifesto for a society where too many of us are overconfident about our opinions and under-curious about the views of those who disagree with us. It is a challenge for those of us who know which cable television channel tells the truth and which one trades in lies. It is a riposte to a world where many of us oscillate between a blind acceptance of some claims and an unthinking rejection of others.

This book is a strident call to take ideas seriously, but it is not a jeremiad. It will show you that the ability to think well is a skill, and it is a skill that can be learned. This is also a book that is written with experience, erudition and, yes, with love: it is an invitation to us all to sit down at the table of scholarship, to listen generously to others, but also to think carefully and skeptically, and then make our own contributions to the storehouses of human knowledge.

Shankar Vedantam

Host of Hidden Brain

2023

Preface and Acknowledgments

I have a distinct memory of the moment when the idea of writing this book first occurred to me.

I was sitting with a student reviewing a video recording of the oral presentation she had recently given in a seminar I was teaching. She was a senior and one of the most talented majors in my department that year. As we reviewed her presentation, I commented, Rachel, this presentation was really substantive, and you made all your points very effectively. But it would have been that much better if you had just begun by spelling out for us the research questions you were addressing. That way, we would have understood exactly how all that great information answered those specific questions. She looked surprised but interested, so I continued. It’s always helpful to begin with the questions, I said. Whatever you’re talking about, you should set the stage by spelling out the questions to which this material is the answer. In fact, you can think about this when you’re reading, too. Anytime you read something, you should be asking yourself, ‘What questions were the authors asking, and why did they attempt to answer them this way?’ By now, Rachel was sitting up and really focused on taking in what I was saying, so I took it one step further. In fact, when you get a course syllabus, you should be asking yourself, ‘What are the questions this course is designed to address, and why has the professor chosen to organize the material in this particular way to explore them?’ Learning is all about focusing on the questions, especially the unstated questions, that underlie whatever someone is telling us.

Rachel was now wide-eyed and clearly looked as if she had just discovered something extraordinary, though it seemed to me that all this was obvious. Finally, in words that still echo in my ears nearly a decade later, she asked, Why hasn’t anyone ever told me this before? Spoken with a mixture of sadness and frustration, that question registered with me as few students’ questions have, either before or since. My first thought was, How could a student as successful and smart as Rachel be hearing this for the first time late in her senior year? But that question quickly gave way to another: "Why don’t we tell students at the very beginning of their college careers that questions are the key to understanding, to research, and to analyzing pretty much everything they will encounter? How might their college education be enhanced if we spelled this out, along with the other keys to college-level thinking, and didn’t just expect them to figure this out on their own?" As our meeting ended and I walked back to my office, my mind was spinning. Why had it taken me this long—by this point, I had been teaching undergraduates for nearly thirty years—to realize that they needed to be explicitly instructed on how to think critically in the ways my colleagues and I expected them to. And so, spurred by Rachel’s penetrating question, I resolved to write a book.

◼ ◼ ◼

What intellectual skills and habits of mind do students need to succeed in college courses, and how can we most effectively introduce these at the very outset of their college careers? That question has animated this book. In the course of answering it, I have relied heavily on the work of educational psychologists, learning specialists, and advocates for critical thinking, as well as scholars in fields of study about which I claim no expertise. Along the way, I have also conferred with dozens of colleagues at diverse institutions to ensure that these lessons would be helpful in teaching first-year students in a variety of settings. I also shared drafts of chapters with students and held multiple focus groups to ensure that I was addressing the issues students actually faced as they adjusted to college-level learning.

In addition, I explored other college success books, of which there are dozens, to see what kind of guidance they provided. To my surprise, virtually none of them touched on the issues that students encounter in their courses. Typically, those books are full of valuable tactical advice about taking notes, going to professors’ office hours, time management, study skills—even eating well, getting enough sleep, and getting along with roommates. But I looked in vain for anything that would have helped Rachel get any clearer about the intellectual challenges of college coursework.

But while my initial and primary motivation for writing this book was to orient students to college work, over time it became clear to me that there is far more at stake here than simply helping students tackle college assignments more effectively. The flip side of students’ need to learn how to learn is higher education’s commitment to prepare students for successful careers, engaged citizenship, and fulfilling lives.

It is widely recognized that colleges are failing to fulfill their own commitments to produce students who are critical thinkers, capable of asking penetrating questions about the information they are increasingly bombarded with (especially when they find it on the Internet). As faculty can attest, students are frequently incapable of distinguishing a well-supported argument from a sloppy one, much less articulating a reasoned and evidence-based critique of the latter. They need help making the transition from high school–level thinking, which frequently required only that they absorb and repeat what others had taught them, to college-level thinking, which requires them to analyze, synthesize, consider, and weigh alternative explanations of phenomena. Colleges purport to teach students critical thinking, to prepare them for lifelong learning and the responsibilities of citizenship; if you have any doubt, just look at the mission statement of just about every institution of higher education in this country. But if we look at the general-education requirements of most of those same institutions, we will find surprisingly few courses in which these intellectual skills are singled out and explicitly taught. It is my sincere hope that this book will help address this long-standing issue in higher education.

◼ ◼ ◼

While the impetus to write this book emerged after a single exchange with a gifted student, the ability to do so is the fruit of many years of teaching and many conversations with current and former students and faculty colleagues. It also involved a great deal of additional research as I delved into the literature on how students develop these critical-thinking skills. In that work, I was helped enormously by several very talented Stanford students—Jonah Glick-Unterman, Noah Howard, Ayesha Pasha, Rishabh Kapoor, Laura Tobar, Liv Jenks, Via Lamberti, Alex Li, Forrest Dollins, Alicia Purpur, and Ariana Davarpanah—all of whom served as research assistants at various points in the writing and editing of this volume. Collectively, they did more than just read the literature on a range of topics, digest it, and help organize this material in ways that enabled me to write this book. They were thought partners, helping me determine the sorts of features that would make this book more engaging and accessible to students. I am enormously grateful to all of them for their careful work, their creativity, and their dedication to this project. A number of former students were instrumental in shaping parts of this book, including Caleb Rakestraw-Morn, Josh Pitkovsky, Jesse Rothman, Jon Kagan-Kans, and Nadav Ziv.

Several colleagues have also