Turning Point Exercise
(Repeat usage of this form for each article that you analyze. Use the form to develop your opinion and write your thesis statement). Critical thinking is defined by dictionary.com as disciplined thinking that is clear, rational, open-minded, and informed by evidence. For each of your four articles, read the article thoroughly. Try to locate sentences that showcase the authors critical thinking. Underline them. Using only information from the article, complete these seven prompts: To develop his/her assertion that ______________________________, the author states ______________________________. For the first blank, fill in the point of view of the author. For the second blank, give the authors reasoning or evidence. Based on what the author said above, my question is: to what extent does the author make a fair assumption that ______________________________? For this question, give an example that shows the authors fair assumption. If the question is ______________________________, on the other hand one piece of evidence points to ______________________________. For the first blank, state a question that you have about the authors opinion that might challenge the authors perspective. For the second blank, give an alternate opinion that could come from the evidence that might contradict or challenge that perspective. On the other hand, a different piece of evidence points to ___________________. State a third possible assumption. This could come from another article. Between these different perspectives, _____________________seems to lead us more toward a conclusion because _________________________. For the first blank, state the perspective that you feel is best supported by the evidence in the article. For the second blank, give the reason why the other perspective is not the best one. Use evidence from the article. Although I tend to think the evidence supports ______________________________, to be fair, I am not sure about _____________. For the first blank, state the strongest piece of evidence that is forming your own opinion. For the second blank, state a concern that you have from the evidence. Therefore, if the question is whether or not the author is fair to assume ______________________________, the evidence seems to suggest that ______________________________. Use these blanks to give your concluding opinion based on just this one article.
