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Analytical Thinking
What is analysis and
how does it work?
What is analysis?
To ask what something means
To ask how something does what it does or
To ask why it is as it is
Analysis is thinking – the kind we do every day!
Most of us analyze all the time!
We don’t realize that is what we are doing
Steps to becoming a better analytical thinker
Become aware of your thinking process
Build on skills you already have
Eliminate habits that get in the way
Move 1: Suspend Judgement
We tend to evaluate, make judgements
We follow the mental paths we are used to
Becomes automatic and thinking stops
FIGURE OUT WHAT THE SUBJECT MEANS BEFORE DECIDNG HOW YOU FEEL ABOUT IT
Move 2: Define significant parts & how they’re related
Divide the subject into its defining parts, its main elements or ingredients
Consider how they are related, to each other and to the whole subject
Analytical writing pays attention to detail
Moves from larger subject to key components
Get past first generic response to discover what it is made of
Then how do these parts help me understand the meaning of the whole subject
Move 3: Make the implicit explicit
Converting suggestions into direct statements
Essential step
Known as making inferences
Implication is to describe something suggested; inference describes the thinking process
You infer what the subject implies!
Converts suggestions not overly stated into direct statements of meaning
Analysis
Move 4: Look for patterns
How do you know which parts to pay attention to?
What makes some parts more important than others?
3 principles to select important parts
Pattern of repetition or resemblance
Organizing contrasts
Anomalies-unusual things, things that don’t fit
Move 5: Keep reformulating questions and explanations
Requires experimenting
Purpose of analytical writing is to figure something out
Don’t expect to know where you’re going, how all the subject’s parts fit together, and to what end
Questions to take you from uncertainty to understanding
Organized by the moves they come from
Define significant partsMake implicit explicit
Which details seem significant? Why?
What is the significance of a particular detail? What does it mean?
What else might it mean?
Look for patterns of resemblance & contrast
How do the details fit together? What do they have in common?
What does this pattern of details mean?
What else might this same pattern of details mean? How else could it be explained?
Look for anomalieskeep asking questions
What details don’t seem to fit? How might they be connected with other details form a different pattern?
What does this new pattern mean? How might it cause me to read the meaning of individual details differently?