Exploring Critical Thinking Dispositions among Fourth Year BSc Nursing Students of Various Colleges of Nursing, Pakistan

Background: Critical Thinking (CT) dispositions in nursing are prominent predictors of competence in delivering high-quality care, and of professionalism, in newly graduated nurses. CT skills, in isolation of CT dispositions, do not guarantee success in the workplace, because Critical Thinking Dispositions (CTD) are important elements of intellectual reasoning that simulate a person towards using the CT skills. Therefore, nursing educational programs should promote lifelong learning rather than focusing on transferring the content of nursing knowledge only. And for this purpose, quality education is the key. Education should focus on teaching from diverse perspectives, incorporating various teaching learning strategies that are congruent with the modern era. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to explore critical thinking dispositions among final year Baccalaureate Nursing students of various military colleges of nursing, in Pakistan. Methodology: A descriptive qualitative exploratory study design was used to investigate the CTD of BSc final year nursing students. The study population included twelve willing nursing students, from six military colleges across the country. Demographic information and consent was taken from the participants of the study. In-depth interviews, through a semi structured interview guide, and probes were used to obtain data related to personal experiences of CTD amongst the nursing students. Results: Data analysis showed two broad themes: 1) Perceptions of CT, and 2) Experiences of CT dispositions. In theme one, the emerging category was: Clarity of CT;whereas in theme two, the categories that emerged were: a) Truth Seeking, b) Open Mindedness, c) Inquisitiveness, and d) Self Organization. Conclusion: The findings of the study revealed positive dispositions towards truth seeking, open mindedness, and self-organization, whereas disposition towards inquisitiveness was weak. Self-confidence and maturity also emerged as positive factors that the students possessed. This study recommends that faculty and learners should extend their concept of CTD, and emphasizes its application in daily routine. Additionally, faculty should modify their instructional strategies and focus on the cultivation of dispositions of inquisitiveness, curiosity, and allow questioning by students in the class.

Correlation between critical thinking and emotional intelligence:a national crosssectional study on operating room nursing students in Iran

Objective:According to the World Federation of Medical Education,critical thinking should be part of the training of medical and paramedical students.Professionals can improve the quality of care of patients after surgery by having or acquiring this skill in health care.Also,Emotional intelligence is introduced as an impor tant and effective factor on the professional performance and mental health of healthcare professionals.Thus,the present study was designed and implemented to determine the relationship between emotional intelligence and critical thinking among operating room nursing students of medical sciences universities in Iran.Methods:This cross-sectional study was done on 420 operating room students in 10 top medical sciences universities of Iran in 2022.The sampling method in this research was multistage sampling.The data collection instruments included demographic characteristics,Rickett's critical thinking,and Bradberry-Greaves'emotional intelligence questionnaires.After receiving the ethics code,data collection was done for 2 months.For data analysis,descriptive and inferential analyses including independent t-tests,analysis of variance,and Pearson correlation were used.The collected data were analyzed by SPSS 18(IBM Corporation,Armonk,New York,United States).P-value<0.05 was considered significant.Results:The mean age of the students participating in this study was 23.02±3.70 years,with women constituting 67.4%of them.The results of data analysis indicated that the mean total score of critical thinking and emotional intelligence was 124.10±37.52 and 114.12±43.63,respectively.A direct significant correlation between critical thinking and emotional intelligence(r=0.459,P-value<0.001)and a significant relationship between gender and emotional intelligence(P-value=0.028)were found.Conclusions:Based on the present study results,educational managers in the Ministry of Health are suggested to consider suitable educational programs for improving critical thinking and emotional intelligence to enhance the quality of care provided by students in operating rooms.

Analysis of the Impact of Inductive Reasoning on the Mathematical Thinking Style of Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Students

In this paper,we combine the teaching and learning situation of deaf and hard-of-hearing students in the Linear Algebra course of the Computer Science and Technology major at the Nanjing Normal University of Special Education.Based on the cognitive style of deaf and hard-of-hearing students,we apply example induction,exhaustive induction,and mathematical induction to the teaching of Linear Algebra by utilizing specific course content.The aim is to design comprehensive teaching that caters to the cognitive style characteristics of deaf and hard-of-hearing students,strengthen their mathematical thinking styles such as quantitative thinking,algorithmic thinking,symbolic thinking,visual thinking,logical thinking,and creative thinking,and enhance the effectiveness of classroom teaching and learning outcomes in Linear Algebra for deaf and hard-of-hearing students.

Cultivate Critical Thinking Ability via Students’ Presentations in College English Classes

In the new era when demands for flexible intellectual skills are increasing,strengthening the cultivation of critical thinking ability of students has become one of the key purposes of higher education.This paper intends to discuss how to cultivate students’critical thinking ability through English classroom presentations.It points out that during the whole process,teachers’guidance plays an indispensable role.Only when both teachers and students are aware that classroom presentations are a golden opportunity for the cultivation of students’critical thinking ability and carry this awareness into their English classes,can English presentations be brought into full play.

Posttraumatic stress symptoms among Chinese university students during the COVID-19 pandemic:Prevalence,correlates,and mental health help-seeking

BACKGROUND Revisiting the epidemiology of posttraumatic stress symptoms(PTSSs)among university students during the coronavirus disease 2019(COVID-19)pandemic as well as understanding the mental health help-seeking behavior of individuals with PTSSs has critical implications for public mental health strategies in future medical pandemics.AIM To investigate the prevalence and correlates of PTSSs among university students during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in China and to examine mental health help-seeking behaviors among these students.METHODS A total of 2507 Chinese university students were recruited via snowball sampling.The students completed the Seven-item Screening Scale for Post-traumatic Stress Disorder during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in China.Sociodemo-graphic characteristics,pandemic-related characteristics,and mental health help-seeking behaviors of students with PTSSs were also collected.RESULTS The prevalence of PTSSs among the participants was 28.0%.Seven significant correlates of PTSSs were identified(odds ratio=1.23-3.65,P≤0.024):Female sex,being 19 years old or older,living with others or alone,a low level of family economic status,fair or poor interpersonal relationships,severe or very severe local pandemic,and having family members diagnosed with COVID-19.However,only 3.28%of the students with PTSSs reported seeking help from mental health specialists.Among the 23 students who sought help from mental health specialists,13 opted for online or telephone-based psychological consultation.CONCLUSION Our data suggest that there was a high risk of PTSSs among university students and a high level of unmet mental health needs during the COVID-19 pandemic.The delivery of mental health services online or via telephone is a promising approach to address these unmet needs.

Contrastive Study of Thinking Modes between Chinese and English and Thinking Training of English Writing for Chinese Students

Based on the relationship between language and thinking, this paper is designed to inform that Chinese mode of thinking has great effect on college students＇ English writing from the perspective of contrastive study of thinking modes between Chinese and English. In addition, one specific measure about training English mode of thinking is put forward.

A comparative study of how Chinese ESL students and American students work on the same writing assignment that involves critical thinking

The paper compares and contrasts how Chinese ESL students and American students work on a same descriptive English writing assignment that requires critical thinking. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the similarity and difference between English composition teaching in China and English composition teaching in America in regarding to incorporating critical thinking, as reflected in the use of this assignment. The study uses descriptive analysis of student writings as well as quantitative analysis of questionnaires, student grades given both from the author and several other researchers who are invited to participate in the study. The cognitive abilities in critical thinking basically consist of logical thinking, dialectical thinking, and creative thinking abilities. The study reveals that Chinese students＇ works generally flow well and they use a language that is coherent and clear. However, the study also reveals that Chinese students have difficulties in implementing critical thinking at English composition learning, and the difficulties lie in creative and dialectical thinking. To cultivate critical thinking, we need to employ affective strategies, meta-cognitive strategies-macro-abilities, and cognitive strategies-micro-abilities. The paper concludes by giving concrete examples in the area of cognitive strategies-micro-abilities in order to cultivate critical thinking.

The Practice and Thinking of the Students'Exchange Program Under the Background of Internationalization

Based on the background of internationalization of higher education, the article analyzed the forms, size, significance and problems of the international students'exchange launched in Dali University of Yunnan Province; and then provided the sustainable developing strategies for the program.

To Improve Students'Linguistic Performance & Independent Thinking Abilities in Business English Teaching

Business English is a required course for English majors.By learning the course,students can know the necessary business knowledge and improve their linguistic performance and independent thinking abilities under the systematic background knowledge of industry & business theory and practice.It will be the strong foundations for students'better future career.

Comparison of Clinical Thinking Ability in Nursing Students of Different Grades

Objective： This study investigated and compared the clinical thinking ability of undergraduate nursing students of different grades, and searched for influencing factors of clinical thinking ability of nursing undergraduate students. Methods： The convenience sampling method was used to select the Subject of the study. In total, 180 third-year, fourth-year, and fifth-year nursing undergraduate students were enrolled in this study. A self-designed scale of clinical thinking ability was used to collect the data. SPSS17.0 was used to analyze the data. Results： The average scores of clinical thinking ability of undergraduate nursing students were 68.14±9.13. In addition, 71.1% of the students have a higher level of clinical thinking ability, and only 7.2% of the students have the best level. The ANOVA test showed that the fourth-year students had the highest scores（72.96±8.64）, and the third-year students had the lowest scores（62.35±8.09）, which indicated a significant difference in the scores of the three groups（ F= 26. 79, P〈0.05）. Multiple linear regression analysis indicated that the frequency of academic activities and the frequency of department rounds were significantly correlated to clinical thinking ability（P〈0.05）. Conclusion： We must pay attention to the changes and influencing factors of clinical thinking ability of nursing undergraduate students. Thus, traditional teaching methods need to evolve and be revised to host the capacity of clinical practice most effectively and, eventually, promote the development of clinical thinking ability of nursing undergraduate students.

Enhancing Evidence-Based Practice and Critical Thinking Skills of Nursing Students: Lessons from the Review of the Bachelor of Science in Nursing Curriculum of the University of Zambia

Background: Making changes in the existing curriculum aims, objectives, course contents learning outcomes and assessment strategies have become a fact of life for nurse educators. Purpose: To enhance the existing Bachelor of Science (BSc) in nursing curriculum through integration of evidence-based practice (EBP) and teaching of critical thinking skills. Materials and Methods: A needs analysis was conducted using a five-phased approach to review the BSc in nursing Curriculum. Kern’s six-step model was adapted and introduced through a series of workshop exercises that highlighted the application of each step: 1) Desk review of the BSc curriculum offered globally;2) Administration of the needs assessment questionnaire to key informants;3) Strengths, weakness, opportunities and threat analysis;4) Consultative meeting with major stakeholders;5) Curriculum review. Results: The five-phased approach established some gaps in existing curricula, and identified critical core competences and best practices in integrating EPB and critical thinking in the BSc undergraduate curriculum and some “A” level content that was not in tandem with the practice of nurses. New courses were developed to support students in academic writing and enhance professionalism and duration of training was reduced from 5 to 4 years. Conclusion: The process demonstrated that BSc curriculum review, in fact, should be thoroughly scrutinized to encourage positive changes to the curriculum, provide opportunities for team building and the development of leadership skills and a whole-of course perspective on the curriculum.

Thinking Process of Nursing Students’ Clinical Judgment in Pediatric Nursing Practicum

This aim is to clarify thinking process of nursing students’ clinical judgment, i.e., how nursing students act and think and what influences this thinking process of identifying approaches necessary for the children under their care in pediatric nursing practicum. By the analysis of M-GTA, students concurrently performed “A: Analytically contemplating the state of this child’s body” and “B: Contextually contemplating this child’s?individuality”. As a result, they acquired “C: Understandingof this child as a familiar existence.” This allows students to enable them to “D: Identify the necessary approach using judgment criteria for this child.” Furthermore, as situations that promote thinking by relating to all processes of thinking, students experienced “E: Attempts to solve problems through various measures” and “F: Encouragement of thinking through reflection.” Meanwhile, “G: Stagnation of thinking because of concerning matters” inhibited the progress of thinking. We found a need for education after grasping the process of student thought.

Cultivation of Students' Creative Thinking through Building Models

To comply with the strategic goal of "mass entrepreneurship and innovation",universities and col eges adjusted the discipline cultivation objective to be cultivation of innovational and enterprising talents.Innovational and enterprising talents are inseparable from creative thinking,while the cultivation of creative thinking is the basis of cultivation of innovational and enterprising talents.This paper discussed cultivation of students' creative thinking through making building models in basic course of architectural design.Besides,it analyzed the relation between making of building models and creative thinking from divergent thinking,multi-directional thinking,element changing thinking,conversion thinking,and reverse thinking.It is expected to cultivate students' creative thinking through building models,to lay a solid foundation for architectural design courses,and to provide more architectural designers with more solid foundation and creative thinking.

Effects of Problem-based English Writing Instruction on Thai Upper Secondary School Students' Critical Thinking Abilities and Argumentative Writing Skills

The objective of the study is to examine the effects of Problem based English writing instruction on Thai Upper secondary school students' critical thinking abilities and argumentative writing skill.In this study,the researcher constructed 18weeks' training in a prestigious secondary school M6 level.The instruments used in this research include lesson plans,writing assignments,instructional material and topics.Critical thinking pre- test and post test were used to measure students' critical thinking development.Scoring rubric was designed to measure students' argumentative writing development.The data were analyzed using mean,t-test,correlation through SPSS system.The results of the analyses reveal that 1) students who learn through Problem based English Writing Instruction gained significantly higher average scores on the critical thinking post test than the critical thinking pre-test at the significance level of 0.05 and the mean difference is 0.5 which is referred to large effect;2) students who learn through Problem based English Writing Instruction gained significantly higher average score on their fifth argumentative writing assignment than the average score of their first argumentative writing assignment at the significance level of 0.05,with the mean of the effect size at 0.84 which referred to large effect.Problem-based English writing instruction was proved to be an effective way in improving students' Critical thinking and argumentative writing.

Cultivation of College Students＇ Critical Thinking Ability Through the Reading-Discussion-Writing Approach

Critical thinking ability is the core skill of higher education. How to train the non-English major students＇ critical thinking ability in the English writing instruction plays an important role in the compound personnel training. In this paper, the reading-discussion-writing approach which guarantees the innovative construction of writing is proposed to train college students＇ critical thinking ability, and specific suggestions on the practice are articulated such as designing diversified listening and speaking lead-in activities to activate or supplement the relative notion and background knowledge, using variety of challenging reading-discussion-writing tasks, and conducting mutual evaluation, etc., to let students deeply understand the text through discussion and promote their language competence and writing ability as well as their reflective thinking ability.

The Effectiveness of Using Constructive Learning Strategies in Teaching English Language on Developing the Achievement of Grammar, Translation, and Critical Thinking Skills for the Third Grade Intermediate Students

The study aimed to reveal the effectiveness of the integration between some constructive learning strategies in teaching a unit of the English language course to collect translation skills, using grammar, and the acquisition of critical thinking skills for intermediate third grade students in Mecca. Also, it aimed to acknowledge the statistical differences between the modified averages for the study sample groups degrees in the dimensional collecting of grammar and translation skills at the knowledge of the grammar level and using it, and at the macro level for collecting translation and grammar skills after adjusting the old collecting, as well as the knowledge of the statistical differences between the modified averages for the study sample groups in the total telemetric for the critical thinking skills after adjusting the old collecting. To achieve the study objectives, the researcher used the semi-experimental method that had several experimental groups （four groups）, and applied it to a sample of intermediate third-grade students in the city of Makkah （99 students） in teaching the unit of the English language course, which is （Healthy Eating） in the second semester in 2011/2012. After using the appropriate statistical methods, the study came to a result that there are no statistically significant differences in the old implementation for the test of skills of academic achievement of grammar, translation, and critical thinking skills, and that there are statistically significant differences in the new implementation due to the four strategies. According to the results of the study, the researcher recommended a number of recommendations including： the necessity to focus on the constructive theory in teaching English language skills, the importance of expanding the use of the suggested integrative oriented and its development in the field of English language teaching, to hold an intensive training courses for teachers of the English language to train them on using the suggested integrative strategy, the emphasis on the importance of the curriculum activities which focus on the integration between the constructive learning strategies, the importance of expanding of scientific research in the field of integrative strategies, and the development of synthesis methods that combine two strategies or more.

A Proposed Exercise to Reinforce Abstract Thinking for Upper-Division Computer and Electrical Engineering Students: Modeling a High-Speed Inverter Using Cognitive Representations and Abstract Algebra

In mathematics, physics, and engineering, abstract concepts are an indispensable foundation for the study and comprehension of concrete models. As concepts within these fields become increasingly detached from physical entities and more associated with mental events, thinking shifts from analytical to conceptual-abstract. Fundamental topics taken from the abstract algebra (aka: modern algebra) are unquestionably abstract. Historically, fundamental concepts taught from the abstract algebra are detached from physical reality with one exception: Boolean operations. Even so, many abstract algebra texts present Boolean operations from a purely mathematical operator perspective that is detached from physical entities. Some texts on the abstract algebra introduce logic gate circuits, but treat them as perceptual symbols. For majors of pure or applied mathematics, detachments from physical entities is not relevant. For students of Computer and Electrical Engineering (CpE/EE), mental associations of Boolean operations are essential, and one might argue that studying pure Boolean axioms are unnecessary mental abstractions. But by its nature, the CpE/EE field tends to be more mentally abstract than the other engineering disciplines. The depth of the mathematical abstractions that we teach to upper-division CpE/EE majors is certainly up for questioning.

Research on the oral teaching of university network English in promoting students＇ creative thinking abilities

Many authors probe into the models of promoting college students＇ creative thinking abilities from their own perspectives, among which there are innovative works. However, whether we can improve the above abilities of college students in the oral teaching of university network English still remains blank in the study. Based on the deconstruction of the creative thinking abilities of the students, we should build the components of this capacity from four aspects.

Investigation of Critical Thinking Tendency of Engineering Students and Analysis of Teaching Countermeasures

“New Engineering”construction puts forward higher requirements for the critical thinking ability of engineering talents in the future.With“California Critical Thinking Disposition Inventory Chinese Revision”,the critical thinking tendency of engineering majors in local engineering colleges was investigated and analyzed.The results showed that the critical thinking level of the engineering students was obviously lower.According to the findings and teaching practice,this paper gives some teaching countermeasures to strengthen the cultivation of critical thinking of engineering students.

Teaching Research on the Training of Students'Innovative Thinking Ability Based on Maker Education Concept

In information economy era,training innovative talents is an important step for high speed development of country.Education is an important way to training innovative talents,and the effective cultivation of students;innovative ability is an important symbol of the success of education.Innovative thinking is the basis of innovation ability,we must first improve innovative thinking ability in order to improve innovation ability.In the field of education,middle school is the key step for students to learn diverse thinking,especially innovative thinking.The objective of this paper is to study this step and how can we help students improve their innovative thinking ability.