Course content

To do this course, you need to register both for the course and course exam in the ‘StudentWeb’ system. Access to course resources will be provided a small number of days after registration. Please contact the student office if you have any questions.

-What is critical thinking? -The development of critical thinking skills -Argument identification -Arguments vs non-arguments -Clarity, consistency and structure -Recognizing underlying assumptions and implicit arguments -Identification of argument flaws -Finding and evaluating evidence -Identifying analysis and evaluating critical writing -Critical reflection

Learning outcome

This course addresses the following UN Sustainability Development Goals:

Goal 8, target 8.2: Achieve higher levels of economic productivity through diversification, technological upgrading and innovation, including through a focus on high-value added and labour-intensive sectors.

Goal 12: Sustainable consumption and production is about doing more and better with less. It is also about decoupling economic growth from environmental degradation, increasing resource efficiency and promoting sustainable lifestyles.

This course improves NTNU performance with respect to goal 8, target 8.1 and goal 12 by enabling the PhD student to acquire key research skills more cost effectively in terms of time consumption. This is achieved by employing a teaching format that supports and encourages the learning process to be tightly integrated with the PhD student's chosen field of research.

The course will teach the candidate critical thinking in the context of academic research. The course contributes towards the following learning outcomes:

Knowledge

Strong understanding of academic theory and the preparation of high-quality research. An understanding of what processes are used, the threats that is facing these processes and techniques for mitigating these threats. Understanding the significance of identifying and assessing the assumptions and premises of research works, potential limitations and problems. Ability to select appropriate research methods and sampling techniques for the candidate's research field. When completed the course, the candidate has acquired an enhanced knowledge to evaluate the appropriateness and usefulness of various perspectives, methods and processes in research and in academic and/or artistic projects.

Skills

Having completed the course, the candidate has acquired enhanced skills to analyse and handle complex academic questions and challenge established knowledge and practise within their subject area. In particular, the candidate will be able to identify and assess the significance of underlying assumptions made in other research works. This skill will be of particular use when analyzing to which extent a certain research result is applicable and relevant for a given real life setting.Ability to support and participate in Industrial and Academic research projects at a high international level. Understanding underlying assumptions in a project will provide the candidate with skills for identifying issues that will be critical to the success of a project. The skills acquired will go some way towards making the candidate able to identify and understand the underlying assumption present, the candidate is in a better position to assess if these assumptions have ethical implications that need to be highlighted or investigated further.

General competence

Can participate in debates within their subject area in national and international forums, and in particular, identify when questionable arguments are used - e.g. because an argument is based on assumptions that are not valid in the given context.Can evaluate the need for renewal, and can initiate and engage in groundbreaking thinking and innovation. In particular, through the identification of underlying assumptions that no longer are valid, propose alternative sets of assumptions more appropriate in the current environment on which new research can be built.

Learning methods and activities

• Project work
• Seminars
• Self study

The course is designed such as to provide knowledge, skills and general competences that will be directly usable for candidates in their research work. The candidates will present several 'case papers' that are to be evaluated. The candidate and supervisor are required to propose 'case papers' from their area of research. The evaluation of papers will be discussed in seminars. The candidate will provide a written report giving a summary of the paper analyzed, including a critical analysis. Candidates that produce outstanding reports/particularly interesting or surprising findings will be encouraged and offered guidance to turn their report into a scholarly paper. The course seminars will benefit from a multi-disciplinary perspective by including candidates and supervisors from different disciplines/areas whenever possible. Mandatory tasks: None The course is given every spring semester, next time Spring 2019, assuming enough students register for the course. If not enough students register for the course, it will be given as a self study "ledet selvstudium".

Further on evaluation

Re-sit: The whole course must be repeated.

Forms of assessment: Each candidate must hand in his/her own individual report. Seminars and reports must document that the candidate is able to apply the knowledge, skills and competences in their research field. Each candidate is to give 3 presentations, each presenting a paper and its evaluation.

Required previous knowledge

• The course requires that the student has been admitted to one of the NTNU PhD study programmes.
• The course requires that the student has been allocated a PhD supervisor employed in a full time position at NTNU.
• The enrolment for this course is conditioned on the PhD supervisor accepting to be the student's course supervisor.

Course materials

Papers and books such as[Wallace 2011] Mike Wallace and Alison Wray. Critical Reading and Writing for Postgraduates (SAGE Study Skills Series). SAGE Publications Ltd. Second Edition. 2011.[Brink-Budgen 2010] Roy van den Brink-Budgen. Advanced Critical Thinking Skills. 2010[Cottrell 2011] Stella Cottrell. Critical Thinking Skills: Developing Effective Analysis and Argument (Palgrave Study Skills). Palgrave Macmillan; 2nd edition edition. 2011.[Graham 2003] Leah Graham and Panagiotis Takis Metaxas. 2003. "Of course it's true; I saw it on the Internet!": critical thinking in the Internet era. Commun. ACM 46, 5 (May 2003), 70-75. DOI=10.1145/769800.769804 http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/769800.769804[ Lai ] Emily R. Lai. Critical thinking: A literature review - Pearson education. Available from http://www.pearsonassessments.com/hai/images/tmrs/CriticalThinkingReviewFINAL.pdf Visited March 19, 2013.[Stephen 1985] Norris, Stephen P. "Synthesis of research on critical thinking." Educational leadership 42.8 (1985): 40-45.