FOR EACH SET OF RESPONSES I HAVE THE REQUIRED INSTRUCTIONS.. please be sure there are 8 peer responses.. each set has their own instructions Guided Response: Respond to at least two of your peers. In

FOR EACH SET OF RESPONSES I HAVE THE REQUIRED INSTRUCTIONS.. please be sure there are 8 peer responses.. each set has their own instructions

Guided Response: Respond to at least two of your peers. In responses, provide feedback on how peers’ key skills and qualifications will help get the job to which they are applying. Additionally, provide at least one suggestion on how your peers might emphasize their relevant skills to ensure that they are called in for an interview.

BRANDI’S POST:

Program of study

Bachelor of Arts Degree in Early Childhood Education

The position for which you are applying

Elementary School Teacher

How your field of study has prepared you for this position

My field of study has prepared me to be a teacher by teaching me the necessary skills for educating children. Through the courses that I have taken through this program of study, I have acquired the skills for curriculum planning, inclusion, and collaboration with parents and staff members

A connection you made while volunteering that does not really fit on your resume but will work in your Cover Letter

I volunteered in a second-grade classroom in 2001, while I was in high school, as a teacher’s assistant that gave me great insight into the workings of a classroom environment. This allowed me to see a teacher in action throughout an instructional day and give me the experience of working with children.

MAXINE’S POST:

Program of study:

Bachelors of Arts in Education

The position for which you are applying

Special Education School Teacher

How your field of study has prepared you for this position:

In my field yes and no. Yes because I have learned so much in correct terminology and what our children need in a teacher. No because as a teacher I now Know that I will always be learning new ways to understand our students.

A connection you made while volunteering that does not really fit on your resume but will work in your Cover Letter:

As I moved to Texas I was able to see how families are everything. I was involved in all 3 of my children's learning and afterschool activities as a cares volunteer, substitute teacher, coach or team mom. Being able to see what the teachers are all about helped me to understand as a parent what I needed to do to help my children at home. Now that I am proceeding in the teaching field I learned so many techniques and values from other teachers and coaches.

Respond to Peers: Review your classmates’ posts, and respond to at least two of your peers by Day 7. When responding to your classmates, please provide feedback on their examples of good and poor critical thinking skills. Discuss additional ways one can think more critically. Each participation post should be a minimum of 75 words.

BRANDON’S POST:

· Explain at least five elements of critical thinking that you found in the reading material.

Like I stated in week 1, “Whether you realize it, or not critical thinking is involved in every decision made throughout your life. A critical thinker evaluates the situation and uncovers the links connected to the unknown. However, the individual is ultimately responsible in determining whether the unknown is the right or wrong thing to do”. In my opinion we do this with the list elements below:

Transforming Knowledge – is an element in which the author (you) coverts the information to reader in the most basic of forms. Its providing a sense of clarity.

Analyzing – In this process we dissect the information to determine the true cause of something or what lead to it. Basically, it is understanding the cause and effect of things.

Discriminating – This element compares and contrast the significance of the circumstances presented. Ranking them findings to see what the main factors are.

Predicting – developing a plan that could solve the problem or effect the overall consequences.

Logical reasoning – This element involves piecing back the dissected information to bring about a conclusion or summary on how to fix t what was broken.

· Search the Internet, media, or the Ashford University Library, and find an example in which good critical thinking skills are being demonstrated by the author or speaker. Summarize the content and explain why you think it demonstrates good critical thinking skills.

This author demonstrates good critical thinking skills because they show the uses of information seeking. This trait involves “searching for evidence, facts, or knowledge by identifying relevant sources and gathering objective, subjective, historical, and current data from those sources” (Scheffer, 2001, Critical Thinking Skills). For instance, Bauer used credible and reliable sources. To include HCCC or Human-caused climate change and the IPCC or Intergovernmental panel on climate change. They also provide knowledge on how to obtain the PDF file. This article basically summarizes how the world is contributing to the climate change issue. Bauer (2015) outlined that, “most of the recent change is almost certainly due to emissions of greenhouse gases caused by human activities” (pg. 627, para. 3).

· Search the Internet, media, or the Ashford University Library, and find an example in which the author or speaker lacks good critical thinking skills. Summarize the content and explain why you think it demonstrates the absence of good, critical thinking skills.

Just to clarify. Ian Plimer wrote the original article “Let’s not pollute minds with carbon fears”. Johnson and several scientists review the article and pointed out the misleading evidence.

This by far was a hard find, but I did find an example of bad critical thinking. The person who thought about this did not think clearly, rationally or use credible sources. Plimer article “Let’s not pollute minds with carbon fears” mentioned, “It has never been shown that human emissions of carbon dioxide drive global warming” (Johnsons, 2019, Ian Plimer op-ed in The Australian again presents long list of false claims about climate ). The article summarizes that all the climate change data the media puts out to the public are false. This article demonstrates the absence of good, critical thinking skills due to the lack of Intellectual Perseverance. This trait is “having a consciousness of the need to use intellectual insights and truths in spite of difficulties, obstacles, and frustrations” (Scheffer, 2001, Critical Thinking Skills). The author uses nonsense to justify the scientific data gathered. They also failed to use the analyze part of critical thinking, no credible research was provided.

References:

Johnson, S. (2019, November 22). Ian Plimer op-ed in The Australian again presents long list of false claims about climate. Retrieved from https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/ian-plimer-op-ed-in-the-australian-again-presents-long-list-of-false-claims-about-climate/ (Links to an external site.)

Scheffer, & Rubenfeld, (2001). "Critical Thinking: Critical Thinking Skills ( (Links to an external site.) http://www.umich.edu/~elements/probsolv/strategy/ctskills.htm (Links to an external site.)

Valuable Intellectual Traits ( (Links to an external site.) (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.cetla.howard.edu/new_showcase/lectures/docs/jones/intraits.html

BAUER, H. H. (2015). Climate-Change Science or Climate-Change Propaganda? Journal of Scientific Exploration, 29(4), 621–636.

AREALE’S POST:

Elements of Critical Thinking

For some individuals, the common misconception of critical thinking is that it is merely a skill. However, in the article Common Misconceptions of Critical Thinking, the concept of critical thinking has evolved far beyond logical reasoning. Contributors Sharon Bailin, Roland Case, Jerrold Coombs and Leroi Daniels (1999), speak to the concept of critical thinking and demonstrates what it can be once developed in practice. Critical thinking is a transferable skill used to develop or enhance other elements such as, mental operations, processes, procedures, behaviors, and practices.

Applied Critical Thinking: An Article

In Common Misconceptions of Critical Thinking, critical thinking incorporates all of these elements. Critical thinking as a procedure suggests reducing critical thinking into steps to accomplish the bigger objective (Bailin, Case, Coombs & Daniels1999). Critical thinking as a mental process involves attending a school curriculum to obtain a collection of skills to utilize in all aspects of life. For example; displaying the ability to analyze, classify, evaluate, sequence, synthesize, translate or abstract within a task to fulfill a process (Bailin, Case, Coombs & Daniels1999). In addition to the Common Misconceptions of Critical Thinking article, Valuable Intellectual Traits demonstrates a higher level of critical thinking, which I found very interesting and valuable (Valuable intellectual traits, 2014).

Fake News: A Lack of Critical Thinking

Fake news would be a good example of the lack of critical thinking where the source, misinformation or other characteristics in the fake news is used to distinguish its credibility. Otherwise fake news is misinformation and misguidance. The video Fake News provides insights of how social media uses misinformation to spread gossip or aid a personal agenda (Tan, & Walko, & Dimoff, 2018). According to University Librarian Kelly Diamond (2018) “the problem now is fake news is so readily shared through social media” some of this fake news contains “propaganda, hokes, pranks... all kinds of social media platforms and gets shared much more quickly” (1:34-1:59).

References

Bailin, S., Case, R., Coombs, J. R., & Daniels, L. B. (1999). Common misconceptions of critical thinking. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 31(3), 269-283. doi:10.1080/002202799183124

Tan, K., & Walko, D. S. (Executive Producers), Dimoff, D. (Producer). (2018). Fake news: Part 1 [Video segment]. In How to recognize fake news [Streaming video]. Films On Demand database

Valuable intellectual traits. (2014 , September). Retrieved from http://www.cetla.howard.edu/new_showcase/lectures/docs/jones/intraits.html

Guided Response: Due by Day 7 (Monday). Respond to at least two of your classmates’ postings. Your responses should be a minimum of 100 words each and should either elaborate on a key point a peer has made or seek to gain additional information.

JOANNE’S POST:

First of all, we need to ask some questions pertaining to program itself;

Who is the target population? What are the main goals of the program?

The intended target is Eastern Kentucky and the very rural towns. This section of the United States lives in poverty, and while the government has tried to revitalize, there almost seems no hope for the small towns. “The median household income there is barely above the poverty line, at $22,296. The unemployment rate is 12.7 percent. The disability rate is nearly as high, at 11.7 percent. Nearly half of Clay County is obese” (Lowry, 2014, para. 4).

The benefits of employing privatization include lesser participation of government, lowered costs, probably better response towards the people’s requirements and accommodating service conditions. The cons include personal avarice, uniform responses in place of addressing individual problems, insufficient assets and failure to adequately offer the agreed services.

The main goals of the implemented program are to reduce those in poverty, provide new jobs and reduce unemployment, and even, perhaps, increase the life expectancy span by educating on health. This being the case, I do believe that the county should actually consider implementing the program and take bids from other agents. A collaboration may work better than having funding be one-sided. For the health and disability issues, the county can call on other agencies to bid on funding a program specifically designed to help the people regulate their personal health issues. Parallel to this, the county should implement a program for the unemployed population.

To evaluate success would be to compare the practices that have already been tried, such as government aid and private aid. The article mentions that neither of these have truly worked, and so this collaboration would take the advantages of both the county itself, and other agents.

Some advantages of public funding include: a purpose set by legislation, focus on functions usually impacting significant groups in society, having the most money and more likely to award large grants/contracts, more likely to pay all project cost and/or cover indirect costs, and easier to find information about and to stay current on project needs/interests. Likewise, some advantages of private funding include: they are more likely to focus on emerging issues, new needs, populations not yet recognized as "special interests”, they are often willing to pool resources with other funders, and they offer a wide range in size of available grants -- some can make very large awards, others are strictly for small local projects.

Lowrey, A. (2014, June 26) What’s the matter with eastern. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/29/magazine/whats-the-matter-with-eastern-kentucky.html?_r=2

TANISHA’S POST:

The Lovely People County Board of Eastern Kentucky has considered developing a program order to bring jobs back into its community. Give education incentives to young children in kindergarten all the way to High School in order for them to complete their College education order for the people of the rural county of clay to continue to survive. Having privatized services is an effort to improve their cost effectiveness and quality of the county in order to bring more jobs and job training to the community. The advantages and challenges that they face are to deliver quality product to the customers and consumers without reducing any cost but insuring that the product is of high quality in order to beat the competition. The rural areas are far from any highways or interstates. The communities are small and spread apart. Its roads are not up to standards for transporting products or goods in and out. Many of the county's population do not have a good economical stature in order to travel. With this being said this section is at the lower income end living in poverty with no hope for these small towns that are affected. In some places, decades of growth have failed to raise incomes, and of late, poverty has become more concentrated not in urban areas but in rural ones.In many cases, a primary problem in poor rural areas is the very fact that they’re rural. With the implemented of these new programs it would help laid-off coal miners and others find new jobs and help reduce the unemployment rates. The problem comes from the big northern companies rapping the region of its resources. Some concerted effort by those inside and outside the region to begin improving the schools, providing economic incentives and training for local businesses to begin filling in the gaps left by mining, and a willingness to stay the course for many years rather than giving up--as so many of the "War on Poverty" programs ended up. That "historic lack of investment in human capital" is something that must be overturned, and that will only come from large scale efforts at many levels of government and private enterprise working together. More focus should be placed on human capital from education to health and reducing the poverty rate in these rural areas.

Guided Response: Due by Day 7 (Monday). Respond to at least two of your classmates’ postings. Your responses should be a minimum of 100 words each and should either elaborate on a key point a peer has made or seek to gain additional information.

SHAWNTOBIA’S POST:

Throughout our courses I learned how important the Health and Human Services field is to individuals in society. Each course placed emphasis on the traits and skills that are necessary for a Health and Human Services professional to help others in their time of need. These courses provided me with the information and tools that will aide in helping others make the necessary changes needed in their life to succeed. I feel as though I am well equipped to resolve the issues that individuals are faced with by educating them on their options and providing them with assistance. Respecting others regardless of who they are and what they are going through as well as finding ways to continuously educate myself on various topics within the field stands out to me the most. For instance, regardless of one’s culture, values, or beliefs, we must be respectful, open-minded, non-judgmental, and empathetic to others. Educating ourselves and receiving training on individual’s differences will help me gain an understanding of the diverse backgrounds they come from, the values and beliefs they live by, and how these factors have an impact on their behavior, experiences, and lifestyle. This is key to providing the support, information, and resources they need to enhance their quality of life. Education and training in our field will also prepare me for the different scenarios I will encounter, inform me on policy updates, patient education, and cultural awareness. This is important because we owe it to our clients to be well versed on the issues affecting them and their communities and be prepared to come up with solutions to the issues that they are facing. Education and training also plays a significant role in decision making. I learned the importance of having all the required information to help me assess and evaluate a situation and ensure I’m making the best decision for that individual and their circumstance. Decisions will be made in the best interest of the individual as well as be results driven. Now, that I’m taking my last course I feel prepared to enter the field, but I know my questions will come once I actually begin to train and work. One thing that I’m unsure of is if I want to still want to work in the Social Services field or another field such as a mental health counselor or case manager. Learning about the different fields has made me think of different areas that I would enjoy working in.

NICOLE’S POST:

I especially take pride in discussions such as this being an employee in the health and human services field currently. I have learned so much from this field. I employ everything I learn to my daily work life. One of the most important things that I learned is how to actively listen. I was not a good listener prior to the Human Services Leadership program. I would speak to people and listen to a few words they said then I would contemplate other things without active engaging in the conversation. I takes extra work for me to give eye contact which lets the speaker know I am listening, but it is worth it. Competent communication is another strategy I have learned and apply in my daily life. Competent communication means communication in which all participants understand the message being relayed in the manner which it is being shared while engaging in an exchange of information. Competent communication and active listening upgraded my interpersonal communications which upgraded my career.

The decisions I make as a health and human services provider are better because I have more knowledge to positively mix with my experience. I use empathetic attitudes when dealing with clients and I value management and staff equally. I will always make the best business decisions that positively impact my clients. During the trying time of COVID-19, I have been sacrificing personal time to make sure my clients have access to everything they need. I understand that as a health and human services professional I am tasked with the responsibility of going above and beyond for my clients and staff. I also learned that constant training, learning, and preparation is imperative to be an effective leader.

The questions I have are more about other experiences as health and human service professionals. I am curious as to strategies that others use to manage their staff and their own caseloads. I am a good handle on my staff and work, but I always sacrifice my personal time to make sure everything runs smoothly. I think I put my job first sometimes which is not fair to my family. My question is how are people managing the work and home balance? I understand a lot of people are home, but I am not since I am an essential worker, so this question mostly relates to when you were out every day with work. Thank you for responses and I hope everyone is remaining safe.

AN example of peer response:

Hi Shawntobia,

Cultural diversity places a major role in every day life. it is very important to have certain programs or training groups in place especially in the communities of where the diversity is among. Cultural diversity helps especially as a social workers to better understand that individual culture .As a medical assistant now i try to always be proactive in listening , accepting, and always welcoming them and their ideas as well for their own health. I never try to impose my own personally values on theirs but I do try and give an honest opinion overall. You did a great job on this post.