Page 133 - Keys To Community College Success

Through these actions, Joe’s emotional intelligence made it more likely that he
would achieve his goal of attending college and earning a degree.
If you know that social interactions are difficult for you, enlist someone to give you
some informal coaching. As Dr. Norman Rosenthal reports in “10 Ways to Enhance
Your Emotional Intelligence,” you may not realize how much others can tell what you
are feeling. “Ask someone who knows you (and whom you trust) how you are coming
across,” he recommends. For example, ask a friend to role-play the meeting with your
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instructor (with the friend playing the instructor) and give you feedback on your words,
tone, and body language. Or, bring a friend with you to the actual meeting and talk
later about how things went. Critical, Creative, and Practical Thinking

Practical Thinking Means Action

Action is the logical result of practical thinking. Basic student success strategies that
promote action—staying motivated, making the most of your strengths, managing
time, seeking help from instructors and advisors, and believing in yourself—will keep
you moving toward your goals. Learning from mistakes and failure is an especially
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important part of practical thinking. As psychologist Barry Schwartz points out,
“Wisdom comes from experience, and not just any experience. You need permission
to be allowed to improvise, to try new things, occasionally to fail, and to learn from
your failures.” When people resist making mistakes, they deny themselves chances
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to learn and develop their powers of reasoning.
The key to making practical knowledge work is to use what you discover, assur-
ing that you will not have to learn the same lessons over and over again. As Sternberg
says, “What matters most is not how much experience you have had but rather
how much you have profited from it—in other words, how well you apply what you
have learned.” 30
See Key 4.9 for some questions you can ask in order to apply practical thinking to
your problems and decisions.

KEY 4.9 Ask questions like these to activate practical thinking.

• What worked well, or not so well, about my approach? My timing? My tone? My wording?
• What did others like or not like about what I did?
To learn from ask • What did I learn from that experience, conversation, event?
experience
• How would I change things if I had to do it over again?
• What do I know I would do again?

• What have I learned that would work here?
To apply what ask • What have I seen others do, or heard about from them, that would be helpful here?
you learn • What does this situation have in common with past situations I’ve been involved in?
• What has worked in similar situations in the past?

• How can I get motivated and remove limitations?
To boost your • How can I, in this situation, make the most of what I do well?
ability to take ask • If I fail, what can I learn from it?
action • What steps will get me to my goal, and what trade-offs are involved?
• How can I manage my time more effectively?

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