English Composition Will Help You Develop Critical Thinking Skills
The link between critical thinking and expressive communication are constantly explored in the English Composition class. Using various forms of literature, this course demands that students formulate opinions and articulate conclusive viewpoints in composition format. Reading and interpreting short stories is one of the literature methods used to develop these skills.
Remember in elementary school how you learned to breakdown stories and analyze them by elements? Well, the same is true of English Composition. Students reflect on stories by studying basic story elements: plot, characters, setting, point of view, and theme. Each element is probed and interpreted in relation to the story, and then expressed through written essays.
Every story has a plot – the events involving the characters and the conflict situations the characters endure. Conflict is essential to the plot because it is what holds the reader’s attention. Identifying the various conflicts and determining how conflict is used and its effectiveness, like between character and society, or character and nature, or between two characters is one of the many strategies students learn to build on critical analysis.
The most important elements of a story are the characters. Characters are defined by traits created for them by the author. In the English Composition class, students will learn to identify specific character traits, which can be viewed through descriptive action, dialogue, and appearance, and how they are related to the character. Surmising character traits is essential for comprehension reading.
Setting is a valuable element for a story. In some instances setting is unimportant, but in other cases, setting is integral to the stories’ effectiveness. The learned four dimensions of setting, time period, weather, time of day, and location will help the student determine whether the setting is important, and if so, what is the connection to the plot and/or characters.
Understanding the points of view by which stories are written is essential to understanding characters and the events of a story. In the English Composition class, students will get a solid grasp of the four points of view: first person, which is told through the eyes of one character; omniscient, which narrated by an all-knowing God-like storyteller; limited omniscient, which reveals only the thoughts of one character; and objective viewpoint, which makes readers the eyewitnesses to the story.
Theme is the underlying meaning of a story, which usually is expressed through a character’s emotions and values. Making sense of a story’s theme requires deep probing and reflection, which is why critical thinking skills are necessary for the English Composition class.
Some story themes are explicit, like the ending of a fable or fairy tale, while other themes are implicit, which requires a deep understanding of the story. The theme element requires a great deal of critical thinking and sound writing skills to translate reflection into composition form.
English Composition class helps students develop analytical and reflection skills. You may even be able to take this as a free college course at accredited online universities and colleges. Through the reading and reflection of various literature forms, students gain a solid foundation of how stories are structured and the key elements that make up an effective story. Understanding story elements helps students learn how to effectively critique and formulate articulate compositions.
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