The document outlines the author's goal action plan to improve their critical thinking skills over the course of the semester. Their short term goals are to finish reading, exercises, and summarizing marketing textbook chapters, and to practice explaining graphs. To achieve these, the author plans a daily schedule for reading, assignments, and breaks. They acknowledge obstacles like limited time, difficulty expressing thoughts in English, and phone addiction. The author requests guidance from teachers on summarizing chapters, explaining graphs clearly, and improving writing skills. Completing these goals will encourage critical thinking and benefit their future career.

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Nicha Tatsaneeyapan
Prof. Nicole Yurchak
Learning English In American Classroom
26 July 2020
Goal Action Plan For Developing Critical Thinking Skills
The first short term goal statement for improving my critical thinking skills is to finish all
the reading and doing exercises from chapters 4 to 6 in the “principle of marketing” textbook
written by Philip Kotler by the end of this semester. I bought this book four months ago but did
not even start to open the first page of the book yet. It is challenging not only because I have to
finish all the assignments given by my instructors, but I also have to manage my personal time as
well. Time management is important because it wisely helps me to accomplish these goals.
Unfortunately, there are only three weeks left before I will have completed all of the English
courses. During this time I plan to read, complete the exercises, and summarize all the readings.
I also have a plan to do each teacher's assignments each day starting from 9 a.m. to 12 a.m., and
then having a break for two hours. Afterwards, I would continue to work from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m.
on my work. After taking another break for two hours, I will finally start my next task at 7.00
p.m. In this way, I aim to read chapters one, two, and three in a week (July 26-Aug2, 2020).
After this I will attempt to finish problems 1 to 20 at the end of chapters one, two and three
during the second week (Aug 3-Aug 8, 2020). Doing these exercises helps me to better
understand the concepts for the whole course. During the third week, I plan to summarize all the
chapters (Aug 9-Aug 14, 2020). These action plans must be completed in a timely manner, or
otherwise I will have to do all of these activities simultaneously which is too much at one time.

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Another key obstacle that I might face is that I have to answer in English. Sometimes I
cannot think of words to express my thoughts clearly, and therefore cannot answer the questions
in a well-organized manner. Since writing is an important essence for critical thinking, my
English instructors can help contribute by first giving suggestions of ways to improve my writing
skills, and correcting my end-of-chapters answers.
My second short-term goal this course is to practice explaining graphs. There are many
marketing jobs that have to deal with numbers and data. Marketers always represent their budget
allocation in graphs, bar charts, and tables. At times, it is challenging for me to recap these
statistical graphs because I haven’t used graphs since I was very young and some of these skills I
might have forgotten. I also need to allocate time every day for six hours to study and practice it.
I am very capable of completing two drafts for a teacher's assignment in three days. For example,
it takes one and half hours to edit and make a final draft. Therefore, I would have four days left
for the last three weeks to study graphs. It is important that I allocate time each day for doing
assignments to practice writing explaining graphs starting from 9 to 12 a.m. and then from 2 to 5
p.m. However, it is difficult for me to complete this task because I should manage my time to
balance my studying and relaxing hours. Another obstacle for me is that I am addicted to using
my mobile phone. I like to scroll up and down on Instagram applications to keep updated with
my friends. Therefore, I will plan to spend just 30 minutes a day on my phone. Then I will have
time left to do other things; walking, running and playing with dogs. This would make myself
truly relaxed because I will have time for myself to refresh my brain. I will need to practice and
finish writing graphs; four circular graphs; two bar charts; and four-line charts taken from the
above mentioned resources. I will do this by taking the graph-explaining exercises from The
Cambridge English for IELTS academic book. The last key challenge for me is to find good

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examples of explaining graphing each graph and ways to explain it in a well-organized order
format. Teachers could help me by giving good tips on how to explain these graphs clearly and
sorting out good words to be used to explain the graph. The professor could also give me some
guidelines on how to understand these graphs and correct my writing skills including grammar
and explanation capabilities.
In conclusion, completing these two short-term goals: finishing reading, doing exercises,
and summarizing the chapters from the textbook and practice explaining graphs are two key
challenges for me to complete by the end of this semester. However, these goals will encourage
me to think critically because accomplishing these goals requires “the process of analyzing,
evaluating, and synthesizing information to increase my deeper understanding” (Salah & Sandra;
2004). Moreover, it will help me to be “self-directed, self-disciplined, self-monitored, and self-
correcting thinking” (Foundation for Thinking, 2001). Following this plan will ultimately help
me feel accomplished, and gain the knowledge and skills I will need for my future career.

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Work Cited
Foundation for Critical Thinking (2001). Critical Thinking Handbook.
Kotler, Philip. Principles of Marketing. Englewood Cliffs, N.J. :Prentice Hall, 1991.
Kutieleh, S. & Egege, Y.S., 2004. Critical thinking and International students: A Marriage of
necessity. First Year in Higher Education 2004 Conference: Dealing With Diversity.