One of the most common pieces of feedback students receive about their work is that it requires more analysis. As a teacher, I often tell students the same thing. And from my experience, students can get frustrated by this feedback for various reasons. This is because they have not been told what it means to analyze. Students should first understand the skill for what it is, and then be given the expectations to apply it.
In this post, I’d like to share my thoughts on the importance of analytical skills, in not only educational and academic settings but also in life.
Let’s start with the basics. What exactly does it mean to ‘analyze’?
There are various definitions of the word ‘analyze’, and here are a few:
“Break down in order to bring out the essential elements or structure.” (International Baccalaureate Organization)
“To identify parts and relationships, and to interpret information to reach conclusions.” (International Baccalaureate Organization)
“To learn the nature and relationship of the parts of (something) by a close and careful examination” (Merriam-Webster Learner's Dictionary, 2021)
These definitions are clear and spot on, but for the sake of those who may want the term broken down (or analyzed further, hehe), here is my attempt at doing so:
To analyze is to look at an object of study (which can be literally anything, e.g., a poem, a person, a song, a film, a quote, an argument, a situation, an event), break it down into smaller elements and identify the patterns of these elements and relationships between them. All of this is done with the aim of understanding the object of study better.
Starting from early education in primary and middle school, all the way up to the doctoral level, analysis is important in one’s academic career. At each of these stages, a certain level of analysis is required to succeed.
Analytical skills are not only important in one’s academic career, but also in day-to-day life. It is a helpful skill to employ when making decisions as small as what time to wake up in the morning all the way to what business to invest in.
To demonstrate how to use analytical skills, let’s analyze an issue together. Here is a question: “Analyze the global response to COVID-19”. The key focus of this task is to break down the global response to COVID-19 and achieve a deeper understanding by doing the same.
To break down the ‘global response’, we can look at the responses of:
Governments and Nation-States
International Institutions such as the UN and WHO
Private Organizations – Corporate Sector
NGOs and non-profits
Individuals
Once we have noted down and considered the responses of the players listed above players, we can try to find patterns and the relationship between the responses of these players. One doing this, we are well into analyzing the global response to COVID-19.
Now, on to you. Here is an activity you can do to practice and develop your analytical skills. I call it ‘Analyze This!’
In under 200 words, analyze a song of your choice. In your analysis, you can consider:
the different elements of the song (lyrics, literary devices, tempo, rhythm, melody, overall mood, and so on)
what these elements represent
the relationship of these elements to each other
the overall message of the song
Here are other things you can analyze, using the same prompts as above:
An advertisement
A poem
A book
A movie
A personal situation
A historical event