Learning lies on personal growth, professional growth, and development of the society. This is due to the fact that in a time where technology is evolving at a very rapid pace, we have seen globalization, and a complex social issue, critical thinking and innovativeness is a compulsory skill. The process of learning is no longer a memorizing or a teaching process; it relates to the building of skills, habits and attitudes that enable the people to analyze, evaluate information and come up with creative solutions. Through learning, a person is able to be flexible, achieve excellence, and positively impact the society because of the enhancement of critical thinking and invention.

Catalyst Learning: A Critical Thinking Process

Critical thinking can be defined as a skill that allows one to reason objectively, assessing diversity of opinion and take proper decisions. It is a skill that is acquired as part of the conscious learning. The aspect of good learning ensures that one thinks outside of the box, evaluates facts and draws reasonable conclusions. Educational learning environments using critical thinking encourage students to:

• Questions: Inquiry-based learning causes individuals to be inquisitive and knowledgeable about complicated matters.
• Inferential thinking: The students will be taught to learn how to evaluate the credibility, relevance, and reliability of the sources.
• Solutions step at a time: people are engaged in real life issues and are in demonstration of the application of logic and reasoning to discover solutions.
• Reflect on results: Self-reflection and evaluation would help the learner to enrich his thinking and decision making.

It is through these experiences that learning transforms passive knowledge acquisition into active process of reasoning, evaluation and judgment which is important in critical thinking.

The Introspection of Innovation and Learning

It is through learning that the ability to be innovative, that is, to generate innovations, create processes or products that have not been done before. Life is continuous learning that gives individuals a very broad scope of opinion, new tendencies, and technologies, and it is in this context that the prospects of creativity are open. The creative minds are likely to bring together knowledge in different areas in order to develop solutions to help in solving complex problems. Learning supports innovation which:

Facilitation of experimentation: The learners must come up with learning environments where they can experiment without the fear of failure.

Training interdisciplinary thinking: Learning a number of disciplines assists in creating more links and to view the problems through a new lens.

Learning problem solving skills: Education equips a person with problem solving techniques to identify the problems, analyzing the causal factors behind the same problems and presenting solutions to such problems.

Insuring flexibility: Life-long learning will also ensure the ability to confront emerging situations with the assistance of new practices.

By making people adaptable in changes and initiate change through the means of curiosity, resilience and creativity, learning not only causes technological, business, scientific and social developments but also predisposes people to changes.

Formal and Informal Learning situations

One of the ways of becoming a critical thinker and innovative is through a combination of formal and informal learning processes. The basic information and skills are systematically available in formal education, e.g. in schools, universities and training related to work. Project-based learning, research work and group work provide students with the chances to think and find new solutions under controlled conditions.

Informal learning on the other hand occurs outside the normal classrooms. It includes self-managed education, web-based education, mentoring, work-based, and participation in the community. Informal learning is imaginative because it encourages discovery, experimentation and introspection. Formal and informal learning will enable one to be balanced in analyzing, adapting and innovating.

The use of Technology in enhancing learning

Technology has transformed the process of learning as it has enabled people to be capable of thinking critically and to be creative. Digital platforms provide numerous opportunities regarding the availability of information, interactions, and learning in groups. Adaptive learning technologies can bring education to the personalization level of an individual learning and being in the personal speed of learning process, the learner may be challenged to critically evaluate. Such simulations, virtual laboratories, and AI-assisted resources are both amenable to experimentation and solution-finding and build up the skills that directly translate into innovation.

Moreover, technology makes it easy to work with other countries, this exposes learners to a diverse world of opinions and promotes creativity. Technology allows the learners to contact the people of other cultures and other subjects and therefore be able to resolve issues in numerous ways.

Life Long Process of Learning

Education should not be restricted to school or childhood in the ever-changing world. One of the critical thinking and innovations that should be upheld in the career and in life is a lifetime learning. When individuals are always eager to know something new, are ready to take risks and to think, they will be better able to resolve the complex issues and cope with the change and make significant innovations.

Increased creativity, productivity and competitiveness are also the characteristics of companies that have adapted the culture of life-long learning. By encouraging workers to learn and test, they have more opportunities of emerging with new ideas and implementing relevant solutions that would mature organizational goals.

Conclusion

Innovation and critical thinking require learning. Learning allows individuals to have curiosity, analytical skills, creativity and flexibility, which allow them to solve complicated problems and contribute positively to the society. The acquisition of these skills is based on formal and informal learning conditions and can be enhanced through access, collaboration and experimentation with the help of technology. By lifelong learning, individuals will be guaranteed to be agile, innovative, and agents of change in a world that is characterized with changes which are constantly present. Learning should be considered as dynamic to bring forth future leaders, thinkers, innovators.