خلاصة:
There is a general consensus that critical thinking can be influential in almost every occupation due to its association with the abilities such as problem solving and decision making. This paper aims at probing the role of critical thinking (CT) skills on EFL learners' reading comprehension performance using Bloom's taxonomy. Therefore, the role of CT strategies training across two language proficiency levels, high & low, was investigated. Then the difference between females and males regarding their CT was studied. In so doing, 240 male and female Iranian EFL students were selected and screened into two proficiency levels based on the Longman preparation course for TOEFL test. Each proficiency group was divided into critical and non-critical group. The results suggested CT skills significantly affected EFL learners’ reading comprehension performance. However, the effect of critical thinking strategy training didn’t vary across different language proficiency levels. Overall, the findings provide empirical support for the facilitative effect of critical thinking strategy training on reading comprehension performance of EFL learners.
ملخص الجهاز:
Overall, the findings provide empirical support for the facilitative effect of critical thinking strategy training on reading comprehension performance of EFL learners.
Keywords: , critical thinking, strategies training, gender, reading comprehension, language proficiency Introduction Despite the controversy over a unified definition for CT, there is a general consensus that CT can be influential in almost every discipline and occupation, due to its association with abilities such as problem solving and decision-making.
As part of that education, learners need to develop and learn to apply CT skills to their academic studies effectively (Kealey, Holland Watson, 2005), to the complex problems that they will face in their professions (Yeh, 2004), and to the critical choices they will be forced to make as a result of the information explosion and other rapid technological changes (Oliver Utermohlen, 1995).
To this end the following research questions were posed and investigated in this study: RQ1- Does critical thinking strategies training affect EFL learners' reading comprehension performance?
Procedures In order to investigate the probable effects of critical thinking strategies training on reading comprehension performance of Iranian EFL learners, at first, the subjects were screened into two proficiency levels based on the TOEFL test.
These results reject the first null hypothesis and confirm the effect of critical thinking training on the EFL learners' reading comprehension performance.
This supports the purpose of the study that teaching critical thinking skills has a positive effect on reading comprehension The results of the present study verified the researchers' contention.