Abstract:
One of the main aims of the education agenda in the last decade has been to develop critical thinking and autonomy among children, in order to educate them to be active and involved persons in society. The present study sought to examine the relationship between Iranian male and female EFL learners’ autonomy and their critical thinking ability. To this aim, the researcher used a language proficiency test, a questionnaire of autonomy, and a questionnaire of critical thinking. The study was conducted in two phases. In the first phase, 242 third-grade high school students of Urmia city were provided with a Key English Test (KET). Afterwards,162 of them were selected as the homogenized group and were given a questionnaire of autonomy and questionnaire of critical thinking. Finally, the results of 144 (because some of participants did not complete their critical thinking questionnaire) participants were analyzed. The Pearson coefficient of correlation revealed that Iranian EFL learners’ autonomy and critical thinking were significantly related. The findings offered important pedagogical implications for teachers, learners, and syllabus designers.
Machine summary:
"The Relationship between Iranian Male and Female EFL Learners’ Critical Thinking Ability and Autonomy Nasser Ghafoori*1 ,Vida Javanshir2 Department of English, Tabriz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tabriz, Iran *Corresponding author: ghafoori@iaut.
The present study sought to examine the relationship between Iranian male and female EFL learners’ autonomy and their critical thinking ability.
The effect of Iranian EFL learners’ critical thinking abilities on their receptive English language proficiency skills was investigated by Hashemi and Zabihi (2012).
Fahim and Behdani (2011) carried out a study similar to the present study on investigating any significant relationship between critical thinking ability and autonomy of Iranian EFL learners.
e. , the relationship between the male EFL learners’ critical thinking ability and autonomy, the researcher conducted the Pearson Product Moment Correlation test.
The results of Pearson Correlation analysis to investigate the second research question showed that female learners’ critical thinking positively correlated with their autonomy (table 8).
g. , Abdul Rashid & Hashim, 2008; Dafei, 2007; Hashemi &Zabihi, 2012), the existence of a high relationship between both critical thinking and autonomy with proficiency and L2 language learning have been proved.
Autonomy involves learners control over learning management, cognitive process and learning content Birjandi and Bagherkazemi (2010) also in an investigation found a positive relationship between Iranian EFL critical thinking ability and pedagogical success.
The present study sought to find out the relationships between Iranian elementary male and female EFL learners’ critical thinking and their autonomy."