EFL Reading Comprehension Textbooks at University Level: A Critical Thinking Perspective

Abstract

Abstract—In line with the studies in EFL/ESL contexts confirming the positive relationship between critical thinking ability and reading comprehension, this study intended to investigate how frequently critical thinking is used in EFL Reading Comprehension textbooks at university level in Iran. The study investigated the course books used in order to understand to what extent critical thinking is advocated in such books. To this end, all question types in general and Critical Reading Questions (CRQs), Vocabulary In Context (VIC), Literal Comprehension (LC), and Extended Reasoning (ER), in particular were identified. The focus of the study was on ER questions, leading to critical thinking. The reason was that the crucial problem of the students lies in textually implicit information of the texts, that is, ER questions. To classify the questions for CRQs, Peterson`s (2008) model was employed, and to specify critical thinking question types, a framework proposed by Academic Skills Unit (2008) was used as reference. To collect the data entirely, the researcher identified the total number of percentages of frequencies of questions related to the passages in the course books of Reading Comprehension I, II and III. The findings seem to indicate high attention to critical thinking within the objectives of the questions of their course books and the authors of the passages.