Abstract
Critical thinking, a vital skill for the 21st century, has become a desirable educational outcome by educators. Promoting students’ critical thinking has been a concern in various educational settings and the role of teachers is considered to be the most significant factor for successful instructional implementations. The present study aims to examine the effects of WebQuest-supported critical thinking instruction on the critical thinking disposition levels of Turkish pre-service teachers (PTs) of English and to determine whether receiving WebQuest-supported critical thinking instruction leads to a change in the PTs’ understanding of critical thinking. Data were collected from 60 freshman PTs studying at a state university in Istanbul, Turkey. Thirty PTs were assigned to the experimental group and received WebQuest-supported critical thinking instruction, while 30 PTs were assigned to the control group and received traditional text-only instruction. The study lasted seven weeks and data were collected by means of the Turkish version of the California Critical Thinking Disposition Inventory and semi-structured focus group interviews conducted before and after the treatment. Findings revealed that the WebQuest-supported critical thinking instruction produced statistically significant differences in the PTs’ critical thinking disposition levels and the PTs demonstrated clearer awareness of critical thinking at the end of the study.
Highlights
The concept of critical thinking has been defined by various scholars in different disciplines
There were no significant differences between the groups regarding their level of critical thinking in systematicity and open-mindedness (p.05), the pre-service teachers (PTs) in the experimental group had greater gains than the control group at the end of the study
Once the post-focus group interviews were analyzed, it was seen that the PTs could elaborate their definition of critical thinking as follows: Critical thinking means creating one’s own ideas by evaluating multiple perspectives objectively
Summary
The concept of critical thinking has been defined by various scholars in different disciplines. Researchers indicate that critical thinking is more than the successful use of the right skill in an appropriate context. It is an attitude or disposition to recognize when a skill is needed and the willingness to exert the mental effort needed to apply it (Mathews & Lowe, 2011; Valenzuela, Nieto, & Saiz, 2011). It is not enough to teach students the skills of critical thinking if they are not inclined to use them To this end, critical thinking dispositions, e.g. open- and fair-mindedness, the propensity to seek reason, inquisitiveness, the desire to be well-informed, flexibility and willingness to accept and respect different opinions, need to be focused on (Lai, 2011)
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