THE EFFECT OF TEACHING CRITICAL THINKING ON IRANIAN UPPER-INTERMEDIATE EFL LEARNERS' ESSAY WRITING ABILITY (original) (raw)

The present investigation was an attempt to study the Effectiveness of Teaching Critical Thinking on Iranian Upper-Intermediate EFL Learners' Essay Writing Ability. To that end, an OPT test was administered to 110 university students learning English language in institutes. Learners who scored between one above and below the standard deviation were selected. 40 learners were selected and they were divided into experimental and control group, each group contained 20 learners. A writing test was administered to both groups as a pre-test to take their initial knowledge of writing ability. The writing section of the TOEFL test was selected to test the writing ability of the participants. The experimental group received treatment in order to help them improve their writing ability by teaching critical thinking in fifteen sessions .The control group received no treatment. Finally both groups sat for the post-test of the same writing test. The results were analyzed through ANCOVA and it was explored that teaching critical thinking had a positive effect on Iranian EFL learners' essay writing ability.