The role critical thinking in the teaching of english i an second year of high school class in Chile.

Abstract

With the growing challenges of the 21st century, the development of critical thinking skills has become crucial (Diamond, 2002; Ord, 2007). However, according to Tsui (2008) little is known about how to develop critical thinking among students. The purpose of this study is to examine the use that teachers of English give to critical thinking in order to plan, deliver and evaluate classes in a second year of high school class from both a municipal and a private Chilean High school. For this, a comparative case study was conducted, for which 2 different educational establishments, one private another municipal, were observed for a period of 8 pedagogical hours. To guide the data gathering process 4 different instruments were used, these being: observation, checklist, interviews and journals. The data gathered is separately presented for each educational setting. For that matter observed classes were described and narrated for both educational establishments individually. Moreover, the data was analysed regarding two main aspects: techniques and assessment of critical thinking in the classroom. As an overview, the analysis shows that the implementation of critical thinking is weak in both educational establishments, however, it was in the private school in which efforts to include critical thinking were observed.