Fostering Critical Thinking Skills in the EFL College-Level Classroom Through Online Collaborative Document Tools

This paper explores the potential of applying online collaborative documents to foster critical thinking skills in EFL college-level classrooms.Considering the limitations of traditional teacher-centered approaches and the need for innovative methods,the study examines the integration of online collaborative tools,using Tencent Docs as an example.The discussion highlights the importance of critical thinking in the academic and professional spheres and introduces the concept of online collaborative documents for enhancing this cognitive skill.Through a detailed exploration,the paper presents a model of employing collaborative documents within a college English class,demonstrating how students collaboratively learning an article.Then,the paper discusses the pros and cons of employing this technology in classroom.The conclusion emphasizes the transformative potential of integrating technology into pedagogy and its role in creating a dynamic learning environment.The paper underscores the importance of striking a balance between technology and traditional methods,foreseeing avenues for further research and development.

Improving the Reading Skills of ALS Learners Through Project RICE(Reading Intervention and Comprehension Enhancement)

One of the major problems in the education sector is the reading skills of learners.Students enrolled in the Alternative Learning System(ALS)also experienced this scenario due to several circumstances.This study focused on the improvement of reading comprehension skills of ALS learners by means of project RICE(Reading Intervention and Comprehension Enhancement)as well as the issues and challenges.A quasi-experimental design was utilized in this study which was participated by 54 learners,composed of 27 learners under the experimental group and 27 under the control group.The result revealed that the learners in the experimental group changed from frustration level to instructional level after the implementation of project RICE while the learners in the control group changed from instructional level to inde-pendent level,thereby signifying a significant difference and the effectiveness of the project.Additionally,issues with time and resources were often encountered by the learners.

Transitivity Analysis and Critical Reading

Transitivity system is one of the frequently used analytical tools in critical linguistics. It has often been considered as a useful analytical model, and employed both in stylistics and critical linguistics. This paper briefly introduces the transitivity model and its applications within critical linguistics based on the analysis of an article of media discourse, and aims to raise readers＇ critical language awareness to improve their critical reading ability.

Teaching Critical Reading in Chinese EFL Classrooms

This paper aims at proposing some instructional suggestions for incorporating critical reading strategy into Chinese EFL class rooms. It analyzes the current situation of college English reading instruction and points out the possibilities and significance of teaching crit ical reading to L2 learners. It attempts to raise both English language teachers'and students'awareness in using critical reading strategy and to provide them with some feasible suggestions for applying this strategy into the real classroom practice.

Integration of Critical Reading Pedagogy and English Teaching

Teaching English reading lessons is not an easy task if students are not motivated. To encounter the problem, critical reading pedagogy are discussed for the benefits of teachers and students. Critical reading pedagogy, as it is discussed, will improve the teaching of English reading to some extent.

The New Critical Reading of Desert Places

From the perspective of new criticism, this article attempts at a profound study of Robert Frost's Desert Places so as to better understand the value, reveal the meaning and enjoy the charm of this works.

An Action Research Project Aiming to Improve the Students' Reading Skills and Performance in an EFL Reading Class

As is universally acknowledged,educators have endeavored for ages to seek the more effective teaching method.Then action research has become a tool which is frequently applied to the teaching practice aiming to locate the teaching mode satisfactory to both teachers and students.The English majors are required to pass the TEM-4 exam when they are sophomores.It is essential for them to acquire the effective learning skills from reading classes.But it seems that vocabulary and grammar study—so called the traditional teaching method prove boring to students.Therefore,the tapestry approach is put forward.But the question is though the tapestry approach stimulates students’interest,can it can improve their English level?In order to figure out the result,two classes will be chosen in this research—one is controlled class,the other is experimental class.The traditional teaching method and the tapestry approach will be used in these two classes respectively.The experiment will last one semester.The students will be tested on two same TEM-4 papers at the beginning and at the end of the semester.The data will be collected for comparison.If the experimental class get the higher scores in the TEM-4 paper,it demonstrates that the tapestry approach is successful in balancing the need for interests and the need for English improvement.

On Critical Thinking Skill Cultivation in EFL Teaching

Critical thinking has been recognized internationally as an essential skill for high-quality talents.This article analyzes what the experimental researches on cultivating critical thinking skills in EFL teaching have achieved and identifies the three weaknesses to be addressed in the future.Firstly,there are divergences among scholars on the concept and subskills of critical thinking.Secondly,the teaching modes and methods explored by the experimental researches are more personalized than systematic,which reduces their application and guidance value.Thirdly,the reliability and validity of the experiments need to be improved,and the cultivation practices tend to improve the critical thinking skills of some students,without considering the differences among students,especially the students with relatively poor language proficiency.

On A Few Reading Skills

This paper provides students with the contents and the forms of the materials they should read and with the methods and skills they should acquire.It also deals with the ways of how the students could raise their speed of reading.And it too,offers students some available principles and judicious suggestions.

Using critical thinking activities as tools to integrate language skills

Every day communication is an event in which there is an interactional relationship between interlocutors. This interaction needs whole language in which language skills of speaking, listening, reading and writing; associated knowledge of vocabulary, meaning, syntax, etc.; and also, thinking skills are interwoven. This means that language should be kept whole and ＂if language isn＇t kept whole, it isn＇t language anymore＂ （Rigg, 1991, p. 522, cited in Richards ＆ Rodgers, 2001, p. 109）. In English as a Second Language/English Foreign Language （ESL/EFL） learning settings, improvement in one skill can affect the development of other skills. A particular course may highlight certain skills, but if the teacher is creative or specific tasks and problems are used in language learning settings, learners are provided with the opportunity to improve multiple, integrated skills. This paper aims at elaborating on critical thinking approach to language learning and introducing practical ideas for helping teachers to integrate language and thinking skills. It introduces 3 critical thinking activities （Dialogue journals, reading logs and literacy portfolios）, and also discusses how implementing them can serves as a way to integrate language skills. It also maintains that engaging learners in these activities helps them use authentic materials and solve problems of their own interest that in turn has a positive effect on student＇s motivation.

Conjunction and Teaching Reading Skills in English

Conjunction contributes to organizing and managing stretches of discourse, indicating the way the information is arranged. Successfully identifying these discourse markers is of great benefit to the reader to extract the required information from what he/she reads, especially for the candidates who are tested for their reading abilities in a given time, for these markers give clues to the reader and make the perception easier and save a lot of time. To teach students to explore reading skills and read su...

Skills of Cultivating Critical Thinking in English Speech

English speech is an important way for international cultural exchange in the context of globalization.Meanwhile,the cultivation of critical thinking has been universally recognized as one of the goals of higher education.However,critical thinking,as a top-level cognitive ability,is extremely abstract and complex,so how to put it into English speech is a challenge.Therefore,in order to simplify the issue,inspired by the interdependent relatiomhip between critical thinking and creativity,this article helps to explore some skills of cultivation.

Prediction Skills and Its Influence on Learners’ Achievement in Reading Comprehension: A Case of Vihiga County, Kenya

Prediction is one of the comprehension processing skills encapsulated by the interactive approach instruction.Prediction skills enable learners to decode the meaning of comprehension passages by making guesses about the contents of texts to be read.Learners in Vihiga County perform poorer in English language examinations than their peers in neighbouring counties.The performance is weaker in comprehension than in grammar sections.Despite this,no study has assessed the nexus between the use of prediction skills and learners’achievement in reading comprehension.This study applied the Solomon Four-Group Design to obtain primary data from 279 primary school learners and eight teachers in 2017.Multiple Linear Regression was used to generate two models,one for the experimental group(Model 1)and one for the control group(Model 2).Results show that the influence of prediction skills on learners’achievement in reading comprehension was statistically significant the experimental group,but insignificant in the control group.However,the influence seemed to be stronger in the experimental than in the control group,which suggests that training English language teachers on how to correctly apply prediction skills is likely to improve learners’achievement in reading comprehension.The study recommends the need to:sensitise teachers to use textbooks cautiously,while supplementing with relevant resource materials;sensitise teachers on the need to guide learners through titles;as well as update the teacher training curriculum by integrating inter alia,new instructional methods based on information and communication technology and entrenching innovation to enable teachers diversify instructional resources.

Cultivation of Reading,Writing,and Critical Thinking in the Teaching of Selected Readings in American Literature

Selected Readings in American Literature is a required course for the third year of English major,and it is also a compulsory course for the Bachelor Degree of English Language and Literature at School of Foreign Languages,Leshan Normal University.The course uses the combination of English literary reading and course paper writing to develop students’English reading and writing skills,while focusing on the cultivating critical thinking skills of English majors.

Assessing and Improving General English University Students＇ Main Sub-skills of Reading Compression： A Case of University of Bojnord

General English course at Iranian universities has always been a controversial issue since the students taking this course are rather weak in English proficiency and need more authentic instructions based on accurate need analysis. The materials applied in this course are mainly focused on reading comprehension. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to improve General English university students＇ main sub-skills of reading comprehension and see the effect of the possible changes in terms of time and the fields of study of the students. To do this, 168 university students taking General English course at university of Bojnord, including humanities, engineering, physical education, and sciences, received instruction on the main sub-skills of reading comprehension after taking a pre-test sample TOELF section of reading comprehension. After 16 sessions of 90 minute instruction, they took the post-test section of TOEFL sample of reading comprehension. Mixed between within subject analysis of variance was used to assess the impact of instruction for the four groups of students from pre-test to post-test. The findings of the study indicated that the effect of instruction in terms of time, from pre-test to post-test, and the interaction of time and fields of study were significant. Besides, changes for 10 sub-skills were the same among the four fields of study.

Appraisal Research： A Model of Critical Reading

Reading is a process of negotiation and interaction between readers and writers. Critical Reading of a text is achieved chiefly by figuring out the attitudes, viewpoints, and ideology of the writer, also termed as evaluative resources in Appraisal Theory. This paper carries out an appraisal research into a reading passage taken from TEM-8 paper in hope of helping English majors to cultivate their Critical Reading ability by offering them a practical and implementable reading model.

The Application of the Six Receptive Skills in Reading

Ⅰ.Introduction The training of reading ability is very important in a comprehension lesson of English as asecond language teaching. It refers to many factors, some are inherent in the reading material(its linguistic difficulties, its contents, its length, its types, etc.); some are present in the

Nurses'critical thinking disposition and professional commitment:a cross-sectional study

Objective:High-quality and successful nursing care delivery in a variety of situations requires critical thinking training and professional commitment.The present study aimed to investigate critical thinking disposition,professional commitment,and the relationship between these 2 variables among nurses.Methods:As a result of stratified random sampling,201 nurses were enrolled in the present cross-sectional study.Data were gathered using a socio-demographic form,the Critical Thinking Disposition Inventory(CTDI),and the Nurses'Professional Commitment Scale(NPCS).Results:Although the critical thinking disposition scores were at a moderate level(115.70±13.55),the mean score for professional commitment was high(91.37±11.77).A positive correlation was found between critical thinking disposition and professional commitment(r=0.67,P=0.001).Conclusions:Nursing managers are urged to employ strategies to enhance nurses'critical thinking disposition and professional commitment.

Web Quest and EFL Critical Reading and Writing

This study aimed at investigating the effect of using a Web Quest program on developing some EFL critical reading and writing skills of the first year experimental secondary school students. The participants of the study were 60 students from one of the Experimental Secondary Schools in Egypt. Instruments of the study were EFL critical reading and writing tests. Students in both the experimental and the control groups were pre-tested using the critical reading test and the writing test. Then, students of the experimental group were using Web Quest. Finally, students in both groups were post-tested using the same instruments. The study showed that there was statistically significant difference between the mean scores of the pre and the post critical reading test and writing test of the experimental group in favor of the post tests. This difference can be attributed to using Web Quest.

A Study on Cultivation Strategies of Critical Thinking in Junior Middle English Reading Class

This paper analyzes the importance of critical thinking to junior middle school English reading ability.This paper probes into the cultivation of critical thinking in English reading ability from the perspective of teachers and students,and discusses the problems based on the questionnaire survey.