A Study On The Correlation Between Critical Thinking Disposition And English Writing Achievement Of Students In Senior High Schools

Critical thinking(CT)is a widely recognized thinking quality vital for one’s personal,academic and social lives.Its related research has been booming in China these years.Critical thinking consists of two components,critical thinking skills(CTS)and critical thinking disposition(CTD).The positive correlation between CTS and writing achievement(WA)has been highlighted in previous research,while studies with respect to the relationship between CTD and WA,especially that in high schools,is of paucity.To enrich related research,this study investigates the correlation between CTD and the WA of EFL learners in senior high schools based on Facione’s definition over CTD.The following three major questions are discussed in this study:(1)What is the current situation of CTD for senior high students?(2)What is the participants’ WA in the test?(3)What is the correlation between students’ CTD and WA in senior high schools?To this end,the quantitative method combined with the qualitative one was applied,and data collection was mainly based on a questionnaire and a test.140 students,who were from three classes with different language competence in Senior One in Chengdu,took the questionnaire.They also attended the monthly test in which they were required to finish a piece of argumentative writing.The writing pieces were scored by two proficient teachers and the author based on the five scoring points indicated by the rubrics in Gaokao,and a mean score was finally adopted.SPSS 28.0 was then employed to analyze the quantitative data,and a semi-structured interview was followed for qualitative information.The major findings revealed that:(1)The students generally maintained a relatively positive state of CTD(Mean=290.12,SD=28.42).The top three sub-scales which students performed well were inquisitiveness(Mean=44.97),analyticity(Mean=43.72),and open-mindedness(Mean=42.11),but they showed a neutral attitude in the dimension of systematicity(Mean=38.42)and truth-seeking(Mean=37.58).(2)The writing pieces of the participants were generally categorized into “being good” in WA(Mean=17.13,SD=2.91).Furthermore,17.86% of the writing pieces were“excellent”,and 55% of the writing pieces were “good”.Then 25.71% of them reached the “intermediate” standard,and the rest 1.43% of the writing pieces were “basic” to meet the requirements.(3)A positive but not significant relationship was found between CTD and WA among senior high students(r=0.013,sig.=0.891).Nevertheless,the correlation between the sub-skills of WA and CTD was detected,though at a low level.To be specific,the dimension of content(r=0.202,sig.=0.026),the accuracy of vocabulary and grammar(r=0.286,sig=0.001)as well as the appropriateness of format(r=0.186,sig.=0.04)were found to be related to CTD in general.The result indicated that CTD was not directly related to WA,but the writing rubrics of Gaokao could predict senior high students’ CTD to some extent.Based on the exploration of the three questions above,this study may shed some light on people’s understanding of the high school students’ CTD situation as well as the relationship between CTD and WA.Several implications for integrating the two constructs in the high school English teaching were given.Meanwhile,the limitations of present study,together with some suggestions for future study were offered at the end of this thesis.