CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS IN ENGLISH FOR ACAEDMIC PURPOSES CLASSES: THE CASE OF MEDICAL SCIENCES STUDENTS

Critical thinking is conceived as an inseparable aspect of individuals’ personal and academic life. The current study aimed to investigate the status of critical thinking among the medical sciences students in an English for academic purposes course. To this end, ۹۴, male and female, students majoring in medical sciences filled out a Critical Thinking Questionnaire (Honey,۲۰۰۰). The results indicated a moderate level of critical thinking performance among the students of medical sciences regardless of their gender. It was shown that less than half of the participants were familiar with critical thinking skills, namely researching and reasoning before accepting or rejecting any prepositions, setting criteria for evaluating the strengths of an argument, challenging the upcoming ideas, etc. The findings may raise the awareness of the EAP material developers and syllabus designers to take into account the students’ higher-order skills in devising the EAP textbooks and their constituent themes and tasks. Moreover, the results would highlight the role of the EAP instructors in meeting the medical sciences students’ needs in EAP classes and adapting the class procedures to enhance their competencies and alleviate their weaknesses.

کلیدواژه ها:

critical thinking ، English for academic purposes ، medical sciences students.