The Application Paul’s Critical Thinking Elements To English Writing In Senior Middle School

In recent years,there are more and more researches on critical thinking at home and abroad.Critical thinking is not only a thinking skill,but also a thinking disposition.Critical thinking is a necessary skill to improve self-thinking through a certain standard evaluation.It is reasonable and reflective thinking and can be widely used in various fields.Richard Paul,an internationally recognized expert of critical think authority,put forward eight elements of critical thinking,which greatly influenced people’s thinking mode and made human thinking logical and organized.In this study,the author applies Paul’s elements of critical thinking to senior middle school English writing,aiming to improve the students’ ability of analysis and organization of writing through the training of critical thinking,so as to improve the students’ critical thinking level.Mastering English writing is one of the requirements in the English Curriculum Standard for Ordinary Senior Middle School(2017 Edition)for the language ability to understand and express meaning in listening,speaking,reading,looking,writing.And English writing is an examination of students’ comprehensive mastery and application of this subject,which reflects the vocabulary,the familiarity of sentence patterns,the mastery of grammar and,more importantly,the organizational skills of language and clear logic skill.However,these points are just students lack.According to the current problem existing in senior middle school writing teaching,this research is planning to solve two questions:(1)can the application of Paul’s critical thinking elements in writing improve senior middle school students’ English writing achievement?(2)can the use of Paul’s critical thinking elements cultivate the critical thinking disposition of senior middle school students?This research selects two parallel classes of Grade Two in Linfen Experimental Middle School as participants: the experimental class and the control class,lasting nearly one semester.The research adopts three research instruments: questionnaire,interview and tests to carry out the experiment on the middle school students.In the specific teaching process,the procedure of this research is divided into three parts: theoretical input stage,article analysis stage and article output stage.The author mainly uses the group teaching activities to enhance the enthusiasm of students’ learning;and the author also uses the analysis method of critical thinking elements to guide students’ writing practice and exercise students’ logic and analysis ability.The results show that:(1)The application of Paul’s critical thinking elements in English writing can improve students’ English achievement.In the process of the experiment,students adopted the writing methods which can enhance their analysis,logic and autonomy,instead of the traditional writing ways.The students can clearly understand their own shortcomings,so as to improve their writing level.(2)The use of the Paul’s critical thinking elements has cultivated the critical thinking disposition of senior middle school students.The seven dimensions of students’ tests have been improved obviously.They dare to seek truth,analyze things,be full of confidence,and have mature cognition.This analysis method is not only suitable for English writing,but also can be applied to other subjects and life.Because we human beings are thinking all the time,and any thinking and reasoning contain elements and components of thinking,so to a certain extent,it also helps students improve their critical thinking.