The Relationship between EFL Teachers’ Critical Thinking and Use of Motivational Strategies

Gholamreza Parsi

Abstract


The present study was conducted to investigate the relationship between EFL teachers’ critical thinking and use of motivational strategies. The participants of this study were 101 EFL teachers. These teachers were both male and female between 21 to 36 years old, and they taught intermediate and advanced levels and varied in their experience from 3 to 17 years. They were chosen randomly from private language schools in Mashhad and two questionnaires were given to them: A questionnaire to evaluate the use of motivational strategies (Cheng and Dornyei, 2007) and another questionnaire to estimate their critical thinking (Honey, 2000).To fulfill the objective of the study, a Spearman Rank Order Correlational analysis was conducted to investigate any significant relationship between the two variables. The results showed that there is no correlation between critical thinking and motivational strategies. This result may help teacher educators to consider the relationship of critical thinking and teachers’ use of motivational strategies as an integral part of the teaching and learning process in teacher training courses.

 


Keywords


Critical Thinking, Use of Motivational Strategies, EFL teachers

Full Text:

PDF

References


Alison, J., & Halliwell, S. (2002). Challenging classes: Focus on pupil behavior. London, Great Britain: CILT.

Al-Mahrooqi, R., Abrar-ul-Hassan, S. & Asante, C. (2012). Analyzing the use of motivational strategies by EFL teachers in Oman. Malaysian Journal of ELT Research, 8(1), 36-76.

Astleitner, H. (2007). Teaching critical thinking online. Journal of Instructional Psychology, 29(2), 53-77

Brown, H. D. (2001). Teaching by Principles (2nd ed.). New York: Longman.

Chambers, G. N. (1999). Motivating language learners. Clevedon, U.K.: Multilingual Matters.

Cheng, H.-f., and Dörnyei, Z. (2007). The use of motivational strategies in language instruction: The case of EFL teaching in Taiwan. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching 1, 153-174.

Cottrell, S. (2005). Critical thinking skills. Developing effective analysis and argument. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Dornyei, Z. (2001). Motivational strategies in the language classroom. Cambridge. University Press.

Dornyei, Z., (2010). Researching motivation: From integrativeness to the ideal L2 self. Introducing applied linguistics: Concepts and skills, 3(5) 74-83.

Dornyei, Z., & Csizer, K. (1998). Ten commandments for motivating language learners: Results of an empirical study. Language teaching research, 2(3), 203-229.

Dörnyei, Z, & Otto, I. (1998). Motivation in action: A process model of L2 motivation. Working Papers in Applied Linguistics (Thames Valley University, London), 4, 43-69.

Ellis, R. (1997). Second language acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ennis, R. (1986). A taxonomy of critical thinking dispositions and abilities: teaching thinking skills theory and practice. New York: W.H. Freeman and Company.

Ennis, R. (1996). Critical thinking assessment. Theory into Practice, 32(3), 179-186.

Facione, P. A. (2000). The disposition toward critical thinking: Its character, measurement, and relation to critical thinking skill. Informal Logic, 20(1), 61–84.

Glaser, E. (1942). An experiment in the development of critical thinking. The Teachers College Record, 43(5), 409-410.

Huangfu, W. (2012). Effects of EFL teachers’ self-efficacy on motivational teaching behaviors. Asian Social Science, 8, 15, 68-74.

Jay, J. K., & Johnson, K. L. (2002). Capturing complexity: a typology of reflective practice for teacher education. Teaching and Teacher Education, 18, 73-85.

Kadir, M. A. A. (2007). Critical thinking: A family resemblance in conceptions. Journal of Education and Human Development, 1(2), 1-11.

Kamali, Z., & Fahim, M. (2011). The relationship critical thinking ability of Iranian EFL learners and their resilience level facing unfamiliar vocabulary items in reading. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2(1), 104-111.

King, A. (1995). Designing the instructional process to enhance critical thinking across the curriculum. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), 13-17.

Kurffiss, J. G. (1988). Critical Thinking: Theory, Research, Practice, and Possibilities. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report No. 2, 1988. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Reports, The George Washington University, One Dupont Circle, Suite 630, Dept. RC, Washington, DC 20036-1183.

McDonough, S. (2007). Motivation in ELT. ELT Journal, 61, 369-371.

Mason, M. (2007). Critical thinking and learning. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 39(4), 337-473.

Marzano, R, Pickering. D., & Pollack, J. (2001). Classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Mirzai, Z. (2008). The relationship between critical thinking and lexical inferencing of Iranian EFL learners. Unpublished master’s thesis, Azad University of Science and Research, Tehran, Iran.

Noddlings, N. (2006). Critical lessons. What our schools might teach but do not. New York: Cambridge. Paul, R., & Elder, L. (2002). Critical thinking: tools for taking charge of your professional and personal life. Dillon Beach, CA: Foundation for Critical Thinking.

Norris, S. P., & Ennis, R. H. (1989). Evaluating Critical Thinking. The Practitioners' Guide to Teaching Thinking Series. Critical Thinking Press and Software, Box 448, Pacific Grove, CA 93950-0448.

Paul, R. W. (1992). Critical thinking: What, why, and how? New Directions for Community Colleges, 77, 3–24.

Paul, R., & Elder, L. (2005). A guide for educators to critical thinking competency standards. Dillon Beach, CA: Foundation for critical thinking.

Paul, R., Elder, L., & Bartell, T. (1997). California teacher preparation for instruction in critical thinking: research findings and policy recommendations. Sacramento, CA: California Commission on Teacher Credentialing.

Sheikhi, B. R. (2009). The relationship between Autonomy, Critical thinking and Reading comprehension of Iranian EFL learners. Unpublished masters, Azad University of Science and Research, Tehran, Iran.

Solak, E., & Bayar, A. (2014). The factors influencing the motivational strategy use of non-native English teachers. International Journal of Education and Research, 2(2), 1-12.

Takeuchi, O., & Sugita, M. (2010). What can teachers do to motivate their students? A classroom research on motivational strategy use in the Japanese EFL context. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 4(1), 21-35.

Ushioda, E. (2011). Language learning motivation, self and identity: Current theoretical perspectives. Computer Assisted Language Learning, 24(3), 199-210.

Williams, M., & Burden, R. L. (1997). Psychology for language teachers: a social constructivist approach. Cambridge: CUP.




DOI: https://doi.org/10.7575/aiac.alls.v.8n.2p.14

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Bookmark and Share


Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

2010-2023 (CC-BY) Australian International Academic Centre PTY.LTD.

Advances in Language and Literary Studies

You may require to add the 'aiac.org.au' domain to your e-mail 'safe list’ If you do not receive e-mail in your 'inbox'. Otherwise, you may check your 'Spam mail' or 'junk mail' folders.