Abstract

Critical thinking is important for shaping the way students learn and think. However, there is a need for a systematic direct instruction aimed at developing effective critical thinking skills.This study aims to investigate the effect of a proposed critical thinking program on developing the critical thinking skills of college students. During a 5-week intervention, 80 second-year female students of the English Department of Princess Noura Bint Abdulrahman Univetsity (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia) underwent this program during the thinking skills course. The effectiveness of the program was examined using a critical thinking assessment instrument that evaluated five critical thinking skills: causal explanation, determining the reliability of sources, argument, prediction, and determining parts-whole relationships. The data demonstrated statistically significant gains in the five critical thinking skills tested.Thus, this study provides a framework for creating teaching methods that provide effective direct instruction for the development of critical thinking skills of college students.

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