Evaluating the impact of instruction in critical thinking on the critical thinking skills of English language learners in higher education

In 1994 the Lebanese government called for an education reform to introduce critical thinking (CT) in the curriculum. The reform failed as there was no consensus on how CT should be taught. Some commentators consider CT a cultural practice that cannot be taught in cultures that do not encourage independent thinking. This study examines whether instruction in CT can develop the CT skills of undergraduate English language learners in a system where politics and religion take precedence over the quality of education. The thesis begins with a systematic review that synthesises empirical evidence of the effect of teaching CT on CT skills of undergraduate English language learners. Of 1,830 records, only 36 studies were deemed relevant. The review suggests indicative evidence that explicit instruction may be beneficial. However, because of methodological flaws, the strength of the evidence is weak. To establish the effect of this approach, a cluster randomised control trial was carried out in a university in Lebanon involving 29 English classes (413 students). The trial was conducted over one term in which 11 lessons in CT (14 sessions) were substituted for material from the regular curriculum. Experimental students made bigger gains on the Cornell Critical Thinking Test between pre- and post-test (ES = +0.3). Process evaluation shows that the key factors in successful implementations were teachers’ positive attitude, training of teachers, and the readily available lesson plans that were integrated into the curriculum. Students’ attitudes and lack of general knowledge were key barriers. The predominance of poorly designed research in the review suggests that research in CT is underdeveloped and is not a priority for policymakers in non-native English speaking countries. More funding could be invested to strengthen research in CT. Overall, this study shows that the objective of the education reforms in Lebanon to introduce CT is not difficult to achieve if teachers are trained

Who becomes a teacher and why?

This paper reports on a comprehensive review of international evidence, synthesising the findings of some of the strongest empirical work on the main factors influencing people's decisions to be teachers or not. Four search engines, including Google and Google Scholar and five electronic databases identified 517 studies of which 212 were included in this narrative synthesis. These studies highlighted three main motivating factors: intrinsic, altruistic and extrinsic, although the order of the ranking varies with subjects, phase of education and gender of teachers. In general, these studies reported that women are more likely to report being motivated by intrinsic and altruistic reasons, while men are more likely to cite extrinsic reasons. Across all cultures, men are reported to be more strongly influenced by social norms and expectations and were less likely to choose primary and early years teaching. Women are also more likely to experience higher levels of career satisfaction and less social dissuasion than men. Research on motivation to teach is also often focused only on those who have already made the decision to teach. Therefore, policies based on these studies might only be attracting those who are already persuaded. This paper argues that to improve recruitment of under-represented groups (e.g., males and STEM subject graduates), attention should instead be on those who might otherwise have gone into teaching, but have not. For this group, the review found that it is the status of the profession, the working environment and salary over the long term that are important

Improving Attendance and Enrolment at School for Children Living in Poverty

This paper summarises the findings of a large-scale structured review of 73 studies to iden-tify promising interventions to increase school enrolment and attendance, particularly in less developed countries where school attendance is not mandatory. Evidence from the stronger studies suggests that for children living in poverty, provision of easy access to schools, making schools free at point of delivery and incentivising attendance/enrolment with cash offers are the most promising interventions. Incentives with conditions attached are more effective than non-conditional incentives. Paying cash to parents is more effective for young children, while cash incentives are more effective for older children if given directly. Providing easy access to free schools seems most promising in improving school attendance and enrolment in low and middle-income countries

What works in attracting and retaining teachers in challenging schools and areas?

This paper describes a systematic review of international research evidence identifying the most promising approaches to attracting and retaining teachers in hard-to-staff areas. Only empirical studies that employed a causal or suitable comparative design and had robust measurements of recruitment and retention outcomes were considered. Studies were assessed for strength of evidence taking into account threats to trustworthiness which may bias the results. A search of 13 electronic databases and Google/Google scholar identified 20 distinct research reports that met the inclusion criteria. Financial incentives was the only approach that seemsto work in attracting teachers to challenging schools, but not effective in retaining them. To keep teachers working in challenging schools a supportive and conducive working environment would be needed. Other approaches such as mentoring, support, or teacher development do not have strong evidence of effectiveness, largely because much of the research on these approaches was weak. More robust research capable of addressing causal questions is therefore urgently required to determine their impact in attracting and retaining good teachers in areas where they are most needed. Long-term solution would be to change school-allocation policies and improve economic conditions in such areas so that the problem of staffing does not arise