Islamic Teachers’ Perceptions of Improving Critical Thinking Skills in Saudi Arabian Elementary Schools

Abstract

The intent of this explanatory sequential mixed-method study is to examine Islamic teachers' thoughts on improving critical thinking skills in elementary schools in the Southwestern province of Saudi Arabia. This study involves the collection of quantitative data and an explanation of the quantitative results with qualitative data. In the first phase, a survey was administered to Islamic teachers in Saudi elementary schools to assess their opinions on improving students' critical thinking skills and to identify the factors that influence or hinder their implementation of critical thinking instruction. In the second phase, qualitative data was collected using semi-structured interviews with a number of Islamic teachers in order to explore more fully their perceptions toward improving students' critical thinking skills in Saudi elementary schools. The reason for collecting both quantitative and qualitative data was to obtain a better understanding of the gathered information than would be possible using only one of these methods.In regard to the barriers for improving the critical thinking ability of elementary education students, the participants reported seven major obstacles, which are student ability, ii teaching methods, classroom structure, Saudi society and the school community, pre-service teachers preparation programs and in-service teacher professional developmental programs, and the Islamic studies curriculum. The highest ranked obstacle was student ability, with an overall mean of 4.31on a 5-point scale. Teaching methods, with a total mean of 4.29, was the second most cited barrier. The third was classroom structure, with a total mean of 3.72. The study participants ranked society and school community as the fourth obstacle, with a total mean of 3.70, and pre-service teachers preparation programs and in-service teacher professional developmental programs with a total mean of 2.69. The Islamic studies curriculum was ranked sixth in obstacles to improving critical thinking for elementary education students, with a total mean of 2.57.These findings suggest there is a need to also examine female Islamic teachers' perceptions toward critical thinking in the Southwestern region of Saudi Arabia in order to identify the similarities and differences between the perceptions of male and female teachers.It is vital to investigate perceptions of teacher of other disciplines, such as language art, social science, English, and math, in an effort to provide policy makers in the Ministry of Education with a holistic picture of the Saudi educational system. Qualitative studies, interviews with students, and classroom observations can be carried out to investigate students' perceptions as to how critical thinking is taught in the classroom and whether teaching style is a primary obstacle to it being taught. There is an urgent need for an in depth examination of the influence society and the school community has on teaching students' thinking in general and critical thinking in particular. Finally, more research is needed...

Critical Thinking as a Dimension of Constructivist Learning in Social Studies Education: A Study of Teachers’ Attitudes in Secondary Education

“…This study found that lack of time and readiness is confirmed to be a barrier when using critical thinking abilities incorporated to students' constructive learning. This finding is consistent with Alazzi (2008) and Alwadai (2014) research show that students may think critically with their own mental ability, but enhancing the ability of critical reasoning requires time, strategies and motives guided by teachers. According to Alwadai (2014) time is a significant obstacle in developing skills in critical thinking in large classrooms.…”

“…This finding is consistent with Alazzi (2008) and Alwadai (2014) research show that students may think critically with their own mental ability, but enhancing the ability of critical reasoning requires time, strategies and motives guided by teachers. According to Alwadai (2014) time is a significant obstacle in developing skills in critical thinking in large classrooms. They also found that teachers strive to provide students with knowledge in the specific field but experience time challenges with lack of useful learning tools to teach students critical thought.…”

“…As said Demiral (2018) critical thinking skills in all subjects. Critical thinking skills are constructed through various approaches of learning such as content of social studies (Alwadai, 2014;Bataineh & Alazzi, 2009).…”

Error Analysis on Prospective Teacher in Solving the Problem of Critical Thinking Mathematics with Apos Theory

“…Research conducted by Aktas & Unlu, concluded that the critical thinking skills of the basic mathematics preservice teacher are at the middle level but not high enough level [6]. Research conducted by Alwadai, concluded that prospective teachers find the biggest obstacle in improving students' critical thinking skills is the ability of students themselves [7]. The research by Applebaum & Mark concluded that prospective teachers found it difficult to develop critical thinking skills because of difficulties in analyzing the probability of mistakes and overcoming the students' mental incompatibility when faced with opposing answers to geometry [8].…”

Investigating teachers' perceptions of their own practices to improve students' critical thinking in secondary schools in Saudi Arabia

“…Alaqeel (2013) establishes that helping students think critically and develop their skills in observation and analysis is one of the main aims of secondary school education. Although there are studies conducted in Saudi Arabia that acknowledge the importance of teaching students critical thinking skills and training teachers to implement strategies to attain this goal (Alghamdi et al, 2013;Allamnakhrah, 2013;Alwadai, 2014), there are still very few studies that aimed to investigate effective and useful teaching practices that may promote the development of learners' critical thinking skills. The findings of this study may help teachers to decide on the most useful teaching practices to enable the development of critical thinking skills and positively affect students' learning.…”