Investigating Effects of Integrated Reading and Writing Skills Instruction on Enhancing Students' Critical Thinking Skills in EFL Classroom

Abstract

The primary concern of this study was to investigate the praxis of integrated reading and writing skills instruction on EFL learners' critical thinking development at Bahir Dar University. The study used a pre-test-post-test quasi-experimental design, and 96 English majoring students randomly assigned to (n = 48) experimental and (n = 48) control group took part in the study. Herein, the control group was instructed through a separated reading and writing approach and the experimental group learned through a newly designed integrated reading and writing way for 12 weeks concurrently with three sessions per week, and then, 25 pre-and post-tests of critical thinking questions were designed to assess students' critical thinking development. Here, Kappa inter-rater and split-half reliability tests were employed to compute the reliability and internal consistency of both tests, respectively. Finally, an independent t-test was employed to compute the data, and then the results revealed that both the control and experimental group were homogeneous regarding their level in the pre-tests of critical thinking skills. However, after the treatment, the study showed the supremacy of integrated reading and writing skills instruction over the conventional approach in enhancing students' critical thinking skills.