Infusing Critical Thinking Skills into Argumentative Writing: A Study of Chinese College English Learners

Abstract

Argumentative writing plays an important role in higher education with college students needing to know how to compose persuasive arguments for academic and career purposes. While writing an argumentative essay, Chinese college students not only face the challenges of the activity itself but also the difficulties of writing in a foreign language. To facilitate their argumentative writing, a revised six-element argumentative model based on Toulmin’s framework infused with critical thinking skills was taught to 30 students in an English course at a Chinese Teacher-training University. Using an argumentative essay test in a pre- and post-test design, it was found that the students’ holistic argumentative writing ability significantly improved after the intervention. However, the students’ ability to rebut remained weak.