Effects of Critical Thinking Strategies on Perceptual Mismatches: A Case of Iranian EFL Learners

Recent trends in EFL/ ESL classrooms have emphasized the significance of promoting critical thinking skills as a part of English language pedagogy. Through a qualitative analysis of Iranian EFL learners’ reflective journals, the effect of critical thinking strategies on perceptual mismatches was examined. Five learners studying English at Shokooh Language Institute in Shiraz, Iran, were randomly chosen among 20 high-intermediate learners and were asked to write a report about their learning experiences, difficulties, reactions, and reflections at the end of class during 20 session. A number of critical thinking strategies including: questioning, debating, and written assignments was employed in the classroom. The results of the analysis of reflective journals revealed that 473 mismatches were detected from 100 reflective journals. The most frequent mismatches reported by the cases during the whole course were linguistic, strategic, and communicative, while evaluative, cultural, cognitive, and procedural mismatches were the least frequent ones, respectively. The critical thinking strategies affected the mismatches in different ways; however, they were generally effective in minimizing perceptual mismatches between teacher’s input and learners’ intake.

Keywords:

Critical thinking , Iranian EFL learner , perceptual mismatches , reflective journals