Searching for Critical Thinking through Writing: An
Insight into Senior High School Students Written Work
in Indonesia
U. Amhar
*Abstract
A rapid transformation in the world order has led to a crucial need to develop students' critical thinking skills through their academic writing literacy. The quick changes today, coupled with increasing demands in learning and teaching, call for better language approaches to acquiring new skills, including academic writing literacy skills tailored towards improving students thinking abilities. Though this is true, investigations into students' academic critical thinking skills are still limited within Indonesia due to the limited academic writing literacy. The present study investigates High School student's critical thinking skills observed through academic writing. Upon this, the challenges faced by students about critical thinking in writing were examined, then, an analysis of their perception regarding critical thinking was conducted. Data was obtained by assessing students' composition assignments, observation, questionnaires, and interviews. The author discovered that there is an improvement in students' critical thinking acquired after academic writing, but also there were challenges which included: uncontrollable emotions, difficulty in reasoning, limited writing abilities, and poor language thinking skills. However, overall there was an improvement in students' perception regarding critical thinking. It has concluded with time; students have the capacity better critical thinking skills through continuous academic writing literacy in senior high school.
Keywords: Critical Thinking, Disposition, Hortatory Exposition, Intellectual Standard.
1. Introduction
The importance of human resource improvement
The complexity of the twenty-first-century forces people to continually encounter numerous changes and face many challenges from all walks of life. A rapid increase in the written texts found in print and online media has caused the human race to continuously interact with written texts comprised of varying information and opinions, leaving many of us exposed to criticisms from the different perspectives (Stevens and Bean, 2003) of the academia. People have written and continue to
Departement of Islamic Education, Universitas Muhammadiyah Sumatera Utara, Medan, Indonesia
*E-mail correspondence: [email protected]
write about politics, race, ethnicity, languages, socio-economic, socio-cultural, environment, technology, religion, and gender, all topics present themselves with complexity and challenges, including to senior high school students. Such complexities and challenges are of grave effect on the growth of the students' critical thinking and active learning; they affect the way the mind operates and perceives issues (Paul and Elder, 2002). This makes it essential to enhance students' critical thinking skills through academic written literacy to develop reasonable reflective thinking of a learner (Ennis, 1993). Developing students' critical thinking skills empower them to be in full control of their consciousness and are independent decision-makers.
According to Thompson (2011), critical thinking is a fundamental component in academic
2020, Vol. XXIX, N°3, 662-669 DOI: 10.24205/03276716.2020.769
growth; that is to say, it motivates and stimulates inquiry, leads to problem-solving approaches, and promotes a mind of discovery. This has led to the positioning of critical thinking in a higher position by most educationists and education theorists (Ennis, 1993; Thompson, 2011). On the other hand, Facione (2011) and Siegel (2010) view that teaching critical thinking skills empowers the learners, hence helping them make critical decisions in most activities within society. Critical thinking develops students into responsible citizens who can act reasonably and always have a sober mind in all activities which need objectivity because they reason ethically in all affairs (Elder and Paul, 2010). Teaching critical thinking from the early stages of education, more so from senior high school, helps to develop responsible and useful academia required in national growth and development.
Like other fields and areas of specialization, nurturing students, critical thinking abilities is a strategic area for academia. On this point, Hatcher (1999) suggests that there is a need for integration of vital material on critical thinking development in the teaching and learning process, but this can be well done through composition and essay writing and practice. Through analyzing students' academic writing, teachers can identify the areas of weaknesses of the learner and can guide appropriately during the students' learning process. Though to some, there is ambiguity on how writing improves a student's critical thinking skills, a crucial insight into how students synthesize information is vital and should be critically observed and directed by the educator or teacher (Darmawan, Ruyadi, Abdu and Hufad, 2017).
This paper looks at the students' critical thinking skills through the academic writing literacy of senior high school students. Ennis (1993) emphasizes focusing on the instruction process as the primary media for helping students learn. Students' critical thinking skills are an essential aspect of the academic achievement of a learner.
Just like academic reading literacy, academic writing is still new though old in practice, its research is limited, and more so on senior high students. This is the main reason for the present study. The existing research of Vyncke (2012), Flores (2007), and Emilia (2005) focus on both graduate and postgraduate students. The present paper aims to cover this gap of scarcity, focusing on academic writing in Indonesia's studied regions.
A Representation of Critical Thinking through Writing
As one of the significant activities in Language Arts learning, writing is highly connected with one’s way of thinking. Thinking critically is necessary for
one's academic success and an important skill to create any academic document that requires high-level thinking. On the other hand, writing itself helps students to sharpen students’ critical thinking skills. As stated by Meyer et al (2011), the physical act of writing stimulates our thought; thus, the quality of our thinking will directly impact our writing quality and vice versa. In this essence, writing and critical thinking are hand in hand.
For all areas of specialization, a student's critical thinking ability is vital to academic success. Being an essential tool in academia, writing is a required ability that must be possessed by all students (Gray, 2012). Academic writing literacy is one way of developing a student’s critical thinking mind (Langer and Applebee, 1987). Langer and Applebee (1987) further mention that writing supports learning to occur and stimulates an understanding of complex learning activities and tasks while Hatcher (1999) is of the view that the integration of critical thinking material in the teaching and learning stimulate the better academic performance of the learners.
Writing as a medium for the practice of critical thinking is significant; hence it is substantively indispensable. Writing a functional essay involves identifying essential ideas and expressing significant implications of those ideas in a clear and precise way (Paul and Elder, 2006). Moreover, criticism as a process of evaluating and responding to ideas, style, and argument so that readers understand how and why we value them (Dasbender, 2011) is comprised of substantive writing.
A Representation of Critical Thinking through Senior High School Students Writing
Reading and writing with adequate proficiency have been among the most important goals of education that all students need to learn (Westwood, 2008), including reading and writing for academic purposes. Academic writing is mostly about taking a critical, analytical stance toward a subject to result in reliable conclusions (Dasbender, 2011). There are essential elements of academic writing, of which critical thinking is paramount to be developed (Donnelly and Fitzmaurice, 2011; Barnett, 1992). Critical thinking plays a role in shaping excellent academic writing.
Though University students commonly compose academic essays and other written texts, the ability to think and write critically must begin earlier since critical thinking is an active skill that needs to be practiced (Gray, 2012; Donnely and Fitzmaurice, 2011). High School is a good starting point to develop students' critical thinking. At this level, students are prepared to be better critical thinkers of the future, if they live harmoniously in
today’s society. As stated by Paul and Elder (2006), critical thinking comprises one’s ability to solve problems, improve and effective communication skills, and live in a global community. Hence, in the age of transition, the Senior High School students who learned critical thinking can cope better in society and make a better decision.
Academic writing is a vital component in Senior High School and is the right choice and element in enhancing the students' critical thinking mindset. According to Oda (2008), senior high students have unique talents, which are a good starting point for the development of one's critical abilities in academic writing literacy. Thus, teaching critical academic writing literacy in High School is essential because it helps develop students’ critical thinking skills and prepares them for a higher education career.
2. Method
The study aimed to investigate critical thinking elements, students’ difficulties and pitfalls, and students’ perception of their critical thinking in writing, specifically in writing a Hortatory Exposition text. The mixed-method design with an exploratory approach was employed for its nature that fit the aim of the study and the requirement of the data collection procedure (Creswell, 2012). A class of High Schools Students from a Public Senior High school in Medan was purposively selected for the study.
The collected data were collected and analyzed both qualitatively and quantitatively. The analysis for qualitative data was conducted using inductive analysis (Mertler, 2011) while, the analysis of quantitative data included frequency and percentage calculation (Cohen, Manion and Morrison, 2007). In the effort to obtain data, text documents of students' written work, student observation, questionnaires, and interviews were conducted. Students’ written work was the main content of analysis to establish the required academic measures of acquiring critical thinking skills through academic writing.
To validate and strengthen findings, the author also took observations to obtain a clear view and gain a proper insight into students’ critical thinking and to triangulate and to find additional information on the development of students' critical thinking, which was portrayed through writing. The researcher conducted the observation as the main object of the study.
The questionnaire and interviews were administered to establish the students' perceptions of their views on critical thinking acquired through writing and the difficulties faced in applying their critical thinking skills in the daily life situation. The questionnaire was in two different formats:
dichotomous and open-ended. The interviews were conducted in group discussions, which involved twelve participants from the different levels of achievement represented. The group interview questions used were those of Ruggiero (2008), which were extracted from his report on the Critical Thinking Inventory.
3. Result
The part presents and describes findings, which are also substantiated from a critical thinking perspective, considering students' challenges, difficulties, and pitfalls regarding academic writing and perceptions.
Critical Thinking
The written text and observation analysis were conducted to gain a clear view regarding the components of critical thinking evidenced in the Senior High School student's writing of English composition texts. All the analyzed texts contained complete structure and common language features of a good English composition text, such as proper grammar, evaluative language, and connectives (Priyana and Mumpuni, 2008; Gerot and Wignell, 1995). In this regard, these texts had achieved the first contextual coherence, genre, since the wording could be easily identified as a composition text from the complete schematic structure and the use of its language features (Eggins, 2004). The students' writing and observation analysis led to an observation that critical thinking components include: essential components of thinking, critical thinking disposition, and critical thinking intellectual standards, which are embedded in the process of writing.
Critical Thinking Components
Critical thinking comprises five essential components: issue, argument, reason, fact, opinion, and conclusion (Beyer, 1995; Toulmin, 2003; Browne and Keeley, 2007). Despite the text's quality, all of the components are evident in almost all students' writing levels. The differences between the students categorized as high-achievers, middle-achievers,' and low achievers’ in academic writing depend on two limited aspects, that is the quality of reasoning and the ability to reason.
During arguments, high-achiever students had liberal views. The discussion contained conclusions, reasoning, and supporting reasons that are were represented with strong words. The following is an example of the argument, though not the right words: "Many factors cause environmental degradation; however: This condition can be prevented because most of the degrading environmental factors are human-made. (2) Afforestation is a way of improving the environment (3) Deforestation is one way of degrading the
environment because it can lead to a long spell of drought”.
The argument above contains a conclusion (this condition must be prevented) and a significant reason (it can be bad for life). A signal word because it was used to indicate a reason to support the conclusion (Barry, 1983). The supporting ideas are also included in the argument as spotted in sentence number 2 and 3 and are presented in a causal-effect relationship for a persuasive reason (Alwasilah and Alwasilah, 2005).
Middle-achiever students also indicated the capacity to make a line of reasoning. However, middle-achieving students had an issue of consistency. Some of the arguments were sometimes lacking supporting reasons, some others containing incomplete structure. Meanwhile, low-achieving students tended to write the debate in the form of assertions. The student only made a set of lists of the effects of global warming that cannot be considered as reasons to stop global warming. Without ideas, we merely have an assertion, a statement of someone’s opinion (Browne and Keeley, 2007).
In handling counterargument, high-achieving and middle-achieving students could offer a defense, although it is weak. On the other hand, low achieving students were able to include counterarguments but did not provide any justification. The sentences provided showed that the student tried to be well informed about the argument that the opponent might be given by including the counterargument in writing.
Students’ Critical Thinking
The findings of this study led to the establishment that distinctive nature of Senior High School students as an adolescent: high excitement and passionate commitment to what they are doing once they are engaged (Harmer, 2007). In this research, these natures had impacts on students' capacity in entailing critical thinking dispositions, precisely the disposition to be clear about things, the disposition to take a position, and the disposition to be a caring, critical thinker.
Evidence of students' tendency to be clear about things that appear in students' texts and observation. This disposition is indicated by the appearance of facts, examples, alternative points of view, and authority quotations in students' reasoning (Alwasilah and Alwasilah, 2005). In an argument, writing mentions that the effect of the use of a mobile phone can lead to cancer due to radiation. The reasoning presents a scientific fact to support the case. The author tries to include a radiation signal from a mobile phone that possibly
causes cancer to justify the argument to forbid a person from using a cell phone.
The indications of the tendency to be clear about things were also apparent in students' attitudes during writing. Students were willing to accept suggestions by directly correcting their writing. Moreover, the students always tried to be well-informed by actively asking questions when they faced difficulties, asking for clarification for the instruction they did not understand, and offering an alternative perspective in building their knowledge during instruction.
The disposition to take a position was apparent in students’ writing as well as in the process of writing. In writing, this disposition is indicated both explicitly and implicitly. The explicit statement was usually in the form of an opinion preceded by comments I agree or disagree with. Meanwhile, an implicit account is generally in the way of view containing evaluative words such as necessary, useful, and wrong. In writing sessions, students' tendency to take a position is usually indicated by their behavior when exposed to an issue. They were able to choose their position by giving an opinion toward the subject or directly choose a side when they are asked to do so.
Students’ tendency to be clear about anything indicates that they are aware that any beliefs they hold must be true, and their decisions should be justified (Ennis, 1996). Besides, the combination of dispositions' appearance to be precise about things and take position might indicate that students had adequate knowledge of the issue. It follows Lai (2011) that background knowledge has an essential role in critical thinking. It concludes that students’ capacity to entail the disposition to be clear about things and take positions are interrelated with their background knowledge of a particular issue.
Senior High School students, as individuals who are in early adolescent developmental age, are distinctive for their emotional stance (Larson and Sheeber, 2009). The findings of this study show that students had difficulties dealing with their emotions, especially toward a person they disliked. It was apparent in their answer during the interview and their behavior during observation. However, students also enhanced the ability to set aside their negative emotions in giving judgment. This ability is vividly apparent during the writing program, especially in the discussion session.
The student firstly gave a compliment before criticizing the text. The compliment functions as an attempt to lessen the negative feeling that the hearer might get in receiving critics. In this case, the student used politeness strategies named positive prefaces by giving positive remarks, which is
followed by a criticism functioning as a disagreement (Dogancay-Atkuna and Kamisili, 1996). Moreover, although the student was asked to comment on a student that was considered as "public enemy," the judgment was fair and relevant. Hence, it is evident that students acquire the ability to be care, critical thinkers.
Intellectual Standards and Critical Thinking
Eight standards, including clarity, accuracy, breadth, depth, relevance, significance, precision, logic, and fairness (Paul and Elder, 2008), were applied in evaluating students’ arguments, especially arguments in students’ text and discussion during observation. The findings show that almost all of the students had achieved an adequate standard of clarity, accuracy, breadth, and fairness. Some students had difficulties in achieving the standard of depth, the standard of significance, the standard of relevance, and the standard of logic. Meanwhile, almost all of the students neglected the standard of precision.
Despite the adequate accomplishment of clarity, accuracy, breadth, and fairness, the quality of students' arguments cannot be considered sufficient. The lack of the achievement of a standard of relevance and logic, the standard of depth, and standard of significance had a significant impact on their arguments. Some middle-achieving and low-achieving students had difficulties in accomplishing these standards. The failure to achieve the standard of depth is caused by students' inability to make clear and deep reasoning to convince the reader. Meanwhile, the failure of attaining the standard of relevance, logic, and significance is mostly caused by students' problems in selecting and organizing facts and ideas.
The standard of precision is a standard that is neglected by almost all of the students. However, the absence of this standard does not have a significant impact on students' arguments compared with the lack of the accomplishment of the measure of relevance, logic, and significance. The absence of the achievement of the standard of significance, logic, and importance disrupts the inferences students tried to make. Meanwhile, to be a good reasoner, we have to notice the assumptions we are making (Paul, 1990). It shows that no matter how fruitful the data included, without the ability to make sound reasoning and selecting and organizing facts and ideas, the purpose of the argument is hard to achieve.
Students’ Difficulties and Pitfalls
The difficulties and pitfalls faced by students in applying critical thinking in writing comprise four significant issues, including emotional stance,
reasoning ability, writing techniques, and language. Students' inability to control their emotions was manifested in their behavior when interacting with a person they did not like. This problem was vividly apparent during observation as well as in the result of the questionnaire and interview.
The finding of the questionnaire related to primary barriers to critical thinking proposed by Cotrell (2011) shows that adequate reason becomes one of the three significant obstacles students face. Similar awareness was also demonstrated in the students’ confession during a group interview. Student's disclosure confirms that emotional stance becomes one of the problems in thinking critically. Contrary to their behavior and revelation about their difficulties in dealing with sensitive positions, this barrier did not have an impact on their judgment. The students were still able to give fair judgment and deliver their critics politely. It is probably because the students enhanced the ability to be critical care thinkers, as can be seen in the disposition section; thus, they can alter their judgment. It is relevant to Larson and Brown (2007) that adolescents have a more significant potential to acquire metacognitive strategies to regulate negative emotions. Therefore, there were no pitfalls found regarding the students’ emotional problems.
Making a deep line of reasoning becomes a fundamental factor that failed students to achieve the purpose of their argument: convincing the readers and hearers with their beliefs. From the students' argument, it was found that two significant factors prevent students from making sound reasoning. They were students' difficulties in making a complete argument and students' difficulties in selecting and organizing ideas.
Difficulty in making a complete argument mostly occurred for low-achieving students. The students tended to make a list of reasons for their argument. Other essential elements in constructing an argument, such as conclusion, supporting reason, and signal words, were neglected. Hence, their argument did not sound, but there was no argument made at all.
Students' difficulties in selecting and organizing ideas can be seen in their text and their argument during the discussion. Students, who were at the peak of their curiosity when engaged in the issue they were interested in, kept searching on the fact to support their argument. Unfortunately, sufficient information they found during the writing process was not in line with their ability to select and organize the data into ideas. These difficulties violated the relevancy, significance, and logic of some part of their writing.
The final argument is the cause of global warming itself, not the impact, purpose, or even evidence to support the central issue of the argument. It shows that the student had difficulty in selecting and organizing ideas. Writing techniques and language are two common problems that were found in this research. Students' writing difficulties are related to starting the first words and arranging and connecting sentences and paragraphs. However, students seemed to overcome the former problem since the analyzed texts had smooth opening sentences. Meanwhile, students' difficulties in arranging and connecting sentences and paragraphs are apparent in their text. Findings show that some of the texts lack leading sentences and cohesive devices such as conjunction and preposition.
Language is the last but crucial problem in applying critical thinking in writing in this research. Significant difficulties in language use are related to grammar and vocabulary mastery. Grammatical issues arrive at a wrong sentence structure, incomplete sentences, and non-parallel sentences. Meanwhile, the lack of vocabulary mastery usually impacts on semantical ambiguity. This semantical ambiguity can be caused by the wrong choice of words or references that might have more than one meaning. Students’ pitfalls related to grammar and writing techniques are closely related to their mastery in English and the lack of practice, rather than an intentional act to deceive readers (Paul and Elder, 2012). Writing a text in a different language is not easy because not only second-language learners have more than one language at their disposal (Zhang, 2008), but also because they are expected to acquire the mastery of a variety of linguistic, socio-cultural, and cognitive competencies (Barkaoui, 2007).
Critical Thinking and Perception
Students’ perception of their critical thinking comprises four aspects. They include underlying barriers to critical thinking, critical thinking knowledge, critical thinking skills, and critical thinking attitude. Findings on students’ perceptions of critical thinking indicate positive movements before and after writing programs. Overall, after the writing section, students indicated positive enhancement in dealing with critical thinking barriers, especially in dealing with affective barriers. The positive changes in students' knowledge and skill of critical thinking might manifest practices during the writing section. Line with Gray (2012) stated, critical thinking is a skill in which the ability to do it will improve.
4. Discussion
According Paul and Elder (2006), critical thinking involves identifying essential ideas and expressing significant implications of those ideas in clear and precise writing. Therefore, inserting the last sentence in the paragraph above decreased the level of relevancy, significance, and logic of the argument. Besides, students’ difficulties in making a deep line of reasoning and selecting and organizing ideas also arrived in other pitfalls in their argument, including circular reasoning, questionable cause, inconsistency, trivial objection, and evading the issue.
Next, Paul and Elder (2006) finding that the most common academic writing problem is language use. Besides that, the statement of Langer and Applebee (1987) that writing supports complex reasoning. However, the changes were small, which showed that nurturing students' critical thinking cannot be overnight work. In this essence, essential thinking instruction should indeed occur in programs that rely on the events in everyday life to develop one's critical thinking since critical thinking has applications in all areas of life and learning (Facione, 1990).
5. Conclusion
This study sought to examine the Students' Critical Thinking through Writing with a focus on Senior High School Students Written Work in Indonesia to understand the difficulties and students' perceptions about academic writing literacy. It has been established and concluded that critical thinking components are present in both students’ composition of the text and the writing product. However, every student has a different level of accomplishment in demonstrating critical thinking skills.
6. Recommendation
The findings of students’ perceptions of critical thinking reflect positive growth in academic writing. The improvement is evidence that practice and activities urging students to think critically are beneficial in enhancing their capacity to grow into better academics. However, the changes obtained have not been satisfactory regarding students' achievement. There is a need for a better strategy to improve students' academic critical thinking in Indonesia.
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