The effect of using debate strategy in biology teaching on increasing students' critical thinking

النوع : Mémoire

The purpose of this action research was to study the effect of the debate strategy used in teaching biology on developing critical thinking. This study was done in Almanar Modem School, Ras Elmatn, on grade 8 students. In this action research, the data collection techniques employed were observations, interviews and the examination of documents. The intervention, the debate teaching strategy, was applied to one section of grade 8 class (section A). Pretests and post tests were done to both sections. The students of both sections were observed and interviewed before and after the intervention. The time taken for the intervention was two weeks. A paired samples t-test revealed a statistically reliable difference between the mean average of critical thinking elements for section A students in the pretest (M = 3,28, s =0.33) and that in the post test (M = 3.4, s = 0.24), t5= -2.947, p= .032, α=.05. This indicated that the use of the debate strategy in teaching biology increased significantly the critical thinking in students.