The impact of learning-teaching applications based on questioning upon students' critical thinking dispositions and levels

The present study aims to determine the impact of different applications that use questions in instruction process upon students' critical thinking dispositions and levels. The study employed the pre-test-post-test control group experimental design. The study group consisted of a total of 19 junior students studying in the department of Social Studies Teacher Training in the Faculty of Education at Ahi Evran University, of whom 33 were female and 46 were male students. The study data were collected from the target groups using the California Critical Thinking Disposition Inventory (CCTDI). The inventory consisted of a total of 6 sub-scales and 51 items and has a Cronbach alpha internal consistency coefficient of 0.88. The data were subjected to frequency, percentage, arithmetic mean, t-test and ANOVA analyses. At the end of the study, it was established that four different instructional applications that used questions positively contributed to the students' critical thinking dispositions and levels. Nevertheless, the greatest contribution was achieved with the instructional application based on student questions, which was followed by instruction based on teacher questions and blended instructional application, respectively. The smaller contribution to the students' critical thinking dispositions and levels was made by the traditional instructional approach. Blended instructional application contributed more to the students' critical thinking dispositions and levels, when compared to the traditional instructional application in the sub-dimension of open-mindedness. When, the total scores were considered, instruction based on student questions contributed significantly more than the traditional method. © Medwell Journals, 2009