Exploring English language teachers' perception of teaching the critical reading skills at college level, Hyderabad, Pakistan

This study attempts to investigate the perceptions of English Language Teachers about teaching the critical reading skills. Critical reading is considered one of the essential skills for students in today’s world. One of the main objectives of teaching English subject at college level, Hyderabad, is also to promote critical reading skills. Therefore, this study sought to explore the perceptions of ELT teachers have about critical reading and also tried to investigate their understanding level about teaching critical reading skills. Qualitative research method was adopted to conduct this inquiry in which the techniques of classroom ethnography were used as research design. Data was collected into two phases. In first phase, the semi-structured interviews were taken from the twelve (12) English language Teachers who were teaching English at public colleges of Hyderabad, Pakistan. In second phase, classes of five (05) English language teachers were observed. Findings of this study reveals that most teachers had unclear about critical reading which indicates that they were not able to properly implement critical reading skills in their language classrooms. Result of this study suggests that reforms should be made at pre-service teachers training programs about teaching the critical reading skills so that ELT teachers can develop better understanding of this notion