Exploring critical reading in the English textbooks for Thai students

Abstract

The study aims to explore components of critical reading skills in which support the development of critical reading ability in textbooks used by Thai students. 14 textbooks were gathered and used in this research. The instrument used was core critical reading skills checklist for upper secondary school English textbooks. Content analysis and descriptive statistics were employed to analyze result derived from the checklist. The result showed that textbook sample composed of different degrees of critical reading components. Some skills can be found in almost every textbook, while some skills can hardly be found. Moreover, the order of skills presented in textbooks yield differently from the synthesis of literature review of critical reading skills from the year 1980 to 2015. Tasks' characteristics and sample tasks of each critical reading skills are also displayed in the study.