Using literature to develop critical thinking skills in upper secondary students

Abstract

Critical thinking skills are important in the twenty-first century. Access to information is relatively easy nowadays, and therefore students need to be able to approach it critically in order to understand whether the information that they are receiving is either true or false. One way how to develop critical thinking skills in students is to use literary texts in English as a foreign language classes. The aim of this MA thesis is to find out whether literature can be used to develop critical thinking skills in upper secondary students. To do that the author created eight lesson plans based on Aldous Huxley’s dystopian novel Brave New World.