It is commonly accepted in the academy that developing a critical thinking capacity and related capabilities will make students more effective thinkers and writers, and that these are desirable traits for graduates to have no matter what path they take after graduation. While most academics agree that critical thinking is an essential component of…

This paper adds to the nascent literature on teaching research methods and what students learn from courses and assessment. Postgraduate students are often confronted with large amounts of reading, and the content of material can be intimidating. Convincing them also to engage critically with readings is even more difficult. We report on a…

An adaptation of the traditional literary concept of close reading was developed for use in a largely multilingual classroom in which both first language (L1) and second language (L2) students were struggling to comprehend theoretical, lexically dense texts in English. This simplified method of reading a text iteratively and critically is proving…

While writing in doctoral education is increasingly visible as a focus for research and pedagogy, what remains less visible is the role of reading in the doctoral journey. This paper draws on data from two parallel research programmes in which doctoral student day-to-day experience was documented longitudinally, initially in the social sciences…

Using a reading lesson designed for advanced university students in Brazil, the author discusses different types of exercises that can help students become more active readers and be more critical about the reading materials. The author distinguishes between passive and active reading tasks and argues that active tasks are more beneficial because…

A review of several classroom observation and survey studies of comprehension instruction, content area reading for homework, and aspects of reading assignments raises the question of whether enough is being done in Irish schools to develop critical reading competency. It appears from these studies that many students are being left to their own…