CRITICAL THINKING PROBLEMS OF TAIWANESE STUDENTS IN LEARNING SPANISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE

The purpose of this presentation is to expose the final results of a research project developed by the author during current academic year (2016-2017), entitled “Interculturality and Critical Thinking through Spanish Teaching in Taiwan: An Action Research Project at Tamkang University”, and granted by Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan (REF. MOST 105-2410-H-032-071).

The aim of this project, based on an educational action-research methodology whose respondents are a small group of undergraduates from Department of Spanish at Tamkang University, is to evaluate to what extent formal and continuing practice of critical thinking in Spanish classroom in Taiwan can help to improve:
(1) student’s competence upon analysing and presenting topics in Spanish language from a critical and intercultural point of view, on the one hand, and
(2) their performance in official Diploma of Spanish as a Foreign Language (DELE) Level B2 examination, on the other hand. In this oral presentation it will be explained the conclusions obtained after completing the action research process.