The teaching of critical and creative thinking skills in the English Language classroom in Malaysia

The teaching of critical and creative thinking skills in Malaysian schools became more prominent after the implementation of the new standard currikulum or Kurikulum Baru Sekolah Rendah (KBSR) in 1982. In line with the Malaysia Educational Philosophy (1988) which stresses on the development of individual student's potential, the teaching of critical and creative thinking skills is given much emphasis today. Critical and creative thinking are important metacognitive skills. More importantly, these skills are fundamental in the area of education especially among students in the English Language classroom. Apart from the decline in English Language proficiency among Malaysian students over recent years, the emergence of students who are passive learners and lacking problem solving skills have raised tremendous concern. Therefore, it is important that the English Language classroom play an important role in imparting critical and creative thinking skills in English to enable students to become not only proficient in English Language but also efficient users of their cognitive skills.