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1,1 Background of the Research
The western higher education has long preached the cultivation of students' thinkingskills，especially the critical thinking skills. Halpem claimed that the fostering of criticalthinking should be one of the most important tasks in higher education. (Zhang, Qiu, Chen& Xu, 2011，p.499) Many universities have employed various types of tests to evaluate thestudents' critical thinking skills (e.g. Cambridge Thinking Skills Assessment; CaliforniaCritical Thinking Skills Test) and some of them have launched special program to promotethe students' critical thinking skills (e.g. Critical Thinking Through Writing: Georgia StateUniversity's Quality Enhancement Plan). The importance of critical thinking cultivation,the origin of which lies in the western culture, has not become the core of Englisheducation in China. Although it has been acknowledged that China has a long history ofpreaching thinking and reasoning which can be dated back to the Confucian times, (Ma,2011，p.35) it is worth noticing that there are many differences between Chinese philosophyof critical thinking and the western approach. The western culture preaches logic andreason while the Chinese culture, especially the Confucianism, advocates ethics andmorality. Besides，some scholars believe that the advocating of submissiveness by theConfucianism can discourage the seeking of thinking and reasoning. (Ma，2011, p.37) Inthis sense, the cultivation of critical thinking in China really needs improving.
The urgency of critical thinking skills cultivation in China was realized in the late1990s, when some scholars in English education found it necessary to modify the syllabusfor the impending new millennium. The English Teaching Syllabus for English Majors(2000，p.l) sets the teaching goal as “focusing upon developing students' abilities to acquireknowledge, to think independently and to be creative?” This new edition advocates thecultivation of students' higher order thinking skills, i.e. critical thinking skills. However,over a decade has passed since the new curriculum came into effect; English education inthe majority of Chinese universities still lays emphasis on the training of language skills rather than the cultivation of critical thinking skills. (Sun, 2011，p.52) Some teachers andscholars in foreign language studies have come to the consensus that English majorundergraduates in China lack critical thinking skills and call for a revision in curriculumdesign and a reform in English education. (Huang, 1998, 2010; He et al, 1999; Qin & Wen,2007; Sun，2011) The current situation prompts the emergence of researches in theassessment and fostering of English major undergraduates' critical thinking skills.西部高等教育长期以来鼓吹学生的思维能力，特别是批判性思维能力的培养。 Halpem声称，批判性思维的培养，应该是在高等教育的最重要的任务之一。（张，邱，陈徐，2011，P.499）许多大学已聘请各类测试来评估学生的批判性思维能力（如剑桥思维技能评估;加州批判性思维技能测试），他们中的一些已经开展了专项方案，以促进学生的批判性思维能力（例如通过写作批判性思维：乔治亚StateUniversity质量提升计划）。批判性思维培养的重要性，在于西方文化的起源，还没有成为中国英语教育的核心。虽然已经承认，中国有着悠久的历史宣讲思维和推理可以追溯到儒家次，（马，2011年，第35页）值得注意的是，中国哲学的批判性思维之间存在许多差异和西方的做法。西方文化宣扬的逻辑的安德逊，同时中国文化，特别是儒家思想，提倡伦理道德。此外，一些学者认为，儒家所主张顺从劝阻寻求思维和推理。（马，2011年，第37页）在这个意义上说，在中国真正的批判性思维的培养需要改善。
Moreover, a few scholars (Dai & Zhang, 2007; Huang, 2010) also find that mostEnglish major's graduation theses have low quality. For example, some theses are merely apile of materials and quotations without necessary analysis or argumentation; others revealdisor本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。