Critical thinking is a requisite skill for college success, employability, and conducive active civic participation. Empirical studies have noted to the low achievement of Arab students on critical thinking assessments. Insufficient endeavors have attempted to propose effective interventions enhancing critical thinking abilities among Arab students. The current analysis provides a preliminary overview of a special course designed to improve critical thinking skills among Arab college students. Results indicated a great improvement in all areas of critical thinking including explanation of information, identification of strategies, implementing solutions, and formulating logical inferences. Students’ scores on a critical thinking assessment increased from sufficient to good as a result of participating in the program. The gains are consistent after controlling for gender, major, class seniority, and nationality. Notwithstanding these promising results, this paper is limited in several respects including the choice of critical thinking assessments represented by two questions, the highly contextualized setting making it difficult to be replicated, and the convenient sampling strategy used to recruit participants. This set of limitations, however, does not discourage proactive attempts like designing special courses to enhance students’ critical thinking acquisition in the Middle East.
While a consensus has emerged on the importance of creativity in graphic design and multimedia field, little systematic research has attempted to understand its facilitators or inhibitors in the graphic and multimedia education across colleges and universities. The current investigation surveys a sample of experts as well as professors teaching across the Arab World concerning their perceptions on the most significant correlates of creative thinking among students. Results point to the importance of: (1) instructors’ engagement; (2) appropriate use of instructional strategies, tools, and resources; (3) institutional support; (4) peer support; and (5) the removal of red-tape regulatory frameworks. Most importantly, this research highlights the need to move away from the rigid higher education creativity model assuming perfection, precision, accuracy, and optimal effectiveness to a more flexible creativity framework. The Multi-Layered Autonomous Phases Model (MLAPM) is proposed as an alternative approach to cultivating creativity at the higher education level. The MLAPM applies to all levels beginning with the students and the instructor in the classroom and all instructional tools applied, moving upward to the institutional administration levels. The model offers cost-effective, flexible, dynamic, and effective practices that improve levels of creativity and creative thinking among students without the need to invest in new costly equipment, tools, curriculum, or instructional programs.
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