INTEGRATING CRITICAL LITERACY INTO ACADEMIC WRITING INSTRUCTION FOR PRE-SERVICE TEACHERS: AN EXPLANATORY SEQUENTIAL MIXED-METHOD

Abstract

Critical literacy is a core support for EFL pre-service English teachers to process complex, ideologically embedded multimodal texts. However, most current academic writing instruction in EFL teacher education programs shares a widespread common flaw: prioritizing linguistic accuracy while neglecting critical engagement. To explore the actual effect of integrating structured critical literacy tasks into academic writing courses on improving pre-service teachers’ writing performance and critical awareness, this study adopts an explanatory sequential mixed-methods approach, and conducts an 8-week teaching intervention with a sample of 36 pre-service English teachers. The intervention tasks cover critical questioning, multimodal text analysis, and writing critical response papers. For quantitative analysis, a paired-samples t-test is used to process pre-test and post-test writing assessment data, while thematic analysis is used for qualitative analysis to process data from reflection forms and semi-structured interview materials. The study’s results show that the mean writing score increased from 2.81 (SD=0.50) to 3.66 (SD=0.45), t(35)=11.42, p<.001, Cohen’s d=1.90. Scores for critical awareness, argument quality, and evidence use rose by 1.04, 0.91, and 0.78 respectively. Qualitative results indicate that students gradually developed the relevant core competencies, and this set of intervention plans can provide a reusable evidence-based teaching reference for the EFL teacher education field.