Historical thinking skills and their relationship to academic achievement among students of the Department of History at the University of Diyala

Abstract

The current research aims to determine the effectiveness of a program based on productive mental habits to develop analytical thinking skills among middle school students in the Directorate General of Education in Diyala Governorate. The researchers chose Al-Nisai Secondary School and Al-Muhsin Secondary School and used an experimental approach as a research tool with two groups, control and experimental. The research sample consisted of 60 students from the second grade, and a number of behavioral objectives were formulated totaling (30). The researchers also formulated a test for their research tool, represented by a test of analytical thinking skills. The research results showed that the experimental group outperformed the control group in analytical thinking skills. The researchers concluded that teaching according to a program based on productive mental habits among students helped develop their mental skills and thinking abilities, leading to increased interest in learning social studies. Adapting the strategy of productive mental habits to the level of middle school students helped in developing their thinking skills. The researchers recommended the necessity and importance of developing social studies curricula in different educational stages to achieve growth and development in students' thinking, especially analytical thinking abilities, according to the nature and characteristics of the students.