Abstract:

This study aims to assess the critical reading skills of upper primary school students in Surakarta, Indonesia. Therefore, descriptive research design was used. The research participants consisted of sixty students (20 male and 40 female) in the fourth, fifth and sixth grade from five public primary schools and five private primary schools.. They were purposively selected from five public schools and five private schools. In terms of gender composition, the number of male students was proportional to the number of female students. . Thirty male students and 30 female students involved in this qualitative research. The data were collected from reading comprehension test and interview. The results were analyzed using Paul & Elder’s (2008) six aspects of critical reading skills which consist of accuracy, clarity, precision, depth, relevance and logic. The results of this study revealed that in terms of accuracy and relevance, private primary school students' critical reading skills were higher than that of the public primary school students, while the same results were achieved for clarity and logic, depth and precision. While the students in the sixth grade developed all aspects of the skills equally to a comprehending level, the fourth graders’ clarity and the fifth graders’ clarity and logic were in the emergent level. In terms of gender, the male students in the fifth grade and the female students in the sixth grade showed a comprehending level in almost all of the aspects.

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