Impact of the Development of Critical Thinking Skills and Academic Development of Vulnerable Students during Confinement due to COVID-19 Impact of the development of critical thinking skills and academic development of vulnerable students

This study examines the impact of confinement on critical thinking (CT) skills in vulnerable students pursuing careers in nutrition, nursing, and physical therapy and rehabilitation at a private educational institution on the Atlantic Coast in Mexico. In the situation of confinement is important use the CT skills to improve the development of the students in our institution. The original research comes from a mixed two-stage, quasi-experimental sequential study. The sample is non-randomized for the convenience of thirty-seven students, who comprise nineteen women and eighteen men, aged 20 to 24. In a first stage of the study twenty-six teachers are trained in CT, all showing an increase in the disposition questionnaire to the CT. Educational intervention is conducted in Google Classroom through the creation of a research project. The main results show a positive impact on the control group on interpretation skills (Xpre = 1.3 to Xpos = 2), analysis (Xpre = 1.3 to Xpos = 1.8) and evaluation (Xpre = 1.2 to Xpos = 1.9) of the CT, with an average effect size of 1.5 from the pretest-to-post-test evaluation. At CT development levels, results show a positive large effect size (1.3). The project spurred a meaningful change in CT in the students of the experimental group and led to better personal performance. The final work, product of the educational intervention, facilitated viable ideas on how to be more effective in their approach to research for thesis. In conclusion the confinement did not affect to the students in the experimental group. With this all the students continued in the university, there was no desertion in the experimental group, the control group had a desertion of four students.