Becoming critical thinkers and collaborative learners is important for today's students as they develop the skills needed for success in the 21st century (National Research Council, 2012; Partnership for 21st Century Learning, 2019). One instructional strategy used to develop critical-thinking skills through collaboration is Socratic seminar. A Socratic seminar is a collaborative, intellectual conversation based on a text being analyzed and discussed by students, with the teacher as the facilitator. Through the seminar process, students evaluate text, create questions, and discuss their ideas working together to create meaning and reflect on mutual learning (Roberts & Billings, 2012).This quasi-experimental study sought to answer if critical-thinking skills increased during the use of Socratic seminars as compared to regular English Language Arts (ELA) instruction and if the order of instruction affected the efficacy of the two approaches. A counter-balanced research design was used to examine two groups of students receiving ELA instruction and an addition of Socratic seminar instruction. Data analysis techniques of repeated measures ANOVA, paired sample t-tests, mixed design ANOVA, and ANCOVA were used for analysis. The findings showed that even though critical-thinking skills grew significantly for both groups, the use of Socratic seminar did not improve overall critical-thinking skills more than a traditional ELA approach. However, significant growth in several elements of critical thinking indicated that when implemented early in the academic year with elementary aged students along with traditional ELA instruction, Socratic seminar was a viable instructional strategy for learning and continuing to apply critical-thinking skills specifically in the areas of issue, point of view, and inference. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com.bibliotheek.ehb.be/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]