Argumentation and Evaluation Intervention in Science Classes: Teaching and Learning with Toulmin

The focus of this chapter is on an Argumentation and Evaluation Intervention (AEI) and the associated graphic organizer, the Argumentation and Evaluation Guide (AEG). The primary goal is to describe the final version of the intervention and graphic organizer developed during a 3-year design study funded by the National Science Foundation for use in middle and secondary science classrooms that contained students of diverse abilities. The framework for the intervention was based on components of argumentation described by Toulmin (The uses of argument. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1958). As such, it incorporated consideration of claims, qualifiers, evidence or grounds, warrants, rebuttals or counterarguments, and conclusions or judgments. This chapter presents detailed descriptions of the major components of the AEG and instructional procedures. After the description of each component, we will present insights from the design study, during which the project staff developed the intervention in collaboration with participating teacher-researchers. In discussions, teacher-researchers provided insights into their views of argumentation, perceptions of their own abilities to teach higher-order thinking associated with argumentation, and their views about students’ abilities to engage in argumentation. Then, via classroom observations and debriefings, they provided information about implementation of the procedures in science classrooms. Finally, observations and discourses with the teacher-researchers and others in the participating schools provided information on the use of additional general supportive instructional strategies and cross-curricular implications of the AEI.

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