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How We Argue
A Workshop on Reasoning Skills
with Harvard's ThinkerAnalytix
Facilitated by
Nate Otey
Target Audience
Middle and High School Educators
How do we argue?
Too often it seems that when discussing current issues and writing essays, students rely on unsubstantiated facts or appeals to emotion, rather than evidence and reasoning.
Argument Mapping
In this workshop, we introduce argument mapping: a simple, powerful, *research-backed method that helps students improve the logical reasoning skills which support effective writing and communication.
As software has improved over the previous decade, an increasing number of college professors and high school teachers are teaching students to analyze and evaluate arguments with mapping.
The result is that students write more clearly and logically and engage in more constructive, charitable conversations about difficult issues. To get a quick introduction to argument mapping, check out our *puzzle game.
*(refer to the 'Links' section on this page.)
How We Argue (HWA): Interactive Textbook
(free for instructors)
ThinkerAnalytix is an educational nonprofit that partners with the Harvard University Department of Philosophy.
We have developed a new interactive textbook called *How We Argue that uses mastery learning to help students work through many exercises to practice the basic skills of logical reasoning and argument analysis.
In this sense, HWA is a bit like a "boot camp" where students can visit to improve their "logic muscles." We have designed HWA to make it equitable and accessible for all types of learners with various skills and backgrounds. We are now in use in many US states and countries worldwide.
*(refer to the 'Links' section on this page.)
Workshop Overview
In this workshop, we will introduce you to the basic skills taught in HWA and show you how to use it to help students develop their skills.
Participants will leave this workshop with strategies and resources to help students reason carefully and support their claims with relevant evidence.
Who will lead this workshop?
