Element 18

Helping Students Examine Their Reasoning

“Sometimes a clearly-defined error is the only way to discover the truth” -

~ Benjamin Wiker, The Mystery of the Periodic Table

Desired Effect

Students can produce and defend claims by examining their own reasoning or the logic of presented information, processes, and procedures.

Purpose

It forces students to read for a purpose and become critical consumers of information.
Students learn to back conclusions by analyzing resources.
It strengthens a student’s understanding of a concept or skill.
To encourage students to be critical thinkers when analyzing and evaluating faulty logic in themselves and others.

By examining reasoning, students learn how to produce and defend claims derived from two sources:

Their own reasoning as it occurs in classroom discussions and as evidence in their writing and
The logic of information presented in print, processes, and procedures.

Teacher Evidence for Helping Students Examine Their Reasoning

Student Evidence for Helping Students Examine Their Reasoning

Asks students to examine and analyze information for errors or informal fallacies in content or in their own reasoning.
- Faulty Logic
- Attacks
- Weak Reference
- Misinformation
Asks students to examine and analyze the strength of support presented for a claim in content or in their own reasoning.
- Statement of a clear claim
- Evidence for the claim presented
Asks students to examine logic of errors in procedural knowledge.
Asks students to analyze errors to identify more efficient ways to execute processes.
Involves students in taking various perspectives by identifying the reasoning behind multiple perspectives.

Describe errors or informal fallacies in content.
Explain the overall structure of an argument presented to support a claim.
Demonstrate ability to identify errors or make and support a claim through artifacts.
Demonstrate various perspectives by identifying the reasoning behind multiple perspectives.

Scale

Strategies

What it is NOT:

Doing the thinking for the students
Failing to push students to the level expected in the standard
Failing to give students opportunities to learn from the errors
Not holding students accountable for explanations about why they chose a certain method
Not expecting students to examine the efficiency of a method of solving a problem
Not directly teaching and/or modeling the strategy for the students
Not having clear learning targets
Not directly instructing academic vocabulary.

Resources

How to Use Analyzing Errors Strategies

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