Identify 2 educational controversies that interest you.
Locate 2 peer-reviewed research articles that address each of the controversies you’ve identified. You can use the Journals & Professional Organizations site to identify sources.
TIP: You only need to read the article abstracts to find out if they are relevant and potentially interesting.
Consult the “Analyzing an Argument” handout. Use the questions included in the handout to guide your 1-3 page article analysis. Remember to include the citations in your analysis!
you must use this questions which are from the analyzing an argument handout.
Assumptions
What should be taught, researched, and valued
What knowledge is of most worth? Whose perspectives are represented? Who is considered a “knower”? Whose voice is heard?
How it should be taught, researched, and presented
What strategies or methods are used? What roles are assumed? What behaviors, interactions, and formats are allowable?
How it should be assessed
What counts as learning, good research, &/or knowledge? How is effectiveness defined? What are considered valid measures? What are the consequences? For whom?
Who gets to decide
What issues of power and authority are involved? What is negotiable/non-negotiable? Whose interests are served?
Underlying assumptions about the larger goals and purposes of education
Larger political agendas and purposes to which the issue is attached
What is said
What is the “opposition” to the other side?
When it speaks for itself.
What are its assumptions?
When it speaks for itself.
What are the larger agendas to which it is attached?
What rhetorical strategies are used?
What is heard
How is the opposition “constructed”?
By the other side.
How are its assumptions represented & countered?
By the other side.
What rhetorical strategies are used?
