High school students’ conceptions of data-driven argumentation as advocacy when reasoning about variability

Abstract

The main purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it seeks to clarify the different ways in which Thai high school students conceive of data-driven argumentation when asked to provide persuasive arguments based on data analysis, in the context of a socially open-ended problem requiring reasoning about variability. Second, it seeks to analyse the connections between those conceptions and the students’ predispositions to argue. A group of 26 Thai Grade 12 students engaged in a statistical investigation, in which it was necessary to use an unsorted set of varying test scores to rebut a mother’s claim about how awful her child’s test result was, in order to experience data-driven argumentation as advocacy (i.e. the questioning of a standpoint, the objections to a person’s arguments, and the offering of arguments against the standpoint someone is supporting) and variability modelling. Five conceptions of data-driven argumentation as advocacy were identified from the data analysis, based on the type of reasoning about variability exhibited by the students. Moreover, three predispositions to argue were also identified from the participants’ responses, which were found to be culturally-shaped response tendencies.