The Dramatic Arc in the Development of Argumentation Skills of Upper Secondary School Students in Geography Education

Kimmo Härmä,Eila Jeronen,Sirpa Kärkkäinen

doi:10.3390/educsci11110734

Abstract

Geography education can facilitate learners’ critical thinking and argumentation skills to make well-reasoned decisions on social and environmental issues. This study reports on a geography course consisting of 18 lessons, each of them 75 min, designed to afford intensive practice in argumentation to upper secondary school students (n = 21) and following the dramatic arc. The study produces examples of different developmental pathways of upper secondary school students’ argumentation during the geography course. In this qualitative case study, the data were collected from learning diaries and analyzed using content analysis following ARRA-analysis (Analysis of Reasoning, Rhetorics and Argumentation), which is based on Toulmin’s argumentation model. The results indicated that most of the students developed justified arguments and composed clear claims and relevant rhetorical modes such as qualifications, rhetorical questions and rebuttals. Justification categories that were mainly used were backings, grounds and warrants. However, some students had difficulties in recognizing the main claim and arguments. The students developed their argumentation skills following the dramatic arc. They possessed the prerequisites for argumentative reasoning and writing but needed further practice in analytical and critical writing.

Highlights

Informed citizens need to be able to make decisions
Based on the ideas outlined above, using the dramatic arc framework and an argumentation approach, we explored what the secondary school students’ argumentation skills are and how they develop in a geography course on environmental and social issues following a dramatic arc
The teaching was implemented in the context of environmental issues and geography education [19,43] in a course in which upper secondary school students had to develop critical thinking [3,70,71] and argumentative skills [44]

Summary

Introduction

It is important that they learn to present evidence-based arguments. The term argumentation refers to the process of creating a considered or reasoned opinion on an issue or problem, based on relevant information: individual or group perception of the issue or problem and personal or social values. It includes drawing conclusions through logical reasoning. Three additional elements include a backing, rebuttal and qualifier [9] related to the quality of the structure of the argumentation chain [10]. The focus is on how the arguments presented are justified by sufficiently quantitative and qualitatively valid data that together form reliable chains of argumentation [7,11,12]

Objectives

Methods

Discussion

Conclusion