Make an argument = give a speech. Make an argument = write a paper. Make an argument = succeed in a debate. Make an argument = collaborate with others. Make an argument = real world skill.

The ability of a child to make an academic argument is an essential skill for school success. Children who are able to use this skill quickly find success in school while children who cannot flounder in continuing waves of uncertainty and inept attempts at school assignments.

An academic argument is the creation of an academic statement and the stipulation of ideas that support the truth of the statement. Although it may seem formulaic, the application of an academic argument to so many school situations makes it a tool that can be used over and over again with each use seeming unique and fresh. An academic statement can arise in any and all school subjects and at every grade level. It works in exacting subjects like math and computer programming as well as in subjective subjects like language arts and art or music. It works in book subjects like history as well as in lab subjects like science and woodshop. It is both cognitive and hands-on and really is made more powerful and easier with the use of Internet resources.

How does it work?

A third grade curriculum often includes the expansion of family and community concepts with towns and cities, rural and urban, and what people do in these settings. Children read stories about people who live in towns, cities and in the country. When third graders make academic arguments, they find a particular concept or idea and then demonstrate what they know about it.

Idea – Machinery has made farming easier and helps farmers to produce more food.

Idea – People who live in towns live closer to many of the services they need. There is a convenience to living in a town.

Idea – Cities are different depending upon where they are located in the United States.

Each of these ideas requires a child to use what she read in texts and supplemental readers, heard and saw in media presentations, and experienced in her own life to define the terms in these ideas. What are examples of farm machinery? How is a horse-drawn machine different than a gas-powered or electric machine? How much land could a farmer plow in a day using a horse-drawn plow or a tractor-drawn plow? Could a farmer pick more corn by hand or with a gas-powered corn picker? Would a farmer using only hand work produce more or less food than a farm using machinery?

What are the kinds of services that people need? What kinds of services are located in your town? How far does your parent have to drive from home to each of these services? How far does a family living on a farm near (place nearby) have to drive? Name all of the grocery stories, gas stations, hospitals or clinics, hardware stores, and clothing stores you can think of that are in your town.

Use a map to find these cities – Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, Kansas City. Use the map to list as many differences between these cities that you can identify. Also, list the similarities that you can identify.

Children engage in these kinds of studies all of the time. The dilemma is that we do not help them to consider each of these studies as an academic argument – an opportunity to state an idea and provide examples that make the idea true. Teaching and using this strategy can immediately assist students to see a purpose in their academic assignment, grab hold of a strategy for understanding the information they are exposed to, and to verify their personal learning.

The strategy easily becomes more complex as the child advances in grade level and subject. The strategy is easy because its application remains much the same no matter the grade level. The application becomes more complex as the breadth and depth of information the child has available to make a valid argument is enriched. A third graders academic argument about the convenience of city life is not valid for a high school student’s study of urban blight. However, the strategy a high school student uses is only an extension of the strategy learned in elementary school.

Learning how to make an academic argument is a key to school success.

Teach children to argue because they really do not know how. Sounds ludicrous! Not so much.

Children know how to talk. They think that talking louder and longer and saying the same things over and over again is arguing. Standing nose to nose is arguing. Letting a little anger grow is arguing. Shouting is arguing. Getting a little mean and demeaning is arguing. Making the other person cry or run off near tears is winning an argument. They observe their friends, family and people on television do this every day. This is what arguing looks and sounds like to a child. Not really.

It may be that argument is too difficult and verbal lambasting is too easy. Once we explain to children that a real argument is the presentation of information in support of a point of view or an interpretation of an event or of the truth of an idea, arguing quickly can lose its allure. However, teaching all children to argue is one of the most essential skills they can develop. We want all children to argue well.

What an interesting assignment it would be if a teacher told her students, “let’s argue!” After an initial “yea”, the lesson could be quite fun.

Objective: Each child will explain the purpose of an argument and demonstrate a strategy for constructing a proactive argument.

Anticipatory Set: Already accomplished. “Let’s argue” got student attention and caused them to think about their experiences in arguing.

Explanation/Demonstration:

Think of the last time you were in an argument. Pair/Share and tell another child at your table about your last argument.

1. Please raise your hand if you believe you won your argument.
2. Pair/Share and tell your paired classmate what made you think that you won your argument.
3. Teacher talk

An argument is …

• In order to have an argument, you must have a point of view or an interpretation of an event or an idea that you want …
• In order to build your argument, you must find information that supports your …
• In order create an argument, you must learn this information and organize it in such a way that …
• In order to win an argument, the other person must …

An argument is not …

Modeling: We will model an argument by reading this section of script from … Notice the point of view, the supporting information used to support the point of view, how the information is organized and presented, and whether or not the other person’s thinking about this point of view is changed as a result of the argument. Then we will read an argument for the other point of view.

Practice: Look at these five examples of a point of view.

1. Select one and reword it into this beginning of a sentence – “I think that ….”
2. Consider three ideas that you could use to finish the sentence – “I think that …., because of these three reasons.
3. Use our classroom resources to verify and strengthen your three reasons. Or, to find better reasons that support your point of view.

Let’s practice. Pair/Share and make your argument and then listen to your paired classmate’s argument. Did your thinking about the point of view change as a result of the argument you heard? Explain your thinking to the classmate who made the argument.

Checking for understanding; The teacher must hear or read each child’s argument and provide feedback as to the clarity of the “I think” and the “because” reasons.

Independent Practice: For tomorrow, please consider something in your world that you feel strongly about and create your point of view sentence. Tomorrow, we will work on your argument.

The case for making an argument is not age, gender or ability limited. Children of all ages need to learn to make an argument and then to present their argument orally and in writing. With age, children should find more complex topics and make more sophisticated arguments.

Making an argument is both an age-old and truly 21st century skill. Making a good and valid argument is a higher order problem solving skill. Understanding the role of argument is an increasingly mature social, political, and economic skill that will serve children well in their continuing education, career and personal lives.

When I say these words to an adult, “… there is a way of walking with crutches so that your arms hold your weight and not your shoulders,” I can quickly separate those who have experience with walking with crutches from those who do not. Experience creates a defining understanding that can be described or shown but never fully appreciated without having the experience. Women who have experienced childbirth will always hold men at bay by saying “… it’s nothing like childbirth.” That is an experience men can conceptualize but never fathom, thanks be.

Knowing that experience is king in creating a clear understanding of a concept, imagine the disparity among children when we begin talking about a subject that some have experienced but others have not. It is no wonder that the inexperienced give us back a blank look – they have no prior knowledge of what we are trying to describe in words. However, those who have prior knowledge through personal experience leap ahead in their ability to associate our words with what they already know. What an advantage!

“A zebra is a horse with stripes.” Children who have not seen a zebra can only wonder if the stripes run from head to tail. Is there one stripe or are there many stripes? How wide are the stripes? Is the tail also striped? But, children who have been to a zoo and seen a zebra or whose parents have used picture books to show them pictures of zebras have a clear mental picture of this striped horse.

A child’s quantity and quality of background information is associated with that child’s knowledge of words and phrases associated with that information. Early studies found that children who are raised in families on welfare have about 70% of the vocabulary of children who are raised in working families and about 45% of the vocabulary of children raised in professional families. Each child’s wealth of words is derived from their exposure to the word or picture or real-world experiences.

A child who is raised looking at National Geographic magazines or whose parents have taken him on trips to the mountains or seashore or museums or who has access to many books, especially books with pictures, or whose parents watch informational television, like the Discovery Channel, has an unbelievable advantage over children who have not been exposed to these informational enrichments. Hence, new information can make sense to a child a strong with strong background information and be meaningless to children without such background.

Of course, there are concepts that children cannot experience. To an extreme, space travel is outside their experience. However, children who have read stories about long sea voyages or biographies about explorers or watched science fiction movies have experiences that help them to conceptualize what space travel might be like. Once again, a child without wide ranging reading and viewing will have more difficulty creating a semblance of space travel.

Background knowledge can be separated into information that is “school-based” or academic and information that is “non-school based” or real world. A streetwise child will have a real life advantage over a more sheltered child when both are trying to navigate an urban landscape. However, later life success as measured by career ladders and economic status is much more related to academic knowledge than real world knowledge and children who have stronger background knowledge at an early age have a real advantage in sculpting their pathway along a variety of careers and financial earnings.

That leaves teachers with the challenge of teaching around the deficit in background knowledge or working to backfill a child’s background deficit. Needless to say, teaching around a deficit only makes the deficit a greater obstacle for future learning.

Direct Method –

Parents and families. These are first-hand experiences that a child has that provide a direct imprint of information into the child’s frame of reference. As much as educators can advocate for parents to create these experiences, the actuality relies falls to partners in educators and not educators.

Indirect Methods –

Classroom. These are the virtual experiences for a child created by teachers that expose a child to information that can be illuminated by teaching and peer exploration.

Marzano (Teaching Basic and Advanced Vocabulary, ASCD, 2010) identifies 8,007 terms and phrases in 17 subject areas. 2,845 of the terms and phrases are basic and 5,162 are advanced or related to a specific academic subject area. Marzano’s work develops a strategy that will position a child so that she has a quantitative and qualitative working vocabulary that should allow her to meet the needs of academic learning and content area specialization.

Marzano’s six-step approach to vocabulary development has application for classroom teachers and parents at home. The English language has so many terms and phrases that it is impossible to accommodate all of them through direct instruction in school. Hence, school and home can work together to build a child’s academic vocabulary.

Creating a working vocabulary of basic and advanced terms and phrases allows a child without strong background knowledge to close the gap between what they understand and what experientially-rich children understand.

Personal Experiences Out-of-classroom. Beyond direct vocabulary instruction, there are a myriad of ways to expose a child to background information. School-based field trips and parent-led family trips yield an incalculable amount of visual, hands-on experiences which are turned into the words and phrases of knowledge. Trips to museums, zoos, monuments, forests, memorials, exhibition halls, demonstrations, aquariums and planetariums, foreign lands, and even outer space are rich with information. And, every child can experience these – virtually.

Virtual. The most effective and efficient strategy for indirectly growing background information is through virtual means and every school can do this. If we believe that every child can learn and succeed, we need to individualize a curriculum of virtual field trips and simulated experiences for our most background-deprived and grow them into backgrounded children.

Educating children presents many problems; some we can resolve and some we cannot. A deficit in child’s background knowledge is one of the problems we can substantively resolve.

Sir Ken Robinson is compelling. He is concise and concrete while ingeniously illuminating the concepts he very successfully develops in his publications and media presentations. He is believable and makes a believer of me. Recently, I viewed his You Tube video in which Sir Ken points to the structural impediments in American public education that stymie children in their development of creativity. American schools pound facts and convergent thinking. There no incentive in the many federal and state mandates for schools to facilitate the growth of divergent thinking, he proclaims. (http://www.ted.com/talks/sir_ken_robinson_bring_on_the_revolution.html).

Darn right, I agree. And, to emphasize my agreement I paraphrase Matthew 22:20-22. “Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s…” What is it that Caesar requires? Federal mandates demand competent achievement of all students on prescribed standardized tests. In addition, verified accountability systems are in place that publicize student, teacher and school effectiveness. What is that Caesar does not require. The No Child Left Behind Act does not list creativity as one of the educational outcomes included in tests of student competency or school effectiveness. The Race to The Top also omits references to creativity as a requirement for states, hence local school districts and schools, to be waived from iron-fisted NCLB requirements. Creativity is not one of the “things ” Caesar claims as his.

In addition, junior Caesars, state governors, also forsake creativity. The National Governor’s Association which authorized and approved the Common Core State Standards comes “close but no cigar” for their efforts. “Close” is the inclusion of academic problem solving melded with collaboration with other students as a process skill within specific CC standards. Yet, this is not enough to win a cigar or the agreement of Sir Ken or anyone who advocates for a public education that values and purposefully promotes student creativity.

Hence, render unto our modern day Caesar, our mandating federal and state governments, that which they require – a standardized education that does not value creativity.

For educators, our dilemma is age old in school lore. That which is tested gets taught. That which is part of the mandated school and educator effectiveness accountability systems gets attention. The new state report card for all K-12 schools in Wisconsin does not include creativity in any of its measures of student, teacher or school effectiveness. Wisconsin’s state assessments fall into the category of all standardized tests. They assess convergent thinking. The Iowa legislature recently passed educational reforms with the goal of returning its high school graduates to national prominence in the ACT test, a test used for college readiness and admissions. Instruction for this purpose assures that classrooms will value the learning of content, skills and processes for discerning “right” answers.

“New York is one of the first states to revamp its annual exams to match up with the new Common Core Standards, a comprehensive set of academic expectations designed with the goal of better preparing American children for “college and careers”. Forty-six states and the District of Columbia have formally adopted the Common Core, but reviews are mixed. Diane Ravitch, an education analyst at New York University, calls the standards a “fundamentally flawed” mandate foisted on the states without “any idea how they will affect students, teachers, or schools”. Other commentators argue that the standards honour “data, not children”, neglect creativity in the classroom and weave an unholy bond between public education and test-development companies.” (“Not Prepared,” The Economist, 4/16/13)

“However counter-intuitive this notion may appear, fostering a nation of creative thinkers will serve the U.S. well in an increasingly global and technological economy. After all, one of the most successful and profitable companies in the world (high-tech or otherwise) is Apple. Until August 25, 2011, Apple was led by CEO Steve Jobs, who stepped down (for the second time) for health reasons. Jobs was one of the most creative thinkers of the past 50 years and was not trained by the American university system for such greatness. He was a creative thinker, not the toiler of a particular trade conferred upon him by some professional degree.” (“We Need an Education System that Promotes Creativity, Innovation, and Critical Thinking”, Huffington Post, 03/23/2012)

So, what should we do?

Parents, allow your Huck Finn to play (safely). An overly structured childhood stifles creativity. Don’t register your child for every team, ensemble and group that rises in your community for the purpose of keeping kids busy so that they will be “safe.” Count your own hours of driving to and from every practice and event and then add that large number to the gazillion hours your child is at practice or performing and you must arrive at “Stop!” Too much is too much. Let your Huck Finn play safely in the neighborhood without electronic devices and programmed activity. Let children design and act out their personal and collective creative fantasies. Play acting life on Mars and manufacturing their own playgrounds and creating their own language that keeps their doings safe from others brings out their creativity. Children in generations prior to helicoptering parents somehow created an American economy and culture that constantly regenerated itself.

Schools, use your powers of assessment to find children who possess true creative energy and give them time and opportunity to grow. Schools have a long history of divining which children need special education and assistance to succeed in school. Don’t stop annual “child find” activities, but add “loose the creative” children to your findings. Every school contains children who easily learn what they must know in order to pass required tests. Once they have gotten to the head of the testing line, free them to experience the learning that is their passion. Supervise their safety, but give them time, place and opportunity to compose, paint, sculpt, program, write, shape metals, graft plants, mix chemicals, and lead their peers. This is the environment what young entrepreneurs, engineers, artists, authors, and explorers need. There is time in any school day for this. Observe what children who finish their assignments first do while waiting for the class to finish. Turn them loose.

Government, stop meddling. Public education may be governmentally funded, but a public education is an investment in an individual’s potential to advance the community, state and national future. The ebb and flow of liberal and conservative agenda handcuffs any opportunity for schools to create long-term practices that promote student creativity. Educators spend too much time explaining and defending best practices to the political agenda du jour that children get robbed of time and opportunity for creative work. There is a world of difference between assuring a free and public education that creates graduates who are college prepared and community ready and fencing in the future.

I am composing this blog on a tablet with a touch screen, saving it to the “cloud” and will post it to the world. These processes are the result of unbelievable creativity by individuals, collaborating groups, and corporations that proper from “time and opportunity” to do the right work.

“A day that you tarry is a day that you lose.” (Jeremiah Johnson, film -1972).

Or, for a child, no time passes faster than a day of summer vacation and it is almost impossible to think about school and learning on a day of vacation. However, when we let a day pass without attending to what a child can learn, we lose that day just as assuredly as Jeremiah lost the beaver pelts that could have been traded if he did not attend to his traps every day. Now work, no pay. No new words, no new learning.

Words are the currency of education. When a child does not know a word that is heard or a phrase that is read, that child is out of business as a learner. The words might as well be Martian. It is easy to observe. Just watch a child’s face when she is reading and notice the small frown that appears between the eyes of the tightening at the corners of the mouth when an unknown word is encountered. Children are exposed to new words every day. They hear new words on television and in music. They see new words on a TV screen and in print in a book or magazine or comic. When they know the words they are reading or hearing, their learning is advanced. However, each word that is unknown stalls the child’s understanding and too many unknown words push the child backwards in the economy of learning.

The size of a child’s vocabulary is argumentative. The number of words that a child should comprehend depends upon the source of the research. The common truth in all vocabulary studies indicates one universal, however – vocabulary and background knowledge are required for continued learning, and, a stronger vocabulary and a richer background knowledge have immediate and real benefits for advanced learning.

Increasing a child’s vocabulary and background knowledge increases their readiness for new learning. Jeremiah just found the greatest beaver pond in the Rockies! (This does not make any sense if you are not aware of the character played by Robert Redford in a cult escape movie from forty years ago – background knowledge enriches our metaphors.)

Summer vacation is a perfect time for parents to increase the currency of their child’s education. The absence of grade level instruction in June, July and August means that every word a child learns that is relevant to the next grade level of instruction is a bonus. Each word and every family of words gives the child an advantage in their new learning in September.

What to do:

Add 1,000 words to your child’s vocabulary this summer. One thousand sounds like a large number but it is not. It is approximately ten words each summer day. It is two word families each week counting all of the ways in which a word is used, making a noun into a verb or an adjective or an adverb. It is 250 words with two synonyms and two antonyms for each word. Adding 1,000 words can mean the difference between a child being ready for new learning on the first day or playing catch up for months.

Talk with your children. Talk to them about meaningful things. Talk about what you did at work each day and let them hear the vocabulary that is important to you and the ways in which you provide for them. Use the words that are unique to what you do. Children really do want to know “what my mom or dad does at work.” Talk about real, local things like road improvements and the price of groceries and gas and that your lawn needs more rain or suffers from too much rain. Tell them they “whys and what fors” of repairing potholes and resurfacing beaten up streets and how the price of a gallon of gas is increased by “middle men.” Talk about the weather, they experience it every day so give them the words to understand what weather is. Children want and need to hear their adult’s thoughts and learn the words that adults use.

• Conversations: What I did today at work. What problems I had at work today and how I dealt with each problem. What I saw on my way to work and from work to home and what do I think about what I saw. What I bought today and what I think about my purchases. What the things we need cost and why things cost what they do. Explain the differences between gasoline, engine oil, diesel fuel and kerosene. Explain what might happen if you mistakenly substitute one of these for another.
• Conversations: Point at and name birds and small animals around the home. Use exact words to describe a bird’s beak and plumage and nesting and male and female appearances. Point at and talk about squirrels and chipmunks and ground squirrels and voles. Explain the differences between pets and varmints.

Use but don’t abuse electronic devices. If allowed their choice, my grandchildren will grab my I-pads and burrow into their electronic games for hours. They will play games on the Wii or PlayStation without needing adult supervision. Electronic devices have become the preferred pacifiers that keep children out of physical trouble and out of their adult’s way for hours on end. Electronic devices are for today’s children what television was for children in the 70s and 80s – free babysitting and child attention diverters.

• E-learning: I-pads also are wonderful learning aids. Along with games, load children’s books and magazines on your I-pad. Also, load word and math skill games. Balance a child’s time with an e-device between games and learning. Use the incentive of I-pad time to have a child read a story to you and your opportunity to help the child sound out and define new words.
• E-learning: Use the media. Listen, hear and read things that are made more important because they are E. Take a child’s enthusiasm and run with it.

Make a list of all the new words learned over a summer’s time. Children like to quantify things in their life. Numbering and listing things helps them to make sense of what they encounter. Just listen to a child’s talk when she is by herself and notice how often she counts or groups and regroups the things around her. Make and keep a list of words and meanings of words. Writing them down reinforces a child’s mental retention of the words and makes it more likely that they child will use and reuse the word or words that have similar meaning

• Whose list: The child should create the list writing new words on it each day. This is not your list.
• Whose list: Create your own list of new words you learn. Demonstrate that everyone, not just school-age children, learns new words. Post your list next to your child’s list.

A day that an adult tarries in his or her learning, is a day of new learning that an adult loses.