事実と意見を超えて: 学術的な主張や論文の作成

Students who have already mastered the concept of fact vs. opinion still may have trouble differentiating between those kinds of statements and strong academic claims. A compelling claim is the foundation of a good thesis statement, and a good thesis is the foundation of a great paper. Still, lots of students struggle with making a claim that is compelling, rigorous, interesting, and defensible. 

In this class, we will briefly review the concept of fact vs. opinion, emphasizing that facts can be proven with evidence and are agreed upon by pretty much everyone, whereas opinions are subjective truths that vary from person to person. You can present "evidence" for an opinion, too, but it is usually rooted in personal preference. 

Then, we will get to the main focus of the class: how academic claims are different from both of these other categories!

Claims must be provable with facts, but they also need to be debatable--someone reasonable should be able to argue the "other side." 

We will use lots of examples in this class and focus on examples that come from the students' interests. We will also work together on taking facts and opinions about topics we are interested in and turning them into effective claims. 

Instruction will include: 
-Welcome & discussion about student interests
-Screen-shared slideshow with definitions and and examples of class concepts
-Collaborative brainstorming activities
-Sharing our claims with each other and providing feedback on the claims we've developed; opportunities to revise claims
-Conversation about applying these skills to writing academic papers