COURSE CODE IDIS002: CRITICAL THINKING IN THE REAL WORLD

Keep this document. Read it carefully. Consult it before asking questions

about what you are supposed to do.

Instructors

John Williams, SOSS, ext 0209 Room 0458 SOSS johnwilliams@smu.edu.sg

Mark Nowacki, SOSS, ext 0869 Room 4061 SOSS nowacki@smu.edu.sg
Steven Burik, SOSS, ext 0866 Room 4059 SOSS stevenburik@smu.edu.sg
Tan Yoo Guan, SOSS, ext 0851 Room 4062 SOSS ygtan@smu.edu.sg

1. Introduction

a. Course Description

You give reasons for what you do and think every day. You argue. You often
argue about things that matter to you. For example you might argue that you are
the best candidate for promotion, about whether your company should invest in
China, about the best way to help a friend or about what the right thing to do is in
an ethical dilemma. The list is up to you. Increasingly in the 21 st job market, you
will need to think straight about any issue, even those unfamiliar to you. Recent
surveys indicate that the most important skills employers are looking for are
critical thinking and problem solving skills. We will teach you how to get better at
reasoning and arguing in a way that can be applied to any subject matter.

Topics covered include evaluating arguments, constructing arguments,

reconstructing arguments, formalizing arguments, clarifying meaning and
identifying common mistakes in argument (fallacies). At the end of the course
you should be able to (1) identify the structures of real-life arguments in order to
decide if they are good or bad, and (2) argue logically about things that matter to
you. This course is specifically designed to improve writing, thinking and oral
presentation skills that are applicable to all areas of academic study and relevant
to working life. Careful application in this course will deepen your capacity to
critically evaluate everyday practical scenarios and will help you ‘think outside the
box’.

b. Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course you will:

(1) Acquire several formal tools useful for effective decision making
(2) Strengthen your ability to clarify confusing ideas, texts, and situations
(3) Develop your ability to present clearly and persuasively
(4) Increase your ability to plan ahead and exercise reliable judgment
(5) Increase your mental agility and adaptability
(6) Improve your effectiveness in arguing for and developing a position

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2. Assessment

Online Mid-Term Exam 30%

Group Presentation 20%
Written Assignment 15%
Class Participation 15%
Group Project 20%

3. Exercises

There are no graded exercises. However, in the Online Learning Centre of

McGrawHill’s website for the textbook of this course, there is a section full of self-
study exercises and answers and explanations organized in segments that go
with each chapter. This website is important and should be visited weekly. Click
on the url found on the back cover of the textbook.

Since later skills build upon earlier ones, it is important to not to neglect
exercises for a particular class and to attempt the exercises in the same
sequence as corresponding classes. You should feel free to consult your TA with
any help you may need. We expect you to attempt these exercises as we will
sometimes go through them with you in class.

4. Video Classes

All materials for a class will be posted in eLearn before that class. Some of our
classes will be videos, in which your instructor will go through a PowerPoint
presentation. You can see which these are in 12. Course Schedule, below. You
are expected to study the video carefully before class. In the class we will recap
the topic, answer questions and perhaps go through the exercises with you. The
videos will be posted in eLearn.

5. Online Mid-Term Exam (30% of final grade)

This is an online examination held at the beginning of week 9, which will test the
material covered so far in the course. We will give you a format of the mid-term
exercise showing the topics to be covered by section, with the allocation of
marks, and sample questions and answers, in week 7. In weeks 10 or 11 we will
give you the answers. Should you need explanations of these, consult your TA
first.

6. Group Presentation on Fallacies (20% of final grade)

These are team research projects. Your TA will organize you randomly into ten
teams. Students who are not presenting are expected to participate in the

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discussion that follows the presentation. Each team shall research and then
teach the class, three fallacies from the list of eighteen below. Your TA will
assign the fallacies to the teams later on.

Fallacies of Irrelevance
Appeal to pity
Appeal to popularity
Argument against the person (Abusive, You Too, and Circumstantial)
Straw man
Missing the point (not covered by the textbook, so research is needed)
Red herring
Appeal to ignorance
Rejecting the conclusion of a bad argument

Fallacies of Weak Induction

Hasty generalization (Small Sample and Biased Sample)
Appeal to unqualified authority
False cause (After This, So Because of This; With This, So Because of
This; and Mistaken Cause)
Causal slippery slope

Fallacies of Presumption
Begging the question (by Omission of premise, by Restatement, and by
Circular chain)
Complex question
False dichotomy (by Overlooking Alternatives and by Overlapping
Alternatives)

Miscellaneous Fallacies
Equivocation
Composition and division
Fallacy of accident
Semantic slippery slope
Missing comparative
Exception proves the rule
Weak analogy
Suppressing information

Each team will take 20 minutes to teach three fallacies. Allow some time for
feedback and Q&A from the class. You must take the theory from the course
textbook and give new, novel examples of these fallacies, not from the course
textbook but from other textbooks (acceptable) as imagined (better) or as found
in real passages (best). Looking in the web is usually a bad idea, as much of the
material there is poor or unreliable. You should get the class involved. You may
give a quiz. The presentation must be serious and with no frills. No skits or fancy
graphics. There is no dress code.

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In the BC area of the Library (shelves of books the call numbers of which start
with ‘BC’) are whole shelves of books on reasoning, argument and critical
thinking. This is more reliable than much of what is on the web, which is usually a
mix of good, bad, ugly and boring.

After you have given your presentation you may take three days to make any
improvements before sending them to your TA to be posted on eLearn for the
rest of the class.

Assessment: A mark of up to 10% will be awarded to the team as a whole for

content and quality of presentation while each team member will be judged
separately by the same criteria for the other 10%. Teams who are not presenting
will give feedback on the quality of presentation (details to be explained in week
7)

7. Written Assignment (15 % of final grade)

The written assignment consists of an evaluative essay that discusses the

application of the critical thinking skills learned in this course to the student’s
individual life. Students are to assess the impact of the critical thinking course for
their further studies, career path, and their life in general. This essay will be
around a 1000 words and should argue how critical thinking skills may be useful
for the student in real life.

8. Class Participation (15 % of final grade)

Class participation marks: 10% for general participation during the entire course,
to be decided by your instructor, and including online participation in discussions,
and 5% to be earned during the fallacy presentations, where you will have to
provide feedback on the presentations of the other groups.

9. Group Project (20% of final grade)

Project Poster Presentations

The project is to put into practice some of the critical thinking skills that we have
learned in this course. Your group will need to identify a real life case of critical
thinking lapse or mistake, be it in an official or business setting, or in a
newspaper article or elsewhere. Your group will then analyze what went wrong in
this instance of critical thinking lapse, and offer suggestions to remedy the
situation in reality. Your group will then present your case and possible solutions
in a poster presentation in week 13. Assessment will take place during the poster
presentation and will be done according to the strength of your case, your
analysis of the lapse of thought, and your offered solution(s).

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10. Consultation

The TA is the first line of support when seeking consultation. In the event that this
is exhausted, you may email your instructor questions or email a request for a
consultation. Consultations are in your instructor’s room as shown above. You
must in all correspondence, give your full name (as matriculated) and your
group number. You may also attend the weekly one-hour open consultation
session held by the TAs, starting in week 3. Your TA will announce the time and
venue by email.

11. Textbook

T. Brian Mooney, John N. Williams, and Steven Burik: An Introduction to Critical

and Creative Thinking: Analyzing and Evaluating Ordinary Language Reasoning
(McGraw-Hill 2015). Available in BookLink.

For information about financial assistance for textbooks see:

http://www.smu.edu.sg/about/financial/financial-assistance-schemes

12. Course Schedule

Week Topics Learning Chapters Activities/Assessments

Objectives
1 - Introduction to 1, 2 1 Group activity: Collect
Argument and essay titles
Reasoning

- Definitions 10

2 - Argument 1, 2, 6 2 Group activity: defining

Video Structure (Arrow key terms in essay titles
Class Diagrams 1)

3 - Evaluating 1, 2, 6 3 Website exercises

Inferences

4 - Argument 1, 2, 6 4 Website exercises

Video Structure
Class (Arrow Diagrams
2)

5 - Forms of 1, 4, 6 5 Website exercises

Video Argument
Class (Deduction &

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 Induction)

- Soundness &
Cogency

6 - Categorical 1, 4, 6 8 Group activity:

Video Syllogisms (Venn translating normal
Class Diagrams) language to Logical
language
- Translating
arguments into Website exercises
categorical
syllogisms

7 - Translating 2, 3, 5, 6 6 Group activity:

logical translating Logical
language/technical language to normal
terms into plain language
English

- Argument How to write an

Construction argumentative essay

8 Recess
9 - Presentations: 3, 4, 5 7 Group presentations
Fallacies 1
Class Participation by
giving feedback

Online Midterm Exam in

beginning of this week
10 - Presentations: 3, 4, 5 7 Group presentations
Fallacies 2
Class Participation by
giving feedback

11 - Communication 3, 5, 6 Group activities:

Skills - Presentation
preparation
- Q&A Session - Project preparation
with Discussion of
Presentations and
Project

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12 - Examples of 2, 4, 5, 6 11 - Case Studies
applications of
Critical Thinking
Skills in real life

- Preparation for - Group discussion and

Project project preparation

13 - Argument 2, 5, 6 Group activity: Analysing

Reconstruction and evaluating real life
and Evaluation examples of
argumentative texts

- Poster Group Poster

Presentations Presentations of Projects

14 Revision
15 Submission of 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
Written
Assignment

13. Make-up Dates

Make-up dates for any public holidays will be announced at the start of the
course.

14. Only One Ground Rule: Phones switched off. Strictly enforced!

15. Academic Integrity

All acts of academic dishonesty (including, but not limited to, plagiarism,
cheating, fabrication, facilitation of acts of academic dishonesty by others,
unauthorized possession of exam questions, or tampering with the academic
work of other students) are serious offences.

All work (whether oral or written) submitted for purposes of assessment must be
the student’s own work. Penalties for violation of the policy range from zero
marks for the component assessment to expulsion, depending on the nature of
the offense.

When in doubt, students should consult the instructors of the course. Details on
the SMU Code of Academic Integrity may be accessed at
http://www.smuscd.org/resources.html.

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16. Accessibility and Accommodations

SMU strives to make learning experiences accessible for all. If you anticipate or
experience physical or academic barriers due to disability, please let me know
immediately. You are also welcome to contact the university's disability support
team if you have questions or concerns about academic accommodations:
included@smu.edu.sg

END