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Amnesty: More Than A Word
Ever yelled "fire!" in a crowded theater? Don’t. It’ll probably get you arrested.
Because language can inspire emotions (panic!) in addition to conveying information
(the building is on fire), we have to be careful not to let words do our thinking
for us. This lesson will teach students to identify when emotive terms, in this
case "amnesty," alter their perceptions and obscure the facts. They will look at
advertisements about immigration and analyze polling data that show how the word
"amnesty" affected public perceptions.
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Background Beliefs
When two people have radically different background beliefs (or worldviews), they
often have difficulty finding any sort of common ground. In this lesson, students
will learn to distinguish between the two different types of background beliefs:
beliefs about matters of fact and beliefs about values. Students will work to go
beyond specific arguments to consider the worldviews that might underlie different
types of arguments.
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Building a Better Argument
Whether it’s an ad for burger chains, the closing scene of a "Law & Order" spinoff,
a discussion with the parents about your social life or a coach disputing a close
call, arguments are an inescapable part of our lives. In this lesson, students will
learn to create good arguments by getting a handle on the basic structure. The lesson
will provide useful tips for picking out premises and conclusions and for analyzing
the effectiveness of arguments.
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Combating the Culture of Corruption
It's a classic film concept: the idealistic new senator heads to Washington where
he finds that his hero is accepting bribes. Now, the Democratic National Committee
claims that presumptive Republican nominee Sen. John McCain is the villain, not
the hero. Students will dig into a recent bribery scandal to assess McCain’s real
role in the culture of corruption.
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Death and Taxes
Did you know the government taxes dead people? Did you know John McCain wants it
to continue? Well, actually, he doesn’t. But that didn’t stop the anti-tax group
Club for Growth from saying otherwise. The ad contains a claim that may be literally
true, but misleads the viewer by omitting crucial information. This lesson examines
the ways in which the unscrupulous can use charged language to mislead casual readers.
Students will dig beneath the loaded language to assess the truth of these claims.
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Dubious Adoption Data
Maybe numbers don’t lie, but they can certainly be folded, spindled, turned inside
out and refashioned to support a different conclusion. In this lesson, students
will analyze a graph from the New York City Administration for Children’s Services
showing a significant increase in New York City adoptions after ACS was founded.
They’ll see how the statistics were manipulated to show these results, and will
learn to keep an open mind about statistical proofs and to analyze numbers for themselves.
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Everything You Know Is Wrong
1: Us and Them
Humans aren't instinctively good reasoners — most of the time, the way our brains
work isn’t rational at all. This lesson, the first of two, focuses on the ways that
people define themselves and others—how we develop our personal and group identities,
how we treat people whose identities are similar or different, and how this affects
our ability to reason.
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Everything You Know
is Wrong 2: Beliefs and Behavior
Humans aren't instinctively good reasoners — most of the time, the way our brains
work isn’t rational at all. This lesson, the second of two, focuses on how people
reconcile their beliefs with the world around them, even when the evidence doesn’t
seem to agree with those beliefs.
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Facts of the Union
It's morning again in America! Jobs are plentiful, the deficit is shrinking, we're
reducing our dependence on foreign oil, and all our children are above average.
At least that's the impression you might have come away with if you watched President
Bush's 2007 State of the Union address. The facts are a little more complicated,
and the picture not always as rosy. This lesson provides students with a starting
point for examining some of the issues Bush laid out in his address.
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Health Care Hooey
In the hotly contested 2008 presidential election, one ad from Democrat Barack Obama
created the perfect storm of election themes, accusing Republican John McCain of
planning to increase taxes on your health care. But the ad used outdated sources
to justify its claims. In this lesson, students will draw on independent experts
to determine the accuracy of Sen. Obama’s charge.
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Made in the U.S.A.
American companies are shipping many jobs overseas. Democratic presidential candidate
John Edwards wants to stop U.S. companies from moving jobs offshore, and a group
called Working 4 Working Americans ran an ad in support of his plan. But the story
the ad tells doesn’t quite give the whole picture. In this lesson, students will
examine the facts behind this potentially misleading ad.
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Monty
Python and the Quest for the Perfect Fallacy
If you weigh the same as a duck, then, logically, you’re made of wood and must be
a witch. Or so goes the reasoning of Monty Python’s Sir Bedevere. Obviously something
has gone wrong with the knight’s logic – and by the end of this lesson, you’ll know
exactly what that is. This lesson focuses on 10 fallacies that represent the most
common mistakes in reasoning.
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Oil Exaggerations
Ever notice how political speeches and ads always mention "the worst," "the best,"
"the largest," "the most"? It’s effective to use superlatives, but it isn’t always
accurate. For instance, President Barack Obama has said that "we import more oil
today than ever before" – but do we? How can you find out? What do the numbers really
mean? And why would he say it if it wasn’t true? In this lesson, students will weigh
Obama’s superlative claim against the facts.
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Olly Olly Oxen Free!
In a game of hide-and-seek, it's easy to determine what spots are "safe." But in
debates about undocumented immigrants, the concept of sanctuary is more controversial.
This lesson focuses on an argument between former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney
and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani over New York’s alleged status as a
sanctuary city for illegal immigrants. Students will explore the meaning of the
term "sanctuary city" and determine whether New York City ought to be considered
one. Download pdf
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PETA Pressure
Politicians, advertisers and others with something to sell choose words and images
that will appeal to their target audience, enticing them to accept claims unquestioningly.
Some of these manipulators, like the animal activism site peta2.com, focus their
attentions on teenagers and young adults. In this lesson, students won’t check peta2’s
factual accuracy, but will learn to spot their manipulative tactics and why they
should be skeptical about them.
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Pump It
Remember the good old days, back in January 2007, when gas cost just $2.20 per gallon?
According to presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain, gas prices
are high because some politicians still oppose lifting a ban on offshore oil drilling.
But McCain’s ad leaves out some basic facts about offshore drilling. In this lesson,
students will examine the facts behind McCain’s false connections.
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Sins of Omission
Politicians can exploit complexity to misrepresent their own opinions or those of
their opponents, making issues seem cut and dried when, in fact, they’re anything
but. In this lesson, students look at some claims made by presidential candidate
John McCain about his Democratic opponent, Barack Obama. In evaluating whether these
claims are accurate, they will see the importance of researching context and learn
to be on the lookout for fallacies that exploit incomplete knowledge.
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Survey Says…
We often rely on polls and surveys to take the temperature of the population. But
depending on how the polls are constructed and conducted, we might end up with misleading
answers. This lesson examines two polls that asked Iraqis about the quality of life
in their country, one which showed an alarmingly negative outlook and one a more
positive assessment. Students will look at the conclusions offered by the organizations
that sponsored the polls and their methodologies.
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Suspect Sources at the Republican
Debate
Job growth is a stunning 17 times higher in America than it is in Europe. Perhaps
that’s because Americans are all working as tax preparers, something they spend
$140 billion a year on. Those "facts" are according to former Massachusetts Gov.
Mitt Romney and Sen. John McCain of Arizona. And they even had sources for their
numbers. Unfortunately, those sources aren’t actually very good. In this lesson,
students will cross-check the candidates’ claims against available data. They will
then question whether bias may explain the conflicting data.
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The Battle of the Experts
When we hear a piece of information that surprises us, we often react by saying,
"Where’d you hear that?" It’s a good question, and one we should ask more often,
because some sources are better – sometimes much better – than others. In this lesson,
students will learn to distinguish between credible and not-so-credible types of
sources. They’ll explore the biases of different sources and develop tools for detecting
bias. Download
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The Credibility Challenge
The Internet can be a rich and valuable source of information – and an even richer
source of misinformation. Sorting out the valuable claims from the worthless ones
is tricky, since at first glance a Web site written by an expert can look a lot
like one written by your next-door neighbor. This lesson offers students background
and practice in determining authority on the Internet – how to tell whether an author
has expertise or not, and whether you’re getting the straight story.
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The Language of Deception
It’s a phased withdrawal, not a retreat. Except that the terms actually mean the
same thing. But "retreat" sounds much worse, so politicians avoid using it. That’s
because they understand that there is a difference between the cognitive (or literal)
meaning and the emotive meaning of a word. This lesson examines the ways in which
terms that pack an emotional punch can add power to a statement – and also ways
in which emotive meanings can be used to mislead, either by doing the reader’s thinking
for him or by blinding her to the real nature of the issue.
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U.S. Generals…Support the Draft
Rumors of the return of the draft abound. Those rumors are especially scary when
they seem to originate from U.S. military commanders. This lesson examines an advertisement
sponsored by Americans Against Escalation in Iraq asserting that military officials
plan to continue the war in Iraq for an additional 10 years and that that plan will
require reinstating the draft. Students will examine whether quotations from Gen.
David Petraeus and Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute really do support AAEI's claims.
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Wikiality
Despite its founder's stated views that Wikipedia provides "good enough" knowledge,
students keep using it – and teachers keep giving out Fs. This lesson illustrates
the potential pitfalls of Wikipedia. Drawing on two controversies – Stephen Colbert’s
on-air altering of his own entry and his call for viewers to alter a second entry,
and the false biography of John Seigenthaler – students will discuss the ease with
which false or misleading information can be added to Wikipedia, and they’ll search
Wikipedia entries for inaccuracies.
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