- studies have shown they improve students' critical thinking
- "…focuses on certain sub-class of relationships"
- limits items that can be mapped 
-  "…arguments have boundaries"
    - "…all reasons have to be grounded" 
    - "…grounds are presented as terminal 'basis' boxes for assumptions" and are evaluated for plausibility

Syracuse University

- "… allows students to display inferential connections between propositions and contentions, and to evaluate them in terms of validity of argument structure and the soundness of argument premises"
- relatively recent innovation (2000)
- analyzes inferential structure of arguments 
- key feature: "…inferences between whole propositions"
- "...interested in the inferential basis for a claim being defended and not the causal or other associative relationships between the main claim and other claims"

Argument Mapping

Davies, M. (2011). Concept mapping, mind mapping and argument mapping: what are the differences and do they matter?. Higher education, 62(3), 279-301.

Concept mapping, mind mapping and argument mapping: what are the differences and do they matter?

- premises: philosopher's sense of statements
- conclusions: claims 

1- "at the first level of the argument there is the contention"

2- followed by a supporting claim and objection 

3- "…supported by more claims of support or objection, which become rebuttals when they are objections to objections…"

4 – "…basis boxes which provide defense for the terminal claims are provided at the end of the argument tree"

-"… Objections and rebuttals to objections can be added at any point in the map"
- basis boxes require evidence

Constructing an Argument Map

Advantages of Argument Maps

- "… does not capture looser, more tangential relationships…"
- "…can assume that students have a sufficiently clear understanding of a topic or issue and the precise nature of the task at hand"

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