English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Free Plan

"For we let our young men and women go out unarmed in a day when armor was never so necessary. By teaching them all to read, we have left them at the mercy of the printed word. By the invention of the film and the radio, we have made certain that no aversion to reading shall secure them from the incessant battery of words, words, words. They do not know what the words mean; they do not know how to ward them off or blunt their edge or fling them back; they are a prey to words in their emotions instead of being the masters of them in their intellects..." Dorothy Sayers, "The Lost Tools of Learning", speech at Oxford, 1947. Dorothy Sayers' lamentation is as relevant as ever. As we go deeper and deeper into the "Information Revolution" our students face an ever increasing variety of channels of information. Due to their unrestricted nature, however, these sources of information are more often than not conflicting, partial, biased, and distorting (Stanford Persuasive Technology Lab, 2004). Thus, instead of utilizing this abundant information to produce better informed students, we often find that students are unable to distinguish true from false, separate fact from fiction, identify the underlying motives, and reach sound and reasoned opinions (Lighthall & Haycock, 1997; Rothenberg, 1997). In order to cope with today's multiplicity of information sources and promote development of learned and informed students, instruction in critical reading and logical reasoning is of paramount importance (Fitzgerald, 2005). In the present work we describe a high school course designed to provide students with applied logical tools. Currently, high school students are not typically offered instruction in logical reasoning, and must instead wait to gain these tools in college. (In this paper we use the term 'college' as it is used in the USA, namely, to describe tertiary education). In our opinion, high school constitutes an appropriate age-range and educational context in which to teach logical skills; delaying such instruction until college simply prolongs - if not perpetuates - the aforementioned problems. The content of the course in question takes into account student age and, accordingly, should place strong emphasis on practice and application alongside theory. In addition, we take into account two primary academic orientations, differentiating between social sciences and exact sciences. In light of this distinction, the course was designed to include several chapters whose contents depend on academic orientation. More broadly, this course was part of a two-year program of a comprehensive study and understanding of logical and concept based systems. The logic program covered different topics in modern logic and its application. These topics were divided into the following modules: logical reasoning and deductions, Boolean algebra and digital systems, inductions, paradoxes, and computation. The course that we describe in this paper was the first year course of the program. It fully covered the first module (logical reasoning and deductions) and most of the second module (Boolean algebra). In addition, it served as an introduction to the other modules of the program. Throughout the course we focused on motivating the students to understand the importance of acquiring applied logical skills. Literature Review This paper is directly related to two fields of research: education of applied logic and information technology. Modern logic has emerged in the twentieth century (see Gabbay & Woods, 2004, for a historical review). It was the theoretical force that drove Turing's (1936) seminal work that laid the foundation for computing science. Our course includes theoretical computing issues such as the Theorem of Incompleteness, The Halting Problem, and NP Problems (Boolos & Jeffrey, 1974; Lewis & Papadimitriou, 1981). Modern logic is also applied in the field of critical thinking, and its importance is manifested in the existence of numerous critical reading textbooks and other printed sources (e. …

Teaching High School Students Applied Logical Reasoning