PHIL 40 - Introduction to Logic: Critical Thinking - Stage 4 - Stephan Johnson

Assessment

Assessment Methods

Analysis of exam, quiz, or homework items linked to specific SLOs

Assessment DescriptionMajor Learning Outcomes Assessment

Philosophy 40

The following outcomes have been identified as major for this course. As a means of determining your proficiency in these outcomes, we are administering the following short quiz. This quiz is to be taken anonymously and will not count for or against your grade. It’s purely a means for us to determine how these outcomes are being taught.

Outcomes Assessed:

A. Demonstrate a grasp of the concepts of validity, soundness, as well as inductive strength and weakness in the evaluation of arguments as a whole.

B. Identify the common informal fallacies and diagnose their occurrences in both written and oral contexts.

Quiz

On your Scantron sheet, bubble in the correct answer to each of the following questions:

1. If you have a valid argument with a false conclusion then you know that:

a. all of the premises must be true

b. none of the premises can be true

c. at least one of the other premises must be false

d. none of the above

2. Which of the following is true of any inductively strong argument?

a. it can be made valid with the addition of a single premise

b. it is necessarily valid

c. it’s conclusion must be true

d. it’s conclusion must be false

3. The passage below commits which informal fallacy?

"The belief in God is universal. After all, everyone believes in God."

a. Ad Hominem

b. Appeal to Authority

c. Begging the Question

d. Slippery Slope

4. An ‘ad hominem attack’ is just a fancy way to say someone was insulted



a. True

b. False
Learning OutcomesOutcomes Assessed:

A. Demonstrate a grasp of the concepts of validity, soundness, as well as inductive strength and weakness in the evaluation of arguments as a whole.

B. Identify the common informal fallacies and diagnose their occurrences in both written and oral contexts.
Number of Sections2
Number of Instructors2
Number of Students149

Data Analysis

Data Shared With

Instructors of the same course (at CCSF)

Data Sharing Methods
  • Face-to-face meetings
  • Email
Data SummaryQuestion 1: 71% answered correctly

Question 1: 58% answered correctly

Question 3: 64% answered correctly

Question 4: 53% answered correctly
Analysis SummaryWe believe these results demonstrate adequate student success on these outcomes.
Next Steps PlannedWe will try to focus more on Informal Fallacies where student success seemed the lowest. We will also put more effort into clearly communicating the definitions of Validity and Inductive Strength.
Learning OutcomesALL

Tentative Future Plans

TermFall 2013
Activities
  • Revision of outcomes and assessment methods (measurements)
  • Assessment (measurement) of outcomes
  • Analysis and discussion of assessment data and next steps
  • Implementation of planned changes and reassessment
More DetailsWe are planning on spending more course time on the Informal Fallacies, including perhaps additional assignments on them.

In addition we are planning on spending more time on the definitions of Validity and Inductive Strength.

SLO Details Storage Location

ELECTRONIC COPY - In my electronic filing system (hard drive or web server)

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