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Teaching in Higher Education

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Teaching and Assessing Critical

Thinking Abilities as Outcomes
in an Informal Logic Course
Polycarp Ikuenobe
Published online: 25 Aug 2010.

To cite this article: Polycarp Ikuenobe (2001) Teaching and Assessing Critical Thinking
Abilities as Outcomes in an Informal Logic Course, Teaching in Higher Education, 6:1,
19-32, DOI: 10.1080/13562510020029572

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 Teaching in Higher Education, Vol. 6, No. 1, 2001

Teaching and Assessing Critical

Thinking Abilities as Outcomes in
an Informal Logic Course
POLYCARP IKUENOBE
Department of Philosophy, Kent State University, Kent, OH 44240, USA
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ABSTRACT I provide a theoretical framework to show that courses in informal logic can be
taught developmentally to focus on a critical thinking practical component. However, efforts
must be made to state clear outcomes, such that the content and processes of the course are
tailored to achieve the outcomes, and clear criteria are provided for students’ learning and
assessment of their performance. This framework is an attempt to respond indirectly to the
distinction between informal logic and critical thinking, and the concern that informal logic
courses only teach abstract principles of reasoning and do not focus on requisite critical thinking
abilities, which are contextualised to subject matter. I suggest a plausible connection between
critical thinking and informal logic: that learning logical principles of reasoning is necessary, but
not sufŽ cient to think critically; there is an extra element which involves learning to apply the
principles to various contexts.

Introduction
I describe a theoretical framework for teaching and assessing critical thinking
abilities as outcomes in an informal logic course, with emphasis on helping students
to acquire, develop, demonstrate and apply the requisite abilities. This is an attempt
to respond to the concern that critical thinking abilities are not sufŽ ciently taught
and acquired in an informal logic course. As a framework, it is general,  exible and
adaptable to suit different pedagogical needs. How the requisite outcomes are
achieved depends on the instructor’s approach and assessment tools. This frame-
work neither describes an actual course nor reports how a course has actually
achieved certain outcomes. It has the following features:

1. The ‘traditional’ way of teaching informal logic usually does not focus on
outcomes, in terms of abilities that students need to acquire, develop, demon-
strate and apply. So, students usually cannot consistently apply the course content
to real life and substantive subject matter. If they are able to achieve the requisite
outcomes at all, it is mostly fortuitous, in the sense that they are not conscious
of their abilities and have not made a conscious effort to apply them to achieve
the requisite outcomes.

ISSN 1356-2517 (print)/ISSN 1470-1294 (online)/01/010019-14 Ó 2001 Taylor & Francis Ltd
DOI: 10.1080/13562510020029572
 20 P. Ikuenobe

2. With focus on outcomes, an informal logic course is taught as a set of abstract

and practical principles of reasoning. The practical components and outcomes
help students to learn the relevance and applicability of the principles. It makes
explicit the criteria for assessing students and the connection between these
criteria, and the requisite abilities and outcomes.
3. It stresses the ability of students to be re ectively aware of their ‘knowledge’ and
abilities: this involves demonstrating what they have learned in ‘assessments’ in
part by a process of application.
4. It allows the requisite abilities to be taught ‘developmentally’ and ‘learned
inductively’ in a way similar to the scientiŽ c paradigm of acquiring knowledge:
students learn and develop the abilities on an incremental systematic basis.
Because the outcomes require students to learn to consistently apply and demon-
strate their abilities, working closely with students and multiple assessments are
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required.

Critical Thinking Abilities, Outcomes and Informal Logic

There is a keen interest in students acquiring abilities which they can apply. Such
complex liberal education abilities, which people have tried to capture by the notion
of critical thinking, involve writing, speaking, understanding, analysing, problem-
solving, re ecting, synthesising, evaluating, moral and practical reasoning, and
decision and judgment-making. Usually, courses in informal logic are offered by
departments of philosophy to meet this need. In recent years, many departments of
philosophy have been asked by curriculum committees in their respective universi-
ties to justify why they should continue to teach courses in informal logic as a
general liberal education requirement. Informal logic courses have been criticised as
not a plausible way to acquire critical thinking abilities, because they do not apply
the abstract principles of reasoning to substantive subject matter (McPeck, 1981). It
is claimed that usually, teachers of informal logic do not pay attention to how the
principles of reasoning are applied to the actual processes of reasoning and discourse
in various contexts. In McPeck’s (1981) view, knowledge of a subject matter is
required for critical thinking because thinking cannot be done in vacuum, but in the
context of a subject matter: critical thinking means thinking about X, where X is a
subject matter. In Robert Ennis’s view (1962), to teach critical thinking outside the
context of a subject matter is to concentrate on its logical component and ignore its
pragmatic or contextual component.
McPeck (1981) among other theorists has tried to distinguish between the
abstract logical principles of reasoning and practical critical thinking abilities.
However, some theorists (Siegel, 1988) also agree that some connection exists
between logic and critical thinking. This paper attempts to show indirectly that a
connection exists between informal logic and critical thinking: that the logical
principles of reasoning are necessary for critical thinking but they are not sufŽ cient.
According to Irving Copi (1986), ‘the study of logic is the study of the methods and
principles used to distinguish good (correct) from bad (incorrect) reasoning’ (p. 3).
It also involves learning strategies, and abilities for assessing and evaluating argu-
 Teaching and Assessing Critical Thinking Abilities 21

ments in substantive discourse. Those who distinguish between logic and critical
thinking argue that critical thinking is a set of integrative, complex, and applicable
abilities in the context of a subject matter. According to Paul (1982), critical
thinking in the ‘strong sense’ involves the ability to see, and critically engage issues
and problems as a network. He argues that critical thinking requires that we reason,
and see issues from a global, contextual, historical world views of multi-cultural,
ethnic, racial, gender and class perspectives. This will help people to understand
substantive discourses, points of view, issues and beliefs, as shaped by race, culture,
gender, religion, class and the context of the world we live in. This stance about the
factors that shape reasoning is plausible; hence, I see the need to teach informal logic
as a set of abstract principles, which is applicable as critical thinking abilities.
This requires a framework which calls for a new approach and new thinking in
the pedagogy of informal logic, and creativity on the part of a teacher to articulate
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clear teaching outcomes and criteria for assessing achievements. My framework

which does this is grounded in the idea that logical principles of reasoning can be
learned as outcomes of cognitive abilities that may be acquired inductively and
developmentally. Critical thinking has therefore been conceptualised to involve,
The entire range of what is generally called ‘cognitive skill development’ …
[where] the student learns to analyze problems, situations, issues, ideas,
substances, or process in a manner which is primarily inductive. In develop-
ing an understanding of anything as a whole, a student must learn to
observe the individual parts and their relationship to one another. General-
izations about meaning or signiŽ cance are possible only after this careful
consideration has been undertaken. (Alverno College, 1992, p. 19.)
This conceptualisation represents a developmental and inductive process of knowl-
edge acquisition, learning and testing our beliefs. A common view of induction is
that it is a process of moving from premises to conclusion such that the information
content of the conclusion is ‘more than’ the information content of the premises, hence
the premises only render the conclusion probable. This developmental process of
learning critical thinking is given credence by the fact that the strength of a
conclusion in inductive reasoning can improve with better information or evidence.
In a similar manner, abilities can improve with practice and more knowledge. The
plausibility of inductive method is given credence by the plausibility of the scientiŽ c
method. Theorists like McPeck (1981), Siegel (1988) and Ennis (1962), have tried
to use the scientiŽ c paradigm to captured the idea of critical thinking as a set of
complex cognitive abilities of rigorously inquiring about knowledge in order to use or
apply it. ScientiŽ c method involves formulating hypotheses and theories, testing
them, making generalisations and conŽ rming them based on observations. This
method is signiŽ cant because of its analytical rigor in testing and applicability.
In this regard, Scriven & Paul (1992) see critical thinking as the intellectual
disciplined and rigorous process of actively and skillfully conceptualising, applying,
synthesising, and evaluating ideas and information by a process of observation,
experience, re ection, reasoning or communication, and using the information as a
guide to one’s belief and action. What does this mean in terms of abilities? To make
 22 P. Ikuenobe

this general idea a bit more substantive, critical thinking may be broken down into
the following abilities that students must acquire, demonstrate and apply as critical
thinkers:
(1) analyse ideas and issues;
(2) evaluate and question knowledge and information;
(3) identify problems and Ž nd creative approaches to solving them;
(4) articulate, organize and express ideas;
(5) arrive at informed and reasoned judgement about issues expressed in various
works and texts.

Ennis (1962) also articulates the idea of these abilities into 12 substantive aspects of
critical thinking:
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(1) grasping the meaning of a statement;

(2) judging whether there is ambiguity in a line of reasoning;
(3) judging whether certain statements are contradictory;
(4) judging whether a conclusion follows necessarily;
(5) judging whether a statement is speciŽ c enough;
(6) judging whether a statement is actually the application of a principle;
(7) judging whether an observation statement is reliable;
(8) judging whether an inductive conclusion is warranted;
(9) judging whether a problem is identiŽ ed;
(10) judging whether something is an assumption;
(11) judging whether a deŽ nition is adequate;
(12) judging whether a statement made by an alleged authority is acceptable.

These abilities can be articulated as outcomes that students must achieve by

learning, demonstrating, applying the content of an informal logic course.
The following are also substantive outcomes that students would achieve in an
informal logic course, which represent the general idea of critical thinking abilities
articulated above:

1. Students are able to understand, articulate, and explain the concepts, notions,
ideas, beliefs, conceptual scheme, world views, principles and elements involved
in reasoning in general.
2. Students are able to use these ideas, concepts and principles, to understand and
identify different kinds and elements of reasoning in texts, their own actual
reasoning and that of others.
3. Students are able to understand, articulate, and explain the fundamental
principles underlying inductive and deductive forms of reasoning.
4. Students are able to understand, articulate, and explain the concepts and
principles underlying adequate and inadequate reasoning.
5. Students are able to use the principles they have learned to organise their own
reasoning in speaking, writing, actions, judgments and decision making;
6. Students are able to use the principles they have learned to identify errors and
strengths in reasoning in general.
 Teaching and Assessing Critical Thinking Abilities 23

8. Students are able to use the principles to evaluate and judge their own reason-
ing, as well as that of others in writing, speaking, texts, actions, judgments and
decision-making.
9. Students are able to use the principles to avoid bad reasoning and generate good
reasoning;
10. Students are able to use the principles in a broad context: to engage themselves
and others dialogically, and to re ect on and critically examine their conceptual
schemes, background beliefs, and world views in terms of how they affect their
perspectives and reasoning.

Teaching Critical Thinking Abilities in Informal Logic

The pertinent issue now is how to teach—in terms of content and process—an
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informal logic course, to achieve as outcomes the requisite critical thinking abilities.
I suggest that it be taught at Ž ve different developmental levels, with different
outcomes at each of the Ž ve levels. However, the outcomes at each level are
systematically incremental with a succeeding level building on a preceding level. The
outcomes in level one involve the ability to observe, recognise; and understand
simpler facts and concepts. To achieve this set of outcomes, the student learns how
to observe, perceive, recognise and understand accurately, facts, ideas and concepts
in the context of various subject matter. A plausible way to teach this aspect of
critical thinking is for students to learn how to understand and deŽ ne concepts, and
adequately place things or ideas in conceptual categories. They do this by learning
to identify main ideas and statements (declarative sentences as opposed to questions,
commands and exclamations, which do not state anything). They would also learn
the nature of propositions as components of argument, premises (facts and data),
conclusion, inference, issues, assumptions, implications and ideas. This involves
learning how to identify an author’s arguments and ideas, and that of other people
that an author refers to or criticises; how to identify the distinct and simpler ideas,
complex statements, ideas and arguments, arguments in favour and against.
This complex process of empirical observation is usually construed to be funda-
mentally inductive, rather than deductive. However observation could also be
construed otherwise and taught as a deductive process. Observation, identiŽ cation,
recognition, perception, comprehension and understanding are ‘theory laden’. An
observation is a deductive inference from our conceptual scheme, background and
meta-beliefs. The analysis of our experience or statement and determination of
whether we observe correctly are done by analysing conceptual schemes or world view
that we bring to bear on observations (Paul, 1982). The process of critical thinking
involves making critical connections among conceptual schemes, observed physical
objects, statements and the beliefs we hold. It also involves critically examining the
nature of conceptual schemes, world views, biases, presuppositions, prejudices, and
meta and background beliefs, and how they shape observations and understanding.
For instance, one’s ability to identify a physical object as a chair and make
statements about it suggests that one has the concept of a chair. Then one is able to
make the judgment that the physical object perceived ‘falls into the conceptual
 24 P. Ikuenobe

category’ of chair. If one’s concept of ‘chair’ is ‘correct’, and one’s statement about
the essential features of the physical object is correct, then as a conclusion, one’s
statement identifying the object as a chair, which involves placing it into a concep-
tual category, cannot be false. It follows necessarily from one’s premises—concept
and perceived features. The deductive reasoning underlying observing and identify-
ing a chair is as follows: anything with features X, Y, Z is a chair—X, Y, Z represent
its deŽ ning features. I see that the object S has X, Y, Z. Therefore, S is a chair.
This complex deductive reasoning process may be taught in an informal logic
course. The ability to observe correctly, recognise and identify arguments, state-
ments, ideas or objects involves the ability to grasp concepts and apply them.
Students need to learn the concept of an argument or reasoning as a systematic set
of propositions or ideas in which at least a proposition or idea acts as a support for
another. One is reasoning if one thinks of a plausible counter-argument against one’s
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own view or idea in a dialogical form (Paul, 1982). The process of engaging in a
critical dialogue with oneself or another person is a process of critical thinking by
which one arrives at a well reasoned position. This can be informed by teaching the
nature and application of argument analysis and evaluation in an informal logic
course. By learning that the observation process could be deductive, students are
able to critically re ect on their conceptual scheme, and how it affects their
observations, perspectives and judgements. Understanding the nature of concepts
and arguments in informal logic with respect to the ability to observe, identify and
recognise is important for critical thinking (Carey, 1999). They would learn to
distinguish among concepts, argument, explanation, illustration, description, exposi-
tion, report, opinion, warning and conditional statement (Hurley, 1999, pp. 14–25).
This will facilitate their reading, analysis and understanding of texts or discourse
because they will be able to isolate the different ‘logical aspects’ of the piece
(Loacker et al., 1984; Stratton, 1999).
At level 2 students should learn how to move inferentially from simple facts,
concepts and observations to a set of complex ideas, facts and concepts, which may
involve simple inductive generalizations and deductive inferences. They learn how to
draw inferences and understand their reasonableness by careful observations, recogni-
tion, and understanding of facts, ideas and concepts. They learn how to distinguish
between facts and inference, the evidence provided in support for statements, the
implications of a proposition and the assumptions underlying a belief. At this level
students learn how to make reasonable inferences by unpacking the notions of
‘reasonable’ and ‘inference’ in logical terms. Some who argue for a context depen-
dent view of critical thinking indicate that reasonable inference is context and
subject matter dependent, and it should not be taught in abstract logical terms. This
is unsatisfactory because it is necessary to have an objective set of rational standards
that can be rationally agreed on to unpack the notion of ‘reasonable inference’
(Hurley, 1999; Salmon, 1989). If what constitutes a ‘reasonable’ inference is not
couched in objective logical principles of reasoning, it would be difŽ cult for students
to learn the appropriate criteria that they can rely on. What constitutes a reasonable
inference is not context dependent because two people in the same discipline could
be at odds regarding the notion of a ‘reasonable’ inference.
 Teaching and Assessing Critical Thinking Abilities 25

Two researchers may not agree on a ‘reasonable inference’ that could be drawn
from a given set of data. If each person’s understanding of what constitutes a
reasonable inference is at odds with the other, the data will ‘pull them’ towards a
different conclusion. There are inferences which cut across disciplines, whose
reasonableness will need to be settled objectively on the basis of certain logical
canons of reasonableness (Carey, 1999; Hurley, 1999). The principles of reasoning
would be helpful in illuminating what constitutes reasonable inference with respect
to deductive and inductive reasoning, which can then be applied to substantive
issues and disciplines. Understanding the notion of ‘reasonable inference’ would
help students to begin to make meaning of signiŽ cant connections among various
ideas, views, issues, points, and their proofs, as discourses, thus avoiding the weak
sense of critical thinking and errors in identifying inferential links (Paul, 1982).
Students sometimes see inferential links and meaningful connections—and what
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they think are reasonable ones for that matter—among ideas and statements where
none exists. When asked to provide evidence for a statement, they provide another
statement which has no evidential link or connection.
Students need to properly grasp the concepts of ‘evidence’, ‘inference’, ‘eviden-
tial link’, ‘meaningful connections’ and ‘reasonableness’. We may teach critical
thinking skills at level 2 by assisting students to understand the elements that could
vitiate the reasonableness of an inference. They are systematically introduced to the
concepts of ‘validity’, ‘truth of statements’ and ‘soundness’ regarding deductive
reasoning, ‘strength of evidence’ and ‘cogency’ regarding inductive reasoning, the
nature of fallacies, both informal and formal (Carey, 1999; Hurley, 1999; Stratton,
1999). The notion of soundness would require students to think critically about
arguments and perspectives in the context of subject matter and reality, with respect
to determining what is true. In doing so, students learn how to avoid certain pitfalls
and fallacies in order to make a ‘reasonable inference’. They learn the principles for
evaluating and thinking critically about other people’s reasoning, in order to arrive
at well-informed conclusions. They learn to avoid unwarranted idiosyncratic or
subjective intuitions, and views which are beclouded by personal sentiments and
emotions. They learn how their world views and emotions could becloud their
ability to think critically about issues (Paul, 1982; Hurley, 1999).
At level 3, students learn to make complex and intricate connections among
various simpler facts and complex deductive and inductive inferences. This involves
the ability to perceive and make complex relationships among issues, ideas, assump-
tions, world views, conceptual scheme, facts and contexts (Paul, 1982; Loacker et
al., 1984; Cromwell, 1986). At this level, students learn to recognise how inferences
are related to observed facts in broader and complex contexts. They learn to see
relationships in and among features, objects and ideas, and to distinguish among
patterns, trends, causal and functional relationships, and comparisons and contrasts.
Students learn various kinds of inferences and relationships, and how to evaluate
them. They study syllogisms of different types (hypothetical, categorical and dis-
junctive), enthymemes and sorites, and how to evaluate them. They also learn
different argument structures: the nature of dependent and independent reasons,
simple and compound statements and arguments, chain arguments and divergent
 26 P. Ikuenobe

conclusions. They learn various types of and connection between inductive and
deductive argument, and how in conjunction they are used in real life reasoning and
knowledge acquisition. With respect to inductive arguments, they learn the nature of
causal, probabilistic, statistical and hypothetico-deductive inferences, analogical
arguments and simple generalisations (Salmon, 1989). They learn ‘informally’
deductive argument forms, such as modus ponens, modus tollens, dilemmas,
simpliŽ cation, addition, conjunction and DeMorgan’s rule among others, and their
use in discourse. These argument forms represent ways of making relationships
among statements, beliefs, perspectives, views, phenomena and ideas in various
contexts.
At level 4, students learn how to use models to understand, make sense of, and
extrapolate from patterns and structures, how to make complex inferential reasoning
from one experiential or theoretical context to another, and how to see ideas and
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beliefs as part of a coherent structure. These involve analyzing structures and

relationships in order to integrate patterns into coherent and consistent systems
within various analytical and conceptual frameworks. Students learn how to Ž nd
principles underlying various structures and organisations, and how they make
meaning. Many phenomena or ideas we deal with in various contexts have some
semblance of logical structures, forms and patterns for which there are underlying
principles. In this sense, informal logic would help students to learn how to see and
analyse structures—in relation to issues, data, theories, problems and solutions.
Having learned how to deal with some argument forms, they learn to analyse more
complex argument structures to see how complex facts, assumptions, ideas, beliefs
and statements provide support for complex generalisations. To teach students the
ability to analyse argument structures in a broad sense, which they can carry over to
other plausible structures and contexts, they learn the principles and rules underlying
categorical syllogisms and how to use Venn’s diagram to analyse argument forms and
structures (Stratton, 1999; Carey, 1999).
Students are introduced at this level, to the analytical methods of propositional
calculus informally, as ways to understand argument structures and how to use truth
tables to analyse structures. They are introduced to elementary natural deduction,
and how to translate compound statements and arguments into symbolic structures
in order to analyse them in terms of validity. They learn how to introduce content into
symbolic argument structures and analyse them. They also learn how to use the
methods of indirect and conditional proofs to analyse propositional argument
structures. They are introduced to elementary predicate calculus as argument
structures, as well as argument structures involving identity, relationships and deŽ nite
descriptions. They learn these structures in formal and informal ways, to get a better
understanding of the nature of language that we use in everyday discourse. By
learning these structures, students learn how to use language appropriately and how
to analyse and evaluate its use. To apply this knowledge, they Ž nd discourse, texts
and arguments in various contexts that display the logical structures studied, and how
these structures can help them to understand issues better. The intellectual abilities
of logical analysis in Ž nding structures help students approach issues with a judicious
re ective skepticism, to see things beyond their face value (McPeck, 1981).
 Teaching and Assessing Critical Thinking Abilities 27

From levels 1 to 4, students learn the principles of reasoning as objective

principles which transcend disciplines. As outcomes, the principles are learned as
abilities which engender the disposition to apply, transfer and use them across
disciplines and contexts. The fact that one can use the content of informal logic to
teach critical thinking abilities which are applicable to the context of a subject
matter does not imply that a subject matter is necessary or sufŽ cient to acquire
critical thinking skills. The issue of subject matter regarding applicability raises a
pragmatic issue about the pedagogy of informal logic (Stratton, 1999). To make
subject matter a necessary component of critical thinking is to suggest that the
requisite abilities and its applicability are not transferable from one context to
another. So, at level 5, critical thinking abilities are speciŽ cally contextualised to
various disciplines, context and subject matter. Here, students learn how to practi-
cally apply the ‘objective’ principles they learned from levels 1 to 4 to different
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contexts. For instance, they learn informal fallacies, formal fallacies, rules of infer-
ence, such as modus ponens, modus tollens, hypothetical syllogism, disjunctive
syllogism, etc., how inferences are made and how fallacies are avoided in various
contexts. When they read texts in disciplines, they see in a hands-on way how
professionals use and apply objective principles, as well as other ‘idiosyncratic’
principles that are peculiar to disciplines and other contexts. In philosophy, one
focuses on teaching critical thinking at level 5 by teaching the application of the
principles of reasoning to the different philosophical traditions, such as history of
philosophy, analytic philosophy, existentialism and phenomenology, to show how
the principles learned in levels 1–4 actually apply to and illuminate issues in
epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, aesthetics, philosophy of mind and philosophy
of language.
Students learn how philosophers use the principles of logic to argue for
positions and articulate theories. They learn to use issues in metalogic and modal
logic to analyse and resolve philosophical problems. Critical thinking outcomes
deriving from the conceptualised process and content of an informal logic course
above can help to prepare students in nursing, business, the physical and social
sciences for methodological and research issues raised by inductive generalisation,
statistical inferences and deductive reasoning. This helps them to develop models
and how to apply them to solve problems or simulate situations to which models
could be applied which they extend to other contexts. It will also provide them with
fundamental principles of collecting data, interpreting them in terms of drawing
reasonable inferences so that conclusions or results are not skewed. Knowledge of
the informal fallacies of biased sampling, hasty generalisation, begging the question
(self-fulŽ lling prophecy), gambler’s fallacy, genetic fallacy, incomplete evidence,
and ignoring common cause and the attempts to avoid them in research, becomes
relevant (Hurley, 1999; Carey, 1999). With these, students learn how to apply
principles underlying inductive reasoning (statistical, probabilistic and causal),
which are fundamental to different disciplines. They learn to avoid errors, biases
and fallacies that can be engendered in different modes of reasoning, world views
and perspectives, as well as how to evaluate reasoning and held views, results and
conclusions in a research work.
 28 P. Ikuenobe

Assessing for the Ability of Critical Thinking in a Logic Course

This framework raises the issues of how to assess students’ abilities in relation to the
desired outcomes and how students can learn from the process of assessment. A
teacher has to determine, using different and relevant assessment tools, that students
are demonstrating the requisite critical thinking abilities as outcomes. We need to
create ways of assessing how well students are able to use and apply what they have
learned. Assessment could be articulated as a complex form of learning, whereby
students use various means, such as journals and portfolios, to know where they are
in their performance with respect to certain abilities as outcomes on the basis of
certain criteria (Woodward, 1998). Assessment in this sense can be construed as
outcome/ability-based, integrative, experiential, re ective, interactive, active, trans-
ferable, and applicable; it involves a kind of self-awareness of one’s learning process
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(Alverno College Faculty, 1994). In any mode of assessment, instructors have to be

able to observe in students’ performances, that they are demonstrating the requisite
critical thinking ability. As a form of outcome or ability-based assessment, we have
to be able to describe in relation to clear criteria what students are consciously
demonstrating as opposed to what they were not able to do prior to learning the
principles of logic.
An effective assessment helps students to be re ective on their abilities, per-
formance, and what they have learned in relation to some criteria (Woodward,
1998). They are aware of how they demonstrate abilities in behavioral terms, as
opposed to a fortuitous demonstration or performance. Students demonstrate their
own abilities and their disposition to use them. Morgan (1995) argues that, ‘Critical
thinking is dependent on a person’s disposition to use it … If there is no willingness
to use thinking skills, however they may be deŽ ned, there will be no thinking … it
implies that even the best instruction may not succeed if a student is unwilling
to utilize the skills taught’ (p. 338). The instructor has to use the tool
of self-assessment (self-re ection and self-awareness of one’s own ability and
knowledge) as an integral aspect of assessing students (Sullivan & Hall, 1997;
Raychaudhuri, 1998; Orsmond et al., 1997). In spite of the beneŽ ts of critical
thinking abilities which involve a disposition to use them, self-re ection provides a
motivation for students to keep track of how they use the skills they have learned.
The contrast between a student’s self-assessment and the instructor’s assessment of
the student provides a learning approach to assessment by harmonizing students’
own awareness and performance (Orsmond et al., 1997). This provides a basis for
a dialogue between students and instructors, and what needs to be done for the
students to make further progress in performance.
An effective assessment relies on articulating statements of performance criteria in
relation to statements of outcomes (Alverno College Faculty, 1994; Orsmond et al.,
1997). The criteria state the activities that students need to satisfactorily perform
and the behaviour they should manifest to be considered as having effectively
demonstrated an ability. Students learn to demonstrate critical thinking abilities in
the form of communication, analytical, evaluative, problem-solving, decision-
making and judgment skills. From the general outcomes stated earlier, an instructor
 Teaching and Assessing Critical Thinking Abilities 29

can articulate criteria based on the materials used in class and the activities that the
students engaged in. With these criteria, an instructor can evaluate a student’s work
to determine whether she has achieved the requisite outcomes. The integrative mode
of assessment involves a combination of papers, activities, simulations, projects,
prepared speeches and short answer tests. In the ‘traditional’ way of teaching
informal logic, the only way we can Ž nd out whether students have ‘learned’ the
material is to give them tests, quizzes or examinations. They may not have learned
the material in terms of being able to apply the knowledge. This, a test may not be
able to determine. Sometimes, they only show familiarity with the material, or they
simply memorize and regurgitate it in tests. This framework suggests that the only
way we can prove that students have achieved the requisite outcomes, and acquired
the abilities is to develop a good assessment tool that is able to specify criteria that
would connect the assessment to the outcome and abilities. The following represent
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a general set of criteria which re ects the different developmental levels of critical
thinking ability.

Level 1
1. Students understand the concepts of argument, premise, conclusion, statement
(proposition), and sentence, and she is able to articulate and explain what these
concepts mean.
2. They are able to identify statements, other kinds of sentences, arguments and
with the help of indicators, identify premises and conclusions in different texts.
3. They understand the notions of illustration, exposition, report and explanation
among others.
4. They are able to distinguish between argument on one hand and, on the other,
illustration, report, exposition, explanation, opinion, warning, etc.
5. They are able to construct a discourse which they can categorise into the above
concepts.

Level 2
1. Students understand, and are able to articulate or explain the concepts of
inference and evidence in relation to premises and conclusion.
2. They understand and articulate the basic principles of reasoning (in terms of
justiŽ cation), the notion of inferential or evidential link, and differences between
inductive and deductive inferences.
3. They understand the concepts of validity, strength, soundness and fallacy.
4. They are able to identify in different texts, particular fallacies in inferences and
articulate or explain why they are fallacious or unreasonable, in terms of the
principles underlying them.
5. They are able to construct valid and fallacious arguments, evaluate them and
explain why they are valid or fallacious. They are able to re ect on their
arguments with the aim of avoiding fallacies.
 30 P. Ikuenobe

Level 3
1. Students are able to articulate or explain different kinds of inferential and
evidential relationships.
2. They are able to identify in different texts these different relations when they see
them in different argument forms and structures.
3. They are able to construct arguments in which they make relationships based on
the forms that they have studied—in decisions, actions, writing and speaking.
4. They are able to construct and identify different argument structures or patterns,
such as modus ponens, disjunctive syllogism, hypothetical syllogism, statistical
and inductive generalisations.
5. They are able to evaluate arguments in different texts and contexts, their own
arguments and that of others, in terms of the nature of relationships between
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premises and conclusions.

Level 4
1. Students are able to identify the different argument structures and their basic
forms.
2. They are able to articulate or explain the principles underlying each of the types
of argument structures that they have studied.
3. They are able to use each principle to analyse the associated argument struc-
ture—for instance, they are able to use the method of truth tables or Venn
diagrams to analyse argument structures.
4. They are able to construct different types of argument structures and are able to
analyse them.
For level 5, I cannot specify a set of general criteria because the assessment becomes
contextual, in that it involves applying general logical principles to the context of a
subject matter. The subject matter in this case will largely determine the criteria and,
since my framework does not make speciŽ c reference to a speciŽ c subject matter,
this is where the speciŽ c instructor of a subject matter comes into the picture. So,
from the above general criteria, the assessment modes may differ from one instructor
to another and perhaps from one group of students to another, and from one
circumstance to another. The instructor has to be able to develop assessment tools
to suit the needs of students, materials and situations. The following sample
represents an assessment assignment depending on the level: students should look at
magazines or newspapers, or listen to a speech. They should identity argument(s) in
the piece; they should identify premises and conclusion, and inferential links. They
may be asked to ‘Ž gure out’ an explanation, exposition or report from a text. They
could also be asked to evaluate the validity of an argument in two different contexts:
one will be an argument involving emotionally charged issues such as abortion, and
the same argument that is symbolised to increase the emotional opacity of the issue,
so that students can focus on the relationship between premises and conclusion.
This would help them to see the relevance of symbolic logic and the use of Venn
diagrams, truth tables, and other logical techniques as means for evaluating and
 Teaching and Assessing Critical Thinking Abilities 31

analysing arguments, in order to make judgments about their value and signiŽ cance
in different contexts. They could be asked to determine how the argument can be
supplemented, modiŽ ed, changed to make it better, or a plausible alternative or
counter argument. They would demonstrate their understanding of the in uence
that contexts, emotions and world views could have on reasoning.
I will not dare to specify anything concrete! The instructor who is in touch with
the students and circumstance and understands them can make the best judgement
regarding an assessment tool. This process involves a kind of learning process for
instructors because they have to be willing to devise techniques, re ect on their
methodologies and modes of assessment, to determine which fares better, and which
will better achieve the outcomes in a given circumstance. Any mode which does not
fare well can be modiŽ ed. It may be helpful to Ž nd out from students the modes of
assessment which they feel have helped (or could help) them to demonstrate the
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requisite ability and assess their performance. Their suggestions and input may be
illuminating. Finding out from students how an informal logic course has helped
them to demonstrate critical thinking abilities in the context of the articulated
outcomes should be an integral part of the assessment. Students also have to be
aware of what their abilities were prior to taking informal logic, what they have
learned, how they can or have applied what they have learned, and how, in general
they have developed. This is a reasonable way to prove that using this framework to
teach informal logic can achieve the stated outcomes of acquiring, demonstrating
and applying critical thinking abilities.

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