Course Instructor Contact:

Hilary E. Davis

hdavis@yorku.ca

Virtual Office hours: by appointment on Zoom

BLENDED COURSE

(Lecture Material online + 2 hours per week in classroom)

ACCELERATED COURSE

(24 Class Modules in 12 weeks)

This course combines both online asynchronous and in-person components:

ASYNCHRONOUS: pre-recorded lectures, practice exercises, weekly quizzes and forum activities, other written assignments

IN-PERSON: weekly class meetings (Mondays, 2:30-5:20pm EST)

The overall purpose of this and all Modes of Reasoning (MODR) courses is to teach students to reason correctly and to express themselves clearly and precisely in verbal and written form.  These critical thinking skills will help students not only with the remainder of their academic studies, but also in their professional and personal lives in general.

• This course (MODR 1730) will introduce important critical thinking and analytical skills by focusing on arguments made about social issues found in the social science, science, ethics, and mass media. In the past these have included the refugee crisis, student debt, online dating, sexting, and Ebola screening at airports. You will learn how to distinguish between inductive and deductive reasoning and how to identify, evaluate, and construct arguments.  In addition, MODR 1730 will include a brief introduction to evaluating statistical and scientific information. You will be asked to develop arguments that arise from your personal interests and opinions as well as critical arguments that assess the writing of others.  Throughout the course our focus will include the analysis of various media such as the news and popular press, feature films, advertising and political rhetoric, blogs and websites, as well as academic writing and philosophical arguments in this field.
• This is an approved LAPS General Education course for Social Science.

Course credit exclusions: AP/MODR 1770 6.00, AP/MODR 1760 6.00.  This means you may not take this course for credit if you are currently enrolled in or have a credit in either MODR 1770 or MODR 1760.

Technical requirements for taking the course:

To participate in the asynchronous portions of this course, students will require a computer and/or smart device an internet connection.

To meet with Prof. Davis during her virtual office hours on Zoom, you will need a computer or smart device with webcam and microphone and a stable internet connection.  Zoom can be downloaded as an app on most smart phones.  Google chat is also an option for Prof. Davis’ virtual office hours.

Here are some useful links for student computing information, resources and help:

Student Guide to EClass

Zoom@YorkU Best Practices 

Zoom@YorkU User Reference Guide

Computing for Students Website

Student Guide to eLearning at York University

To determine Internet connection and speed, there are online tests, such as Speedtest, that can be run.

Lewis Vaughan.  Concise Guide to Critical Thinking, Third Edition.  (Oxford, 2024).

Mark Battersby.  Is That a Fact?  A Field Guide to Statistical and Scientific Information.  Second Edition.  (Broadview, 2016).

Additional readings may be posted on eClass

Times and locations:

BLENDED COURSE

(Lecture Material online + 2 hours per week in classroom)

ACCELERATED COURSE

(24 Class Modules in 12 weeks)

When: in person on Mondays, 2:30-5:20pm

Where: Vari Hall 3009

This course moves at an accelerated pace.  Two modules of material – lecture videos, forum activities, quizzes will be posted weekly on eClass.  24 modules will be covered in 12 weeks.

This course is blended which means that it mixes in-person and asynchronous online elements.  All lectures will be pre-recorded and offered asynchronously on eClass.  Weekly online forum activities will also be required on eClass.  There will also be weekly in-person class meeting.  These weekly in-person classes will review and reinforce the weekly material using practice exercises and team activities.  They will also be an opportunity for students to ask questions and have interaction with the instructor and their classmates.

Each week’s asynchronous materials and activities should be completed before Monday’s class meetings.  Weekly online forum activities will be due on Mondays at 11:59pm EST.

There will be two in-person tests, in our classroom.  There will be no online or remote option for these tests. If you know you will not be able to take these tests in person you should not take this course.

By the end of this course, if you apply yourself, do all the reading, watch all pre-recorded lectures, and complete all assignments, activities, and quizzes, you can expect to see improvement in the following areas:

• Reading Comprehension: You will become a more active reader which includes learning how to read between the lines and how to ask critical questions.
• Writing: You will learn how to write two different types of arguments – a definition essay and researched proposal essay.  Your essay planning, organization, and editing should also improve.
• Critical Reasoning Skills: You will learn to identify and evaluate arguments in order to distinguish strong from weak arguments.  This will include learning how to evaluate evidence and sources used in arguments and those you use in your own research.
• Critical Thinking Skills: Ideally, you will learn to become a 'reasonable skeptic' and become able to identify and discuss the weaknesses and strengths in claims and arguments you encounter in the media, academic texts, and everyday conversation.

Course policies

• The lecture slides, handouts, and all materials found on this site are for the personal use only of students who are registered in this course, MODR 1730A. They are for educational purposes only and intended only to enhance accessibility. The instructor of this course holds the copyright to this material and does not give permission for any course material to be to duplicated, copied, and/or distributed outside of the class.  Nor do students have permission to upload course materials to commercial websites, file sharing websites or apps, or social media.  Anytime you download material from this eClass site you agree to these terms. Any person who uploads or shares course material without the instructor's permission violates copyright regulations and also FIPPA  and will face serious consequences.

In this course, all work should be completed by you and you alone. As such you are not allowed to use generative artificial intelligence (AI), such as ChatGPT, to help you complete any of your work in this course (e.g., tests, papers, assignments, presentations, etc.). If you do not know whether an online resource or tool can be used in this course, please contact me for guidance. Any use of generative AI in this course will be considered a breach of the Senate Policy on Academic Honesty http://www.yorku.ca/policies/senate.

• Plagiarism and other misappropriation of the work of another will not be tolerated in this course.  Plagiarism is the representation of another person's ideas or writing as one's own. The most obvious form of this kind of dishonesty is the presentation of all or part of another person's published work as something one has written. However, paraphrasing another's writing without proper acknowledgement may also be considered plagiarism. It is also a violation of academic honesty to represent another's artistic or technical work or creation as one's own. Just as there are standards to which one must adhere in the preparation and publication of written works, there are standards to which one must adhere in the creation and presentation of music, drawings, designs, dance, photography and other artistic and technical works. In different forms, these constitute a theft of someone else's work. This is not to say that students should not use the work of others with the proper acknowledgement.  It is also a violation of academic honesty to forge another student’s signature on an attendance sheet.  Please see the Senate Policy on Academic Honesty at http://www.yorku.ca/policies/senate.
• Successful academic performance includes students not only completing assignments, but completing them on time. Late penalties are applied to assignments submitted after the due date. Exceptions to the late penalty can be presented to the course director by email for consideration. All essays must be uploaded to Turnitin via eClass.

• An assignment will be considered late one minute past the Turnitin deadline.

• You are strongly encouraged to avoid uploading assignments within the last hour of a deadline. If, for whatever reason, your document does not upload, it will be considered late.
• There will be no opportunity to make-up missed weekly Online Forum Activities.  If you miss these weekly deadlines, you will receive a “0” for the assigned work. 

• The lowest mark will be dropped for the Online Forum Activities. This is to say that of the 11 weekly online forum activities only the highest 10 will count toward your final mark.
• The test will be in-person, in our classroom. There will be no online or remote option for this test. If you know you will not be able to take this test in person you should not take this course.
• No make-up work or outstanding assignments will be accepted after the last day of class, Monday, December 2^nd.