Warrants, and Backings. Perhaps the more “tentative” nature of the Modified Claim made
necessary these support statements.
Group 5B, on other hand, typically used no Modified Claims, and sometimes their
Alternate Claims were elaborated and sometimes they were not. In other words, I cannot
accurately characterize Group 5B’s use of supporting statements. This lack of elaboration and
support may account for a persistent misuse of the terms orbital velocity and escape velocity.
Summary
Based on this analysis of Grounds, Warrants, and Backings, I can now claim these groups
are supporting their argument co-construction with statements that would be expected in a
Toulmin argument structure.
The grounds for this claim are:
7 of 16 patterns contain additional Grounds, Warrants and Backings.
5 of 16 patterns contain Grounds and Warrants.
1 pattern contains mostly Warrants and Backings.
3 patterns contain little additional elaboration or support.
Groups that use Backings tend to prefer the professor.
SUMMARY
In this chapter I explored the similarities in the argument co-construction between these
14 problem-solving groups. Chapter Five will discuss the implications of these findings for
present and future research and practice in science education. The emphasis was on the use of
the Modified Claims and Alternate Claims, the role of requests, as well as creative controversy
and conflict avoidance. Since the Toulmin structure includes Grounds, Warrants, and Backings,
I also examined how groups use these types of statements. There are three major findings.