Teachers and administrators from Argument-Centered Education partner schools have made an important request over the past couple of years: since we cannot expect students to learn the difficult skills of academic argumentation all at once, how can these skills be taught and built in sequence?  Argument-Centered Education has in response designed a vertically-articulated recommended instructional sequence for high school, along with recommended activities and assessments.  The skills building sequence is divided by quarter.

This skills building sequence is a broad set of guidelines, not a tightly prescriptive set of directions, but it can help schools bring greater systemic continuity to their incorporation of argumentation throughout their curriculum and instruction.

We have designed a similar skills building sequence for middle schools, too.

These skills building sequences have as their pedagogical nerve center the Key Components of Academic Argumentation.

Partner schools of Argument-Centered Education have begun to use these sequences to guide curriculum and instruction decisions and initiatives.  Please let us know if your school is doing so, and how they are working in practice, if so.