Evaluation Thinking Organization


Evaluation thinking is a superset of all other higher order thinking skills, a highly important intellectual skill. There is a structure to this form of thought and these images can serve as memory devices to help in the recall of the process. These images have deep roots. Why do many cultures from ancient times to the present use the symbols above to represent justice? What is the meaning of the sword, the scales, the blindfold, the fight, and the gavel for writing an evaluation essay?

All of us must constantly weigh the value of one idea versus another. This weighing involves both preparation and execution. Preparation begins with clarifying or clearly identifying the question that is being debated. This leads to research into the evidence, recording evidence that comes from both personal experience and the ideas of others. The execution phase of an essay involves three steps that form the actual essay. First restate the question, then list the criteria for the weighing or decision making that will follow. Think of this as a kind of introductory paragraph to the essay. Next provide your reasoning and conclusion about each criterion. Think of this as the body of the essay. Finally, explain the overall conclusion reached in comparing your thinking about all the criteria. Think of this summary reasoning as your closing paragraph.

It may be helpful to move or copy this web page into a web page editor or copy and paste this template into a word processor. Use each of these headings and prompts below to practice creating your response to the problem, claim or question which requires evaluation thinking. It is not a particularly valuable use of your time to try to figure out or match your instructor's or someone else's judgment on a question. Independent thinking is valued here. The evaluation of your writing depends not on your agreement with someone else but on your written reasoning and on following the process of the headings below.

Question

Restate the question, problem or claim.

Search Terms

3 layered information pyramidThis is the research phase. It is only at this phase that digital technology lends its incredible power to the process. After this step, the rest is about reasoning from the information available. What are the facts? What is the truth? Differing search strategies aid in finding relevant information. So, a key preparatory step is to determine and list the search terms (words and phrases) that are useful in collecting evidence and ideas. Though these terms and a section by this title are not included in the final essay, they are not only useful but essential at the pre-writing or Look phase to enable the hunt for further evidence and ideas to use in your reasoning. In evaluation thinking, the value of the information technology is in its ability to provide information and to help process and organize the ideas in meaningful ways. Use the three sections of the information pyramid of the Look section of the CROP model to guide your further research. Also, seek facts that do not support your point of view with an open mind so that thinking is open to change. Could you be wrong? Seek the truth.

Criteria

Clarify the choices and choose the scales. If someone asks which refrigerator is best, then one must provide some brands of refrigerators from which to debate the options. If someone asks which social behavior is best, then one must provides some choices from which to choose. State what is being judged if it is not spelled out in the initial question or problem. Then, and this step is critical, note the criteria that will be consider and explain any of them if necessary; criteria are standards, rules, or tests on which a judgment or decision can be based. This can often be done in a list like format in which each criterion is described in a sentence or two. Seek to make the criteria impartial. That is, considering only certain criteria might bias the results. It is important to consider a criterion or set of criteria that best represent the issues under discussion for whatever topic is chosen.

 

Criterion Reasoning

Explain your reasoning based on each of the criteria that you present, dealing with one criterion at a time, presenting evidence where necessary to make your points. If you list three criteria, there should be at least one solid paragraph that addresses each of the three criteria. Reach a conclusion based on each criterion. That is, each criterion provides a topic for a mini-debate followed by an impartial mini-decision that must be made, clearly stating the result of your reasoning in some fashion, such as: yes, no, maybe; for or against or undecided; and so forth. The more space and time available, the more paragraphs one creates for that topic. Very short evaluation essays would have one paragraph per criterion. Longer essays might have pages per criterion that go into greater detail and evidence and also include pictures, audio and other media.

Either number your criterion or give each a heading to clearly identify your reasoning about each one. The reasoning based on each criterion does not have to agree with that of the others. That is the reasoning from the first criterion might conclude something should not be done. While the reasoning based on the second criterion might support doing something. The reasoning based on the third criterion might be neutral, unsupportive of yes or no action. In each case, your reasoning should be "blind", that is, as impartial as humanly possible.

In summary, if you have 3 criteria, then you have three judgments, evaluations or conclusions to make in the criterion reasoning section, a conclusion for each criterion.

 

Summary Reasoning

Up to this point 2 or more decisions or judgments have been made. The next debate takes place at a higher level. In this section, those 2 or more decisions must be compared, weighed and debated. Which criterion is more or less important than the others? What is fair? Compare and weigh the collective value of your conclusions about each criterion, indicating on the whole how the evidence and your conclusions came out. If you reached conflicting recommendations in the mini-decision reasoning about each criterion, this is normal. But the summary reasoning section is the time for further reasoning which explains why you weighed this or that criterion more heavily or gave it more importance in coming to your final conclusion. Finally, clearly state your overall conclusion.

 

 

Next 

  • Review a Model of Evaluation Writing
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    Educational Perpective

    How often and in what circumstances is a teacher required to be the entire courtroom, from lawyer to jury to judge? In what ways do evaluation skills involve more than just discipline issues? That is, what decisions must an educator make? How often in a school day do students needs to work these skills in real life situations? Is the quality of the available information to make a decision more important than the decision making process itself?



    Page author: Houghton