Argumentation in a changing world 5

10 Abstract Critical reasoning has been recognized as a valuable educational goal since the 11 end of the nineteenth century. However, the educational programs to reach this goal have 12 changed dramatically during the twentieth century and moved to a dialogic approach. The 13 shift to dialogism in programs to promote critical reasoning brings challenges concerning 14 evaluation. We depict such a program here. This program is based on the use of graphic 15 tools for argumentation in e-discussions. We focus on one history teacher who implemented 16 the program in his class during a period of 7 months. In a design-based research cycle, we 17 investigate the process of finding proper criteria to evaluate the program and to improve it. 18 We show that the criteria of coherence, decisiveness and openness are appropriate for 19 evaluating the program as they stem from pedagogical principles (autonomy, collaboration, 20 commitment to reasoning, ethical communication, procedural mediation, etc.) that are 21 central to a dialogic approach for critical reasoning education. We show that the history 22 course was successful according to those criteria, but not successful according to other 23 more traditional criteria. We discuss whether these differential performances suggest new 24 standards for critical reasoning, actions to improve the program, or both.