TEACHING GUIDE
The Evidence Lab
A good story. But is it a good explanation?
A café queue. A navigation app. A very confident claim. Open the everyday mysteries, choose evidence that could separate the rival stories and build an investigation of your own.
Choose how to play
For Class requires Full. Complete the required decisions, evidence checks and explanations, then assemble the report. Printing and assignment-report downloads unlock when that work is current. Progress backups remain available throughout.
For Fun: explore at your own pace. Where Core and Full length choices are offered, they are available in For Fun. Exploration reports are personal records.
Write your own explanations. Learners may paste their own drafts or use course-permitted input tools; follow the course rules for sources and assistance. First checked responses, revisions and opened-hint history remain available. Completion checks establish required work, not authorship or reasoning quality.
What you will do
- Try the warm-up and investigate the café and navigation-app cases.
- Design your investigation in five numbered fields: question, explanation, rival, evidence and predicted results. Critique it, then connect evidence to public power.
- Complete the unfamiliar final challenge before opening its optional hints. Check and save the current version of each step, then use the named Continue destination to review the Full investigation record.
Learning goals
- Distinguish an observation from a proposed explanation.
- Choose comparisons and evidence that can distinguish rival accounts.
- Explain what a finding supports, what it leaves open and how you would investigate next.
- Design and critique a small investigation, then connect evidence to a question about public authority.
Before you begin
No advance reading or statistical background is needed. The cases and records are supplied.
Plan 45–60 min for the activity and make room for discussion. Longer activities can be paused between files or chapters. Keep Full as the Class route across those sessions.
Bring it back to the room
- Which comparison could separate your explanation from its rival?
- What did the case establish, and what would require another record?
- How would you change your own investigation to make its evidence more informative?
What to assess
Assess the connection between claim, comparison and evidence; a plausible rival; an informative next observation; and an honest limit. Read the written reasoning. A completion check records work, not the quality of the argument.
Ask what the learner chose, which observation supports the explanation, what followed and what would lead them to reconsider. A retained judgment can be as defensible as a changed one. Hints should support a reasoning move while leaving the interpretation to the learner.
Save, return and submit
Check the activity’s save status. Download a JSON progress backup before changing websites, browsers or devices, and use its restore control to resume. Device saves do not synchronize between the two websites.
For Class, complete all required Full work and the final report action. Then use the report’s Print / Save as PDF or other readable export control and follow your instructor’s submission instructions. Downloading does not submit your work. A JSON backup restores progress; it is not the assignment report.
Sources and scope
The cases and data are fictional. They teach ways to test explanations; they do not establish real-world effects. A remaining uncertainty can be a well-supported result.
Use the source notes and dated records supplied in the activity when supporting a claim. Keep the difference between a fictional model and historical evidence clear.