D3.4.6-8: Developing Claims and Counterclaims

Overview

Lesson Procedure

65-70 minutes of class time across 5 phases.

1. Warm-Up10 minutes
2. Direct Instruction20-25 minutes
3. Guided Practice15 minutes
4. Independent Practice10 minutes
5. Closure10 minutes

1. Warm-Up10 minutes

   Warm-Up Prompt

   "Two classmates both say the class mural was their idea. One drew a sketch in September. The other organized the painting and finished it in October. Who deserves the credit? What would the other person say back?"

   Collect two or three answers on the board. Students usually split: some credit the first sketch and some credit the finished mural. Name the parts. Your answer is a claim. The other side's best answer is a counterclaim. The reasons and facts each side points to are its evidence. Then ask: what does the dated sketch show well (a strength), and what can it not show (a limitation)? For example, a dated sketch shows who had an idea first, but not whether that idea would have worked.

2. Direct Instruction20-25 minutes

   Part 1: The question and four key words. The compelling question is "Who deserves credit for inventing the telephone?" The telephone is a vehicle for the skill: students will develop a claim and counterclaims and weigh the strengths and limitations of both. Several words from the sources need defining first.

   • A telegraph sends messages along a wire as electric signals. Source 1 says inventors of Bell's time were "in quest of a better telegraph instrument" (paragraph 2).
   • An apparatus is a device or machine built for a task.
   • A patent is a government grant that gives an inventor the right to stop others from making or selling the invention for a set number of years.
   • A caveat, in the old patent system, was a notice an inventor filed to say an invention was coming. Source 1 defines it as "a declaration that the writer has not invented a thing, but believes that he is about to do so" (paragraph 3), and Source 2 calls it "a one year renewable notice of an impending patent" (paragraph 7).
   • Priority means being first. A "discussion as to priority" (Source 3, paragraph 2) is an argument about who came first.
   • A House resolution is a statement voted on by the House of Representatives alone. Source 2 gives "the sense of the House", meaning the House's opinion; it is not a law and not a court decision. Each "Whereas" clause gives one reason for the resolution. Fraud (paragraph 10) means cheating to gain something.

   Source Information: who made each source, when, and from what position (from the sources and their source notes)

   Source	Maker and position	When made	Which inventor it supports
   1: Casson's history	Herbert N. Casson, a writer telling the story of the telephone business	1910	Bell, against Elisha Gray
   2: House Resolution 269	The U.S. House of Representatives, honoring "the great Italian inventor" (paragraph 2)	June 11, 2002	Antonio Meucci
   3: Encyclopaedia Britannica	H. R. Kempe and Emile Garcke, writing a reference article	1911	Mostly Bell, while describing Philipp Reis's earlier work
   4: Practice claims	Invented students (written for this page)	Invented	Different inventors; two claims are deliberately weak

   Part 2: Read the sources. Read Sources 1-3 aloud in pairs. For each one, students write in the margin the answer it supports and one fact it gives. Remind students that a source's answer is itself a claim, so the writer's words are evidence of what the writer believed, and not automatically the truth.

   1The most plausible and persistent of all the various inventors who snatched at Bell's laurels, was Elisha Gray. He refused to abide by the adverse decision of the court. Several years after his defeat, he came forward with new weapons and new methods of attack. He became more hostile and irreconcilable; and until his death, in 1901, never renounced his claim to be the original inventor of the telephone.

   2[...] In 1874, he and Bell were running a neck-and-neck race to see who could first invent a musical telegraph--when, presto! Bell suddenly turned aside, because of his acoustical knowledge, and invented the telephone, while Gray kept straight ahead. Like all others who were in quest of a better telegraph instrument, Gray had glimmerings of the possibility of sending speech by wire, and by one of the strangest of coincidences he filed a caveat on the subject on the same day that Bell filed the application for a patent. Bell had arrived first. As the record book shows, the fifth entry on that day was: "A. G. Bell, $15"; and the thirty-ninth entry was "E. Gray, $10."

   3There was a vast difference between Gray's caveat and Bell's application. A caveat is a declaration that the writer has not invented a thing, but believes that he is about to do so; while an application is a declaration that the writer has already perfected the invention. But Gray could never forget that he had seemed to be, for a time, so close to the golden prize; and seven years after he had been set aside by the Western Union agreement, he reappeared with claims that had grown larger and more definite.

   4When all the evidence in the various Gray lawsuits is sifted out, there appear to have been three distinctly different Grays: first, Gray the scoffer, who examined Bell's telephone at the Centennial and said it was "nothing but the old lover's telegraph. It is impossible to make a practical speaking telephone on the principle shown by Professor Bell.... The currents are too feeble"; second, Gray the convert, who wrote frankly to Bell in 1877, "I do not claim the credit of inventing it"; and third, Gray the claimant, who endeavored to prove in 1886 that he was the original inventor. [...]

   5It is now clearly seen that the telephone owes nothing to Gray. There are no Gray telephones in use in any country. Even Gray himself, as he admitted in court, failed when he tried to make a telephone on the lines laid down in his caveat. [...]

   1In the House of Representatives, U.S., June 11, 2002.

   2Whereas Antonio Meucci, the great Italian inventor, had a career that was both extraordinary and tragic;

   3Whereas, upon immigrating to New York, Meucci continued to work with ceaseless vigor on a project he had begun in Havana, Cuba, an invention he later called the "teletrofono", involving electronic communications;

   4Whereas Meucci set up a rudimentary communications link in his Staten Island home that connected the basement with the first floor, and later, when his wife began to suffer from crippling arthritis, he created a permanent link between his lab and his wife's second floor bedroom;

   5Whereas, having exhausted most of his life's savings in pursuing his work, Meucci was unable to commercialize his invention, though he demonstrated his invention in 1860 and had a description of it published in New York's Italian language newspaper;

   6Whereas Meucci never learned English well enough to navigate the complex American business community;

   7Whereas Meucci was unable to raise sufficient funds to pay his way through the patent application process, and thus had to settle for a caveat, a one year renewable notice of an impending patent, which was first filed on December 28, 1871;

   8Whereas Meucci later learned that the Western Union affiliate laboratory reportedly lost his working models, and Meucci, who at this point was living on public assistance, was unable to renew the caveat after 1874;

   9Whereas in March 1876, Alexander Graham Bell, who conducted experiments in the same laboratory where Meucci's materials had been stored, was granted a patent and was thereafter credited with inventing the telephone;

   10Whereas on January 13, 1887, the Government of the United States moved to annul the patent issued to Bell on the grounds of fraud and misrepresentation, a case that the Supreme Court found viable and remanded for trial;

   11Whereas Meucci died in October 1889, the Bell patent expired in January 1893, and the case was discontinued as moot without ever reaching the underlying issue of the true inventor of the telephone entitled to the patent; and

   12Whereas if Meucci had been able to pay the $10 fee to maintain the caveat after 1874, no patent could have been issued to Bell: Now, therefore, be it

   13Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Representatives that the life and achievements of Antonio Meucci should be recognized, and his work in the invention of the telephone should be acknowledged.

   1[...] Telephony is the art of reproducing sounds at a distance from their source, and a telephone is the instrument employed in sending or receiving such sounds. The term “telephony” was first used by Philipp Reis of Friedrichsdorf, in a lecture delivered before the Physical Society of Frankfort in 1861. But, although this lecture and Reis’s subsequent work received considerable notice, little progress was made until the subject was taken up between 1874 and 1876 by Alexander Graham Bell, a native of Edinburgh, then resident in Boston, Mass., U.S.A. Bell, like Reis, employed electricity for the reproduction of sounds; but he attacked the problem in a totally different manner.

   [...]

   2In Reis’s lecture an apparatus was described which has given rise to much discussion as to priority in the invention of the telephone. The instrument was described in over fifty publications in various countries, and was well known to physicists previous to Bell’s introduction of the electric telephone as a competitor with the electric telegraph. [...]

   3Reis’s object was to reproduce at a distance not only music but also human speech; but that he did not wholly succeed is clear from the following extract from his lecture:—“Hitherto it has not been possible to reproduce human speech with sufficient distinctness. The consonants are for the most part reproduced pretty distinctly, but not the vowels as yet in an equal degree.” Considering the time at which he wrote, Reis seems to have understood very well the nature of the vibrations he had to reproduce, but he failed to comprehend how they could be reproduced by electricity. His fundamental idea—the interruption of the current—was a fatal mistake, which was not at the time properly understood. [...]

   Part 3: Model the moves. Think aloud through the worked examples. Each one builds a claim or counterclaim and then names one strength and one limitation of its evidence. Write the pattern on the board: Claim, because evidence. Strength: what the evidence shows well. Limitation: what it cannot show.

   • Developing a claim (Bell, from Source 1)

     Develop a claim for Bell using Source 1, then name one strength and one limitation of its evidence.

     Result: Claim: Bell deserves the credit, because his patent application described a finished invention while Gray's caveat described one Gray only expected to make. Source 1 says an application "is a declaration that the writer has already perfected the invention" (paragraph 3). Strength: it explains the difference between the two papers filed that day. Limitation: Casson wrote a history of the Bell business and defends Bell throughout, so we still need a second source on the same point.

   • Developing a counterclaim (Meucci, from Source 2)

     Develop the strongest counterclaim to the Bell claim from Source 2, then name one strength and one limitation.

     Result: Counterclaim: Meucci deserves credit, because he worked on the invention years before Bell. Source 2 says he "demonstrated his invention in 1860" (paragraph 5) and filed a caveat on "December 28, 1871" (paragraph 7). Strength: the dates come from an official statement of the House. Limitation: the resolution gives the House's opinion, not a court's ruling, and some lines rest on what was "reportedly" true (paragraph 8).

   • Developing a second counterclaim (Reis, from Source 3)

     What counterclaim could someone build for Philipp Reis, and how strong is its evidence?

     Result: Counterclaim: Reis deserves some credit, because his work on sending sound came first. Source 3 says his apparatus was "described in over fifty publications" and was "well known to physicists" (scientists who study matter and energy) before Bell's (paragraph 2). Strength: it shows Reis's work was public and widely known. Limitation: by Reis's own words, speech could not yet be reproduced "with sufficient distinctness" (paragraph 3), so his device did not do what a telephone does.

   • Pointing out a limitation in the wording of a claim

     A student writes a deliberately weak sample claim: "Bell invented the telephone, and nobody else did anything." What is the limitation, and how could the claim be fixed?

     Result: The claim goes further than any source. Even Source 1, which defends Bell, says Gray "had glimmerings of the possibility of sending speech by wire" (paragraph 2). A fairer claim: "Bell deserves the main credit, because he was the first to patent a working telephone, though others had worked on the idea." Stronger wording names exactly what Bell did first.

3. Guided Practice15 minutes

   Pairs read Source 4, four practice claims written by invented students. Tell the class that two of the claims are deliberately weak. For each claim, pairs fill in one row of the Claim and Counterclaim Scale (Diagram 1): the claim, its evidence, one strength and one limitation. Then they write the strongest counterclaim to Jada's claim.

   1These four claims were written for this page by invented students who read Sources 1-3. Two of them are deliberately weak, for practice in finding limitations. They are not models to copy.

   2Jada: "Bell deserves the credit for the telephone because his papers reached the Patent Office first on the day Gray filed. Source 1 says the record book lists Bell as the fifth entry that day and Gray as the thirty-ninth."

   3Omar: "Meucci invented the telephone. Congress proved it in 2002 (Source 2)."

   4Lena: "Reis deserves the credit because he was the first person to use the word telephony, in 1861 (Source 3)."

   5Theo: "Several inventors worked on sending sound by wire before 1876: Reis lectured on it in 1861 (Source 3), and Meucci filed a caveat in 1871 (Source 2). Credit could be shared, although Bell is the one who received the patent in 1876 (Source 2)."

   Teacher key (discussion points, not a script). Jada's claim is supported by a detail in Source 1 (paragraph 2), but the order of entries on one day shows who reached the office first, not who had the idea first. Omar's claim is one of the two weak ones: Source 2 states the opinion of the House, and its final line asks that Meucci's work "be acknowledged", which is less than proof. Lena's claim is the other weak one: using a word first is not the same as building a device that carries speech, and Source 3 says Reis's main idea was a mistake. Theo's claim is the most careful, because it names what each inventor did and when. Its limitation is that "credit could be shared" does not say how much credit each one deserves. The strongest counterclaim to Jada is one built on Meucci's earlier dates (Source 2), because it answers her point about who came first.

4. Independent Practice10 minutes

   Each student writes one paragraph that answers the compelling question. The paragraph must contain a claim with one quotation and its source and paragraph number, a counterclaim from a different source with one quotation, one strength and one limitation of the evidence for the claim, and one strength and one limitation of the evidence for the counterclaim. Frame for students who need it: "I claim ___ because Source ___ says ___. A strength of this evidence is ___, but a limitation is ___. Someone could argue ___, because Source ___ says ___. That evidence is strong because ___, but it is limited because ___."

5. Closure10 minutes

   Exit ticket: "Write one counterclaim to your own claim from today. Then write one sentence that names its biggest strength." Collect the cards and sort them by inventor to open the next lesson.

   Teacher note on the sources: Source 1 is a 1910 history that strongly defends Bell; the words in italics are italic in the 1910 printing. Source 2 is a 2002 House resolution passed in honor of Antonio Meucci; it states the opinion of the House and is not a law. Source 3 is a 1911 reference article. None of the sources is neutral, which is what makes the set useful: students see that every claim has evidence with strengths and limitations. Present the inventors fairly. The point is not to crown a winner but to weigh what each source can show. Two points from outside the sources help keep the discussion fair. In 1888 the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Bell's patent against rival claims in The Telephone Cases (126 U.S. 1, a 4-3 decision); Meucci's claim was not part of that case. Historians still disagree about Gray and Meucci: some, such as Seth Shulman in The Telephone Gambit (2008), argue that Bell may have learned details of Gray's caveat, while others defend Bell's priority, and the House resolution itself marks one of its key statements as "reportedly" true.

   Quiz passage. Questions 11-14, 19 and 20 use Source 5, an invented scenario about a robotics club.

   1This scenario is invented for this page. The school, the students, the coach and the dates are invented.

   2At the invented Lakeview Middle School, the robotics club won a regional contest with a robot arm that grips objects with three fingers. Two students, Priya and Marcus, each say the three-finger gripper was their idea. The club must decide whose name goes on the design in the contest program.

   3Source 5A, Priya's notebook: a pencil sketch of a gripper with three fingers, dated October 3. The sketch has no measurements, and Priya did not build it.

   4Source 5B, the club's sign-up sheet for the 3D printer: Marcus printed a three-finger gripper on October 10. The club log says it held a tennis ball on its first test.

   5Source 5C, an email from Marcus to the coach on October 11: "I designed the gripper myself over the weekend."

   6Source 5D, a note the coach wrote in December: "In early October Priya showed the club a sketch of a gripper with fingers. I don't remember how many fingers it had. Marcus built the first one that worked."

Differentiation Strategies

Assessment Guidance

1. Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Which statement is a claim about the compelling question, "Who deserves credit for inventing the telephone?"

   ABell was granted a patent in March of 1876 BMeucci deserves more credit than he gets CThe House passed Resolution 269 in June 2002 DReis gave a lecture on sound in 1861

2. Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Source 2 says Bell "conducted experiments in the same laboratory where Meucci's materials had been stored" (paragraph 9). What is a limitation of this sentence as evidence that Bell used Meucci's work?

   AIt was written by Bell's own company BIt never says Bell saw or used them CIt does not give a year for Bell's patent DIt was written before Meucci was born

3. Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Which detail in Source 2 is a strength for a Meucci counterclaim, because it helps explain why Meucci never received a patent?

   AHe linked his basement and his first floor at home BBell was granted a patent in March 1876 CHe was on public assistance and could not renew DThe House passed this resolution in June of 2002

4. Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Source 1 says that until his death in 1901, Gray "never renounced his claim" (gave up his claim) to be the inventor (paragraph 1). What is a limitation of using this as evidence for a Gray claim?

   AKeeping a claim does not make it true BGray died long before the year 1876 CCasson does not name Gray anywhere DGray filed nothing at the Patent Office

5. Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Source 3 says that "Considering the time at which he wrote, Reis seems to have understood very well the nature of the vibrations he had to reproduce" (paragraph 3). How does this sentence help a counterclaim for Reis?

   AIt proves that his device carried clear speech BIt shows he received an early patent CIt shows Bell copied his apparatus DIt shows a critic praising part of his work

6. Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Source 1 says Gray "refused to abide by the adverse decision of the court" (paragraph 1). Here "adverse" means "against him". Which claim does this phrase support best?

   AA court decided against Gray's claim BGray won his case in a court of law CGray never brought his claim to court DA court decided the case for Meucci

7. Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Source 2 says the government moved to annul (cancel) Bell's patent for "fraud and misrepresentation", and that the Supreme Court found the case "viable" (able to go forward) and sent it back for trial (paragraph 10). What is a limitation of this as evidence that Bell cheated?

   AMeucci's family brought the case to court BThe case came before Bell had a patent CThe Court did not rule that Bell cheated DThe case was about Reis, not about Bell

8. Question 8 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Source 1 says Bell "suddenly turned aside, because of his acoustical knowledge" (his knowledge of how sound works), "and invented the telephone" (paragraph 2). Which claim does this sentence support?

   ABell's knowledge of sound led him to it BGray knew far more about sound than Bell CBell copied Gray's musical telegraph DBell filed his papers later than Gray

9. Question 9 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Which claim is worded most carefully, so that it does not go further than the evidence in Sources 1-3?

   AReis invented every part of the telephone that we use today BMeucci is the one true inventor, and all of the others were frauds CGray filed a caveat on the same day as Bell, so Gray was the real inventor DMeucci worked on speech by wire before Bell, but he never got a patent

10. Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Source 2 says Meucci "never learned English well enough to navigate the complex American business community" (paragraph 6). How would a Meucci supporter use this sentence?

    ATo show that Meucci's device worked very well BTo explain why he did not build a business CTo show that Bell spoke Italian at home DTo show that Meucci filed before Reis did

11. Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    In Source 5, which piece of evidence best supports Priya's claim that the gripper was her idea?

    ASource 5C, the email from Marcus BSource 5B, the 3D printer sign-up sheet CSource 5D, the note from the coach DSource 5A, her dated notebook sketch

12. Question 12 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    What is a limitation of Source 5A as evidence for Priya's claim?

    AIts date comes after the date of Marcus's print BIt shows a gripper with only two of the fingers CIt shows an idea that no one built or measured DIt was written by the coach and not by Priya

13. Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    What is a strength of Source 5B as evidence for Marcus's counterclaim?

    AIt is a club record that his gripper worked BIt is a statement by Marcus about his own design CIt shows that Priya agreed the idea was his DIt was written in December, long after the contest

14. Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    What is a limitation of Source 5C, Marcus's email, as evidence for his counterclaim?

    AIt was sent before the gripper was printed BHe wrote it himself, about his own credit CIt names Priya as the person with the idea DIt does not mention the gripper anywhere

15. Question 15 of 20 · Short Answer

    Develop a claim that answers the compelling question, "Who deserves credit for inventing the telephone?" Then develop a counterclaim from a different source. Quote each source and give the paragraph number.

    Show model answer

16. Question 16 of 20 · Short Answer

    Choose one quotation from Source 1 that supports a claim for Bell. Name one strength and one limitation of that quotation as evidence.

    Show model answer

17. Question 17 of 20 · Short Answer

    Source 2, paragraph 4, describes a link Meucci set up in his Staten Island home. Develop a claim using this paragraph, and name one limitation of the paragraph as evidence.

    Show model answer

18. Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer

    A classmate says, "If I put a counterclaim in my paragraph, my argument will look weaker." Explain why a fair counterclaim, with its strengths and limitations, can make an argument stronger. Use one example from Sources 1-3.

    Show model answer

19. Question 19 of 20 · Short Answer

    Use Source 5 to develop a claim and a counterclaim about whose name should go on the gripper design. Point out one strength and one limitation of the evidence for each side.

    Show model answer

20. Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer

    Source 5D, the coach's note, can be used by both sides. Name one strength and one limitation of the note as evidence.

    Show model answer

These standards connect to D3.4.6-8: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.

Standard text: National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS), The College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework for Social Studies State Standards: Guidance for Enhancing the Rigor of K-12 Civics, Economics, Geography, and History (Silver Spring, MD: NCSS, 2013). NCSS was not involved in the production of this lesson and does not endorse it.