Name the Claim: A New Game for Social Media Literacy

🧰 Twella Toolkit: “Name the Claim!” Is it a…

🎯 Fact Claim: States that something happened, exists, or is real.

Example: “Elon Musk bought Twitter.” / “Sales dropped 30% last quarter.”
Why it feels compelling: Facts sound neutral and objective. Names, numbers, and dates give an instant sense of authority—even when the data is incomplete or taken out of context.

🔗 Causal Claim: Explains why something happened or what caused a result.

Example: “Social media caused teen anxiety.” / “He failed because he didn’t study.
Why it feels compelling: Humans love simple explanations. A clean cause-and-effect story makes a complex situation feel understandable, and it can point to something (or someone) to blame or fix.

✨ Vibe Claim: Judges something as cool, cringe, good, bad, etc.

Example: “This song slaps.” / “She’s so toxic.” / “That brand feels fake.”
Why it feels compelling: Vibes build identity and belonging. Agreeing or disagreeing becomes a way to signal who you are and what group you’re part of—often more powerfully than any statistic.

👉 Order Claim Tells the audience what to think, believe, or do.

Example: “You need to watch this.” / “Don’t trust this brand.” / “Stop eating meat.”
Why it feels compelling: Orders cut through uncertainty. Urgent or moral language (“now,” “must,” “it’s your responsibility”) can feel like common sense, nudging us to act before we slow down and reflect.

When we’re scrolling quickly, these claims can blur together. Name the Claim reduces the blur just enough for players to ask: Is this reporting, explaining, judging, or directing?

The next step, of course, is to consider what evidence, if any, is there to support the claim and potentially using AI tools and strategies to evaluate the evidence.

📊 Research Insight: Why This Practice Matters

There is no scarcity of research in digital literacy and misinformation showing that young people, despite growing up online, often struggle to spot misleading or manipulative content—and that repeated, active practice (not one-off lessons) is key for building durable critical thinking habits.

Name the Claim is designed as that kind of workout: short reps, immediate feedback, and lots of chances to practice labeling claims in context. Over time, that recognition can become automatic, helping students pause before sharing, ask better questions about evidence, and hold “vibes” and “orders” more lightly.

🌊 Ready to Practice?

Instead of teaching “Is this true?”, effective approaches help learners first ask, “What kind of thing am I looking at—and what kind of evidence should I expect for this?”

As you scroll through digital content this work, social media or not, play your own version of “Name the claim.” Which of the 4 claims are populating your feed the most?

Connect & Share!

“Name the Claim” is just one of the games we’re building to help young people practice critical thinking inside their real media environments, not just in worksheets or one-off lessons.

If you’re at a middle or high school, college or university and would like to pilot these games with your students, I’d love to hear from you—just reply to this newsletter or contact me at [email protected] 

And stay tuned as this game and others roll out on the Twella learning platform—and as we keep finding new ways to turn everyday scrolling into everyday critical thinking practice.

To thinking well together!
James