The data from a survey of high school math and science teachers show that in the district of Sanlee many of these teachers reported assigning daily homework, whereas in the district of Marlee, most science and math teachers reported assigning homework no more than two or three days per week. Despite receiving less frequent homework assignments, Marlee students earn better grades overall and are less likely to be required to repeat a year of school than are students in Sanlee. These results call into question the usefulness of frequent homework assignments. Most likely the Marlee students have more time to concentrate on individual assignments than do the Sanlee students who have homework every day. Therefore teachers in our high schools should assign homework no more than twice a week.
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
The argument indicating that high-school students should be assigned with less homework based on the survey of two schools in Sanlee and Marlee district is neither reliable nor robust. It relies on three assumptions that needs further examination before reaching into conclusions.
First of all, are the students in the district of Sanlee and the students in the district of Marlee comparable? It is possible that the students in the district of Marlee on average come from wealthier families and thus earn better grades, in which case the amount of workload may not be directly linked to the overall discrepancy of the students' performance. If the students' academic intelligence are different before school admission, the so-called evidence of 'better grades' would not be accountable.
Secondly, does the quality of schooling in these two district the same? In other words, do teachers teach classes similarly and give homework in similar ways? It is very likely that the difference in grades is not caused by the quantity of the assignments, but rather the quality of the assignments and classes. Marlee students may be encouraged by their teacher to do individual works while Sanlee students are not. If any of the above assumptions is true, then the suggestion that promotes reducing the homework to no more than twice a week does not hold water.
Lastly, even if both the students and the teachers' abilities are initially about the same, could the survey finding apply in a greater population? Less homework might be beneficial to students in terms of math and science while it may be harmful to students in terms of history and art. These two schools' situations may be a special case that can not be generalize nationwide or worldwide. The data collected from only two high schools in limited disciplines and limited district is not enough to derive a robust argument.
In conclusion, we need a more detailed understanding of the students initial academic abilities, the school's teaching methods, as well as more research evidence from different schools and disciplines to evaluate the suggested recommendation fully and responsibly.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 15 15
No. of Words: 347 350
No. of Characters: 1762 1500
No. of Different Words: 178 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.316 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.078 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.798 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 140 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 111 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 87 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 41 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 23.133 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.277 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.8 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.338 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.589 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.079 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 339, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'students'' or 'student's'?
Suggestion: students'; student's
...inked to the overall discrepancy of the students performance. If the students academic i...
^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, if, lastly, may, second, secondly, similarly, so, then, thus, well, while, in conclusion, as well as, first of all, in other words
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 18.0 19.6327345309 92% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 10.0 12.9520958084 77% => OK
Conjunction : 14.0 11.1786427146 125% => OK
Relative clauses : 7.0 13.6137724551 51% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 14.0 28.8173652695 49% => OK
Preposition: 50.0 55.5748502994 90% => OK
Nominalization: 12.0 16.3942115768 73% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1804.0 2260.96107784 80% => OK
No of words: 347.0 441.139720559 79% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.19884726225 5.12650576532 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.31600926901 4.56307096286 95% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.86733812994 2.78398813304 103% => OK
Unique words: 179.0 204.123752495 88% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.515850144092 0.468620217663 110% => OK
syllable_count: 555.3 705.55239521 79% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 15.0 19.7664670659 76% => Need more sentences. Double check the format of sentences, make sure there is a space between two sentences, or have enough periods. And also check the lengths of sentences, maybe they are too long.
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 52.9498714719 57.8364921388 92% => OK
Chars per sentence: 120.266666667 119.503703932 101% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.1333333333 23.324526521 99% => OK
Discourse Markers: 9.46666666667 5.70786347227 166% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 8.20758483034 110% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 2.0 6.88822355289 29% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 4.0 4.67664670659 86% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.252515350166 0.218282227539 116% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.08443566253 0.0743258471296 114% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0546328597553 0.0701772020484 78% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.139045061603 0.128457276422 108% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0593446847422 0.0628817314937 94% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.6 14.3799401198 102% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 48.13 48.3550499002 100% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.3 12.197005988 101% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.18 12.5979740519 105% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.65 8.32208582834 104% => OK
difficult_words: 85.0 98.500998004 86% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 54.17 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.25 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.