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 author’s conclusion is that the teachers in some high school should assign homework no more than twice a week. The evidence on which the argument is based is about the difference in grades and school achievement in two other schools, where there is a discrepancy between the frequency of homework assignments. However, before the argument evaluation, some pieces of evidence are needed.
First of all, we need evidence that the data from the mentioned survey is reliable and valid. In fact, it is mentioned that the research was conducted in a high school in the district of Sanlee and in some school in the district of Marlee. These two schools might be completely not comparable to each other. Suppose, the survey from a district of Marlee was conducted in a primary school where it is obvious that primary schools get fewer home assignments than high school students. Further, high school students tend to repeat a year of school more frequently than primary school students as the classes are much more taxing. Therefore, if this is the truth that the survey was conducted on two different levels of schools, the whole argument would be flawed and based on invalid evidence.
Secondly, before the evaluation, the author should provide us with evidence, that the schools in a district of Sanlee and Marlee are related to the school in which the recommendation is considered to be implemented. Suppose, that the schools from the evidence are in a completely different part of the world, where the education system might be totally different. For example, mentioned districts might be in Africa and the author’s school might be in the US. If this was true, the whole argument would be weakened and not valid as it is impossible to compare these schools. That is why we need evidence of the relation between the mentioned schools.
Additionally, to evaluate the argument we need evidence that the students from the school in the district of Marlee are equal to the students in Sanlee. In other words, that students from a Sanlee district are comparable to students in Marlee. In fact, it might appear that a high school in Marlee is the best one in the whole country, thus it is more probable that students pass all the classes without any difficulties. Moreover, we need evidence that the homework frequencies are the only factor influencing the student's abilities. Suppose, the students in Marlee have fewer assignments, but they have more exams, and this is why their grades at the end of the semester are better. If this was true, the author’s suggestion to make no more than two homework a week might not bring the desired effect, therefore the argument would be weak and not cogent enough.
In conclusion, the argument, as it stands now, is considerably flawed due to its reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. To evaluate it, the author’s school should make no more than two homework assignments in a week we need more pieces of evidence. The provided pieces of evidence will make the passage more reliable and help to evaluate whether fewer homework has an influence on the student's achievements.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 3 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 1 2
No. of Sentences: 23 15
No. of Words: 526 350
No. of Characters: 2534 1500
No. of Different Words: 185 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.789 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.817 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.614 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 194 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 139 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 106 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 48 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.87 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.993 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.565 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.346 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.525 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.157 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 7, column 575, Rule ID: FEWER_LESS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'fewer'? The noun assignments is countable.
Suggestion: fewer
...s. Suppose, the students in Marlee have less assignments, but they have more exams, ...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, however, if, moreover, second, secondly, so, therefore, thus, for example, in conclusion, in fact, first of all, in other words
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 36.0 19.6327345309 183% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 18.0 12.9520958084 139% => OK
Conjunction : 11.0 11.1786427146 98% => OK
Relative clauses : 18.0 13.6137724551 132% => OK
Pronoun: 36.0 28.8173652695 125% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 69.0 55.5748502994 124% => OK
Nominalization: 28.0 16.3942115768 171% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2613.0 2260.96107784 116% => OK
No of words: 532.0 441.139720559 121% => OK
Chars per words: 4.91165413534 5.12650576532 96% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.80261649409 4.56307096286 105% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.75266728838 2.78398813304 99% => OK
Unique words: 195.0 204.123752495 96% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.366541353383 0.468620217663 78% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 801.0 705.55239521 114% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 9.0 4.96107784431 181% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 6.0 2.70958083832 221% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 8.0 4.22255489022 189% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 23.0 19.7664670659 116% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 40.1329077386 57.8364921388 69% => OK
Chars per sentence: 113.608695652 119.503703932 95% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.1304347826 23.324526521 99% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.04347826087 5.70786347227 106% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 8.20758483034 49% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 9.0 6.88822355289 131% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 10.0 4.67664670659 214% => Less facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.201496612508 0.218282227539 92% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0690423960897 0.0743258471296 93% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0614831469248 0.0701772020484 88% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.125407726761 0.128457276422 98% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0413328663031 0.0628817314937 66% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.3 14.3799401198 92% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 56.59 48.3550499002 117% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.1 12.197005988 91% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.49 12.5979740519 91% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.51 8.32208582834 90% => OK
difficult_words: 92.0 98.500998004 93% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 12.3882235529 85% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 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.