The following is an excerpt from a letter sent by the principal of Greenwood School to the parents of all incoming kindergartners.
"We have decided to institute a policy of all-day kindergarten, instead of half-day kindergarten, for all students at Greenwood School. All-day kindergarten will help all our students achieve at their highest levels. The classes will be 'tracked'; so that average students are together, but high-achieving and low-achieving students will be put together in classes. In this way, the high-achieving students will be able to help pull the low-achieving students up to their level, so that no student falls behind. The all-day kindergarten classes will cover the same material previously covered in the half-day kindergarten classes, but will go at a slower speed to accommodate learning differences. In addition, the students will receive extra instruction in music, art, and physical education. One of the greatest benefits of the plan, however, is that students will be in a structured environment for longer hours, reducing the numbers of hours that otherwise would be wasted at home or in day care."
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
In the letter sent by the principal of Greenwood School to the parents of all incoming kindergartners, it is stated that the institute has planned to adopt a policy of all-day kindergarten, instead of half-day kindergarten. The Principal of Greenwood School has come to this conclusion based on the assumption that longer hours in a structured environment is beneficial for kids, as well as the assumption that covering the same topics at a slower pace will eradicate the learning differences among-st kids. He also made others assumptions such as tracking the kids performance and segregating them into average, high performing and low performing will help in the development of every kid in a holistic approach. However, before this recommendation to adopt the policy of all-day classes for kindergarten can be implemented, the following three assumptions must be warranted and it's implications should be evaluated.
To begin with, the Principal assumes that kids benefit more from learning in a structured environment, compared to the learning's from experiencing the real world which is quite unstructured in nature. One might argue that its important to protect the kids from the perils of the evil world, but how long can they be protected inside this safety bubble ? Once they grow up, a sudden burst of this safety net will traumatize the kid, and the kid will be put in a state of tumult and it might stunt their future growth. Therefore, kids might benefit more from experiencing the real unstructured environment, where they can fall and learn to get up on their own, rather than spending more time in a factitious environment at school.
Furthermore, the Principal assumes that teaching the same topic but in a slow pace would help the entire class understand the concept better. But, he fails to recognize that each kid is unique. For example, a kid with good grasping power in math, might be bad at understanding the concept of art. If this kid is made to spend more time on math just because his counterparts can also catch up with the subject, he will lose interest in math and find no time to better himself in the field of art. This example shows that, extending the class hours just to elaborate on a topic for better understanding by all the students might hamper the knowledge growth of few kids.
Thirdly, based on what factor is the Principal segregating the kids into average, low achieving and high achieving ? A kid that is very good at music might be poor in their math skill, how can mixing this musically high performing kid with a musically low performing kid ensure overall development of both the kids ? Furthermore, the average kids, if they don't get to interact with high performing or low performing kids then they might fail to recognize their true competition and their true strength. One needs to interact with various kinds of individuals to learn the reality. Narrowing down their interactions might hamper the growth rather than enhancing it.
In conclusion, the argument as it stands now, is considerable flawed due to it's reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author is able to evaluate the three assumptions above and offer more evidence (perhaps in the form of a systematic research study), then it will be possible to fully evaluate the viability of the proposed recommendation to implement the policy of all-day kindergarten at Greenwood School.
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: 20 15
No. of Words: 568 350
No. of Characters: 2785 1500
No. of Different Words: 257 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.882 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.903 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.867 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 181 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 139 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 110 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 84 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 28.4 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.466 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.7 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.3 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.539 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.093 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 562, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'kids'' or 'kid's'?
Suggestion: kids'; kid's
...others assumptions such as tracking the kids performance and segregating them into a...
^^^^
Line 1, column 919, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...d its implications should be evaluated. To begin with, the Principal assumes tha...
^^^^^
Line 7, column 357, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: don't
... Furthermore, the average kids, if they dont get to interact with high performing or...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, furthermore, however, if, so, then, therefore, third, thirdly, well, for example, in conclusion, such as, as well as, to begin with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 17.0 19.6327345309 87% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 22.0 12.9520958084 170% => OK
Conjunction : 13.0 11.1786427146 116% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 41.0 28.8173652695 142% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 86.0 55.5748502994 155% => OK
Nominalization: 16.0 16.3942115768 98% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2846.0 2260.96107784 126% => OK
No of words: 567.0 441.139720559 129% => OK
Chars per words: 5.01940035273 5.12650576532 98% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.87972968509 4.56307096286 107% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.92877384248 2.78398813304 105% => OK
Unique words: 265.0 204.123752495 130% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.467372134039 0.468620217663 100% => OK
syllable_count: 864.0 705.55239521 122% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 28.0 22.8473053892 123% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 62.826745897 57.8364921388 109% => OK
Chars per sentence: 142.3 119.503703932 119% => OK
Words per sentence: 28.35 23.324526521 122% => OK
Discourse Markers: 7.1 5.70786347227 124% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 14.0 8.20758483034 171% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 6.88822355289 58% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.67664670659 43% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.203710611414 0.218282227539 93% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0702380148058 0.0743258471296 95% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.143229433106 0.0701772020484 204% => The coherence between sentences is low.
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.130352538442 0.128457276422 101% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.129269227712 0.0628817314937 206% => More connections among paragraphs wanted.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 16.4 14.3799401198 114% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 51.52 48.3550499002 107% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.0 12.197005988 107% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.13 12.5979740519 96% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.2 8.32208582834 99% => OK
difficult_words: 114.0 98.500998004 116% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 19.5 12.3882235529 157% => OK
gunning_fog: 13.2 11.1389221557 119% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 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.