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 draws a conclusion that high school teachers should not give students homework more than twice in a week. This conclusion is drawn based on a survey on maths and science teachers from schools in Sanlee and Marlee districts, and the performance of the students in their evaluation. The hypothesis of the author can be possibly correct, however, there are several assumptions that are considered without being supported by proper evidence. There are flaws in survey data as well as various unwarranted assumptions about overall grades and free time of the students.
Firstly, there is no concrete data that illustrates the details of the survey conducted. The survey should also provide the information whether all the teachers in the district participated in the survey or it was few selected school teachers considered for the survey. The author needs to support the hypothesis with correct data from the survey. It could be possible that very few teachers participated in the survey, who consider giving more homework to the students whereas, the teachers who supplied lesser homework were left out of the survey. Without this, the results of the survey cannot be considered as statistically correct.
Secondly, another big leap that the author takes while presenting the hypothesis is considering that homework in the subject of maths and science only will impact the overall grade of any student. While it is true that the maths and science grades do contribute to the overall score, they are not the only factors involved. The author generalises the hypotheses for all the subjects on the basis survey conducted only on maths and science. A good performance is required in all the areas of study is req required so that the student does not have to repeat his to her year. Hence, further evidence on homework given in all the subjects is needed to establish the relation between the quantity of homework to the performance in examinations, without which the argument remains weakened.
Finally, the author ignores the difference in the quality and quantity of homework given in schools of both the districts. The hypothesis is not supported by the fact that how much homework is given to the students. The author assumes that homework on lesser number of days implies that students have more time for their individual assignments. It is also a possibility that even though the students in Marlee district are given homework for no more than three days, the time spent by the students are considerably more because of the complexity of the work required. On the other hand, the students in Sanlee district have more free time, although they were given daily homework that requires lower time investment. If the author can provide the evidence that students of Marlee had actual free time apart from their homework, it will provide bolster and strength to the author’s hypothesis.
In conclusion, even though the author arrives to the conclusion that high school teachers should give homework for no more than two days, there are several unwarranted assumptions and lack of evidence that undermines the author’s assumption. There are multiple pieces of evidence required to support the survey statistically and provide the strength to the author’s assumption of “free” time that the students of both districts have. However, with the absence of these pieces of evidence, the conclusion remains flawed.
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: 23 15
No. of Words: 557 350
No. of Characters: 2809 1500
No. of Different Words: 211 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.858 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.043 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.621 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 217 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 168 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 119 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 52 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.217 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.57 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.652 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.352 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.352 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.159 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, finally, first, firstly, hence, however, if, second, secondly, so, well, whereas, while, apart from, in conclusion, as well as, it is true, on the other hand
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 25.0 19.6327345309 127% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 9.0 12.9520958084 69% => OK
Conjunction : 12.0 11.1786427146 107% => OK
Relative clauses : 20.0 13.6137724551 147% => OK
Pronoun: 32.0 28.8173652695 111% => OK
Preposition: 71.0 55.5748502994 128% => OK
Nominalization: 22.0 16.3942115768 134% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2874.0 2260.96107784 127% => OK
No of words: 557.0 441.139720559 126% => OK
Chars per words: 5.15978456014 5.12650576532 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.85807034144 4.56307096286 106% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.71831190757 2.78398813304 98% => OK
Unique words: 223.0 204.123752495 109% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.400359066427 0.468620217663 85% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 882.9 705.55239521 125% => 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: 14.0 8.76447105788 160% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 23.0 19.7664670659 116% => OK
Sentence length: 24.0 22.8473053892 105% => OK
Sentence length SD: 47.8241501584 57.8364921388 83% => OK
Chars per sentence: 124.956521739 119.503703932 105% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.2173913043 23.324526521 104% => OK
Discourse Markers: 7.30434782609 5.70786347227 128% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 8.20758483034 110% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.67664670659 150% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.276658141687 0.218282227539 127% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.088492893384 0.0743258471296 119% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0660069948918 0.0701772020484 94% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.170018519999 0.128457276422 132% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0530810614754 0.0628817314937 84% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.0 14.3799401198 104% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 47.12 48.3550499002 97% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.7 12.197005988 104% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.94 12.5979740519 103% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.8 8.32208582834 94% => OK
difficult_words: 105.0 98.500998004 107% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 11.1389221557 104% => 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.