TPO-15 - Integrated Writing Task
The cane toad is a large (1.8 kg) amphibian species native to Central and South America. It was deliberately introduced to Australia in 1935 with the expectation that it would protect farmers' crops by eating harmful insects. Unfortunately, the toad multiplied rapidly, and a large cane toad population now threatens small native animals that are not pests. Several measures have been proposed to stop the spread of the cane toad in Australia.
One way to prevent the spread of the toad would be to build a national fence. A fence that blocks the advance of the toads will prevent them from moving into those parts of Australia that they have not yet colonized. This approach has been used before: a national fence was erected in the early part of the twentieth century to prevent the spread of rabbits, another animal species that was introduced in Australia from abroad and had a harmful impact on its native ecosystems.
Second, the toads could be captured and destroyed by volunteers. Cane toads can easily be caught in simple traps and can even be captured by hand. Young toads and cane toad eggs are even easier to gather and destroy,since they are restricted to the water. If the Australian government were to organize a campaign among Australian citizens to join forces to destroy the toads, the collective effort might stop the toad from spreading.
Third, researchers are developing a disease-causing virus to control the cane toad populations. This virus will be specially designed: although it will be able to infect a number of reptile and amphibian species, it will not harm most of the infected species; it will specifically harm only the cane toads. The virus will control the population of cane toads by preventing them from maturing and reproducing.
The reading passage presents three proposals to stop the spread of the cane toad in Australia. However, the speaker in the lecture casts doubt on the measures discussed in the article. She mentions that the proposed solutions are likely to be unsuccessful or may cause environmental damage.
To start, the author assumes that establishing a national fence could help prevent the toads from colonizing new areas. Nevertheless, the lecturer indicates that young toads and toad eggs mostly move in rivers and streams. As a result, it would be easy to spread from one side to the other. Furthermore, according to the lecture, only few toads or eggs are needed to establish a population. Hence, constructing a barrier would be ineffective.
Secondly, the writer contends that a collective volunteer effort organized by the government could be implemented to gather and destroy the toads. In contrast, the professor in the listening brings up the fact that untrained volunteers would not be capable of telling apart the toads from the native frogs, especially when they are young. Thus, this technique could result in loss of native species which are already endangered.
Lastly, the excerpt states that a disease-causing virus could come in handy since it would prohibit the young toads from maturing and reproducing. Although some reptiles and amphibians might get infected too, the virus would only harm toads. The lecturer opposes this method saying that the infection could make its way to Central and South America and devastate the native cane toad population there, which is an essential part of the eco-system on the continent. She illustrates that the infected toads could be transported to research centers and pet collectors in the americas.
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Transition Words or Phrases used:
furthermore, hence, however, lastly, may, nevertheless, second, secondly, so, thus, in contrast, as a result
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 11.0 10.4613686534 105% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 13.0 5.04856512141 257% => Less auxiliary verb wanted.
Conjunction : 10.0 7.30242825607 137% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 12.0772626932 91% => OK
Pronoun: 16.0 22.412803532 71% => OK
Preposition: 32.0 30.3222958057 106% => OK
Nominalization: 4.0 5.01324503311 80% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1482.0 1373.03311258 108% => OK
No of words: 281.0 270.72406181 104% => OK
Chars per words: 5.27402135231 5.08290768461 104% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.09427095027 4.04702891845 101% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.82377558238 2.5805825403 109% => OK
Unique words: 168.0 145.348785872 116% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.597864768683 0.540411800872 111% => OK
syllable_count: 444.6 419.366225166 106% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.55342163355 103% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 3.25607064018 123% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.23620309051 109% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 1.25165562914 160% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.51434878587 0% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 2.5761589404 116% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 15.0 13.0662251656 115% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 21.2450331126 85% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 43.4521448134 49.2860985944 88% => OK
Chars per sentence: 98.8 110.228320801 90% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.7333333333 21.698381199 86% => OK
Discourse Markers: 7.2 7.06452816374 102% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 4.09492273731 98% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 4.19205298013 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 2.0 4.33554083885 46% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 10.0 4.45695364238 224% => Less negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.27373068433 70% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.476879450516 0.272083759551 175% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.140030466722 0.0996497079465 141% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0689811274134 0.0662205650399 104% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.262517241538 0.162205337803 162% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0672227249759 0.0443174109184 152% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.8 13.3589403974 96% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 53.21 53.8541721854 99% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 5.55761589404 158% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 11.0289183223 93% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.29 12.2367328918 109% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.31 8.42419426049 111% => OK
difficult_words: 85.0 63.6247240618 134% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 7.0 10.7273730684 65% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 10.498013245 88% => OK
text_standard: 10.0 11.2008830022 89% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 83.3333333333 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 25.0 Out of 30
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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.