The following appeared in a letter to the editor of the Parkville Daily newspaper.
"Throughout the country last year, as more and more children below the age of nine participated in youth-league sports, over 40,000 of these young players suffered injuries. When interviewed for a recent study, youth-league soccer players in several major cities also reported psychological pressure exerted by coaches and parents to win games. Furthermore, education experts say that long practice sessions for these sports take away time that could be used for academic activities. Since the disadvantages outweigh any advantages, we in Parkville should discontinue organized athletic competition for children under nine."
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.
The author of the letter might have meant well while writing to protest against athletic competition for children under nine. However, his complaints do not make a cogent argument based on the many loopholes and insufficient evidence.
First, though more children might suffer from injuries due to an increased number who join in sports, this is not to say that there is also a huge increase in the percentage of children who suffer. 40,000 might seem like a huge number, but the author does not mention the total number of children who participated in youth-league sports; if there were hundreds of thousands of children who played sports, and only 40,000 were injured, the situation would not be serious enough to require a total cancellation of these sports.
Even if there is a large percentage of children who suffered from injuries, what might have been defined as an injury could be inconsequential. For example, if most of the children received injuries from slightly scratched knees, parents need not worry about the health and safety of their children doing sports. What's more, the fact that these children were injured might not have been connected to sports activities at all. The author only stated that 40,000 players were injured, but did not state whether they were injured due to youth-leagued sports, or if they managed to get hurt while playing at home.
As for psychological pressure, the author condemns the pressure to win as a negative thing. He/She neglects the fact that the pressure to win is not specified for sports activities, but ever-present in children's daily activities, from board games to competitive tests. The advantageous side of this urge to win, such as higher determination and motivation, is overlooked. Plus, there is no mention of the number of players who expressed psychological pressure by playing youth-league soccer. If there were only two or three who are unaccustomed to the pressure in sport games, wouldn't it be unwise to eliminate the fun completely for others, when they can perhaps choose not to participate instead?
Moreover, there can be many pros to youth-league that can benefit children. Though there can be pressure to win, children can also learn teamwork, and make friends along the way. While there would be less time from academic activities, there can also be beneficial parts of youth-league that would tip the scale. For example, children may release pressure from schoolwork through sports, and have a better physique so they feel less tired everyday from studying. In fact, studies have shown that playing sports while young often helps people build on their concentration, which can lead to better academic performance in the future.
Though youth-league can have its downsides, such as the occasional injuries and pressure, the author does not make a convincing point to make it worthy of shutting down the games completely. It is highly unlikely for the author to change other people's views if he does not better support his opinion with valid reasoning.
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Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 4 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 7 2
No. of Sentences: 20 15
No. of Words: 499 350
No. of Characters: 2479 1500
No. of Different Words: 240 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.726 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.968 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.679 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 176 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 125 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 93 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 48 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.95 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.484 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.9 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.333 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.599 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.133 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 6 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 353, Rule ID: A_HUNDREDS[1]
Message: Possible agreement error. Consider using: 'a hundred'
Suggestion: a hundred
...d in youth-league sports; if there were a hundreds of thousands of children who played spo...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 353, Rule ID: A_PLURAL[1]
Message: Don't use indefinite articles with plural words. Did you mean 'a hundred' or simply 'hundreds'?
Suggestion: a hundred; hundreds
...d in youth-league sports; if there were a hundreds of thousands of children who played spo...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 314, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: What's
... safety of their children doing sports. Whats more, the fact that these children were...
^^^^^
Line 5, column 401, Rule ID: TO_NON_BASE[1]
Message: The verb after "to" should be in the base form: 'sport'.
Suggestion: sport
...njured might not have been connected to sports activities at all. The author only stat...
^^^^^^
Line 7, column 524, Rule ID: WHO_NOUN[1]
Message: A noun should not follow "who". Try changing to a verb or maybe to 'who is a are'.
Suggestion: who is a are
...soccer. If there were only two or three who are unaccostomed to the pressure in sport g...
^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 577, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: wouldn't
...ostomed to the pressure in sport games, wouldnt it be unwise to eliminate the fun compl...
^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 588, Rule ID: IT_VBZ[1]
Message: Did you mean 'is'?
Suggestion: is
...the pressure in sport games, wouldnt it be unwise to eliminate the fun completely ...
^^
Line 9, column 440, Rule ID: EVERYDAY_EVERY_DAY[3]
Message: 'Everyday' is an adjective. Did you mean 'every day'?
Suggestion: every day
...better physique so they feel less tired everyday from studying. In fact, the endorphines...
^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, first, however, if, look, may, moreover, so, well, while, as for, for example, in fact, such as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 22.0 19.6327345309 112% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 20.0 12.9520958084 154% => OK
Conjunction : 13.0 11.1786427146 116% => OK
Relative clauses : 16.0 13.6137724551 118% => OK
Pronoun: 29.0 28.8173652695 101% => OK
Preposition: 64.0 55.5748502994 115% => OK
Nominalization: 11.0 16.3942115768 67% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2673.0 2260.96107784 118% => OK
No of words: 519.0 441.139720559 118% => OK
Chars per words: 5.15028901734 5.12650576532 100% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.7730044521 4.56307096286 105% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.75525688153 2.78398813304 99% => OK
Unique words: 253.0 204.123752495 124% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.487475915222 0.468620217663 104% => OK
syllable_count: 792.9 705.55239521 112% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 4.96107784431 81% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 9.0 2.70958083832 332% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 8.0 1.67365269461 478% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 19.7664670659 106% => OK
Sentence length: 24.0 22.8473053892 105% => OK
Sentence length SD: 53.2590043274 57.8364921388 92% => OK
Chars per sentence: 127.285714286 119.503703932 107% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.7142857143 23.324526521 106% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.52380952381 5.70786347227 97% => OK
Paragraphs: 6.0 5.15768463074 116% => OK
Language errors: 8.0 5.25449101796 152% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 10.0 8.20758483034 122% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 10.0 6.88822355289 145% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.67664670659 21% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.187651953458 0.218282227539 86% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0566112956857 0.0743258471296 76% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0410653494539 0.0701772020484 59% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0963626565963 0.128457276422 75% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0488725809912 0.0628817314937 78% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.2 14.3799401198 106% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 55.58 48.3550499002 115% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.89 12.5979740519 102% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.11 8.32208582834 97% => OK
difficult_words: 108.0 98.500998004 110% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 11.1389221557 104% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
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.