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.
In the letter, the author recommends Parkville to stop organizing athletic competitions for children below the age of nine. To support the recommendation, the author points out that young players suffered severe physical and mental injuries due to sports, and that time occupied by sports has affected the players' academic performance. However, the author makes several unsubstantiated assumptions that need to be addressed before Parkville could accept or reject the recommendation.
In the process of reasoning, the author assumes that the psychological pressure feedback from the youth-league soccer players in several major cities can be used to represent for the young players in Parkville. Apparently, the assumption needs to be further evaluated in two ways. Firstly, there comes the question whether the studied youth-league soccer players are representative of players specialized in other sports. Perhaps soccer is highly valued in the area where the interviewees stay, thus the pressure is relatively higher. Secondly, the study conducted in several major cities is not necessarily applicable to Parkville. For example, soccer might not be popular in Parkville, or the soccer league is only open to teenagers above nine years old. Without considering these factors, we could not conclude that the study can be used to indicate the possible situations in Parkville.
Another hidden assumption behind the argument is that the time used for sports practice, if stopped, will be utilized for academic activities. There are many other activities that children would like to do if they have extra free time. For instance, perhaps they might spend the time playing video games which is a widespread problem among children, or perhaps they might use the time for traveling if some of them are travel lovers. The author should consider these possibilities carefully, otherwise the assumption of shifting time for academic activities might not sound valid.
Last but not least, one more assumption that is also import for the argument relates to the recommendation the author made. The author suggests stopping atheletic competitions for children under nine because of the outweighing disadvantages. However, without comparing the advantages and the shortcomings of ceasing the sports matches, we could not draw the conclusion that the shortcomings are overwhelming. In addition, even if so, there are other possible solutions rather than completely shutting down the competition. For example, the sports organizers could provide safer protections for the kids, or could reduce the frequency of the matches. Unless properly weighing the pros and cons behind the recommendation, and taking other alternative ways into account, the decision-maker in Parkville might not be convinced to carry out the measure.
In conclusion, even though the author proposes a possible solution to reduce injuries for youth players under nine in Parkville, he or she should provide more supporting evidence for the assumptions mentioned above. These include, but are not limited to, the scope and validity of the study, the alternative choices for more spare time, and the comparison of the advantages and disadvantages.
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Comments
Essay evaluation report
argument 1 -- OK
argument 2 -- OK
argument 3 -- OK
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also need to argue:
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.
//among those 40,000 of these young players suffered injuries, need to know how many injuries for children below the age of nine.
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 22 15
No. of Words: 491 350
No. of Characters: 2653 1500
No. of Different Words: 239 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.707 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.403 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.916 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 206 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 160 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 116 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 75 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.318 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.511 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.682 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.294 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.509 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.091 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 303, Rule ID: WHETHER[5]
Message: Can you shorten this phrase to just 'whether', or rephrase the sentence to avoid "the question"?
Suggestion: whether
...uated in two ways. Firstly, there comes the question whether the studied youth-league soccer players...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 54, Rule ID: BEEN_PART_AGREEMENT[2]
Message: Consider using a past participle here: 'imported'.
Suggestion: imported
...least, one more assumption that is also import for the argument relates to the recomme...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, apparently, but, first, firstly, however, if, second, secondly, so, thus, for example, for instance, in addition, in conclusion
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 20.0 19.6327345309 102% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 17.0 12.9520958084 131% => OK
Conjunction : 15.0 11.1786427146 134% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 20.0 28.8173652695 69% => OK
Preposition: 57.0 55.5748502994 103% => OK
Nominalization: 17.0 16.3942115768 104% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2723.0 2260.96107784 120% => OK
No of words: 491.0 441.139720559 111% => OK
Chars per words: 5.54582484725 5.12650576532 108% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.70728369723 4.56307096286 103% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.01005238809 2.78398813304 108% => OK
Unique words: 248.0 204.123752495 121% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.505091649695 0.468620217663 108% => OK
syllable_count: 844.2 705.55239521 120% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 4.96107784431 81% => OK
Article: 12.0 8.76447105788 137% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 7.0 1.67365269461 418% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 7.0 4.22255489022 166% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 22.0 19.7664670659 111% => OK
Sentence length: 22.0 22.8473053892 96% => OK
Sentence length SD: 40.5468813446 57.8364921388 70% => OK
Chars per sentence: 123.772727273 119.503703932 104% => OK
Words per sentence: 22.3181818182 23.324526521 96% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.04545454545 5.70786347227 106% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 10.0 6.88822355289 145% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 4.0 4.67664670659 86% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.144968935559 0.218282227539 66% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0459752444673 0.0743258471296 62% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0494714018573 0.0701772020484 70% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.090276032865 0.128457276422 70% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0467942712683 0.0628817314937 74% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.9 14.3799401198 111% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 40.69 48.3550499002 84% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.1 12.197005988 107% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 15.21 12.5979740519 121% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.0 8.32208582834 108% => OK
difficult_words: 133.0 98.500998004 135% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.5 12.3882235529 117% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.8 11.1389221557 97% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 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.