Self-study
Robert: The school board is considering adopting a year-round academic schedule that eliminates the traditional three-month summer vacation. ████ ████████ ██████ ██ ████████ █████ ████████ ████ ██ █████ ████ ███ ████████ ██████ ███ ██████ ████ ████ ████ ██ ████
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Summarize Argument
Samantha claims that a proposal to eliminate the three-month summer vacation won’t allow teachers to cover more new material. This is because the proposal adds six new, shorter breaks, so the total number of school days won't change.
Samantha's argument is about cause and effect; she seeks to deny the causal claim that the proposed change will allow teachers to cover more material. To counter (i.e. weaken) this argument, Robert needs to show that the new schedule could still create an opportunity to teach more, even though the number of school days will be the same.
Notable Assumptions
Samantha claims that the two schedules will accommodate the same amount of material, solely because the number of school days will be the same. This requires assuming that the distribution of school days is unimportant to how much material teachers can cover—that only the number of days matters. In other words, Samantha assumes that a schedule with six two-week breaks will not allow teachers to cover more material compared to a schedule with a three-month summer vacation.
One way that Robert can counter Samantha's argument is by denying this assumption. This would look like an answer stating or strongly indicating that a schedule with more, shorter breaks will in fact allow teachers to cover more material.
9.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ ██ █ ████████ ██████ █████ ████ ████ █████ ███████ ██████████ █████████
a
Teachers would be ███████ ██ ██████ ███████████ ██ ███ ███████████ ███████████ ██████ ████████ ██ ████ ██ ███ █████ ████████ ████ ████ ███ ████████ ██ ████ ████ ██ ███ ████████
Samantha's argument isn't about what teachers are willing to do or even whether the new schedule would be practical to implement, just about how much material the change would hypothetically allow teachers to cover. Teachers' preferences aren't relevant to that determination.
b
Most parents who ████ ███████ ███ ████ ████ ██ █████████ ██ ███████ ████████ ███████████ ███ █████ ██████████ ████████ ████ ███ ███████████ ███████████ ██████ █████████
The argument isn't about the overall cost-benefit of the new schedule, it's specifically about whether the change will actually have the effect of allowing more material to be covered. Additional benefits for parents are great, but irrelevant to the central cause-and-effect.
c
In school districts ████ ████ ███████ █ ██████████ ████████ ████ █████████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████ ████ ███ █████ ████████ ████ █ ██████ █████████████ ███ ██████ █████████ ██ ███ █████████
This would be great, except it only gives us information about year-round schedules that increase the total number of school days. However we need to explain how teachers can cover more material in the same number of days, which this doesn't help with.
d
Teachers spend no ████ ████ █ ███ ██ █████ ████ █████████ ███ ████████ ████ ████████ ████ ████ ████ ████ ██████ ███ ████ █ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ██ █████ ██ ██ █ █████ ██ █████ ████ █████████ █████ █ ███████████ ██████ █████████
This denies Samantha's assumptionthat only the number of school days is important. Instead, shorter breaks mean less time reviewing, i.e. more time for new material, meaning teachers can cover more in the same number of days. This is a good counter to Samantha's argument.
e
Students prefer taking █ ████ ████████ ████ ██████ ██████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████ ████ ████████ ███ ███████ █████████ ██████ ██████████ ███ █████
Like (A), this isn't relevant because the argument doesn't bring anyone's preferences into questions, including students'. We need to establish that the proposed schedule will allow teachers to cover more material than before, which this doesn't help with.