Argument Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 2

Argument Analysis - Essay Example Botstein however claims that it is not the length of school days that affects the performance of the children rather; it is how the time in school is spent. He presented some statistics to point out his argument. The thesis of the article is that the solution to the improvement of the academic performance of the school children in the US is not the lengthening of the time spent in school but rather, an analysis of how the time in school is spent. Botstein’s article is targeted to every American citizen, particularly to the politicians who are moving for the extension of the number of school days. He also aims to target the parents of the school children to explain to them that it is not the number of school days that really matters. He is addressing the parents to probably put some pressure on the politicians to extensively study their proposal before making it into a law. Botstein is trying to convince his readers to believe his argument through the use of the logical appeal to prove his point. He supports his argument by comparing the number of school days in the other countries that outperforms the US’ school children. Botstein indicated that some countries have longer school days, others have less school days while others have the same school days as in the US but it was not what really mattered. What are essential are the instruction hours that are dedicated in key areas such as mathematics, science, history and literature. He mentioned that American high school students spend only 41 per cent of their time in school studying these subject areas unlike the Japanese and the French (Botstein 1). Botstein used analogy to prove his point. Another issue which Botstein identified as the reason for the poorer performance of the US school children compared with other countries is the issue on who is doing the teaching. To prove his point he presented the results of the 1996 survey of the Education