Statistics, Anecdotes and the Word Limit
A Year 11 revision class compares two short texts about a proposed skate park. Text A is a council press release: it reports that a public consultation received 312 responses, 64% in favour, and includes a quote from the mayor saying the park will 'revitalise the area'. Text B is a local resident's blog post: it claims that 'my son and his friends have nowhere to go', calls the consultation 'a tick-box exercise', and uses the emotive phrase 'teenagers with nowhere to go but a wall'. A comprehension question asks: 'Which text is more reliable and why?' A candidate writes: 'Text A is more reliable because it has statistics and Text B is just an opinion.' The teacher wants the candidate to move beyond 'statistics equals reliable'. A second question asks for a 50-word summary of the arguments for and against; the candidate copies long phrases from both texts and exceeds the limit. The teacher must decide how to teach reliability and summary in the same lesson without conflating the two skills.
1. What is wrong with the candidate's answer, and what would a full-mark answer need to say about Text A's statistics and Text B's anecdote?
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The answer treats 'has statistics' as a guarantee of reliability and 'is an opinion' as a disqualification. Both are shortcuts.
- Provenance and purpose. Text A is a council press release from the body proposing the park. It has an interest in showing support. The 312 responses and 64% figure may be accurate, but we are not told how the consultation was conducted, who responded, or whether it was representative. The statistic is evidence of respondents' views, not of all residents.
- Text B is openly partisan and anecdotal. 'My son and his friends have nowhere to go' illustrates a concern but cannot measure demand. The blog's purpose is to persuade, and the emotive phrase is part of that design. That does not make it worthless: it may reveal lived experience that a press release omits.
- A full answer compares. It should ask: reliable for what claim? Text A is more reliable for the factual claim that a majority of consultation respondents supported the plan. It is less reliable for the claim that the park will 'revitalise the area', which is the mayor's assertion. Text B is useful for understanding residents' frustration but not for estimating overall support.
- Language of judgement. Use 'more reliable for this purpose because...', not 'reliable' as a fixed label. That is the conceptual move the question rewards.
2. How should the teacher teach the 50-word summary so the candidate stops copying? Give a concrete method and a model summary of the two texts.
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Method: gist before words.
- Read each text once. Write a five-word label in the margin: A = 'council claims majority support'; B = 'resident says consultation tokenistic'.
- Under each label, note only the claim and one reason. Cross out examples, quotations and emotive language.
- Draft the summary from the notes with the texts closed. This breaks the copying habit.
- Count words. If over, cut examples first, then adjectives. Keep both sides balanced.
- Distinguish summary from evaluation: a summary says what each text argues; it does not decide which is right. Reliability language belongs in the other question.
Model summary (49 words): 'Supporters argue the skate park will revitalise the area and point to 64% support among 312 consultation responses. Opponents claim the consultation was a tick-box exercise and that local teenagers lack somewhere to go. The blog uses an anecdote about the writer's son, while the council quotes the mayor.'
This is under 50 words, covers both texts, uses some own words, and keeps the claims distinct. The teacher should show the word count, not just the model, so the candidate sees that compression is a design choice.
3. The teacher has 30 minutes. How should the lesson be split between reliability and summary, and why?
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Split the lesson, but do not teach the two skills as one.
- 0–5 minutes: same texts, two questions. Put the reliability question and the summary question side by side. Ask: 'What is different about what each question wants?' Draw out: reliability = evaluate; summary = compress.
- 5–17 minutes: reliability. Use a four-column grid: author/purpose, evidence, language, usefulness for a specific claim. Fill it for both texts. Insist on 'reliable for...' sentences. This is evaluation, so students need criteria, not a slogan.
- 17–27 minutes: summary. Model the gist-note method, then a timed 50-word draft with texts closed. Peer-check word count and balance. Do not let students drift back into 'Text A is more reliable' - that is a different task.
- 27–30 minutes: exit ticket. One sentence: 'Text A is more reliable for ___ because ___.' And one 20-word summary of Text B.
Why this split. Reliability requires criteria and comparison; summary requires comprehension and selective deletion. Combining them encourages the candidate's original mistake: judging while summarising, or copying while evaluating. The shared texts save time; the separate questions protect the skills.