Question

Read the excerpt.

The benefits of conducting school year-round greatly outweigh giving students a summer break. With year-round schooling, students can remain active in their learning. A long summer break makes it easy for students to forget what they learned during the previous school year, making it harder to apply learned skills during the next year. Allowing students to have weeks of free time means that their skills will be dulled when they return. With shorter breaks, they will forget fewer skills and be able to start each new year performing at their maximum capability. Summer vacations are death to American education since students will forget everything they learn each year.

Which statement explains how the author’s use of a straw man impacts the overall argument?

It weakens the overall argument by distracting from the benefits of year-round school by focusing on what students do with free time.
It strengthens the overall argument by pointing out that students’ time spent at school is mostly wasted.
It weakens the overall argument by inviting criticism with the exaggeration of the amount of learning students lose in the summer.
It strengthens the overall argument by advocating for students’ learning and pushing for best practices.

Answer 1

It weakens the overall argument by inviting criticism with the exaggeration of the amount of learning students lose in the summer.

Explanation: The author exaggerates (e.g., "Summer vacations are death... forget everything"), creating a straw man that is easy to refute and undermines the argument's credibility.