Integrated Writing - Seb Answers

The reading provides three reasons why online encyclopedias are not as good as traditional encyclopedias. However, the professor in the lecture disagrees with the points in the reading for several reasons.

To begin, while the errors in online encyclopedias may number more than traditional encyclopedias, they are more easily corrected than published encyclopedias. Online documents are, in a sense, living documents. Editors can make revisions when new information comes out and incorporate these changes in real time.

Changes to online encyclopedias by hackers can happen. While this is a concern put forward in the reading, the lecturer handily counters by stating that editors monitor changes, and that crucial facts are protected within the website through read-only formatting. Whereas researchers may come upon altered information in online encyclopedias, these malicious attacks are prevented and corrected for by the editorial staff of the online encyclopedias.

Finally, the significance of information is questioned in the reading, but the lecturer again debunks the claim by explaining that traditional print encyclopedias have limited space, over which an editorial board judges what ought to be included. However, there is no limit to the space of online encyclopedias, and the diversity of views and information is the greatest advantage that the online version offers as it reflects the much broader interests of the public than published encyclopedias ever could.

(222 words)

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We read about the large stone structures, or “great houses,” in the Chaco Canyon and the three theories on which their existence is based. The professor in the lecture presents three reasons, one for each theory, as to why the origin of the large houses remains unknown.

The professor begins with the first theory on the structures as apartment buildings. The main flaw in this theory is that while there are indeed many rooms for a large number of inhabitants, there are relatively few fireplaces. If there had been residents, there would have had to have been enough fireplaces for each family.

The second theory proposes that the buildings stored corn. The lecturer explains that there were very few containers among the remains and little corn. Therefore, if these structures were for storage of maize, excavators would have found much more corn and many more ceramic containers.

Third and finally, the professor rebuts the proposal that this had been a ceremonial center. There are many remnants in addition to any possible religious artifacts, and the random distribution of the remains suggests just as likely that this was simply a trash heap.

(191 words)

Tag: Integrated Writing

TOEFL iBT — Model Integrated Essay: Communal Online Encyclopedias

TOEFL iBT — Model Integrated Essay: Chaco Canyon