#18 - Psychologist: Phonemic awareness, or the knowledge

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Must Be True. The correct answer choice is (D).

Answer choice (A):

Answer choice (B):

Answer choice (C):

Answer choice (D): This is the correct answer choice.

Answer choice (E):

This explanation is still in progress. Please post any questions below!

[ClaudiaK32]

I chose D through process of elimination but am unclear of what the stimulus is actually saying. I can tell that the conclusion is supposed to come as a sort of surprise with the word "yet", but I don't know why.

[Charlie Melman]

Hi Claudia,

The stimulus gives two necessary conditions for learning how to read an alphabetic language:

(1) You need to know that spoken language can be broken into component sounds, and

(2) You need to learn how sounds are represented symbolically by means of letters.

There is no conclusion in this argument; rather, we are supposed to select the most reasonable conclusion from among the answer choices.

Hope this helps!

[NeverMissing]

Hi Powerscore,

Is the reason why D is correct and E is incorrect is that the argument never implies that the whole-language method even attempts to teach children how to represent sounds symbolically as letters; it only implies that children learning the whole-language method are not prevented from learning how to represent sounds symbolically as letters (because we know they can read, and representing sounds as letters is a requirement to be able to read)?

In other words, the children learning the whole-language method may learn how to represent sounds symbolically as letters through some other form of instruction completely separate from the whole-language method, so we cannot conclude anything about what the whole-language method did or did not teach them, only that the whole-language method did not prevent them from learning how to represent sounds as letters.

[Francis O'Rourke]

Hi NM,

You are focusing on the wrong distinction here. What makes (E) questionable is that the stimulus told us that, according to the psychologist, in order to read an alphabetic language, one needs to learn how sounds are represented symbolically. Answer choice (E) shifts the language by saying that this method teaches children how to actually write the letters. The stimulus only discusses how to read, not how to write, so we cannot infer answer choice (E).

[sgd2114]

Hi,

Is (A) wrong because of the word "invariably"? We know that there must be some cases in which the whole-language method is successful in teaching awareness of how spoken language can be broken into component sounds, because "many" of the students learn to read alphabetic languages, but not that it always succeeds.

Thank you!

[AthenaDalton]

Hi sgd,

Yes, the word "invariably" makes answer choice (A) incorrect. We know that the whole-language method succeeds in teaching "many" children alphabetic languages (which entails learning component sounds), but we cannot say that every student who is taught in the whole-language method achieves this mastery.

Best of luck studying!

Athena Dalton

[lyujenny]

I must be misreading this question or not entirely understanding it. If this is a must be true question, wouldn't answer choice (b) - when the whole-language method succeeds in teaching someone how to represent sounds by means of letters, that person acquires the ability to read an alphabetic language - be true? I'm interpreting this as, "many children who are taught by the whole language method" learn to read an alphabetic language successfully when it succeeds in teaching them to represent sounds by means of letters. Which is phonemic ability.

Also couldn't you argue that (e) - the whole-language method succeeds in teaching many children how to represent sounds symbolically by means of letters - also be true, since the question specifies that the whole-language method emphasizes the way words sound, implying that it doesn't completely exclude the teaching of symbolic representation by letters? Maybe they mostly spend time on teaching the sound of words but spend some time teaching the symbolic representation, thereby children also learn to read that way since they're able to both gain phonemic awareness and symbolic representation.

[nicholaspavic]

Hi Jenny,

I am going to take your questions out of order. Answer Option (E) is very strong here. We do not know and it is not a reasonable inference to make that the whole language method deals with symbolic representation. I really like the way that Francis broke it down above by characterizing it as "writing" because I think there is a tendency of students to get confused in the verbiage of Answer Option (E) otherwise. Therefore, we get a clean idea from (E) using a specific example of what the LSAT could be talking about and that makes it pretty easy to eliminate.

With Answer Option (B), LSAT is playing a game with us about the logical inferences created in the stimulus. Look at what Charlie broke down for us above:

read an alphabetic language learn how sounds are represented symbolically by means of letters

And what does (B) do?

learn how sounds are represented symbolically by means of letters read an alphabetic language

That's a Mistaken Reversal (switching the sufficient and necessary) and that is a classic wrong answer on MBT questions.

Thanks for the great questions and I hope this helps!

[Oneshot06]

Hi,

If I was to draw this out in formal logic terms, would it be like this:

whole lang. method read alphabet phonemic awareness + means of letters

So if we took the "some" train, can leap over to phonemic awareness + means of letters, justifying reasoning in D.?

Thanks, really appreciate your response.