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Difficulty: EasyEvaluating Relevance for Adding or Deleting Content

For centuries, writers and artists used lead rods to make marks on paper. In 1564, a massive deposit of pure graphite was discovered in Borrowdale, England. [3] Graphite is a crystalline form of the element carbon. Early pencil makers wrapped the graphite rods in string or encased them in wooden sleeves to prevent the soft material from breaking.

The writer is considering deleting Sentence 3 from the paragraph. Should this sentence be kept or deleted?

  1. A
    Kept, because it provides essential scientific context explaining the chemical structure of the writing material.
  2. B
    Kept, because it establishes why Borrowdale, England, was the ideal location for discovering graphite.
  3. Deleted, because it interrupts the paragraph's historical focus on the development of the pencil with an irrelevant scientific definition.Answer
  4. D
    Deleted, because it repeats information about carbon that was already introduced earlier in the paragraph.

Answer

Deleted, because it interrupts the paragraph's historical focus on the development of the pencil with an irrelevant scientific definition.
The correct decision is to delete the sentence because the paragraph is focused on the history and structural evolution of the pencil. The chemical classification of graphite as carbon is an irrelevant digression. The option stating that it interrupts the paragraph's historical focus with an irrelevant scientific definition correctly identifies both the decision and the rhetorical reason.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Identify the main focus of the paragraph.
The paragraph describes the history of writing instruments, specifically the transition from lead rods to graphite pencils.
Understanding the paragraph's main theme is necessary to evaluate if Sentence 3 is relevant.
2
Analyze the content of Sentence 3 and compare it to the main focus.
Sentence 3 defines graphite chemically as a form of carbon. This is a scientific fact that does not contribute to the historical narrative of the pencil's development.
This determines whether the sentence should be kept (relevant) or deleted (irrelevant).
3
Evaluate the reasons provided in the deletion options to find the correct justification.
The option proposing deletion because it interrupts the paragraph's historical focus with an irrelevant scientific definition is the only one with both the correct decision and correct reasoning.
The other deletion option falsely claims the sentence repeats previously introduced information about carbon.

Key Concept

Evaluating Relevance for Adding or Deleting Content
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Topics

Evaluating Relevance for Adding or Deleting Content

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