Some people think that children can learn effectively by watching TV and they should be encouraged to watch TV both at home and at school. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

2017年3月18日这次的考题真心不难，非常传统的“看电视”题。这道题的题干包含了一个因果关系：因为电视可以让小孩有效学习，所以小孩应该被鼓励在家里和学校看电视。回答这道题的一个“标准答案”的是部分同意，部分不同意（应该不会有同学想完全同意的吧？）有两点需要特别提醒大家注意：

首先，在同意（或者说让步的段落）请把重点放在论证看电视和学习的关系上，而不是泛泛地谈看电视的好处；也就是说如果文章有大篇幅论证看电视能够让小孩放松，缓解压力等跟学习没有直接关系的好处是有较大的偏题的风险的。

另外，在不同意的部分，不建议同学们一上来就讲“色情，暴力”，因为色情和暴力并不是电视的普遍特点，而只是比较特殊的情况；如果把这部分论据当作主要的反对看电视的理由是缺乏足够说服力的；特殊情况应该放在比较普遍的情况之后才更合适。

Most children enjoy watching TV in their leisure time. Although this can expand their scope of knowledge to some extent, I do not think that it is a good idea to encourage children to watch TV at will.

It has to be admitted that in some cases, the vivid TV images and sounds can make learning experiences which may otherwise be boring much more lively, thus enabling young pupils to concentrate more effectively on what they are expected to learn. A biology class accompanied by a documentary of animals, for example, can undoubtedly help children gain a deeper impression of the appearances, living habits and habitats of the living creatures. Similarly,through video records of historical events or relevant TV plays, children are more likely to retain their memory of historical facts and their inner connections. At home, well-chosen cartoons with interesting stories allow children to learn some invaluable virtues such as kind-heartedness, honesty and loyalty unconsciously.

However, reaching the conclusion that TV could be educational is not the same thing as encouraging children to watch TV indiscriminately. We should not forget that entertaining programs rather than educational ones constitute a major part of the whole TV networking system; these programs do not have enough meaningful contents but are often fascinating and attractive to young children, who typically lack self control and the ability to judge what is appropriate or not. Given a choice, chances are high that they will become addicted to soap operas, reality shows or singing competitions by sitting in front of a screen for long hours. This is not only damaging to their vision, but may reduce their interest in more serious knowledge acquisition as well. What is worse, some programs may contain violent or pornographic contents which are obviously not appropriate for children, and which may cause imitation and subsequent disastrous consequences.

Overall, I agree that carefully selected programs can be good supplementary tools to regular classroom learning, and that children should be allowed to watch TV at home under parents’ supervision, but I insist that by no means should children be given the autonomy of watching TV in terms of contents and duration.