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Welcome to English Composition

Welcome to English Composition. Today’s Class. Reading review Grammar Exercise Toefl Essay Structures Reading preview Homework. Reading Review. The Elements of Style chapter 2, parts 14 – 22 14. Use the active voice (passive voice is when the subject is also the object of the sentence)

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Welcome to English Composition

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  1. Welcome toEnglish Composition

  2. Today’s Class • Reading review • Grammar Exercise • Toefl Essay Structures • Reading preview • Homework

  3. Reading Review The Elements of Style chapter 2, parts 14 – 22 14. Use the active voice (passive voice is when the subject is also the object of the sentence) "to be" + past participle = passive voice 15. Put statements in a positive form 16. Use Definite, Specific, Concrete Language. 17. Omit needless words

  4. Reading Review 18. Avoid a succession of loose sentences 19. Express coordinate ideas in similar form 20. Keep related words together 21. In summaries keep one tense 22. Place the emphatic words of a sentence at the end

  5. Grammar Review Form the possessive singular of nouns by adding ‘s (Elements of Style pg. 1) Dave’s hat. Charles’s hat. My dog’s hat. Form the possessive plural of nouns that end in ‘s’ by adding ‘ The peoples’ government. My parents’ house.

  6. Grammar Review In lists put a comma after every item in the list except the last item. The last item is always preceded by either ‘and’ or ‘or’.(Elements of Style pg. 2) I ate three hot dogs, five pieces of sushi, and two bags of french fries at the night market. When I wasn’t sure if it would be better to take the train, bus, or to fly.

  7. Grammar Review Enclose parenthetic expressions between commas.(Elements of Style pg. 2) When I first arrived in Taiwan, which was in 2004, I couldn’t speak any Chinese at all. My old friend, who lives in Thailand now, came to visit me yesterday.

  8. Grammar Review The number of the subject determines the number of the verb. (Elements of Style pg. 9) Bob, along with Joe and his friends, is going to run the marathon. All of the students, except Bill, are going to pass the test.

  9. Grammar Review Whenever possible use nouns as adjectives. • DO NOT WRITE, “The goat from the mountains that was fat ate my homework.” • WRITE, “The fat mountain goat ate my homework.” • DO NOT WRITE, “The noodles from Italy that were spicy burned my mouth.” • WRITE, “The spicy Italian noodles burned my mouth.”

  10. Grammar Review BEWARE OF THE WORD ‘OF’! • DO NOT WRITE, “The people of Taiwan.” • WRITE, “The Taiwanese people.” • DO NOT WRITE, “The dog of Matt.” • WRITE, “Matt’s dog.”

  11. Grammar Exercise Lets practice a little bit of what we’ve learned.

  12. A Note on TOEFL Essays TOEFL generally requires you to write two kinds of essays • Normal Essay (5 paragraph style slightly different from the one taught in class) • Comparative Essay For sample essays visit: www.testmagic.com

  13. A Note on TOEFL Essays The Structure of the TOEFL Essay: P1: Background Information + Thesis P2: Supporting Point 1 P3: Supporting Point 2 P4: Supporting Point 3 P5: Conclusion For sample essays visit: www.testmagic.com

  14. A Note on TOEFL Essays The Structure of the TOEFL Essay: • P2-4 were often written as one paragraph. • The conclusion is often different from the thesis. For sample essays visit: www.testmagic.com

  15. A Note on TOEFL Essays The Structure of the TOEFL Comparative Essay: P1: Background Information + Thesis P2: Comparison 1 P3: Comparison 2 P4: Comparison 3 P5: Conclusion For sample essays visit: www.testmagic.com

  16. A Note on TOEFL Essays An example comparative paragraph. My Chinese teacher always taught me to use lots of adjectives when I write English. She said they give the language color and make it interesting. My writing teacher Matt, on the other hand, says that I should use few adjective. He says that they are wasted words and that the meaning of the adjective is often already in the noun. For sample essays visit: www.testmagic.com

  17. The Importance of Editing "Books aren't written- they're rewritten.” -Michael Crichton "Writing is Rewriting.” -Richard North Patterson ""The beautiful part of writing is that you don't have to get it right the first time... You can always do it better."  -Robert Cormier

  18. Why We Workshop • To practice our editing skills • To learn how to see common mistakes in other peoples’ work so that we can find them in our own • To learn about the way other people use language to communicate ideas • Most importantly, to find out what is wrong with our writing so that we can fix it

  19. Group Workshop • Now lets workshop some essays as a class

  20. Reading Preview Chapter 3: A Few Matters of Form • A colloquialism is a slang word, phrase, or idiom. Use them like regular speech. Do not put them in ‘quotation marks’. • Use exclamation marks sparingly. If you use too many, they lose their meaning.

  21. Reading Preview Chapter 3: A Few Matters of Form • Headings: I recommend asking your publisher for requirements • Hyphens are only used to combine two adjectives to create one compound adjective.Eg. The big smelly dog (no hyphen) The world-class hotel.

  22. Reading Preview Chapter 3: A Few Matters of Form • Use normal margins unless you have a special purpose, such as leaving room for editing. • Numerals: Write numbers using numerals rather than words, except when writing dialogue (people speaking).

  23. Reading Preview Chapter 3: A Few Matters of Form • The final punctuation mark of a sentence is always outside of any parentheses inside of the sentence.Eg. It looked like a shadow (but may have been a ghost).orIt looked like a shadow (but might have been a carpet, blanket, or ghost!).

  24. Reading Preview Chapter 3: A Few Matters of Form • Words broken at the end of a line should be broken between syllables.

  25. Homework Reading • The Elements of Style • Chapter 3: A Few Matters of Form

  26. Homework Writing: • .

  27. Homework E-Workshop • Step 1: Format your essay properly (see notes about essay formatting) • Step 2: Email your essay to all members of your group. • Step 3: Edit the group members’ essays using the Microsoft Word editing function. • Step 4: Email the essays back to the group members who wrote them, and the teacher, before 12 noon on Monday, November 30th

  28. Assignment Formatting • Filetype (please do not paste into the email): • .doc or .docx format • Font: Times New Roman 12 pt • File name • should look like: yourname_essay_title.doc • First three lines of the essay should be: • Title • Name • Word Count

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