Lecture Eleven

1. Lecture Eleven Process Analysis Essay

2. Course Outline • Vocabulary Quiz (10’) • Group Discussion(10’) • Pre-Writing (10’) • Classroom Discussion (15’) • Sample Analysis (15’) • Writing Principle Introduction (15’) • Self-revision and group interaction (15’)

3. Corresponding Ideas • Match the clues on the right to the corresponding vocabulary terms on the left by writing the letters on the lines provided. • passion A. There are things the government won’t let you do • prosper B. Her long life is the result of a healthy diet and a positive attitude • resilient C. You can’t infect me with your hateful comments • prohibit D. No one can deny the artist’s compelling love for painting. • conform E. Raise your glass to wealth, health, and happiness! • immune F. People who lack uniqueness and never do this. • collaborate G. Don’t let constant failure stop you from achieving your dreams. • attribute H. Good things happen when we work together. • venerable I. friendly, sociable, good-natured • amiable J. Some people deserve respect.

4. Creating ContextRespond to each of the following prompts in two or three complete sentences. 1. Describe someone with a mundane lifestyle. 2. Why might a group of people convene? 3. What might a benevolent dragon do? 4. Where might you find a gregarious person? 5. If you were a newly appointed government official, how would you foster a sense of hope and pride for China in your fellow citizens? 1. D 2. E 3. G 4. A 5. F 6. C 7. H 8. B 9. J 10. I

5. How Can You Improve Your Spoken English? • Brainstorm ways to improve your spoken English in groups • Pick out five practical ways and put them in an order of importance and then tell us why

6. Pre-Writing • Write a process analysis expository essay on the topic "How Can You Improve Your Spoken English?" within 10 minutes in any way you think appropriate.

7. Classroom Discussion • Please read through the following process analysis expository essay written by your peer student and try to find its good points and problems by considering the following questions. • a) What's the writing purpose? Is it clear? • b) What do you think of the relationship between the reader and the writer? What's the mode of this essay? • c) What do you think of the content? Can the content realize the writing purpose? • d) How is the essay organized? What kind of paragraph developing pattern is used in this essay? Is the sequence of the content proper? • e) What do you think of the language use?

8. How to Improve Our Spoken English It is generally believed that spoken English is quite important in our English learning. However, many English learners complain that they are at a loss as to how to improve their oral English. As an English major, I'd like to offer some suggestions in this regard. To begin with, you must acquaint yourself with a bulk of encyclopedic knowledge such as history, cultures, and current news so that you may have "content" to convey in English. To achieve this end, you must read more and listen more in English. Secondly, you must pay attention to your pronunciation and keep on bettering yourself in this aspect. Once you get rid of your accent and are capable of speaking beautiful English, you'll be more confident and motivated to enhance your spoken English. Last but not least, you must seize every opportunity to practice your oral English. Through constant practice, your oral English will be more and more frequent. In brief, improving your oral English is not an impossible task if you follow the above-mentioned suggestions. Good luck to you.

9. Read through the teacher's commentary of the above essay carefully and compare it with your answers to the above questions. • 1) The writing purpose of this essay is quite clear. The student wrote this essay to explain his/her idea on the process of improving one's spoken English. The readers can get the writing purpose from the last sentence in the first paragraph. • 2) The social distance between the reader and the writer is neither too close nor too far, and it is written to be read. The writer has expressed himself/herself in the proper tone. The writer has used several formal words such as "achieve, seize, acquaint, opportunity, enhance" in this formal essay, but the essay ends with a very colloquial expression "good luck to you", which is mostly used in spoken English. Whenever we write something, we should consider our target readers and choose the right tone accordingly. • In the essay, the author provides us with three suggestions on improving our spoken English. These suggestions are sufficient and appropriate to realize the writing purpose.

10. Read through the teacher's commentary of the above essay carefully and compare it with your answers to the above questions. 4. The essay consists of introduction, body and conclusion. The body is developed by a deductive pattern, namely, the author adds a topic sentence to each point before further elaborating on it. The content is organized in the order of importance, which is typical of process analysis exposition. 5. There are few language mistakes in this essay. Moreover, it is notable that the author tries to use some cohesive markers, such as "to begin with", "secondly", "last but not least" to indicate the sequence. In addition, we can see several parallel sentences with the modal verb "must" to enhance the necessity to improve the spoken English. On the whole, this process analysis expository essay is well-written.

11. Sample Analysis • Please read through the following sample process analysis exposition, and then answer the questions that follow.

12. Questions: 1)What is the purpose of writing this essay? Is the purpose clear? 2)What do you think of the content? Can the content realize the purpose? 3)What do you think are the necessary semantic elements? 4)What kind of paragraph developing pattern is used in the body? 5)What do you think of the language use in this essay? What are the language features used in this essay?

13. How Con WeImprove Our Spoken English? It is a common phenomenon that Chinese students can do English writing exercises well but are poor in speaking English. How to improve spoken English is a problem which has bothered all of the English learners. In order to improve oral English, here are some steps we should follow. Firstly, pay attention to improving pronunciation. Pronunciation is very important i spoken English as it is the basic foundation in the whole learning process. Secondly, listening is another important means to improve our spoken English. There a many listening materials and resources on the internet which we can easily access to, such* VGA and BBC news. We can imitate the broadcasters' pronunciation and their way ( describing an event by listening to the official news reports. It will help us a lot. Lastly, try to do a lot of reading. Reading is an efficient way to enlarge our vocabulary, without which we cannot communicate with others. Reading can also improve our grammar. These are the three important means which will help us to improve our spoken English. I hope we will make great progress in spoken English.

14. Questions: 1)What is the purpose of writing this essay? Is the purpose clear? The author wrote this essay to explain to the readers how they can improve their spoken English. The purpose is clear. 2)What do you think of the content? Can the content realize the purpose? The content can realize the writing purpose. The author provides three suggestions on how to improve one’s spoken English in the body of the essay. 3)What do you think are the necessary semantic elements? The necessary semantic elements are the thesis statement in the orientation, three specific processes in the body and a summary in the coda. 4)What kind of paragraph developing pattern is used in the body? The author follows the order of importance in organizing the body paragraphs. In addition, the deductive pattern is used. Each body paragraph begins with a topic sentence before further elaboration. 5)What do you think of the language use in this essay? What are the language features used in this essay? There are two language features in this essay. The first feature is the use of time markers such as "firstly", "secondly" and "lastly", and the second is the use of the imperative sentence patterns in the body.

15. Writing Principles • Process analysis is very helpful in helping us learn how to do something. By following the step-by-step directions, we may acquire the desired skill or result. Take the process of writing for example. If you follow the procedures of generating and organizing ideas, drafting, revising, and editing, you should clearly know the procedure when writing different types of essays. • Before beginning to write a process analysis, you must choose a process you are able to explain clearly. You should make sure that the process is sophisticated enough to arouse the readers' interest, yet simple enough to be easily explained. For instance, "how to plan a birthday party" is a process which involves several complicated steps, yet keeps the reader's interest. Moreover, it is not too difficult for you to give a clear explanation.

16. Like other essays, process analysis is usually made up of three sections: introduction, body and conclusion. Each of these parts should be well planned in order to ensure the success of the whole essay. The introduction Once you decide on a certain process, it becomes your subject. Then you can begin your essay with a clear thesis statement which states the subject or the exact process you plan to clarify, and expresses the controlling idea which is the purpose of your process exposition essay. Look at the following thesis statements: 1)Training a dog involves several major steps. 2)Preparing egg dumplings is an interesting procedure. 3)What follows is a summary of a few steps involved in assembling a computer. Evidently, the purpose of the first statement is to list the steps in training a dog; the purpose of the second one is to explain how to prepare egg dumplings; and the last one is to show how to assemble a computer. In addition, all these statements provide the readers with a context for the individual steps to follow.

17. The body Many process essays have an order that is set in time. In the body paragraphs, one usually gives directions or explains the steps of the process. There are two points that deserve your special attention. 1) See to it that your information must be adequate and accurate. 2) See to it that each step must be clear and complete.

18. The conclusion • To conclude your process analysis essay effectively, you may choose from a number of ways. • You can make brief comments on the significance or practical value of the information, which will ensure the readers have learned something useful. Be sure that you are not just repeating the introduction. • You can also make a summary of all the steps mentioned, which is particularly helpful if the process has been very long or complex. • You may give the readers a few words of encouragement, or mention relevant or complementary processes that your readers might be interested in. • Whatever method you choose, remember not to mindlessly insist that a process is "fun and easy" when it is not. Try "difficult but rewarding" instead.

19. Important tips in writing a process analysis essay: 1) Bear in mind the purpose of writing a process analysis exposition. The usual purpose of writing a process analysis essay is to break a complicated process into parts or specific steps in order to make it easily understood. Therefore, most process analysis essays have a clear-cut purpose, that is, to tell the readers about a process as objectively as possible (Chen, 2002:157). informational process analysis directive process analysis • How to find a good job • How to improve one's vocabulary • How to prepare a particular dish • How to take a clear picture • How to prepare a birthday party • How a refrigerator works • How a person becomes an alcoholic • How the earth is getting less and less suitable for human habitation • How a computer works • How we can improve our writing competence

20. 2)Consider your audience. The person you choose depends on the type of process analysis which you are going to engage yourself. If the process analysis is directive, address the reader in the second person, e.g. "In order to improve your vocabulary, you should follow the steps listed below..." or " keep practicing for half a year, you will find that your English has greatly improved." If the process analysis has an informational purpose, do not address the reader directly. You may use the first person and third person (both singular and plural).

21. 3)Establish the necessary content to explain and clarify your process. According to the writing purpose of a process analysis expository essay, we can summarize that the semantic structure for the genre is mostly as follows: orientation (the subject and the thesis statement) steps in a proper order (time order, space order or in the order of their importance) coda (making a summary of all the steps or give the reader some encouragement) Identify all the steps that make up the process so that the analysis will lead to a certain point naturally.

22. 4)Determine the proper pattern to organize the steps. Mostly the chronological order is typical in organizing the process paragraph. Process essays can also be developed by spatial order such as in showing how to decorate a house. You may even organize the body of the paper in the order of importance. The most important step will be explained first, then the second important one, and finally the least important one. Or you may reverse the order and begin the least important step first till finally you reach the most important step. * For example: how to deal with study pressure First of all, you must confront pressure bravely and calmly. Secondly, you can change the subject you study from time to time. Thirdly, do some physical exercises at regular intervals. Fourthly, learn to get rid of fear. Finally, you can spend some time with your friends.

23. 5) Think about the language use in process expository essay. Process writing calls for a language dial is accurate, concise, and direct. Your language in analyzing a process should be exact, clear, short and straightforward. There are four language features used in a process analysis expository essay. Firstly, use the time connectors like "first", "next", "then", "finally" to signal the chronological order of the steps and to help the reader to follow the process easily. Secondly, use imperative sentences to explain the specific processes for the readers to follow. Thirdly, use modal verbs such as "must", "should", "have to", "ought to" to tell the readers what they should do. Fourthly, use the present tense both in the active voice and the passive voice to describe the processes.

24. As the day of the exam approaches, there are several things you can do to make life easier. Firstly, you should make sure that you get regular exercise. In that way, you won't feel tired at night and stay awake worrying. Secondly, if you can, find someone else who is doing the exam and share the revision with him. You can organize little tests and quizzes for each other and this can make the process much more fun than working on your own. Just before the exam, it helps to write short notes of the most important study points on pieces of paper and look at them just before you go to bed. On the day of the exam, don't study anything. Finally, eat a proper breakfast and take some emergency snacks with you, wear comfortable clothes and take your favorite pen and pencil with you. (Ding, 1998: 44)

25. As the day of the exam approaches, there are several things you can do to make life easier. Firstly, you should make sure that you get regular exercise. In that way, you won't feel tired at night and stay awake worrying. Secondly, if you can, find someone else who is doing the exam and share the revision with him. You can organize little tests and quizzes for each other and this can make the process much more fun than working on your own. Just before the exam, it helps to write short notes of the most important study points on pieces of paper and look at them just before you go to bed. On the day of the exam, don't study anything. Finally,eat a proper breakfast and take some emergency snacks with you, wear comfortable clothes and take your favorite pen and pencil with you. (Ding, 1998: 44)

26. Self-revision and Group Interaction Please revise your essays according to the above samples and writing principles, and then show them to your group members so that they can find the good points and problems in the essays you have written. In this section, you may ask yourself the following questions: a) Did I describe the steps in a way that is easy to follow? b) Does my composition contain all the necessary steps? Is there any essential information missing? c) Is my composition coherent? Did I use the language properly?

27. After-class Reading for Writing Ready to Receive a Shark Did it ever occur to you that you could be a meal of a shark? If you ever decide that you would like to be eaten by a shark, you need only follow several basic steps. First, choose a deserted beach with no record of attacks. Then, wait for a night so that the shark can see you plainly from below the surface of the water. Now that you are certain of being a good target, dive in and swim out into deep water. Next, splash the water with your hands and feet; this will bring the hungry fish in close to take a look at its potential snack. (It is preferable to have a few cuts or wounds bleeding freely in the water.) The dinner bell has now been rung. Make sure that you are alone, so that once the shark starts to nibble, it won't be deprived of its meal by someone who is pulling you to safety. The last step consists of simply lying back and waiting; the shark won't be long in coming. Once you act according to these steps carefully, your fantastic dream of being eaten by a shark will come true. (Donald, Moore & Morrow, 1998)

28. Assignments • Write a 200-word process analysis expository essay on any topic you like • Upload your essay to the composition revision system and finish peer assessment • Make a video of “How to”