Media Writing Skills In English

1. MediaWritingSkillsInEnglish Introduction.What is it about?Basic Grammar Tools for Journalists.What is Grammar?The correct use of words in sentences.Word order, tense…..etc.a boy he isHe is a boy.Is he a boy?

2. What Is A sentence ? Definition: A sentence is a group of words that expresses a complete thought. Example: The Prime Minister (subject ) chaired a cabinet meeting (predicate) in Amman last night.

3. How to introduce yourself? Your name Your position Your Institution

4. How to write your CV • Name: • Address: • Telephone: • E-mail: • Nationality: • Date of birth: • Marital Status:

5. Education : 2003-2007Islamic University of Gaza, M.A in Islamic Law (Media Controls & Restrictions) 1998-2002 Islamic University of Gaza, B A in Islamic Law. 1983-1987 Islamic University of Gaza, B A in English Language.

6. Experience 2006-present Vice Director of Public Relations Office (IUG) . 2008-present Lecturer of Media Writing Skills at Journalism Dept.(IUG). 2003-2006 Head of Media Department in PRO at IUG. 1998-2006 Administrator at Public Relations Office at IUG. 1991-1998 Teacher of English language at Ministry of Education .

7. Skills Computer literate, familiar with MS Programs, Journalism and Project Management.

8. Activities 2003-2006Chairman of Patient Care Charitable Society (PCCS). 1995-1998 Board Member of English language Teachers Club(ELTC)Gaza.

9. Types of sentences with respect to their use 1. The Declarative sentence: The conference discussed U.S – French relations last night in the post-Iraqi war era. Example

10. 2. TheInterrogativesentence: Example: Why did the Arab League postpone its annual ministerial meeting? 3.TheImperativesentence: Example: Vote for pan-Arab economic integration.

11. 4.TheExclamatorysentence: Example What a disastrous outcome for the Iraqi war! A protestor exclaimed!

12. Forms of sentences 1.Thesimplesentence: The Democratic Convention Opened yesterday New York. 2.The compound sentence: The President arrived and talks started with local officials.

13. 3. Thecomplexsentence: The battle was still raging in Eastern Timor province when military commanders decided to surrender. 4. TheCompound – complexsentence: As demonstrators marched by 10 Downing Street in London they shouted anti – war slogans.

14. Parts of Speech 1. Verbs: E.g.: Start started Fire Fired Visit Visited Regular verbs Go went gone spend spent spent See saw seen Irregular verbs

15. Verbs according to their tenses a. The Simple Present Tense: To describe a repeated or habitual activity, usually over an unlimited period of time. Adverbial keys : always , never , rarely , seldom , often , sometimes , usually, everyday. E.g. : _ Arab leaders meet every year. _ The Gulf Cooperation Council seeks to foster ties among its members.

16. b. The Present Continuous Tense: To indicate a continuing activity, usually within a limited period of time. Adverbial keys: Now , just , right now , at the moment , at this time. E.g.: _ Rescue efforts are continuing now in eastern Turkey. _ U.S aircraft are carrying out air raids on Baghdad at this moment .

17. c. Simple Past Tense: To describe an activity, a condition, or a series of repeated activities or conditions completed at a definite time in the past. Adverbial keys: Last, yesterday, ago, …etc E.g.: _ The meeting reviewed the situation in Afghanistan last night. _ Three persons died in a plane crash in Iran two days ago.

18. d. The Past Continuous Tense: To describe a continuing activity that took place within a limited period of time expressed by an adverbial E.g.: _ The president was giving his speech when news of his cabinet resignation was announced.

19. e. The Present Perfect tense: To describe an activity that is completed as of the present time, or the moment of speaking. Adverbial Keys: Already, ever, never, since, just, for. E.g.: _ Over 1000 persons have died from SARS since December 2002.

20. f. The Past Perfect Tense: To describe an activity in past time (activity 1) that took place before another activity or condition in past time ( activity 2) expressed with past form. E.g.: _ The delegates has held (action1)preliminary consultations before they met (action2)with the Prime Minister.

21. g. Future Tense: The verb forms most commonly used to express simple future time are these: (1) Future form:will +verb. E.g.: _ Voters in Greece will go to the polls tomorrow to elect a new president. (2) Present form of verb “to be” (am, is, are)+going to+verb. E.g.: _ The Minister of Education is going to hold a press conference this morning.

22. Nouns: Nouns are names of persons, animals, ideas, actions, qualities..etc..Nouns are said to have properties like person, gender, and number. There are two kinds of nouns: singular and plural. E.g.: _Three U.S. soldiers were killed in Baghdad last night. (countable) _ Music was played at the opening ceremony. (uncountable).

23. Some nouns have both an uncountable and countable meanings. E.g.: _ Fish is canned at a nearby factory. _ Some fish are raised here.

24. Pronouns pronouns are words that are used in place of nouns. They designate a person, a place, or a thing without naming it. Personal pronouns Demonstrative pronouns: this, that, these. Indefinite pronouns: one, someone, both..etc distributive pronouns. Interrogative pronouns: who, which..etc Relative pronouns. Classes of Pronouns:

25. Adjectives: Adjectives are words that modify nouns, noun equivalents or pronoun. E.g.: _ The United States is a wealthy nation. _ Americans consider the Vietnam experience terrible. _ The decision was outrageous.

26. ous courageous ful wonderful less ceaseless able miserable tual habitual ing breaking ed demolished ish selfish tive destructive

27. Adverbs: An adverb is one word, a part of speech that modifies verbs, adjectives, or other adverbs. E.g.: _ The car crash took place here.(adverb of place) _ The demonstration was politically motivated. (adverb of manner) _ The military post was raided twice last week. (adverb of frequency) _ The meeting should be held soon.( adverb of time)

28. Prepositions: Prepositions are linking or connecting words such as : in, on, at, before, from, to, under, in front of, with, of, into….etc.

29. Conjunctions: There are two classes of conjunction: 1_ Coordinating conjunctions, which connect words ,phrases, or clauses of equal rank. E.g.: And, but-yet, neither-nor, either-or, not only-but…etc. 2_ Subordinating conjunctions, which introduce dependent clauses, and join the subordinate clauses to the independent clauses in a sentence.

30. Interjections: Interjections are exclamatory word or phrases that usually used to express strong or sudden feelings to attract attention. E.g.: _ Good Heavens!

31. Forms of Comparison 1_ Positive degree: The base form of the adjective or adverb. E.g.: _ Canada is a large country. _ The September 11 attacks were horrible acts by all standards.

32. 2_ Comparative Degree: The base form of the adjective or adverb + the ending “er” or “more+ the base form.” E.g.: _ Canada is larger than Egypt. _ The September11 attacks were more horrible than the Oklahoma explosion.

33. 3_ Superlative Degree: The base form of the adjective or adverb+the ending “est”, or “most+ the base form.” E.g.: _ Canada is the largest country in North America. _ The September 11 attacks were the most horrible acts in decades.

34. Conditional Clauses Conditional clauses are complex sentences made up of one independent clause and one dependent clause. E.g.: _ If the European leaders meet as scheduled, the problem will be resolved. Simple present simple future tense.

35. _ If the European leaders met as scheduled, the problem would be resolved. _ If the European leaders had met as scheduled, the problem would be resolved. Past tense simple past future tense. Past perfect present perfect future tense

36. Questions Questions can be classified into two categories: _ “Tag” or “yes/no” questions. E.g.: * Oppression leads to rebellion, doesn’t it? Yes, it does. _ Information questions: when, what, why, at what time…etc. E.g.: * When did the attack start?

37. Punctuation Marks Punctuation refers to the use of certain marks to clarify thought relationships in a sentence. Periods:A period is used in the following cases: (1) At the end of declarative sentence or an imperative sentence that is not exclamatory. E.g.: _The Prime Minister chaired an extraordinary cabinet meeting last night. _Let’s work together to achieve peace.

38. (2) After most abbreviations. E.g.: Ph.D., St., P.M., Dr., Jan. (3) As a decimal point. E.g.: $55.00 25.2% (4) To indicate omission of words. E.g.: “ Let’s kick the………. aggressors out of our land,” the commander said.

39. Commas:A comma is used: (1) To separate two independent clauses joined by a coordinating conjunction: “ and,” “or,” “but,” “yet,” or “ for.” E.g.: _ The delegates arrived early in the morning, but the meeting was put off. (2) To separate words or figures which might be misunderstood. E.g.: _ What the demonstrators did, did not help the cause.

40. (3) To indicate the omission of a word common to both parts of a sentence. E.g.: _ Farmers in the Jordan Valley may grow sugar canes; farmers in hilly areas, never. (4) To separate words, phrases or clauses used in a series when the coordinating conjunction is omitted from the series. E.g.: _ France, Germany, and Japan import most of their oil from Gulf countries.

41. (5) To set off a non-restrictive clause. E.g.: _ George W. Bush, Governor of Texas, was elected president of the United States in 2000. (6) To set off words and phrases that are used as appositives. E.g.: _ Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, has set new records in economic development.

42. (7) To set off parenthetical words and phrases that are not essential to the meaning of the sentence. E.g.: _ The French foreign minister, meanwhile, declared his country’s opposition to any kind of military intervention in Iraq. (8) To set off the year in a date, and also to set off the month and the exact date following the day of the week. E.g.: _ The invasion started on Nov.29,1979.

43. (9) To set off nominatives of direct address. E.g.: _ As you know, Senator, the budget issue is too complicated. (10) To set off the name of the state or country when it follows the name of a city. E.g.: _ The summit was opened in Amman, Jordan. (11) For most figures higher than 999. E.g.: _ Syria produced 100,000 barrels of oil a day.

44. (12) To set off an explanatory figures such as the age of a person, or his address, or phone number. E.g.: _ Mr. Saleem Saif, 2230 Al-Nasr Street, was badly hurt in the crash. (13) To set off party affiliations, degrees, and titles given after a name. E.g.: _ Yunis Ali, ph.D, has been appointed director of the Department.

45. (14) To separate direction quotation from explanatory matter. E.g.: _ “ Let’s give peace a chance,” the President said. (15) To set off participle and infinitive phrases, or long prepositional phrases which precede the main clauses. E.g.: _ Prompted by rising opposition, the Prime Minister abandoned plans for new taxes.

46. Semicolons: the semicolon may be used in the following cases: (1) To separate independent clauses that are not connected by a coordinating conjunction such as “and,” “but,” or “for.” E.g.: _ The rebels cannot keep on fighting; they are finished. (2) Between clauses of a compound sentence, that are joined by conjunctive adverbs like “however,” “therefore,” “otherwise,” “consequently,”……etc.

47. E.g.: _ Ahmed Mousa appears optimistic about his victory; however, polls indicate his chances of winning elections are slim. (3) To separate coordinate phrases or clauses which are punctuated internally with a comma or commas. E.g.: _ Mr. Hamid Ali, Chairman of the Bank’s Board of Directors, is scheduled to announce new austerity plans; and Mr. Salim Ahmed, head of the Bank’s development department, is expected to disagree with him.

48. (4) To separate independent clauses that are joined by a coordinate conjunction, if the clauses are long or have internal punctuation. E.g.: _ The movie star, who rose into prominence in the 1940s, is regaining his fame; but critics, skeptical of his performance, seem pessimistic about his chances in the long run. (5) To separate phrases which contain commas, particularly when the meaning otherwise would not be clear.

49. E.g.: _ The delegation consist of Salim Odeh, the Speaker of Parliament; Ali Mousa, the foreign Minister; and Ahmad Rabie, the Minister of Industry and Commerce. Colons: colons are used: (1) Before a long, formal quotation. E.g.: _ When questioned about his alleged role in the plot, the army commander replied: “ I absolutely have nothing to do with those subversive activities.”

50. (2) After a statement that is followed by an amplifying clause or expression. E.g.: _ President Bush explained U.S global strategy as two-fold: to fight terrorism and to curb the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. (3) After a clause that introduces a list. E.g.: _ The Lower House of Parliament discussed the following topics: foreign trade, educational reforms and tax increase.