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)
"to be" + past participle = passive voice
15. Put statements in a positive form
16. Use Definite, Specific, Concrete Language.
17. Omit needless words
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
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.”
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.”
Grammar Exercise
Lets practice a little bit of what we’ve learned.
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
Group Workshop
Now lets workshop some essays as a class
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.
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.
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).
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).
or
It looked like a shadow (but might have been a carpet,
blanket, or ghost!).
Reading Preview
Chapter 3: A Few Matters of Form
Words broken at the end of a line should be broken
between syllables.
Homework
Reading
The Elements of Style
Chapter 3: A Few Matters of Form
Homework
Writing:
.
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
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