academicwriting17822

Dear All, to complete this semester you need to be ready with the following tasks: 1.  A summary  of an article with an explanation of why you have chosen it and a set of 3 questions to go with it: a) What would you like to learn from it? b) What information from it you knew? c) What information is / was not clear? Please,   choose an article that discusses some urgent/vital/very important/urgent/up-to-date issue Word limit: 250 - 270 words 2. An essay: 280-300 words choose between the options below a) A for-and-against essay b) An opinion essay   c) A solution to problems essay Choose different topics for tasks 1 & 2   3.  A reflection note  about the activities you have been offered this semester:    Y our summary will be graded according to the criteria you can access by following the link https://bit.ly/2LcQsz0   Reflection note: Follow the link to the Reflective note evaluat...

Dear All,  I'd like to share with you the beginning of my story which I got stuck with. Can you help me out? Imagine yourself on a long train journey which you have to take to visit with your friend you haven’t seen for a long time. When you enter the train compartment you see that your companion on it will be   a man in his 40-ies. He is rather good-looking but at the same time there is something not quite pleasant about him. You can’t quite say what it is but soon you begin to realize that it is his stubborn nature. No matter what you start talking about he immediately finds smth. to contradict you. Just imagine that you mention your opinion about the developing scandal in the corporate world. He immediately finds some arguments in support of the people involved. They did not expect the situation to develop the way it is? They could not foresee the outcomes of their actions? Can they be then considered real professionals? ­­­­ But I am getting off the track. So, a...

Dear All, are you superstitious? Hope you are not. The reason why I have to mention this is that the Post I've created for today is number 13. However I'm hoping that it woudn't prevent you from creating an interesting story. How? Here is the explanation: http://writingexercises.co.uk/plotgenerator.php By following the link above you will access a form with the help of which you will be able to receive all the necessary elements for you to create a story. You will get the following details: The main character Character 2 Setting Situation Theme Character action What you need to do is develop your own strory, using this information. You have 3 attempts at choosing the story elements if you do not like the first or the second one that is generated. Your story should be in the genre of your choice: for example, it could be a love story, an adventure story, a thriller or some other kind of story if you wish. You should be able to finish writing it duringf the ...

Dear All, you have just asked me about the difference b/w "buddies" and "friends" I've found the following answer: They are basically interchangeable... mostly depends on context. Here's some generalizations though: Friend: You usually use this to refer to a friend to another person. Ex. "I would like you to meet my friend, George." Buddy: Used like friend ("this is my buddy, George"). Can be friendly (usually used with pets or kids). Ex. "Hey Buddy! How was your soccer game?" .. or angry Ex. "Watch it buddy! You spill your beer on me again and I'm gonna kick your ass!" Mate: We don't say this in America. Dude: Teenagers/young adults use this more often. Ex. "Duuuuuude, we're, like, almost out of weed." Otherwise I hear it a lot when people are mad at a friend. Ex. "Dude! You made out with my girlfriend! That's not cool..." Or when you are excited Ex. "Dude...

Dear All, today I'd like to discuss with you a number of problems that keep recurring in your writing: a) Did you have a chance to read one of the posts by one of your peers they wrote about one of the sessions at the IATEFL Conference? Probably, not yet. So, your first task is to choose one, read about it and comment on it by asking a couple of questions. b) How to formulate a thesis statement http://writing2.richmond.edu/writing/wweb/thesisexerciseprint.html c) What you need to remember about referencing the resources for this task I'll analyse one of your works with you together and then let you add references correctly to one of the works you have recently written: d) Techniques for writing conclusions: This is your hometask for 23.03.19 - http://writing2.richmond.edu/writing/wweb/thesisexercise.htm l : I've discovered in the morning on the 23rd of April the link that I shared with you was wrong. It's a pity nobody let me know about it during the...

Dear All, Today you will have a chance to get acquainted with some materials of the IATEFL conference that took place in Liverpool last week. IATEFL is a large international organisation for teachers of English as a foreign language ( IATEFL ). Each year it holds a conference devoted to the discussion of a large variety of issues associated with language learning and teaching. I have been a member of IATEFL since 2008 and taken part in several conferences throughout these years. Also, I was the editor of the newsletter published by the LT SIG. It stands for Learning Technologies Special Interest Group, and this is a way in which IATEFL members are grouped. You can learn more about it at  https://www.iatefl.org/special-interest-groups/sig-list   First, I'm inviting you to watch the clip made during the first day of the conference, which can help you feel the atmosphere and the mood of it:  https://conference.iatefl.org/conference.html . ...

Dear All, I'd like to remind you again about the necessity to add the information about the resource(s) you have used in your works. Let's say you quoted smb.'s work in yours to make your introduction more engaging or to support the argument you are making or maybe you've paraphrased smb's words or added a summary of some information you have read. In all these cases you need to provide a reference to the resource(s) you have used. It's not enough to just mention the author. There is more information you need to give to your readers.What for, you may ask? For the others to access the resources you have referenced if necessary. It is a common feature of academic and research writing, which is necessary to build up our knowledge and understanding in a variety of fields. Remember too that the details you need to provide depend on whether you are making an in-text or the end of the document reference . This is what you need to do: in the body of your work, y...

Dear All, Your task for today is as follows: You need to find a website which is devoted to Writing in English. It could be a website that contains information about one of the following things 1. The process of writing 2. Some tasks to help you improve your writing 3. A website that discusses the elements of style 4. Some fun stuff that will help you to get motivated to write 5. Some resource about advanced vocabulary for writing 6. Some resource about the Mechanics of writing 7. Some resource about the element of writing of your choice Explain your choice, give us details about the website and provide some examples of its content. Explain why you found it useful and interesting. Add how your peers can benefit from using it

Dear All, as you know, I was not able to comment on everybody's works for today (2.04.2019), so I'll try to do it tonight and tomorrow. Meantime, I'm asking you to read 2 works written by your peers and comment on them using the following questions: -Is it interesting to read? -Are you persuaded by the author's arguments? Are they convincing? It would be great if you gave the author some idea what s/he should add to her/his arguments if you are not fully persuaded by what the author has written. Also, consider the essay from the point of view of the following aspects: -Is the essay logical? -Is it easy to read? -Have you noticed any problems with the essay's Mechanics: Grammar, Punctuation or Spelling? -What about the language? Any problems with it? -Style: is the author'a style appropriate: for now consider whether the essay is written in the same style throughout. It should be semi-formal in style  and the author should try to avoid colloqui...

Dear All, T his post explains to you how to make references to the resources, such as journal articles, books, websites and more in your writing. As you know and as we discussed today during the class, there are 2 kinds of references you should provide in your writing.  The first kind of references is made in the text you are composing, and thus they are called in-text. They include the following information: The author's or authors' last name(s) followed by t he page number(s ): e.g., In his book "Crafting critical writing", the author Troy Hicks discusses different features of writing across media and genres (Troy, 4) In the end of your work, you should have a full list of references that has information about all the resources you have used in your work. It is  alphabetical and must contain the following  details:   T he author's name or authors' last name(s), year of publication, NAME of the journal/book/website, more specific details...

Dear All, I hope you are doing fine and will enjoy doing today's tasks. Here are things for you to do: 1. Go to the website of the newspaper The Guardian and find a short news story in the section  Culture  at  https://www.theguardian.com/uk/culture . It should be devoted to the discussion of some topic of interest to you. 2. Prepare the article summary 150-70 words long and explain in 1 sentence what got you interested in it. 3. Divide into pairs and work together with your peer. You should do the following: - group A: Choose 5-6 words from the articles you have worked which you think are important to the text and useful for you to remember. For each word find a definition and make your own examples with these words. Publish them in the thread. - group B: Find 3 connected stories to the news story you have chosen at step 1. For each connected story, post the web address and one-sentence description of the story. - group C: Read o...

Katya, I'm not sure what the problem is but I can't publish my comments to your essay about the plastic surgery in the comments section of your blog. I got a notification that only "Friends" can do it. Obviously, you need to change the settings in your blog, so that I could add my comments too. Let's fix the problem in class today. The thesis statement is too general: it should list the arguments you are going to discuss in the body Language: interfering to your body: vocab > -ing form should be changed into a N Gr: there are some situation Overall your essay draft is logical and developed rather well. You have presented some arguments in support of plastic surgery and against it. I liked the conclusion because it expresses your personal attitude to the problem it is devoted to. What needs revision is the use of grammar and vocabulary use. See my comments above

 Dear all, I asked you in class today what some of the things are you'd like to revise or study as regards the theory of writing. The book I added the picture of is a very useful resource for it, with such topics covered as Writing with style, Reading to learn, Mastering the college essay and many more. I have it in my professional library and am sharing its Table of Contents with you so that you would look through it during this week and let me know, which sections you would like to cover this semester. p. 1: Why write https://drive.google.com/file/d/191R_WwCEE_tO5H3KH09WKWrtQVD3fukJ/view?usp=sharing p. 2: The forms of writing https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gEzaBubGvzkrNWgDgbxctv2ptz8bZmkW/view p. 3: The tools for learning https://drive.google.com/file/d/10svVEKgDLitNss5w0CV6yCYa5jetEjve/view  

Dear All, I'd like to share with you two resources, which both list a variety of engaging (I hope) topics for discusion and expressing your opinions about them in your works.What I am inviting you to do is look through them and choose 4-5 you personally will be interested in discussing. Here you are: 25 Creative Prompts: https://patch.com/pennsylvania/peters/25-creative-college-essay-prompts 100 Inspirational Essay Topics: https://myassignmenthelp.com/blog/response-essay-topics/ In the thread below let us know what you have chosen and possibly explain what made you interested in these topics. Also, later today I'll share with you a list of topics covering the writing theory, which I'de like you to look through and list the ones you think you'd like to learn more about or revise. 

Dear All, The topic we've chosen for our class today is whether it is important to aim for something big in life? What you are doing now is to discuss different aspects of this question. In the thread below share the main points of your discussion and emphasize what it made you think about?

Dear All, I was not quite sure the topic for today's discussion will fascinate everybody but still decided to discuss your attitudes to plastic surgery In the thread below publish the information about the attitude to it among one of the following groups: a) people from Russia b) people from one of the European countries c) people from the USA d) men e) women here are the organizations you need to check the information from: https://wciom.ru/

Dear All, Welcome to the second semester of the Academic Writing course! I hope you had a good semester break and are ready to continue mastering your writing skills. Today we're going to discuss what students' life around the world is like and then create a guide for the students from other parts of the world coming to study at our university. It'd be great if as part of this task you could interview a student from another department about what his/her life at the university is like and what kind of experiences s/he has had, both good and not quite. In the end I'm hoping that we'll be able to create this guide that your peers will be able to use to make their life easier. In the thread below please share a summary of your discussion of the qus in Ex 1 Also, here is a link to the University of East Anglia students' guidebook: https://portal.uea.ac.uk/documents/6207125/8540534/University+Student+Handbook+for+Taught+Programmes You should ...

December 13, 2018 Dear All, to complete this semester you need to be ready with the following tasks: 1.  A summary   of an article with an explanation of why you have chosen it and a set of 3 questions to go with it: a) What would you like to learn from it? b) What information from it you knew? c) What information is /was not clear Please ,  choose an article that discusses some urgent/vital/very important/urgent/up-to-date issue Word limit:  300 words 2.  A for-and-against essay : I t should be based on the discussion of some important issue you are concerned about Word limit： 400 -450 words ( this is the upper limit) but you can write a shorter one of 350 words Choose different topics for tasks 1 & 2 3.   A reflective note  a bout the activities you have been offered this semester You should comment on the activities you did this semester which should include the following details: a) smth that you found usefu...

Dear All, Choose one of the FOR and AGAINST topics from those we discussed in class with you today (the link to the textbook is in the end of this post) and do the following: 1. List the points on both sides of the issue you are planning to consider and share them in the thread. 2. Write your essay draft, paying special attention to the development of the argument and supporting evidence (how persuasive is it?) 3. Choose 5 expressions from your reading and make your own examples with them. I think it's more useful than providing examples from the dictionary because then you need to understand better how words combine (let me remind you about the Combinatory Dictionary of English, which you can access at http://bbidict.narod.ru ) and how formal they are. 4. Publish your essay draft in your blog a day before the next class or earlier and share a link to it in the thread. 5. Look through the draft of one of your peers and answer the following questions: a) Was it interesting...

Dear All, Today we'll first revise the structure of a 5-paragraph essay by reading and discussing an essay about Market Forces in Business and then we'll complete set of exercises to help you improve your skills in writing thesis statements. Hope you will find these activities useful.                                                                                                                                     Can you comment on the content & structure of this essay: Interesting? (Why or Why not?) Logical? Well-supported? Your comment Add your versions of the thesis statements in the thread below. This is an example from the textbook: ...