English Enrichment

8/8/2019 English Enrichment

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Bespoken English Enrichment

Journalists BEE.


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1. Vocabulary Trees.

Vocabulary trees help provide context. Once

you've mapped out a few vocabulary trees,

you'll discover yourself thinking in vocabulary

groups. When you see a cup your mind will

quickly relate such words as knife, fork, late,

dishes, etc.

Here is an example of a vocabulary tree.


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2. Vocabulary Themes

Create a list of vocabulary themes, include the

vocabulary, a definition and an example

sentence for each new item.

Here is an example of a household appliance

vocabulary theme sheet .


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3. Use Technology to Help You

Watching DVDs is a great way to help you

understand native speakers of English.

DVD use into a vocabulary learning exercise .


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4. Specific Vocabulary Lists

Rather than studying a long list of unrelated

vocabulary, use specific vocabulary lists to

help you prepare for the type of vocabulary

you need for work.

These business vocabulary word lists are

great for industry specific vocabulary items.


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5. Word Formation Charts

Word formation is one of the keys to success

for advanced level ESL learners. Advanced

level English exams such as the TOEFL use

word formation as one of the key testing

elements.

These word formation charts provide the

concept noun, personal noun, adjective and

verb forms.


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6. Visual Dictionaries

A picture is worth a thousand words. It's also

very helpful for learning precise vocabulary.

Here is an online version of a visual dictionary

dedicated to jobs.

Try http://www.visualthesaurus.com/


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7. Learn Collocations

Collocations refer to words that often or

always go together.

A good example of a collocation is to do yourhomework.

These lists ofimportant verb + noun

collocations will help your learn some of the

most important.


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9.Use a Corpus

Corpora are huge collections of documents thatcan track the number of times a word is used. Byusing a corpora, you can find which words are

often used together with target vocabularywords.

Combining corpora use with vocabulary trees is agreat way to learn key vocabulary for specific

vocabulary target areas. You can get started by visiting the British NationalCorpus.


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Part II. English Feel.


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1. Stress.

English is a stressed language:

Primary/secondary stress Focus on specific stressed words

Glides over other words

Stress vis--vis meaning.


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2. Content words

Stressed words are content words

Nouns e.g.kitchen, Peter- (most) principalverbs e.g.visit, construct- Adjectives e.g.

beautiful, interesting - Adverbs e.g.often,

carefully.


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4. Read aloud* !!

The beautiful Mountain appeared transfixedin

the distance.

He can come on Sundays as long as he doesn't

have to do any homeworkin the evening.

*(Both have 5 str.words and take the same

time to read.)


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5.Practice.

1.Write down a few sentences, or take a few samplesentences from a book.

2. First underline the stressed words, then read aloud

focusing on stressing the underlined words and glidingover the non-stressed words.

3. By focusing on stressed words, non-stressed words andsyllables take on their more muted nature.

4. When listening to native speakers, focus on how those

speakers stress certain words and try to copy this.


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Part III.

20 Most Common Grammatical Errors

&

How to avoid them.


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1. Common comma.

The incorrect joining of two independent clauses with a comma is anextremely common error.

They believe in Peter, he is their manager.

There are three ways to solve this problem:

a. Use a period to separate the clauses into two sentences:

They believe in Peter.He is their manager.

b. Join the clauses with a coordinating or subordinating conjunction,depending on their relation to one another:

They believe in Peter, for he is their manager.

c. Join the clauses with a semicolon:

They believe in Peter; he is their manager.

[Arun-on sentencefuses two sentences together without any punctuation:

They believe in Peter he is their manager.

This problem can also be fixed in the same three ways.]


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2. Wordiness causes.

1. Overuse of relative pronouns

2. Overuse of meaningless qualifiers

3. Vague constructions

4. Tentative language

5. Redundancies

6. Passive voice.


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3. Parallelism.

The grammatical elements of parallel clauses must

match.

I acquired my considerable fortune by investing carefully, hardwork and marrying a rich woman.

I acquired my considerable fortune by investing carefully,working hardand marrying a rich woman.

"Justin is not an ordinary person, and neither are his stories,"

You are implying that the stories are not ordinary people. Amore accurate assessment of Justin would be,

"Justin is not ordinary, and neither are his stories."


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5. S/V agreement 1.

Your subject should agree with the verb, even when

there are intervening components in the sentence.

The group of bizarrely dressed youths are taking overthe cafeteria.

The writer has used a plural verb because of the proximity of

youths, but the subject of the sentence is group.

The sentence should read:

The group of bizarrely dressed youths is taking over thecafeteria.


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6. S/V agreement 2.

If there are two subjects joined by and, use a

plural verb:

My mother and father are coming to visit.

If the subjects are joined by or, the verb must

agree with the nearest subject:

EitherR

amu or Sudha is doing it.

Either Sherlock Holmes or the Hardy Boys are

capable of solving this crime.


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7. S/V agreement 3.

Collective nouns such as familytake singular

verbs when the sentence deals with the

group as a whole:

The Nair family is going on vacation this year.

If the sentence deals with the family as

individuals, then a plural form is used:

The Nair family are going to fight all the way

through against the court order.


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8. S/V agreement - 4

Linking verbs in subjective completions agree

with the subject, not the completion:

My favourite thing to buy is compact discs.

But compare:

Compact discs are my favourite thing to buy.


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9. Pronoun agreement

Pronouns agree in gender and number.Collectivepronouns present more of a problem. Indefinite

words such as anyone, anything, someone,everybodyand no one take singular pronouns.

Pronouns are an issue when using gender-specificlanguage.

The antecedent is the noun to which the pronounrefers. Make sure what the antecedent of apronoun is. Also, make sure that you are referringto the correct noun.


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10. V/P/R

There are two kinds ofvague pronoun

reference.

The first occurs when there is more than one

word that the pronoun might refer to.

The second when the reference is to a wordthat is implied (but not explicitly stated).


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11. Example 1

Transmitting radio signalsby satellite is a way

of overcoming the problem of scarce airwaves

and limiting how they are used.

What is being limitedthe signals or the

airwaves?


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12. Example - 2

BeforeBefore MaryMary attackedattacked SitaSita, she was seen by, she was seen by

many as murmuring all 4many as murmuring all 4--letter words.letter words.

Whom doesshe

refer toMary or Sita?

Company policy prevented smoking whichCompany policy prevented smoking which

many employees resented.

many employees resented.

What does which refer tothe policy or

smoking?


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14. I/me.

It is also incorrect to write:

The rain soaked Sheela and I

or They sent the invitation to Sheela and I.

Use Iin the subjective case and mein

the objective case, no matter whatother pronouns are found in the

sentence.


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15.Misplaced Modifiers

A modifying word or phrase should be placed nextto the word it describes. In the followingsentence, the modifying phrase has beenmisplaced:

Growing at the bottom of the glass, Susan foundsome fungi.

Since it is the mold that is growing at the bottom ofthe glass, rather than Susan, the sentence should

read: Susan found some fungi growing at the bottom of

the glass.


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16. Dangling Modifier

A dangling modifier modifies a word which has beenleft out of the sentence:

"After writing all that material, the computer didn't

save it." The computer did not do the writing; what is actually

meant is "After writing that material, I discoveredthat the computer didn't save it, The subject I was

omitted from the original sentence.

The positioning of limiting modifiers such as only, nearly and almostis especially important. "Only Frank dropped the bomb," "Frankonly dropped the bomb" and "Frank dropped the only bomb" allhave different meanings.


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17. Mixed Metaphors

A mixed metaphor attempts to create an extendedcomparison but fails because it is not consistent withitself. For example, in an essay on the language used indescribing pain relief medicine, a student wrote:

"The topic of pain relievers seems clouded in a sea of

medical terminology."

The metaphor is mixed because the images of cloudand sea do not match. The student should have said

either "drowned in a sea of medical terminology" or"clouded in a fog of medical terminology.


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English Enrichment