Job Discussion Forums

[Songbird]

Hey all!

I'm teaching a writing class to 2nd year English major students, and through marking their writing I have discovered problems (of course!) and would love a magical solution to them (hahaha!). I have spoken to the classes about using capital letters and clear full stops to start/ end sentences (which was quite bad) but I'm still having a problem with Chinglish and poor grammar. The textbook does not deal with this, it's just 'this is how you write a paragraph, how you write an essay', boom, boom, boom. I would love to know other people's experiences and how they have helped students improve their writing. Just to give an example, this is one student's writing, errors and all-

"In every daily life, we can see plants hither and thither. You know flowers have sweet smells, beautiful colours and lovely shapes. Maybe, you can some flowers in your house or the others house, it can decorated room. Tree is very common thing, in our lamp we can see willow. do you fined it's beautiful. In spring, we can see the buds on the trees open and become colourful bloom. when the wind blows, we can hear the leaves in the trees and watch the branches swing from side to side. if you know appreciate nature is a happy thing, you can happy everyday! You will find in big modern cities, we have parks full of trees bushes and flowers is very important."

Help!!!!

[Girl Scout]

They are not proof reading their work for errors. You can tell from the writing they know better then to make some of the mistakes theya re making.

One suggestion: Teach proof reading. Make them do it in class before handing in their work. As they are reading it say things like,

Do all the sentences begin with a capital letter?
Did you put periods at the end of a sentence?
If you said this sentece out loud does it sound like English or Chinese?

I'm sure you can think of more things you want them to be aware of before handing in their work.

[Spiderman Too]

[Songbird]

Thanks for the advice everyone, I'll certainly take it on board. I have started with punctuation, it's the first thing they should know! I think half the time they are careless.

Spiderman- I only have 1 semester to do this, do you think your idea could work, even if I just modify it for this amount of time? Thanks for telling me your experiences too, with everything *I've* seen now I officially know I'm NOT crazy !!

[Roger]

Hi, Songbird,
I taught writing at college and university levels and was most positively disappointed by the sloppiness of their work.
I noted that they don't even respect instruction on margins, let alone on punctuation or capitalisation of initials. It is more than a problem of not proof-reading - some of their mistakes are deeply fossilised as for example writing "china" with a lower-case 'C' while writing 'English' with a capital 'E'.

I totally ignore their books on such matters and start from scratch. I make them write frequently and grade their writing strictly, deducting up to 2 points from their score for every mistake.

I had them write CVs or short essays or short stories or news reports. I taught them by example. Amazingly, they copy from the blackborad unthinkingly, and make the very same mistakes again unless you penalise them with very poor grades.

Here is a technique that I found is helpful:
Have them write during class. Make sure they have enough time to compose a text, then to proof-read it.
Instead of each student proof-reading their own writing move the texts from them to other students, preferably to someone farther away 9shuffle all those papers and redistribute them, if you like!). Then have them sign the name of the proofreader who has to mark mistkaes.
Of course, they will not be able to mark all those mistkaes. But you can give them some hints: "OK class, mark all proper names as wrong that have no capital intial". Also, repeat your instruction: "Class, minus 5 points for writing in the margin, which must be one inch wide!"

And, as a variation, you can also group several students together to make a composition as a team with each of them writing a paragraph. Thus, they will be collectively responsible for their performance, and will prevaikl over their weaker members to improve their act.

[Songbird]

Hi Roger,

Thanks for the ideas- however I wanted to do a composition (in fact, the text actually has a chapter on writing a research essay) but I was told by another teacher not to waste my time, it would take a year to maybe even get a half decent piece from a handful of students (and I'm teaching UNIVERSITY level....). That same teacher then handed me an official copy of the CET 4 sample paper & syllabul booklet and I saw why...

Tragic, I tell you. Absolutely tragic. And we're letting these people get their hands on nukes!!!!

[Old Dog]

If we were to award a mark to the last posting from the Great 5000 on the basis of the quality of its proofing and the quality of its spelling and expression, it would be well into the negative. I do hope the example (I taught them by example) provided by our poster to his long-suffering students was of better quality.

This 4983th was a shameless piece of writing. Here was Mr Roger bewailing the fact that Chinese students are poor proof-readers, prone to error and incapable of writing with quite the facility he trumpets for himself. Yet our hero, on someone's payroll as a Foreign Expert teacher of English,

[Spiderman Too]

[NorbertRadd]

1. Teach the active voice.
2. " simple statements.
3. " paragraph writing.
4. " 3-4 paragraph compositions.
5. Model and demonstrate everything, first and foremost, because at Zhoukou U., students only can copy from the board.
6. Teach simple present and present, past and present continuous.
7. " Strunk and White.
8. Good luck!

[Roger]

[Ben H Nevis Jnr.]

Your Chinglish sample was eerily familiar. I had the same problem as you last term with a third year uni class. The textbook I was given to teach was "Mosaic 3". It assumed the students already had a fair grasp of grammar and focused more on how to piece together sentences, rather than compose individual sentences. Had I been a more experienced teacher, I might have ditched the textbook right there and then, but as this was my first semester teaching I felt I needed some sort of syllabus guideline and security net, as it were.

I decided to ignore almost all the grammatical and punctuation errors and taught them how to form distinct, cohesive and coherent paragraphs from within the seething mass of Chinglish scrawl. As they seemed unable and/or unwilling to pass judgement on others work, proof reading was a no-no. The only thing left was to drill into them the need to to plan before they started to write (as of course I have done extensively prior to commencing this post, I don't think ) Think of their given or chosen theme. Subdivide it into main ideas. Subdivide the parapgraph into supporting ideas, find an example to back up each supporting idea, then decorate the paragraph with a topic sentence, bridge, restatement etc. I limited them to seven sentences for a paragraph within an essay or nine, if it was a stand-alone paragraph. It became completely systematic but eventually seemed to work. The one or two in the class who read English books in their spare time and could write creatively possibly felt stifled, but I didn't mark them down for not following the exact conventions as long as their work flowed "naturally".

As we went on, the book and I threw in other aspects such as using pronouns to avoid repetition, paraphrasing, quotation notation, how to write introduction/conclusion parpagrahs etc. I certainly didn't get the cane out when they committed the eighth deadly sin of pronoun de-capitalisation. How remiss of me, huh. Strangly enough, their "micro-sentence" Chinglish actually improved too, even though I had mainly worked on it at "macro-sentence" level.

For the final assessment in December, I based much of the mark around a multiple choice/short answer exam, much to many on this board's discouragement, when I asked/pleaded for advice in the matter in a thread a few months back. It was a bugger to write and make 'watertight' (still not sure it is...), but fairly straightforward to mark. The students' scores ranged from about 50 to 90 %, much like a western uni exam would. I then scaled the marks accordingly to suit institution norms.

The burgeoning language geek within me has been itching for a chance to post it and have it hacked to pieces by the EFL mafia, so here it is....

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You will have 120 minutes to complete this exam. The number of marks given to each question is written in brackets after it.


1. Decide whether the following statements are true (T) or false (F). (

a) A topic sentence must contain at least two main ideas.
b) A paragraph is a group of sentences that develops a main idea.
c) When all your sentences relate to and develop your topic sentence, your paragraph is said to be organized.
d) A restatement should use the same words as your topic sentence.
e) When all your sentences are in a logical order, your paragraph is said to be unified.
f) An academic essay should be at least 4 paragraphs long.
g) The normal order for an academic essay is introduction -> body paragraphs -> conclusion.
h) The topic sentence of one paragraph can often perform the additional role of restatement from the previous paragraph.

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2. Read the following sentences. Which should not be used as topic sentences ? (4)
There may be more than one answer.

a) Over the last three decades, violent crime in America has increased by more than 500 percent and one in three marriages now end in divorce.
b) Is there really any truth in the old saying �an apple a day keeps the doctor away� ?
c) It was such a tough job taking it down, moving the contents uphill in my arms and setting it all up again, that I fell asleep very soon afterwards.
d) Ten thousand years ago, the last ice age turned northern Europe into a polar region.

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3. Read the following notes taken from a small group discussion on the general topic of �water�. Choose which of these statements can be formed into a unified paragraph. Put a cross (X) next to the ideas that you will not use. Decide on a title based on the theme of your unified ideas.
(11)
Theme:__________________

Title:_______________________________

The beach near our town has become too polluted to swim in.
We should drink several litres of water each day to stay healthy.
Wildlife habitats are being destroyed through marshland drainage.
Mars is the only other planet where water is known to exist.
Many areas still cannot guarantee clean, safe water from taps.
Industries should be fined for dumping waste in rivers.
Many wars have been decided by sea battles.
A scald is the name for a burn obtained from boiling water.
Oil spills from tankers can be devastating for marine life.

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4. Read the writing sample below. Identify the topic sentence and underline any irrelevant sentences that it does not suggest. There may be more than one or there may be none.
(12)

Viruses are a common problem when using computers but there are measures you can take to minimise their effects. Other problems include internet fraud, hacking and data protection. The effects viruses have can range from slowing down your computer to destroying every file on it. There are several ways a computer can be affected by a virus. Originally they were transferred by floppy disks. Since the development of the Internet though, many viruses have been hidden inside e-mail attachments. Just as in the postal system, e-mail suffers from �junk� mail too. E-mail attachments are often large and take a long time to load. If they are unwanted �junk� mail, they can waste both your time and valuable space on your e-mail account. Fortunately you can take steps to reduce the threat of viruses by scanning all e-mail attachments and new software with a virus checker. You should also make duplicate copies of all important documents in case the worst happens. So, although we should all be aware of computer viruses, there is no need to panic, provided you take the necessary precautions.

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5. Circle the wrong answer. There may be more than one. (3)

A thesis statement�

a) �contains the main idea of an essay.
b) �can suggest ways the writer will support their point of view.
c) �is usually found at the start of the conclusion.

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6. Circle the wrong answer. There may be more than one. (4)

A good thesis statement�

a) �will mention only what can realistically be covered in the essay.
b) �manages to fit together supporting ideas with different degrees of generality.
c) �will contain supporting ideas which can each be developed in one paragraph.
d) �often has supporting ideas which answer an information question (how�? when�? why�? etc).

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7. Identify which of the following sentences are good thesis statements. (3)
There may be more than one.

a) Modern American culture differs from modern European culture in its humour, icons, political values and sense of history.
b) There are many differences between China today and China twenty years ago.
c) The most successful businesses are usually those which value their customers and sponsor athletics events at local high schools.

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8. Imagine you are given the following questions as essay topics. Choose two and write a thesis statement for them in the space below. (

a) How does environment affect mental health ?
b) Should college students in China be allowed to live off-campus ?
c) What is success ?
d) Who is responsible for educating children about sex ?
e) What are some of the effects of living in crowded urban areas ?
f) Do the advantages of free trade outweigh the disadvantages ?

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9. Circle the wrong answer. There may be more than one. (5)

Quotations�

a) �can only be taken from printed sources.
b) ...are usually used when a writer�s own words cannot be improved upon.
c) �should not be used too often as this reduces their impact.
d) �only need to reference the author�s given name.
e) �should use the author�s exact words.

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10. Choose which one of the following quotations from the article: �Advantages of being the oldest��, by Christine Vu, has the correct format. (4)

a) In �Advantages of being the oldest�,� Christine Vu says that by putting their trust in me, my parents have taught me to take responsibility.

b) According to Christine Vu �she was born in this position, in advantages of being the oldest�.�

c) According to �Advantages of being the oldest�,� an article by Christine Vu, �it has trained me to be ready for my own family.�

d) In �Advantages of being the oldest�,� her family treats her �as though I�m a princess�. Christine Vu said.

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11. Circle the wrong answer. There may be more than one. (4)

Paraphrases�.

a) �are used when it is more effective and efficient to restate the author�s words in your own way.
b) �often omit details from the original text.
c) �do not require the source to be referenced.
d) �should use synonyms of the original words if possible.

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12. Imagine you are writing an article on changing families in the UK and have recorded the following interview with an elderly woman, Anne Jones, aged 78. (6)

�There have been lots of changes since I was your age�..lets see�.yes, well to start with I had seven brothers and sisters. The oldest was James�.well he was almost twenty years older than my youngest, my baby sister�..Margaret�..and he was almost like a father to her really as we were rather poor and my mother and father had to work all day�.my father was a fisherman you see�..but let�s see�.nowadays my granddaughter�.who�s three next week�..well she only has one brother and he�s started school�.when not I�m looking after her she goes to pre-school�..three times a week I think�

Write a sentence about changing families, using a suitable paraphrase from the quotation above to support your point. Follow the correct paraphrasing format.

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13. Circle which of the methods below are not common formats which help to interest the reader when writing introduction paragraphs. There may be more than one.
(5)

a) General-to-Specific
b) Solution-Problem
c) Chronological
d) Problem-Solution
e) Specific-to-General

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14. Read the following two introduction paragraphs. (6)

Identify which format from those listed in Q.12 has been used in each case. Underline the thesis statements in each one.


a) It�s interesting to see how far technology in language teaching has developed since the early educational radio programs. One of the first major advances after that were cassette tapes. These allowed students to practise at home. Later still video, with its lifelike scenarios, began to be used as a classroom tool. Then in the 1990�s computer screens often replaced blackboards, making the teacher�s job easier. More recently, the internet and web-cams have allowed authentic conversation with native speakers to take place from anywhere in the world. The use of multimedia in education clearly has important benefits for both students and teachers.

The format in a) is _______________________________________


b) Despite increased living standards, the health of children is still a concern. More and more are choosing to spend their money on junk food. The more money fast food companies make, the more money they can spend on buying the best locations for their restaurants, giving free toys to children and paying for the most watched advertising slots on television. This only serves to attract even more customers. What can be done to break this cycle ? The government should ban fast food advertising aimed at children and force the companies to introduce healthy options.

The format in b) is ________________________________________

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15. Circle the correct answer. Choose one only. (4)

Conclusions�.

a) �commonly begin with a restatement of the thesis statement.
b) �often follow a specific-to-general format.
c) �give the reader a sense of completion.
d) �should draw upon new knowledge gained after reading your essay.
e) All of the above points are correct.

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16. Circle the correct answer. There may be more than one. (3)

Paragraph coherence can be improved by�..

a) �using personal pronouns instead of listing a person�s name each time.
b) �repeating keywords and concepts whenever you can.
c) �using a mix of repetition and paraphrasing to restate key points.
d) All of the above points are correct.

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17. The following sentences have been taken from the introduction and conclusion of an essay on solar power and mixed up. Sort them according to whether they belong in the introduction (I) or conclusion (C) by writing the letter next to each. Then write the logical order for each paragraph in the space below.
(25)


a) However, most of this energy is currently generated by burning of fossil fuels.

b) We just need to persuade governments to look beyond that which may benefit them in the short term and start looking at what is best for our future generations.

c) Instead of wasting more money on that, I suggest another option:

d) Some people have estimated that oil will have run out within 50 years.

e) Not only does this cause air pollution, but the supplies are rapidly being used up.

f) Only time will tell if we can learn from our past mistakes.

g) It may be cheap to produce, smokeless, and have abundant reserves of raw material, but there are still issues that remain surrounding what to do with the radioactive waste produced.

h) As we are witnessing all over the world, the question of who controls what little is left has become a major source of tension between countries around the globe.

i) So although solar power needs to be researched further, it hopefully has a bright future.

j) As the population grows, energy use is rising faster than ever.

k) Some people have pointed to the benefits of nuclear power to overcome this problem.

l) Indeed, the same can be said of so many other problems affecting the world today.

m) We should invest as much money as possible into making solar energy cheap and efficient.

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Obviously some of the technical terms are somewhat less than universal between other textbooks. I for one cannot remember ever having written a 'restatement' in anger prior to teaching this course. The topics and vocabulary were relevant to those that the students had looked at too. Oh, and yes the last question was too hard and maybe a wee bit too subjective.

[Songbird]

Hello all!

Well, I've taken on board a couple of ideas mentioned here in today's class. Firstly, I was discussing 'Summarising' as per the textbook. Due to no OHT's in this uni (I tell you, these are backwaters!), I did a summary myself, the first excercise in the chapter, very simple, foolproof. God everyone to write this out, word for word, everything to be EXACTLY how I wrote it. Yes, marking my first class lot tonight, they just don't listen, or read very well. I think I will actually repeat this activity next week, until they get it right (as someone here suggested, repeat!).

I also got the students to do another summary (the passage in the textbook to summarise then proofread) then I collected them and redistributed them, deliberately making sure the writer wasn't sitting anywhere nearby and got the students to proofread and mark them. I told them to be TOUGH and HARD on their classmates! Well, there's still a ton of mistakes. I feel this was a bit of a let down, however, they were enthusiastic about helping each other and I will also try this again sometime.

I'm thinking my standards are too high for the students. I just don't know what I should and shouldn't accept, at the moment, I'm thinking bugger all. But I can't just fail everyone (though I've threatened to if they don't pull their socks up!!!). BTW, I'm setting 2 exams (which they have never ever done before so I am now known as the Campus Nazi!)- the first exam will be a simple essay on a subject I will give them, no more than 300 words. Simple things like 'The things I like about this university' etc. The exam will be for an hour & a half. Do you think this is enough time to do this for these students?

Ben, I liked that exam paper, perhaps I should have been thinking more along those lines rather than the ambitious essay I'm wanting them to write?

[NorbertRadd]

That exam above rocks!
Write an exam that's easy to grade.
Last term, I did the exam twice in class and 40% still failed.
Matching was 50%, and another question for 10%: "How many methods of paragraph development are in Unit 4? Any number other than a number receives a zero."
Also, I failed any student who didn't write their name in pinyin.
I gave explicit instructions on the test.
Also, I gave the content of three letters to write and a paragraph for 40%.
I did a histogram and it came in as a [not smoothed curve] normal distribution! Five per cent got grades in the 90s.
Write an exam that's easy to grade.
You won't get paid for extra effort.
More importantly, no good deed will go unpunished!
Try to get the students to keep journals in class and write sample entries on the board.
My students only care about exams that will help them get certificates or into other schools. ZKNU is a buxiban! I just spent a class answering test questions.