Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

Kenji Noda · Joined: 04 May 2007 Posts: 33

Dear teachers,
Would you please correct my writing?

01 Jan 2008
We have a custom to eat mochi--pounded rice-- on the New year in Japan.
I even drink sake in the morning unsusually.
When I was a child, I was exciting and waiting the morning of the New Year in my bed with some hope.
The New Year inspired me a lot and was the special day with a New Year present.
I have not seen snow yet this winter.
It doesn't seem to be winter without snow.

02 Jan 2008
I bought a microphone to do Skype talk on my PC and it came with 100 yen free skype out ticket.
I asked one my friends of her home and mobile phone number to make test for Skype out.
But she seemed misunderstood me and said, "Why do you need my phone numbers, I am confused".
I didn't have any bad intention.
I just wanted to make sure whether I can succeed in making a phone call from Skype out.
It is very difficult for me to understand other countries people and cultures and get me understood by them.

EnglishRaven · Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2008 9:45 pm Post subject:

Hi Kenji,

Well, I hope you don't mind, but I won't edit/correct your writing, but pass on some hints and tips that could hopefully encourage you to do some editing of your own...

1. I'm not sure why you have double dashes around pounded rice.

2. Preposition "on" can be used with a specific day (with "Day" mentioned). Talking about a general event or special time, we might say "at" or "during".

3. When you say "exciting" to talk about a person, you are describing the effect they have or impression they create for others. If you want to describe the person's feeling, try using an -ed form for this adjective.

4. "waiting" needs a preposition to follow it, and before you mention an object "the morning of..."

5. To request something using "ask", try a different preposition (not "of" - to "ask of" is usually followed by the person-object, in this case it almost sounds like you are asking about your friend's home, not requesting something)

6. "to make test for Skype out" (I assume you're talking about Skype Out, not wanting to "test Skype out" as in try it out) - you can delete two words from this phrase to make it perfect

7. Using "seem" with another verb requires a another word before the verb (hint = infinitive)

8. "other countries people" needs a possessive apostrophe

9. Try to change this phrase "and get me understoood by them"

Think about those tips, then have a try at editing your own writing. If you re-post it here, I or someone else might give you some more tips.

Cheers,

- Jason
_________________
http://www.onlinEnglish.net
http://global-english.lefora.com

Lorikeet · Joined: 08 Oct 2005 Posts: 1877 Location: San Francisco

I think the dash is used because mochi is pounded rice. What would you use instead? Parentheses? or something like, "We have a custom of eating mochi, which is pounded rice, for the New Year in Japan."

EnglishRaven · Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 1:23 am Post subject:

Hi Lorikeet,

Sorry about that - I think the use of dashes is fine, just not double dashes as Kenji has done.

So I was trying to hint that instead of:
"eat mochi--pounded rice--"

Kenji might like to write it:
eat mochi - pounded rice -"

Small thing, admittedly, but in writing I think it's important to use correct forms of punctuation.

Cheers,

Jason
_________________
http://www.onlinEnglish.net
http://global-english.lefora.com

Kenji Noda · Joined: 04 May 2007 Posts: 33

Thanks EnglishRaven and Lorikeet.
As I am not an English native speaker, I am always anxious about what I write in English.
I am studying English in the limited circumstance; this room is my important place.
I will try to rewrire them and post them here.
Thank you very much again.
Kenji

EnglishRaven · Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2008 10:27 am Post subject: Re: Thanks for your advise

Kenji Noda · Joined: 04 May 2007 Posts: 33

Thank you,Jason!
Your heartful warm commnts has moved
and encouraged me deeply.
Here I re-wrote them with keeping your advise in mind.

01 Jan 2008
We have a custom to eat mochi - pounded rice - at the New Year in Japan.
I even drink sake in the morning unusually.
When I was a child, I was excited and waiting for the morning of the New Year in my bed with some hope.
The New Year inspired me a lot and was the special day with a New Year present.
I have not seen snow yet this winter.
It doesn't seem to be winter without snow.

02 Jan 2008
I bought a microphone to do Skype talk on my PC and it came with 100 yen free skype out ticket.
I asked one my friends her home and mobile phone number to try Skype Out.
But she seemed to have misunderstood me and said, "Why do you need my phone numbers, I am confused".
I didn't have any bad intention.
I just wanted to make sure whether I can succeed in making a phone call from Skype out.
It is very difficult for me to understand other countries' people and cultures and make myself understood by them.

Sincerly,
Kenji

rice07 · Joined: 26 Oct 2007 Posts: 385

Hi

I couldn't agree with you more,Teacher EnglishRaven! You took the right words from some of the learners' mouths in here. As English learners,we are now going through some processes that happened to you then. With a lack of access to conversing with native Engligh speakers, it's really a good way to practice learning by writing in English. At least, I think so.

I was in my forties. But a fifty-something man from Japan, was Kenji Noda, who earned the respect of me due to his attitude towards restlessly learning.

I believe most learners in this forum, having the same goal-- want to have a good command of English. If everybody doesn't mind my poor English , I'd like to share my experience in English learning with learners in here, despite the fact that I'm not up to the grade over it.

Some two and a half years ago, I'd got a passing thought of learning English. As you know-- I was well into my forties and used to be bad at English, adding that I had drifted apart it for ages. Whereas, it really was a problem-- how would I get it started?

The first thing, I spent time with grammar to establish my concepts about English on some bases, and then reading to prove those grammatical concepts of why a sentence was written in this way. I learned it all by myself until I came here( I spent at least 4 hours a day in English).

In terms of time that I have spent, the efficiency is muddling through. For English learning, in my opinion, I would focus on collocations, phrases, idioms, and some good sentence examples highlighted by me with a red pen for my next time reviewing in convenience, while looking up vocabulary in my dictionaries. Even, I would suggest that English beginners could pay attention to the definitions of a word too( English--English dictionary), because it was easier understood and showed you how to describe thing(s) in the native English speakers' tongues. For instance:

Definitions
1. sour (adj) : having a taste like that of a lemon or of fruit that is not ready to eat.
=> you can learn : the 1st that--pronoun, the 2nd that--relative pronoun.

2. imaginary (adj) : not real, but produced from pictures or ideas in your mind.
=> you can learn: not real, produced from-- a phrasal participle, in your mind.
(1) Gas is important to life.
(2) Gas which/that can be produced from coal is important to life.
=> which/that can be produced from coal-- relative pronoun used to refer to gas.
=> we can transform this relative clause into phrasal participle produced from coal by making it short in the following:
which/that can be produced from coal (a relative clause)
=> being produced from coal( a phrasal participle)
=> produced from coal ( a phrasal participle)
=> Gas produced from coal is important to life.
(3) So next time, you'll find out the definitions of a word that is an adjective in your dictionary, more often than not, which is the form of present participle or past participle at its(the definition) beginning.

Collocations
cure sb of sth, deprive sb of sth, discriminate against, discriminate from, agree with, agree to, agree on, agree about, used to v, (get) be used to ving(sth), it's neccessary (for sb) to do sth, suggest that, suggest sth to sb,it's no use ving, it's of no use to v, it's useless to v,....,and so on.

Up to now, I usually make mistakes in my written English yet, but I've learned the rule--making mistakes is a neccessary process of learning. Here, I reiterate I'm not suggesting that I cut the mustard in English learning by propagating my experience in this posting but to do the thing-- I take every chance to practice my English ability.

I always keep it in my mind that get myself a well understanding of constant dripping wears the stone, and bring it into effect, then success will open its door for me. I hope there's nothing too much in my posting.

BTW,in fact, I do hope that English learners in here can write each other to their PMS, in order to practice writing. I'll be glad , if you write me.

Good luck!

Yours sincerely

Rice07

Lorikeet · Joined: 08 Oct 2005 Posts: 1877 Location: San Francisco

EnglishRaven · Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 9:30 am Post subject:

That is interesting.

I've noticed that word processing programs like MS word create that longer stroke for the dash automatically, but didn't actually realize that that was how to differentiate between hyphens and dashes ... Shocked

But in an email program, this doesn't happen (the auto function, that is), which is why I may have advised Kenji to go with what I called 'one dash', but as you called it - a hyphen.

It's always great to learn something new. Today I have!

- Jason
_________________
http://www.onlinEnglish.net
http://global-english.lefora.com