Spring 2013 HD EAP homework
Friday, April 19: Final Conference Schedule in CELOP Office 214
9:30 AbdulAziz
9:40 Eric
9:50 Isabella
10:00 Tarfa
10:15 Saud
10:25 Faisal
10:35 Naif
11:00 Killian
11:10 Abdul
12:00 Edward
Wednesday, April 17:
1. There will be short quiz (written by me) on noun clauses, adjective clauses and reduced adjective (and adverb) clauses, direct and indirect speech, and some transition signals. Review word order, punctuation, and relative pronouns.
2. Your review of the MIT Museum is due. I’m looking forward to reading about your experiences.
3. I hope that you and your friends had a safe and pleasant long weekend. See you tomorrow for our last class. Friday we will have individual conferences with me.
Friday, April 12: Field Trip to MIT Museum
Meet at Flour Bakery + Cafe by 9:30 [190 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge.] We will be trying to enter the MIT Museum at 10:00. (265 Mass. Ave.) This is a class in an alternative location, and you will have a task for which you will need a small notebook and something to write with.
Looking forward to seeing you Friday. Go early for breakfast and get to know a different academic environment (the MIT environment.)
Wednesday, April 10: HW, evaluative activities, and discussion of Friday’s field trip
N.B.: There will be evaluative activities and exams that will form the basis of your final evaluation. There will be no make-up exams — not in my portion of the class nor in Karla’s. If you miss your exams and other activities, there will be no basis on which to evaluate you. In other words, do not be absent. Period.
1. FOG5: ch. 13: Go over the grammar notes pp. 215-216. We have covered much of this already, with the exception of 2, 3 and 6. Bring any questions that you may have. Do exercises 1B, 2, 3 and 4. We will finish with this grammar point, and — time permitting — will start conditionals (with my materials.)
2. There will be a reading exam. You will find the topic interesting.
3. We will discuss the field trip that we will take this Friday — a reward for your hard work. This is a class in an alternate location, and you will have a task to help you get the most out of the experience.
Monday, April 8th: SEMESTER BOOK PHOTO — COME DRESSED THE WAY YOU WANT TO BE REMEMBERED!
Starting today, there will be evaluative activities and exams that will form the basis of your final evaluation. There will be no make-up exams — not in my portion of the class nor in Karla’s. If you miss your exams and other activities, there will be no basis on which to evaluate you. In other words, do not be absent. Period.
1. Grammar exam, ch. 12, Adjective Clauses (timed exam)
2. Leap R/W. pp. 100-103: Focus on Writing & Vocabulary Build A & B
For Friday, April 5th:
1. FOG5: We didn’t finish the chapter, so the exam will not be until Monday. Please do exercise 5, editing, as well as pg. 210 Unit 12 review. We will go back to exercise 6B and answer your questions, and we will finish the other listening exercises. Then we will move on to the more complex adjective clauses with prepositions and adjective phrases (ch. 13.)
2. Leap RW: Read/look at the model for the compare and contrast essay, pp. 187 to top of 190. There are two different ways to compare and contrast. Read the two model essays, block style and point-by-point style, and decide which one you prefer and why.
For Wednesday, April 3rd:
1. Leap R/W: Ch. 5, Reading 2, pp. 94–99. Fill in the charts and prepare B & C on pg. 99.
2. Look over your grammar exams; identify what you did wrong & why; come with questions.
3. Adjective Clauses–we will finish ch. 12 on Wednesday and carry on with 13. An exam is coming on Friday.
For Monday, April 1st (No Joke!!)
1. Finish the worksheet that accompanies the reading, The Meaning of Information to hand in.
(All the papers have been sent to those who were absent today. No excuses.) N.B.: Some of the final exams will expect you to have an understanding of this information.
2. FOG5: For those who were in class: pp. 203-204 Exercises 1B, 2 & 3.
For those who were not in class: pp.196-198 — reading and exercises; pg. 202 – 204, all of exercise 1 (a &
b), 2 & 3. *********We are doing a quick review of adjective clauses ch. 12 before we continue with ch.
13, a more complex treatment of adjective clauses and adj. phrases*********
For Monday, March 25;
1. Get your revised AUTOBIOGRAPHY in!
2. FOG5: There will be a chapter 11 test on Wednesday (direct and indirect speech.) Tomorrow we will finish the unit. Study, and come prepared with questions if there is something you don’t understand. We will do a comprehensive review and I’ll give you some new tools and (dare I say) we might even have some fun doing some of what I’m bringing. That’s the plan.
3. Leap RW: Jenny assigned pg. 85, relating text organization to content, and also asked you to read the text and fill in the chart B & C on pg. 89 . Looking forward to talking about it!
Hope you had a good week. I look forward to seeing you all after such long breaks! We’re in the home stretch.
For Wednesday, March 20:
1. Work on revising your autobiographies — answer questions I’ve asked, follow suggestions, make corrections, etc. Also, make sure that your introduction does you justice! Either give the revision to the teacher on Friday or send it to me by email.
2. FOG5: Study and learn the rules to indirect speech (grammar notes pp. 78-180 and charts, pp. 176-177) Do exercises 4 & 5 pp. 184-185, and Unit 11 Review, pg. 190. We will have an exam on indirect speech soon.
3. Leap/RW: pp. 72-73, Rdg 1: do part B, and learn the content so that you are able to talk about it without having to refer to the book.
For Wednesday, March 6:
Leap R/W: pp. 65(-68) Section D. Answer the questions and be prepared to explain the content.
pg. 68 Writing Definitions: Do A (analyze) and B.
pp. 183-185. Read the section on Modal 4: How to Write a PROCESS ESSAY.
For MONDAY, March 4:
1. Leap R/W: Vocabulary Build ex. pp. 63-64
Week 6 — Midterms week. There will be evaluative activities (quizzes/exams) every day.
HOMEWORK FOR FRIDAY, March 1:
1. Leap R/W: Ch. 3, Read reading 2 (again) and complete the exercises on page 62. Also, do the vocabulary build exercise on pp. 63-64
2. Prepare for a quiz on all the connectors. Emphasis will be placed especially on the concession words (since we haven’t had an exam on them yet), but review all the others as well.
3. Noun Clause quiz!
4. There will be a timed reading exam on a topic we haven’t covered, but which I think you’ll find interesting.
HOMEWORK FOR WEDNESDAY, February 27:
1. Prepare for a quiz on connectors (as FOG calls them) or transition signals of reason/result. You should know all circle, triangle and star words and how to use them correctly, with correct punctuation.
2. FOG5, ch. 10. Exercises 4 & 5 pp. 166-167. Write out exercise on a piece of paper, but do 5 in the book.
3. Your AUTOBIOGRAPHIES are due! Don’t be late printing it out before class; you can print it during the break if you need to. I am really looking forward to reading about who you are and how you became the people that you are today and where you want to go in your lives. (Did you also notice the three noun clauses in that sentence? I hope so!)
HOMEWORK FOR MONDAY,February 25:
1. Prepare for a quiz on connectors (as FOG calls them) or transition signals of addition and contrast (as I call them. ) You should know all circle, triangle and star words and how to use them correctly. N.B.: These are the contrast words, not the concession words. We will do the concession words on Friday. Reason/Result will be on Wednesday.
2. FOG5, ch. 10 Noun Clauses — exercise 2 (pp162-163)
3. Work on your AUTOBIOGRAPHY — due Wednesday. Follow the assignment as given. As this is an essay, be sure to write an introduction and a conclusion. Your introduction should capture the reader’s interest and preview what you will show about yourself. Since writing is an act of discovery, you will probably want to write your introduction (or at least revise it) well into the writing of your essay.
HOMEWORK FOR FRIDAY, February 22:
1. Noun Clauses: Write a conversation between two people, one of whom is a nosey busybody and the other of whom is a more private person. The first person will ask a lot of questions that the second person doesn’t want to answer. The second person should deflect the questions by changing them into noun clauses used with a polite (or impolite) expression (such as ‘I’d rather not say who I went out with’, etc.) Be realistic and clever when you write!
2. Reading from a book on succeeding as an international student in the US and Canada: Read with a pencil and/or highlighter. Identify the main points. Write a one-paragraph summary in your own words.
3. Start work on your autobiography, which will be due next Wednesday. Start thinking about how you became the person who you are now. This will give you an opportunity to think deeply about your life and to express those ideas in sophisticated English. I look forward to reading about you.
4. Submit any written work you have missed, and revise (write a second draft) of work I have asked you to do.
HOMEWORK FOR WEDNESDAY, February 20:
1. Leap R/W: Read pp. 36 – 39. Then do the exercise on page 39, “Adding Interest by Using a Variety of Sentence Patterns.” There are many ways to do this. Use a variety of sentence types, but keep in mind that the use of subordinators is considered, in general, to be more sophisticated than the options for compound sentences. Hence, you may want to use relatively more subordinators than other types of words.
2. FOG5: Do ch. 21 review pg. 373 (in the book) and pp.g 374-375,#1 & 2 (in the book.)
3. Continue to work on learning the words/phrases from all three sources (FOG5, my handouts, Leap.) This will be an ongoing task for the whole semester.
4. Bring your paper that was due on Friday if you haven’t already handed it in. (see #3 below)
HOMEWORK for FRIDAY, February 15:
1. Leap R/W: Read How Do I Choose the Right Program for Me? pp. 29-31 and answer the questions on pp. 32-33. Review the Academic Survival Skill section about asking questions with the correct word order. We’ll do an exercise on this in the next class.
2. FOG5: Do exercises 3 (pg. 366) and 5 (pg. 368). You can do these in the book.
3. Writing: Write a 1 to 2 page (double-spaced) comparison of [life in] Boston and [life in] your home city. Use all the contrast words for all the sentence types (type 1, coordinators; type 2, transitions –conjunctive adverbs–; type 3, subordinators; type 4, prepositional phrases + noun phrases.) Concentrate especially on the words which are new for you (contrast words like ‘whereas’, ‘while’, etc. ) Your goal in writing this is to convey to me the different experience of living in your city as opposed to the experience of living in Boston. Be as informative as possible so that I have an understanding of what life is like for you back home as well as what it is like for you here. Your language goal is to become comfortable using a variety of connectors (FOG terminology; what I call ‘transition signals’) and sentence types. In other words, you want to become a strong writer with a versatile and sophisticated style.
HOMEWORK for WEDNESDAY, February 13:
1. Focus on Grammar (FOG) pp. 358-365: We read the text and did vocabulary A in class. –All others who were absent should start with this.– Continue and do B. Comprehension exercise, read the grammar presentation & grammar notes. Then do Exercise 1 A & B. Come with questions and observations. [You will notice that the chapter includes a wider group of discourse connectors than we worked with on Monday. Pay special attention. We will end up working with all these and all the ones we looked at Monday to give you a very rich resource to develop a sophisticated writing style and to assist you with your reading comprehension.]
HOMEWORK for Monday, February 11: (postponed from Friday Feb. 8 snow closing)
1. Be prepared to write a detailed answer to Q4 (pg. 23), FINAL ASSIGNMENT. It should be one page (double-spaced) long. You should use specific language, details and examples . You may mention the other 2 trajectories in your answer and discuss why they are not optimal.
2. Read/Review the handout The Essentials of Writing. Come with questions/comments about the content.
HOMEWORK for Wednesday, February 6:
Leap R/W:
Finish scanning questions for the last reading (pg. 19); also, do pp. 22-23 exercises about ways to introduce examples.
Learn the vocabulary from the chapter [highlighted pg. 7(-9) and pg. 17 (-18)] There will be some kind of competitive exam.
HOMEWORK for Monday, February 4:
1. Read the handout Ways of Reasoning. Be prepared to summarize and discuss the content, demonstrating a detailed knowledge of the information given and your reactions to it.
2. Leap/RW: pg. 17: Warm-up Assignment: Write a short answer. Follow the instructions, including reading pp. 178-179 about How to Write a Short Answer. Then write short answers for the two questions given.
3. Bring your Focus on Grammar textbooks.
HOMEWORK for Wednesday, January 30:
Bring your Leap R/W book today.
Those of you who bought books separately can return them to the bookstore and get the bundle. There are students in another class who don’t have their books.
1. Finish the exercises in the Cambridge Preparation for the TOEFL handout.
2. Study the vocabulary + preposition combinations for ch. 1 reading. The goal is to incorporate these into your active usage.
Hi everyone: the mystery of the ISBN numbers for the books has been solved. Please do NOT buy the books separately at the bookstore. In fact, they will come in on Thursday in a package all bundled together, and this will allow you to buy the set at a discount. The single books were ordered for another teacher and another class. Therefore, those of you who already bought them individually might want to try to return the books and get the bundled set on Thursday. We are sorry about the confusion concerning this.
HOMEWORK for Friday, January 23rd: please do the Parts of Speech assignment (completely from your own head and own sense of grammar.)