Showing posts with label Language Instruction. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Language Instruction. Show all posts

Taiwanese Grammar: A Concise Reference by greenhornmedia

>> Friday, March 27, 2015


Taiwanese Grammar: A Concise Reference is an unprecedented guide delivering clear, straightforward explanations of Taiwanese grammar while offering insightful comparisons to Mandarin and English. Explanations are concise and carefully illustrated with well over one thousand example sentences. All example sentences provide highlighted glosses in three languages: Taiwanese, Mandarin, and English.



Taiwanese Grammar: A Concise Reference is an unprecedented guide delivering clear, straightforward explanations of Taiwanese grammar while offering insightful comparisons to Mandarin.



Designed to be both functional and accessible, the text makes searching for topics quick and easy with fully cross-referenced entries and a comprehensive index. Explanations are concise and carefully illustrated with well over one thousand example sentences. All example sentences provide highlighted glosses in three languages: Taiwanese, Mandarin, and English. In addition, examples place particular emphasis on frequently used vocabulary and include character script and Romanization for both Taiwanese and Mandarin.



Topics covered range broadly from parts of speech (nouns, verbs, adverbs, etc.) to grammatical topics (aspect, negation, passive voice, etc.) to special topics (terms of address, pronunciation, time, etc.).



This text is ideal for self-study and enables students at all levels to build a solid foundation in grammar.



Taiwanese is a member of the Chinese language family and spoken by approximately 70% of the population on the island nation of Taiwan. In addition to Taiwan, the language is found in many overseas Chinese communities throughout the world where it is also referred to as Hokkien, Amoy, Southern Min (Min Nan), or Fukienese.



Features of this text include:



• Easy-to-use reference guide with cross-referenced entries and a comprehensive index



• 1000+ example sentences using everyday vocabulary rendered in Taiwanese, Mandarin Chinese, and English



• Character script for Taiwanese in accordance with the official selection of Taiwanese Characters by the Taiwanese Ministry of Education (2007)



• Romanization provided for both Taiwanese (Pe̍h-ōe-jī) and Mandarin Chinese (Hànyǔ Pīnyīn)



• In-depth guide to pronunciation using English approximations and full explanations on rules for changing tones (tone sandhi)









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Sixty Words or Phrases Commonly Misused by ESL/EFL Students Preparing for Universities by Kenneth Cranker

>> Saturday, February 21, 2015


This book is for classroom or individual study for students who need to clean up their grammar at the word level in preparation for university-level academic writing. It presents 60 words or phrases that are problematic for advanced non-native students of English, exposing the errors, explaining them, and providing examples of correct usage and opportunities to practice writing.



This book is intended for classroom or individual study for students who need to clean up their grammar at the word level in preparation for university-level academic writing. It presents 60 words or phrases that are frequently problematic for advanced non-native students of English, exposing the errors, explaining them, and providing examples of correct usage. The most important points are summarized as tips, and students have the opportunity to write their own sentences with the expressions.









About Kenneth Cranker


Kenneth (Ken) Cranker studied biology, concentrating in human nutrition, at Cornell University. It was while working in a biochemical laboratory there that Ken came into contact with international post-doc English, a non-native language, and he was inspired to become an ESL teacher. After obtaining an M.S. in TESOL at SUNY Albany, he taught in Japan for twelve years, nearly half of which were at the university level. After returning to the U.S., he has been teaching primarily English for academic purposes at the University of Delaware English Language Institute, preparing conditionally admitted students for university studies.






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Big Questions in ELT by Scott Thornbury

>> Monday, December 8, 2014


Teachers and learners of English as a second or foreign language constantly engage with certain key questions, such as 'Is memorization good?', 'What's the best kind of practice?' or 'What's the best age to start?' This book addresses 21 of those questions, informed by the author's extensive experience as well as the current state of thinking by experts in the field.



For two years now I’ve been regularly blogging about ELT-related issues that have caught my attention. The topics have been loosely organized around the format of an encyclopaedic dictionary I’d published previously, called An A-Z of ELT. I’ve since clocked up over a hundred posts that in turn have attracted thousands of comments comprising I don’t know how many tens of thousands of words.

A couple of things that have emerged from this ‘long conversation’ are: (1) the same issues come round and round, and (2) they are often framed as questions.

The issues tend to relate to my ‘other’ life as advocate of a Dogme approach to ELT teaching, i.e. the use of minimal materials so as to free up the classroom space (and the cognitive space) in order to allow student-initiated learning opportunities to arise naturally.

That the issues are framed as questions is partly due to the fact that there are still no answers to many of the concerns that exercise us, and partly because, in my teaching and in my training, I favour dialogue over monologue, and dialogue – almost by definition – entails asking questions.

Like many things online, the blog has started to become a little unwieldy, especially for new visitors, so I figured it was time to condense some of the issues and some of the questions into a friendlier format, taking a handful of the original entries as my starting point, re-working them a little to take into account the conversations that evolved online, and presenting them in the form of Big Questions.

Each Big Question, therefore, has been generated from one of the original blog posts (and I’ve thrown in a couple of new ones for good measure) and each entry is rounded off by a number of subsidiary questions – the offspring, if you like, of the Big Questions. These questions are designed as an aid to reflection (for the individual reader), or, in a training context, as a way of framing a discussion or workshop. In a sense, they are a means of re-activating, and continuing, the online conversations that the original blog posts triggered.

And, if you want to see how those conversations evolved, I’ve provided links to the original articles.









About Scott Thornbury


I'm a teacher and teacher educator, with over 30 years' experience in English language teaching, and an MA from the University of Reading. I am currently Curriculum Coordinator of the MA TESOL program at The New School in New York. My previous experience includes teaching and teacher training in Egypt, UK, Spain (where I live), and in my native New Zealand. My writing credits include several award-winning books for teachers on language and methodology, as well as authoring a number of papers and book chapters on language and language teaching. I am series editor for the Cambridge Handbooks for Teachers (CUP). I was also the co-founder of the dogme ELT group. And, currently, I am an associate of the International Teacher Development Institute (iTDi), an online campus dedicated to teacher development.






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Fifty Ways to Practice Writing: Tips for ESL/EFL Students by Dorothy Zemach

>> Tuesday, September 23, 2014


This book is made for students of English as a Second or Foreign Language. You will learn 50 ways to practice and improve writing – both with pen and paper and typing. By applying these methods, you will write more, write faster, and write more correct and more interesting papers and letters



This book is made for students of English as a Second or Foreign Language.



Learning another language is never fast, but the Fifty Ways to Practice series will speed things up by showing you how to practice more efficiently and effectively both inside and outside the classroom. These books can be used by beginners and advanced students alike.



You will learn 50 ways to practice and improve writing – both with pen and paper and typing. By applying these methods, you will write more, write faster, and write more correct and more interesting papers and letters.



You do not need to be living in an English-speaking country or be currently taking an English class to use this book. However, students who are already in a class can also use this book to improve their writing more quickly and easily. You do not need to have English-speaking friends or acquaintances to write to or even any idea of what to write about. This book will provide those ideas.



When you are done with this book, why not write and tell us how you liked it?








Price: $0.99 USD

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Principles of Written English, Workbook 3 by Maggie Sokolik

>> Sunday, April 20, 2014


This workbook accompanies the online course College Writing 2.3x, Principles of Written English, the third of a series of three courses offered by College Writing Programs of the University of California, Berkeley through edX.org. You do not need to have taken the first and second courses to benefit from this third one.



This workbook accompanies the online course College Writing 2.3x, Principles of Written English, the third of a series of three courses offered by the College Writing Programs of the University of California, Berkeley, through edX.org. You do not need to have taken the first or second courses to benefit from this third one.



This workbook offers additional ways to practice writing and reviewing the materials for the online course. The workbook includes a summary of information given in the course, writing prompts, and quizzes (with suggested answers).



If you would like to purchase this workbook and are not taking the course, you may still find use for the materials. However, it should be noted that the course is offered free of charge, so you are welcome to join the live course. Information on how to do so and the website address are noted in the workbook’s introduction.






About Maggie Sokolik


Maggie Sokolik received her Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics from UCLA. She is the author of over twenty ESL and composition textbooks. She has also written for and been featured in several educational video projects in Japan. She is the editor of TESL-EJ, a peer-reviewed journal for ESL/EFL instructors.



She has taught in College Writing Programs at UC Berkeley for over 20 years, and travels frequently to speak about grammar, writing, and instructor education, most recently in Querétaro, Mexico; Shenzhen, China; Tokyo, Japan; and Hyderabad, India.






Price: $2.99 USD

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The Turkish Language Explained for English Speakers by John Guise

>> Saturday, March 22, 2014


This Treatise explains and answers some of the difficulties that the learner of Turkish may encounter along their way. It focuses on the understanding of Turkish grammar and logic with many examples and explanations. There are no practice exercises included as these can be found in many text books or on the internet. It covers the learning process from beginner to intermediate and advanced.



This Treatise on the Turkish Language and its Grammar explains and answers some of the difficulties that the learner of Turkish may encounter along their way. This book focuses on understanding Turkish grammar and logic. Those who are interested in the whys and wherefores of Turkish will find amongst these pages the key to their particular problem of Turkish grammar and syntax. It covers the basics of Turkish and further expands knowledge and understanding of Turkish by using many examples with explanations. It does not contain any practice exercises or sound files as many of these type of basic Turkish grammar lessons can be found in other text books or on the world wide web. It is a book that will be used over the whole of the learning process from basic beginner through to intermediate and advanced stages of learning.



The contents of the 43 chapters range over:

Turkish Basic Grammar: Alphabet, Vowel Harmony, Agglutination, Consonant Mutation, Lack of Gender.

Intermediate: Nouns and Pronouns, Adjectives, Verbs and Tenses, Possessive Relationship and Possession.

Advanced: Verb Moods, Participles, Clauses, Spatials and Spatial Relationships, Word Formation in Turkish

Conversational Items: Time, Seasons, Numbers, Colours, Saying "Thankyou", About "buyurun", Expressing Need, Daily Interjections, Modes of Address, Turkish Sign Language, How to say "too much, too many", Daily Talk, Common Door Signs.

Glossaries: List of Daily Locutions, Daily Word List, Irregular Tense List, Turkish Single Syllable Verb List, Intensified Adjectives List.






About John Guise


John Guise is a 76 year old Turkophile born and raised in England. In his retirement he has settled in New Zealand. He has also set up a website, Manisa Turkish, which offers an easy way to learn Turkish for everybody.



John Guise first visited Turkey for a holiday in Alanya 1979. A year later he started to work in Manisa. Living in Izmir he worked as a Professional Technical Engineering Manager in a factory producing diesel engined industrial vehicles. Besides a daily journey from Izmir to the Manisa factory for two consecutive years, he also found time to visit Istanbul, Ankara, Bursa, Balikesir, Nevsehir, Ayvalik, Isparta and Bodrum for short holiday trips. At the end of his working contract he returned to his own country.



To show his gratitude to the Turkish people for various kindnesses shown to him, he decided to teach Turkish to fellow Language learners. In 2001 he passed the SOAS University examination in the Turkish language. After this he began to teach Turkish at his local Technical College at Coventry in the UK. He has also given private lessons in his own home.



John Guise himself had studied Latin and Greek in his own grammar school days. Also he can speak and write some French and Spanish. Before he began to work in Turkey he had said to himself, "I now have a chance to learn Turkish.." He states that because he already knew some languages then it was easier to assimilate Turkish.



His treatise "The Turkish Language Explained for English Speakers" is the result of his many years learning and teaching this fascinating language. In it he explains the various difficulties the learner may encounter along their learning curve. Many of these differences between English and Turkish are often glossed over or not even mentioned in many already published Language courses.



Grammar is kept to a minimum and explanations are clear and to the point. It is a book about the Turkish language and its grammar that you will keep by your side from your first lesson through intermediate and advanced stages of your studies.



You can now also buy this EPUB version with Turkish fonts embedded so is is viewable in all Ebook readers from http://www.turkishlanguage.co.uk/ebook.htm



Adobe Digital Editions 2.0 now has support for Turkish Fonts (Unicode sub-set). You can update or download it to your PC to view this book correctly.






Price: $9.99 USD

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