Topic Sentences

Topic sentences can be difficult to create when you're writing in a foreign language. Fortunately, there's a simple way to tell if you've written a good one. A topic sentence should have only one topic and say only one thing about that topic. So, to check your topic sentence, ask yourself two questions: What is the topic of this sentence? What does the sentence say about the topic? If you can clearly say what the topic is and what the "one thing" it says about the topic, then you probably have a good topic sentence. That simple, two-step check can make writing good topic sentences easier.

Here's something that might help you remember that your topic sentence needs one topic and one idea about that topic. Just think, "ớt ơi."

One topic, one idea.

Blogs & Wikis for Class?

In December I will be teaching an intensive 3-week writing course and I've been searching for a way that students can post their homework to a blog or wiki, revise it as the course proceeds, and view and comment on their classmates' work.

wikispaces.com may be a solution but I'm a bit concerned that it involves too much tech and tech English. It won't be that helpful if we have to spend a week on  how to navigate a site just to be able to turn in  homework. Of course, emailing assignments is one solution and we've used it successfully in the past, but I like the idea of students being able to see their progress, work together with their classmates and show off their work to others by sending them a link.

DAV students -- Do you think online assignments would work or is it too complicated? Would you like to post your assignments online?

Want to study at MIT?

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is one of the most famous universities in America. It's known for its science and engineering programs but offers other majors too. Most of us will never have the opportunity to study at MIT. Fortunately, MIT makes about 2,000 of their courses available free online.

You won't get college credit for it, but you can view course materials, lecture notes, videos of lectures, and even take exams. They even have an ESL course for Listening, Speaking and Pronunciation. The full list of courses, undergraduate and graduate, is at http://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm.

Reading Hint for K36

Here's a link to the post I mentioned in class. It Gets Clearer Bit by Bit. If you've not seen it before, I recommend reading it.

Learning New Vocabulary

This afternoon we had a great visit with friends in a village just north of Hanoi. On the way back into town, one of my friends asked me how I remember Vietnamese words that are new to me. That's a good question, since I hear so many new words and forget them so easily. Like the English idiom says, they "go in one ear and out the other."

But I have had some success. Usually it comes when I can use the word or phrase a lot for 2-3 days after I learn it. I try to do this when I learn a Vietnamese proverb. Repeating it often and asking if I used it correctly helps me understand and remember.

If you want to try this method, just think up ways to use your new English word whenever you can. For example, if the word is "compromise," make a sentence about two friends who had a small disagreement and had to compromise. If you read news about a policy dispute somewhere, you can say something as simple as, "They need to compromise." If your English-speaking friend wants to take the bus somewhere and you want to go by xe om, say, "Maybe we can compromise and take the bus there and xe om back." Even if there's no one around who can speak English, you can say it to yourself and it will help.

It's an added bonus if you have friends who are native speakers or experts because, after you use the word, you can ask, "Is that the right meaning?" They can help you fine-tune your understanding of the meaning and help you use the correct collocations.

Good luck! Remember, "có công mài sắt, có ngày nên kim." Did I use that correctly?

Writing Classes in Hanoi

How's your writing? Would you like to work on improving it? Beginning in mid-April I will be teaching two private writing classes. There will be a fee, but the class size will be limited to 5 students in each class so they can receive focused attention.

• First Steps in Academic Writing is a high-beginner level class which will focus on basics such as writing good sentences, paragraph structure, and different kinds of paragraphs. This two-hour class will meet twice a week for six weeks (Tuesday, 6:30 - 8:30 pm and Saturday, 9 - 11 am). Writing assignments will be given as homework. If you are interested, send me a message on Facebook, or text your email address to 01227350749 and I will send you the details.
• Improving Your Writing is for high-intermediate and advanced students. This two-hour class will meet once a week for six weeks (Saturday, 1 - 3 pm) and will focus mainly on academic writing tasks similar to some of the IELTS tasks. Writing assignments will be given as homework and students will spend a lot of time editing and correcting assignments in order to recognize and avoid mistakes. If you are interested, send me a message on Facebook, or text your email address to 01227350749 and I will send you the details.

 Classes will begin on 19 April and 23 April and run till 28 May.

Vocabulary Plug-in

Do you use the Firefox web browser? Last week I found out about a plug-in that helps you learn vocabulary. It's not perfect every time (words with multiple meanings complicate things), but it helps. It's called ming-a-ling.

After you install it, you can choose a word and ask it to substitute the word in the language you want to learn. For example, I can never remember the correct tone for mưa, so one of the words I've changed is "rain." Now, whenever a web page loads with the word "rain" on it, ming-a-ling changes it to Vietnamese. For example, here's Yahoo's weather forecast for Hanoi tomorrow:

       Tomorrow: Considerable cloudiness with occasional mưa.
       High 64F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of mưa 50%.

It should work the same way with Vietnamese to English and the words you choose will show up in English when you read a Vietnamese web page.

If you're having trouble remembering a word, give ming-a-ling a try.

Reading the News Vocabulary for Unit 02

Reading the News Unit 01 Vocabulary

 Here are some vocabulary words from Unit 01 of Reading the News. You can click through them as many times as you want to learn or review them. Leave a comment if you think this is helpful.

Press the double arrow to advance to the definition.
(Or click here if it doesn't work below.)