Kompetenzerweiterung I, Homework for Week 7

Our next class meeting will be on December 4th at 9:45 am. For the remainder of the semester, my Kompetenzerweiterung I class will be in that room until 9:40 am. Please do not enter the room while that class is still in session.

For homework, please complete the following:
Little vs. few: https://www.ego4u.com/en/cram-up/vocabulary/little-few/exercises?05
Future tenses plus quiz at the bottom: https://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/english-grammar/verbs/talking-about-future
Gerund vs. infinitive quiz: http://a4esl.org/q/h/9801/el-to-ing.html
Cloze test: http://www.englishrevealed.co.uk/CAE/Part2/cae_open_cloze_1.php
Word formation: http://www.englishrevealed.co.uk/CPE/cpe_wf/cpe_wf_1.php
have/make/take/do: https://www.englisch-hilfen.de/en/exercises/confusing_words/do_have_make_take.htm

If you haven't submitted any written assignments yet this semester, I highly encourage you to work on one during the Projektwoche. You can select any topic published on this blog since the beginning of the semester.

Would the five students who submitted written work to me on Monday please send me an email so that I can scan my corrections to you. I had them corrected with me today, but unfortunately forgot to return them to you (please remind me in the future!). Thanks :).

Kompetenzerweiterung III, Homework for Week 7

Our next class meetings will be:
Monday group: December 4th, 8:10-9:40 (note the change in time)
Tuesday group: December 5th 11:30-13:00

On the exam, you will be:
-providing me with two short argumentative essays, one which is a response to a given question and the other which involves picking a pre-determined stance from a set of four different options.
-doing fronting and emphasizing transformations, which can be practiced here:
http://www.englishtenses.com/exercise/inversion_exercise
-translating quotes to reported speech, which can be practiced here:
http://www.perfect-english-grammar.com/reported-speech-exercise-1.html
-transforming sentences using conditional trigger words, which can be practiced here:
https://www.flo-joe.co.uk/fce/students/strategy/transfrm/conditn.htm
-combining sentences using participle clauses, which can be practiced here:
https://www.englishgrammar.org/joining-sentences-participles/
The latter two grammar points will be elaborated upon in our class sessions in December.

If you haven't submitted any written assignments yet this semester (outside of the in-class essay), I encourage you to work on one during the Projektwoche. It can be on any debate topic of your choice.

For my Monday class: here's the letter from Luz Long to Jesse Owens I mentioned in class:
http://www.lettersofnote.com/2016/08/tell-him-about-his-father.html

Kompetenzerweiterung I, Homework for Week 6

For homework, please:

1. Complete this word formation exercise: https://www.flo-joe.co.uk/cae/students/tests/wfts1.htm
2. Complete the following exercise on modal verbs: http://www.esl-classroom.com/grammar/perfmodals1.html
3. Read this description and complete the exercises on placement of adverbs of frequency: http://www.grammar-quizzes.com/adv_frequency.html#advfrequency 
4. Read up on comma rules: https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/607/02/
    and complete the exercise on the back page of today’s handout.
5. Your optional essay for this week can be your own "5 Things You Don't Know About ___________" or a response to a letter sent to an agony aunt or an advice columnist you find on an English-language newspaper site. Essay submissions must conform to the regulations outlined on my first post. 

Kompetenzerweiterung III, Homework for Week 6

This week, I’d like you to focus on pronunciation:

Read up on the Trap-Bath Split here: http://dialectblog.com/2011/03/10/mastering-the-trap-bath-split/

And the stress differences between the two main varieties: http://www.wordstress.info/word-stress/differences-english-varieties/stress-differences-between-american-and-british-english/

Depending on your preferred variety, have a look at the following materials:

RP: http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/multimedia/pron/index.shtml

AmE (differences between BrE and AmE): https://pronunciationstudio.com/american-vs-british-pronunciation/

Differences between NZ and Australian English: http://dialectblog.com/2011/05/04/south-african-kiwi-aussie/

Here’s an extensive list of differences between BrE and North American English (NAE) vocab: https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/usage/british-and-american-terms

You might also like this illustrated guide: https://www.boredpanda.com/british-american-english-differences-language/

In addition to this, I’d like you to have another look at the article distributed in class today (accessible here (I’m not quite sure why there are two glaring misspellings on the site): https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/10/22/reading-more-but-learning-less/knowlededge-was-more-eagerly-sought-when-it-was-more-precious)

Do you find the author’s arguments convincing? Why or why not? Do you generally agree with statement "knowledge was more eagerly sought when it was more precious"?

Since several students in my Tuesday class listened to the Versus debate on gun control, I thought you might be interested in the following NY Times report on guns in the US: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/07/world/americas/mass-shootings-us-international.html

Kompetenzerweiterung I, Homework for Week 5

For homework, please:

1.       Complete the tense exercise on the back of the error correction handout distributed in class today. The exercise requires some kind of past tense. (You can review the rules in brief here: https://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/english-grammar/verbs/past-tense)

2.       On that same handout you’ll find numbers 11-15 have been left blank. There, I would like you to write five sentences which contain one error each to quiz your neighbor with in Monday’s class.

3.       Try your hand at the error correction quizzes at the New York Times website (these are written with sophisticated native speakers in mind, so don’t fret if they’re hard!): https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/08/17/insider/copy-edit-this-quiz-8.html

(The NY Times site is interactive, so click on the spot in the sentence where you suspect an error and you’ll get automatic feedback as to whether you are right or not. After three tries, the site will display the answer.)

4.       Read the rules for adverb placement here: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/de/grammatik/britisch-grammatik/about-adjectives-and-adverbs/adverbs-and-adverb-phrases-position

5.       And try this quiz: https://www.englisch-hilfen.de/en/exercises/adjectives_adverbs/adverb_position.htm

6.       Finally, take this quiz on negative prefixes: http://a4esl.org/q/h/vm/negprefix.html

Your optional essay for this week is to respond to the article distributed in class on Amazon OR to write your own essay entitled "__________ Doesn’t Play Fair. So What?" is which you insert whatever you want into that blank. For this essay, please still keep my guidelines in mind (available in my first blog post).

Kompetenzerweiterung III, Homework for Week 5

For homework, please:

1. Review your points for the "should we abolish grades at school and uni" debate. If your support does not include quantitative data (e.g. stats, percentages), look up data that supports your position and pay attention to the language you use to describe this data.

2. Have a look at the vocabulary used on this page for describing graphs and trends and be ready to use it with data distributed in class next week:

http://www.stgeorges.co.uk/blog/how-can-i-describe-a-graph-ielts-writing-task-part-1-business-english

3. Check out the "Versus Debates" page and watch at least 30 minutes of one of the debates https://www.youtube.com/user/versusdebates/featured . Paraphrase the weakest point and strongest points made in the debate.

4. Finally, take quizzes 3 and 4 on this page, which resemble exercises on the exam (do quizzes 1 and 2 first if you need the practice):
http://random-idea-english.blogspot.de/2011/05/negative-inversion-practice-exercises.html

Your optional writing assignment is to visit the NY Times Room for Debate page https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate  and select a contribution to a debate question you categorically disagree with. Your essay is a counterargument to that contributor's position and argumentation.