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Welcome to the English Skills blog for English 140 (Grammar), English 143 (Writing for Academic Purposes), and English 146 (Reading for Academic Purposes) at Athabasca University. These courses may be taken separately or as part of the English Language Proficiency Program. The goal is to increase communication between students and instructors, and to provide students with an opportunity to communicate with each other and to practice the skills taught in these courses. If you post general questions about the assignments or the course, they will be addressed in the blog. If you have detailed questions you want answered, then e-mail your instructor.

Feel free to post comments and suggestions for how to improve this site!

WELCOME NEW STUDENTS!

A hearty welcome to all the new students joining these courses. We hope you enjoy your studies and have fun participating in this blog.

Assignments marked with asterisks (*.*) are mandatory for ENGL140 students (Assignment 9).

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Also, be sure to let your tutors know the nickname you have chosen for this blog; otherwise, they will not be able to give you the marks/bonus marks that you have earned for your participation.

Next blog: Friday, September 5, 2014.

PREVIOUS GRAMMAR QUESTION

A visitor to southeast asia must to remember taking their anti-malaria medicine regular to be affective preventing them from sickness and it would spoil the trip.

1. Noun-pronoun agreement: 

"A visitor" and "their/them" do not agree. The easiest solution is to make the noun plural ("visitors"); otherwise the pronouns should be singular ("his/him" or "her/her").

2. Capitalization:

"Southeast Asia" is a proper noun, so it needs to be capitalized.

3. Modal + verb: 

After a modal such as "must", use the verb name, not the infinitive (i.e. "must remember").

4. Infinitive/gerund: 

In this sentence, since it is not a matter of remembering something from the past, the correct form after "remember" is the infinitive (i.e. "remember to take").

5. Word form: 

Since "regular" is modifying the "take", it needs to be in the adverbial form ("regularly").

6. Word confusion: 

The word we need here is "effective" not "affective".

7. Missing words: 

The words "for it" are missing after "regularly", and the word "at" is missing before "preventing".

8. Parallel construction: 

The conjunction "and" joins two phrases that are objects of "preventing", so they should be parallel. Here is one possibility: "preventing them from getting sick" and "spoiling their trip".

9. Word form:

We often use the phrase "anti-malaria medicine", but since "anti-malaria" is modifying a noun, it should be in the adjectival form ("anti-malarial").

Possible solution: 

Visitors to Southeast Asia must remember to take their anti-malarial medicine regularly for it to be effective at preventing them from getting sick and spoiling their trip.

*GRAMMAR QUESTION*

Correct the errors in the following sentence:

The twin’s were unusual amused, first they entertain there school’s friends’ by telling jokes, than they had chased after the neighboring dog and it was ended when they had imitated their friend’s.

Solutions will be posted in the next edition of the blog.

PUZZLE

Solution to the previous puzzle:  

1. quit and it
2. quirk and irk
3. quark and ark
4. quail and ail
5. quill and ill
6. queasy and easy
7. quart and art
8. qualms and alms

New Puzzle:

Five words that contain OD as a letter-pair have had all of their other letters removed and placed into a pool. Put those letters back in their proper places. What are the words?

*OD**, ***OD, *OD***, **OD***, ****OD*

Pool: A, B, C, C, C, E, E, E, H, I, L, M, N, P, R, S, T, T, U, Y

Each asterisk represents one missing letter.

Note, the first person with the correct answer gets the bonus point.

IDIOMS

There are three idioms that use BEE:

Watch this video, and then write a sentence that uses one (or more) of these three idioms.

Try not to use the same idiom as the other posters.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language/theteacher/2009/03/090311_teacher_animal_bee.shtml

*ALL CHANGE!*

Change the words in the following sentence as indicated.

Caring parents skillfully give their children increasing responsibilities.

Please change only the exact word in the sequence given. Each participant should build on the changes made by the previous participant.

For instance, Participant 1 writes #1 Subject Noun, and changes the subject noun; Participant 2 writes #2 Direct Object Noun, and changes the direct object noun, etc.

You are free to make as many changes as you wish. Just remember to number each change (and indicate the part of speech) so it is clear to everyone where we are on the list.

When all 7 changes have been made, return to the top of the list and continue.

Changes:                                                                                                                          

1. subject noun
2. direct object noun          
3. indirect object noun                  
4. adjective(s)
5. adverb(s)    
6. verb name      
7. verb tense

AFFIXES

The word stem -auto- (meaning "self") occurs in many words. 

Add an affix (either a prefix or a suffix) to this stem to make another word. 

Each participant should add a different word to the list.

*COMPLETE THE SENTENCE*

Follow the instructions below to create three different sentences from the following clause.*

…there has been a lot of rain this summer …

Sentence 1. Add a phrase      
Sentence 2. Add a dependent clause
Sentence 3. Add an independent clause


*Add your words to the beginning or end of the clause (but not both).

*NUMBER CHANGE*

If the sentence is singular, change it to the plural; if it is plural, change it to the singular.

When our children went to the lakes north of here, they swam in the shallow parts of those lakes, canoed in other places, took photographs of some spectacular birds, hiked through the forests, and slept in tents at night.

*VOCABULARY*

Vocabulary building is important for both reading comprehension and writing. 

Use the following two words in one sentence (note the part of speech).

irrevocably (adverb) and propensity (noun).

To further improve your vocabulary, remember to check out the Word of the Day. 

The site also has word games and puzzles.

http://dictionary.reference.com/

SYNONYMS AND ANTONYMS

We can describe a someone who is dutiful as submissive. 

Provide a synonym and an antonym for this word. Each participant should suggest a different word.

*ACTIVE vs. PASSIVE*

Write two sentences using the word correct.

In the first sentence, use the word in the active voice; in the second sentence, use it in the passive voice.

*TIME CHANGE*

Change the time in the following sentences by using a different verb tense and replacing any necessary time clues. Each student should choose a different verb tense.

Last weekend I travelled to a National Park in the mountains where I camped by a stream. I fell asleep each night to the sound of rushing water and the wind that blew gently through the trees. Hiking was fantastic as the flowers were all in bloom.

*SENTENCE COMBINATION*

Learning to combine ideas into more complex sentences is an important writing skill. There are many ways to do this. Try to combine the following three sentences.

Sentence 1: Both July and August have been very wet so far this year.
Sentence 2: With so much moisture around, it’s not surprising that there are also a lot of mosquitoes.

Sentence 3: I am walking around in a haze of mosquito repellent these days.

BUILD-A-SENTENCE

Write a sentence using the vocabulary and grammar indicated.

Write a sentence that begins with the phrase "the family" and includes the word "celebrate" in the past perfect progressive tense the word "happen" in the simple past tense.