Thursday, April 18, 2013

PREVIOUS GRAMMAR QUESTION

Driving to the mall last week my car was near disappearing in a pothole: deciding to call the cities administration reporting the problem, I was hoping the problem was to be fixed quickly however its still their and its to be avoided.

1. Dangling modifier: There is no subject for “driving to the mall”—currently the only one available is the car”. Therefore it needs a subject such as “ When I was driving …” That is now an adverb clause of time—it needs to be followed by a comma.
2.  Wording: “was near disappearing” is bad grammar and non-idiomatic—reword to something such as “nearly disappeared.”
3. Gerund or infinitive? The gerund “reporting” doesn’t work here; use the infinitive ‘to report.”
4. Possessive: “Cities” is a plural form; the singular possessive is needed—city’s (no capital).
5. Verb form: instead of “was to be” use the modal passive “would be.”
6. Word confusion: When “its’ means “it is”, use an apostrophe (it’s); when “their” refers to a place and is not a possessive pronoun, use “there.”
7. Awkward wording: “to be avoided” is awkward in this sentence—it would be more usual to use “should be avoided.”
8. Punctuation: replace the colon with a semicolon. The comma after “problem” is insufficient—more of a break is needed. Use either a semicolon or a period. The word “however” separates 2 independent clauses—either make them separate sentences or separate them with a semicolon. After an introductory “however”, use a comma. In the last sentence, “and” separated 2 independent clause; use a comma after “there.”

Possible Answer: When I was driving to the mall last week, my car nearly disappeared in a pothole. I decided to call the city’s administration to report the problem.  I was hoping the problem would be fixed quickly; however, it’s still there, and it should be avoided.

GRAMMAR QUESTION, April 18th, 2013

There are a number of grammatical errors in the following sentence. Rewrite the sentence to correct for those errors. There are many possible solutions.

Studying on my own pace is a lot of benefit for me do to I am not needing to be worrying about no time for attend class. Being a single parent, the classes allows me working and studying and to spend time with my children.

The problems, and their corrections, will be posted in the next edition of the blog.

PUZZLE, April 18th, 2013

Previous Puzzle: Congratulations to Leigha for being the first to completely solve it.
Five words that contain GM 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?

**GM*, **GM**, ***GM*, ****GM, **GM***

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

Answer: (PYGMY, BAGMAN, STIGMA, PHLEGM, AUGMENT)

New puzzle:
There are two groups of four-letter words used in the sentences below. The first missing words (A) of each sentence are anagrams of each other, and the second missing words (B) are also anagrams of each other. Can you find them? (All the A words are anagrams of each other, and all the B words are anagrams of each other).

1. The hunters set a __A__ for the hare. How else were they to enjoy its succulent __B___ ?

2. They all listened in __A__ attention as their leader spoke and motivated them to work as a __B__.

3. There will always be a small __A__ of wildness in a cat, though it is considered to be a __B__ animal today.

*First student with the correct answer gets the point.

ALL CHANGE! April 18th, 2013

Change the words in the sentence below as indicated. You can only change the exact word in the sequence given; after someone else has posted the next change, then you can post another change. For instance, student 1 writes #1 Subject Noun, and changes the subject noun; Student 2 writes #2 Direct Object Noun, and changes that noun. Each student only makes one change at a time and keeps to the order indicated.If you complete all 7 changes, then start making more changes again from 1 to 7. Each student should build on the changes that the previous students make. Please number the change you make.

Yasmin excitedly rode her new bicycle to school.

Changes: #1 Subject noun      #2  Direct object noun                #3 Indirect object noun          
#4 Adjective               #5 Adverb       #6 Verb name              #7 Verb tense

SENTENCE COMPLETION, April 18th, 2013

Use the type of clause, phrase, or grammar indicated to complete the following sentence; you can add the phrase or clause before or after the clause below:

...we are already one-third of the way through the year...

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

VOCABULARY, April 18th, 2013

Vocabulary building is important for both reading comprehension and writing. Use the following two words (note the part of speech) in one sentence.

millennial      (adjective)      +      diminution      (noun)

ACTIVE & PASSIVE, April 18th, 2013

Write one sentence in the active voice and one in the passive voice using the verb use.

SENTENCE COMBINATION, April 18th, 2013

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

Sentence 1: Many people in Canada are looking forward to spring.
Sentence 2: Spring is particularly appreciated in such a cold country where most people experience a very long winter.
Sentence 3: This winter has seemed longer than most with snow still on the ground in many parts of the country.

Thursday, April 4, 2013

PREVIOUS GRAMMAR QUESTION



There were to much peoples at the mall so I was hurried up shopping, I was too hurried that the shirt’s I bought's not big enough and I'm having to return them.
1.  Word confusion: Don’t confuse “to” a preposition with “too”  a modifier.
2. Count/non-count nouns: “people” is a non-count noun; with a non-count noun use “many” not “much”.
3.  Word form: Because “people” is usually a non-count noun, it does not normally have a plural form (the plural “peoples” is uncommon).
4. Active vs. passive: The subject of the verb “hurry” is “I”, so the verb needs to be in the active voice.
5. Word usage: Instead of “too” the word “so” is needed.
6. Apostrophe usage: Apostrophes indicate either possession or a missing letter. The word should be “shirts” because the pronoun “them” refers to them (plural not possessive); also, because this noun is plural, the plural verb “are” is needed after “bought” .
7.  Verb form: For a statement indicating intention, use the simple present tense not the present progressive.
8. Punctuation:  “So” introduces an independent clause and follows an independent—use a semicolon. Either use a period or another semicolon to separate the next 2 clauses. Before the final independent clause introduced by the coordinating conjunction “and”, use a comma.
Possible Answer:  There were too many people at the mall; so I hurried up shopping. I was so hurried that the shirts I bought are not big enough, and I have to return them.

PEER EDITING OPTION

A peer editing option is available for assignments 7 and 8 (you should be working on Assignment 6 before you sign up for this option) for students in rev. 11 of the course. To participate in this option, please sign up for an appropriate group--more groups will be added each month. The peer editing for each one of these assignments needs to occur within a 2-week time frame, and each group requires a minimum of 3 students.

Sign up for the appropriate group when you are nearly ready to do the assignment--the groups listed below (scroll down) are for APRIL & MAY Groups for  the rest of the year will be added nearer the time they are needed.

GRAMMAR QUESTION, April 4th, 2013

Correct the sentence below. There are many errors and many possible correct solutions--lots of bonus points for everyone!
 
Driving to the mall last week my car was near disappearing in a pothole: deciding to call the cities administration reporting the problem, I was hoping the problem was to be fixed quickly however its still their and its to be avoided.

PUZZLE, April 4th, 2013



Previous Puzzle:
Congratulations to everyone who got a correct answer. Here is a possible answer:
  1. o … honor  (o/on/nor/horn/honor)
  2. i … detail    (i/it/lit/tile/tiled/detail)
  3. i … elation  (i/in/nil/nail/alien/entail/elation)

New Puzzle:
Five words that contain GM 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?

**GM*, **GM**, ***GM*, ****GM, **GM***

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

ALL CHANGE! April 4th, 2013

Change the words in the sentence below as indicated. You can only change the exact word in the sequence given; after someone else has posted the next change, then you can post another change. For instance, student 1 writes #1 Subject Noun, and changes the subject noun; Student 2 writes #2 Direct Object Noun, and changes that noun. Each student only makes one change at a time and keeps to the order indicated. If you complete all 7 changes, then start making more changes again from 1 to 7. Each student should build on the changes that the previous students make and number the change you make.

My young nephews greedily ate the chocolate eggs on Easter.

Changes: #1 Subject noun      #2  Direct object noun        #3 Indirect object noun        
 #4 Adjective               #5 Adverb       #6 Verb name              #7 Verb tense

COMPLETE THE SENTENCE, April 4th, 2013

Use the type of clause, phrase, or grammar indicated to complete the following sentence*; you can add the phrase or clause before or after (not both) to the clause below:

...April is here...

Sentence 1: add a phrase            
Sentence 2: add a dependent clause     
Sentence 3: add an independent clause

* Please write three separate sentences.

VOCABULARY, April 4th, 2013



Vocabulary building is important for both reading comprehension and writing. Use the following two words (note the part of speech) in one sentence.

heist      (noun)     +      spasmodically      (adverb)

ACTIVE & PASSIVE, April 4th, 2013



Write one sentence in the active voice and one in the passive voice using the verb draw.

SENTENCE COMBINATION, April 4th, 2013

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

Sentence 1: Children were not in school for April Fool’s Day this year.
Sentence 2: Most of their practical jokes were restricted to their homes and families.
Sentence 3:  Parents probably wished that their children were in school. 

PEER EDITING, Assignment 7, May. 1st - 15th

Please sign up here--click on "comment". Note that by signing up here, you are committing yourself to participating in the peer editing for assignment #7 in between May 1st and 15th. For this exercise to occur, at least 3 students should have signed up for it by Apr. 25th. If that has not happened, you have the option of signing in to a later group, or you can complete the assignment on your own and send it to your tutor as usual.
There is more information on the moodle site. (scroll to the very bottom):
To access your group discussion, on May. 1st, please go to the moodle Discussion Forum

PEER EDITING Assignment 7, Apr. 16th to 30th

Please sign up here--click on "comment". Note that by signing up here, you are committing yourself
to participating in the peer editing assignment #7, between April 16th and 30th.
For this exercise to occur, at least 3 students should have signed up for it by Apr. 13th. If that has not happened, you have the option of signing in to a later group, or you can complete the assignment on your own and send it to your tutor as usual.

There is more information on the moodle site. (scroll to the very bottom):
To access your group discussion, on Apr. 16th, please go to the moodle Discussion Forum:

PEER EDITING, Assignment 8, May. 1st - 15th

Please sign up here--click on "comment". Note that by signing up here, you are committing yourself to participating in the peer editing for assignment #8 between May 1st and 15th. For this exercise to occur, at least 3 students should have signed up for it by Apr. 25th. If that has not happened, you have the option of signing in to a later group, or you can complete the assignment on your own and send it to your tutor as usual.
There is more information on the moodle site. (scroll to the very bottom):
To access your group discussion, on May1st, please go to the moodle Discussion Forum:

PEER EDITING Assignment 8,Apr. 16th to 31st

Please sign up here--click on "comment". Note that by signing up here, you are committing yourself
to participating in the peer editing assignment #8 between Apr. 16th and 30th.

For this exercise to occur, at least 3 students should have signed up for it by Apr. 13th. If that has not happened, you have the option of signing in to a later group, or you can complete the assignment on your own and send it to your tutor as usual.

There is more information on the moodle site. (scroll to the very bottom):
To access your group discussion, on Apr. 16th please go to the moodle Discussion Forum: