POINTS TO STUDY
Learn about four common mistakes in writing an essay
우리의 영작을 자세히 살펴 보면 오늘 스티브가 이야기하는 네가지 실수가 아주 빈번히 눈에 뜨입니다. 제목은 토플영작이지만 모든 영작시험에 적용할수 있는 내용입니다.
VIDEO
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0PXgvhG_Bk
SCRIPT, LISTENING TIPS, & GRAMMAR
Hello everybody and welcome to TOEFL Talk 7. My name is Steve and you’ve come to privateenglishportal.com. My question this week comes from my TOEFL student from South Korea, Jay. And Jay and I are starting to go over the essentials in writing on the TOEFL Test, and the first four points that I’m going to explain to you Jay are the following. You want to determine some of the possible mistakes that you can make in writing to help analyze your own mistakes.
My first example is “singular-plural”. What do I mean by that? Well let’s take an incorrect sentence like, he have been here for six months. Now, we of course know, I mean it may seem very obvious to you that it should be “he has been here for six months.” Right person he has, and I’m gonna tell you something, just a little secret: many of my advanced students carry over from their lower levels of English learning, basic mistakes which nobody corrected them on. So it is not unusual for me to see in some students that they have reached to upper intermediate into advanced level of English, but they still have some of those basic mistakes where by someone did not correct them and they just develop the habit of saying that. So I wanted to tell you that because I don’t want you to worry, I don’t want you to think that oh my god I’m not at a high level of English and now I realize that I’m making basic mistakes. Those mistakes you can correct, you can correct those mistakes yourself. You just need to be aware of them, and that’s why I’m making this video for you, and so that is my first point about singular-plural.
My second one that you can watch out for in the TOEFL writing or many other test preparation writing exams is “word form”. What do I mean by the word form? For example, you can say “I saw a beauty picture.” This is a very common. I see a lot with my intermediate to advanced students, is that they’ll use the wrong word form. So in this case, I saw a beauty picture: beauty means the noun and in this case, we already have a noun, picture, so we want to say, “I saw a beautiful picture.” Now, once again you might think, oh, Steve, that sounds so obvious, but I’m telling you that when you’re speaking and you are just kind in the heat of moment and saying what’s ever on the tip of your tongue that sometimes we were make this mistakes.
l in the heat of moment 굉장히 좋은 표현 입니다.또한 자주 쓰이는 표현 이기도 합니다. “저친구가 한말에 흥분하지 마시게나, 그냥 화가나서 하는 말이니..”를 영작 한다면, Please don’t get upset (frustrated) by his comments which are coming out of his mouth in the heat of moment...!
l on the tip of your tongue 카~ 이것도 아주 좋은 표현 입니다. 한글로 바꾸어 보면 “그냥 혀끝에서 툭툭 튀어나오는 말. 비슷한 표현은 아니지만 형식이 비슷한 말로 “on the top of my head” (그방 떠오르는 생각) 가 있습니다. You can take the Blue Lane metro and probably get off at the Federal Plaza Station to get to the Smithsonian Museums, but you may want to look at the metro map for validation because it came out of the top of my head.
My third example is the example of “word choice.” So we have, she got on the taxi, where it should be “she got into the taxi.” So just because of your word choice in preposition, meaning totally changes. She got on the taxi mean she got on top of the taxi, a not really a comfortable ride, I’m sure.
My last one is “verb tense.” Verb tense for example, he is here since June. Oh students I hear that so much, people using the simple present tense where in fact I mean your big clue here since it should be the present perfect. He has been here since June. Now I can go into long explanation about the present perfect. Maybe I’ll mention that in a future TOEFL talk, but yeah, so be careful of your verb tenses as well. I’ve noticed a lot, a lot, a lot, these four mistakes, these four major mistakes and when you can starts analyze your own writing, just as native speakers do when you’re going to university here when I went to university and I had to analyze my own essays and tried to look for my own mistakes, then you’ll starts notice your own mistakes and then you will correct yourself and then, you will get a higher score on the TOEFL as a result.
l 그러면 우리만 이런 실수를 하느냐? 아니지요, 스티브도 계속해서 동일한 verb tense 실수를 저지릅니다. 바로 조동사 다음에는 동사원형이 와야 하는데 계속 can/will starts 식으로 말을 하고 있습니다. 자세히 들어 보면 스티브 뿐 아니라 아주 많은 미국인들이 이런 단순한 실수를 합니다. 시험에서는 감점이 되지만 일상 회화에선 그렇게 문제 되지 않습니다…
OK? So that is my TOEFL talk seven and Jay I hope that clear some doubts about the common writing mistakes on the TOEFL. OK? So you guys have a great week and we’ll see you on TOEFL Talk Eight! Bye bye!
TODAY’S PRONUNCIATION
Daily Pronunciation #47 - English Lesson – VISCERAL
