英语说明文及范文点评

时间:2024.3.19

英语说明文及范文点评

【要求】

要求:假设你是一名图书馆的工作人员,请写一篇文章说明文,介绍图书的借阅规则。字数在80100字之间。

【范文】

Something You Must Know

This library is and English Language teaching and learning librany. If you want to borrow some books, you must fill out a library application form and put it in the box on the librarian's desk. Because of the large number of applications we receive each week, you must wait one week. Please bring yor student or work card to pick up your library card. Library application forms which are not picked up within 2 months will be discarded and you will have to reapply.

【评语】

本文的借书规则表述得比较清晰,注意到了说明文语言的精练准确、通俗易懂的特点。对于高中生而言,这是一篇优秀的应试作文。

There is no indefinite liberty.

【要求】

要求:小程原来英语成绩很差,自从他参加了学校的英语角,成绩有了很大的进步,尤其是听力和口语提高更是迅速。请你代小程写一篇短文,介绍一下英语角的情况。

【范文】

English Corner

English Corner is very useful to learn to communicate in English. Learning a foreign language requires four skills: reading, writing, listening and speaking. The English Corner is a wonderful place to practise both listening and speaking.

English Corner is also a good place to meet new friends. When I went to English Corner last Sunday, I came across a variety of people, who all had one thing in common; that is they wanted to communicate in English. So the atmosphere was relaxing.

English Corner enlarges our would. As we listen to foreigners talking about their countries and customs, we learn many things that we can't learn from books.

【评语】

本文第一段是总领段,点明了English Corner 在英语学习中的地位和作用。紧接着简单介绍了English Corner如何在我们英语学习中发挥作用。全篇文章结构紧凑,语句连贯,无华丽词汇之堆砌,但文章中心却表达的清晰而明确。

Without you ,it would have never been possible. Thank you.

【要求】

请用英语写一篇关于你校的校园平面图(diagram

教师办公室在教学楼三楼。

学校四周是树。

字数:100

【范文】

This is a diagram of our schoolyard. It is four hundred meters long and three hundred meters wide. The school gate faces the south. Our teaching building stands in the middle of our school yard. It is a building of five stories .The teachers' offices are on the third floor.

There is a garden in front of the teaching building. On the left of the garden is our library. Our lab is on the right of the garden. There is a large playground behind the teaching building. Many trees are planted around the school-yard.

【评语】

本文按照由外到内、由前往后的顺序进行介绍说明,使文章层次分明,脉胳清晰,说明简短有力。

Brevity is the soul of wit. 文以简洁为贵

English Dictionaries

【要求】

English Dictionariesspelling);发音(pronunciation)和意项(meanings)。请你写一短文向别人介绍一本普通的英文字典。

【范文】

English Dictionaries

Most English dictionaries will tell you a number of things about the language.

There are three important things, spelling, pronunciation and meanings. The first is the spelling of the words. If you are not sure about the spelling of a word, you can try to find the correct spelling in a

dictionary. The words are always given in alphabetical order.

The second thing is pronunciation, Most dictionaries give the pronunciation of a word in a special kind of alphabet, which is called phonetic.

The third thing a dictionary will tell you is the meanings of words,Many

words have more than one meaning, and a good dictionary will explain all of the word's meanings.

These are some of the important facts that you can learn from dictionaries.

【评语】

本文抓住了英文字典的三个方面的主要内容进行阐述,采用总—分—总的结构方式组织材料,显得结构严谨。文章紧扣字典的主要特点进行说明,显得重点突出,对字典有一清晰的认识。

“barbecue”是日常生活中常见的一种食品,想知道是什么就去查字典吧。

Hans Christian Anderson

【要求】

请根据下列内容和所给单词及词组,用英语写一篇介绍世界著名童话作家安徒生

(Hans Christian Anderson100——120。内容提示:安徒生生于1805年。十一岁丧

父。由于家境贫困,童年时代没能上学,开始跟人学习缝纫。十四岁时到一剧院工作。后来在一些热心的艺术家的帮助下,上了学。1828年接受高等教育,毕业后献身文学(literature)。他写剧本、小说、诗歌等等。他努力创作,获得很大成功。一生共创作160多个故事。1875年去世。

Words and Expressions to Be Used:

world-famous devote oneself to fairy tales

by the time advanced education lead to

【范文】

Hans Christian Anderson

Hans Christian Anderson was a world-famous writer of fairy tales. He was born in 1805. When he was eleven his father died. His family was then so poor that he could not go to school during his childhood. He learned sewing from a tailor.

At the age of fourteen, he went to work in a theatre. Later helped by some warm-hearted artists, he went to school. In 1828, he began to get advanced education.

After graduation, he devoted himself to literature. He wrote plays, novels, poems and so on. He worked hard at literature. This led to his great

success. He wrote more than 160 stories in all .He was famous for his funny fairy tales, which became popular all over the world. He died in 1875.

【评语】

本文用词准确,语言流畅,内容符合要求

My favorite program

【要求】

现在随着电视等传播媒介的普及和发展,电视节目的花样越来越多,知识性、娱乐性的侧重也各有不同。请你写一篇文章,介绍一下你最喜欢的节目。

【范文】

My favorite program

Nowadays radios and TVs play a more and more important role in our daily life. There are many programs shown every day. Some of them are very good. My favorite program is called“The Animal World”, which is broadcast by CCTV every Sunday night.

The program provides us with natural scenes, the life of all kinds of wild animals and the wonderful explanation about it. We also acquire some knowledge about animals, even some plants. So in my opinion, it is an

interesting as well as an instructive program. Be sides, the pictures are very beautiful.

It's really a great joy to watch it. If you don't believe it, Just watch it yourself.

【评语】

这篇文章给我们提供了一种写说明文的一般结构:点明主题——一般介绍——文章主体——概括和归纳结尾。通过这种结构,可使描述脉络清晰,表述自然流畅,不致于发生思路混乱的局面。

你喜欢哪个电视台的什么节目?你也试写一下?


第二篇:英语说明文写作方法


Expository Writing(说明文写作)

The expository essay is written to explain or inform. There are a variety of ways to organize an expository essay, depending on your purpose. The most common strategies include development by example, definition, comparison and contrast, division and classification, process analysis, and causal analysis.

Unit1. College Life Principles

In this unit, we will focus on the example / illustration essay. This type of expository writing involves using examples to support your general statement or explain your idea:

●You may use relevant facts, statistics, personal experiences, incidents, or stories to explain, illustrate, or support the point in your essay.

● The number of examples you use in an example essay depends on the topic of your writing:

1. In some cases, you may find that a series of short examples fit your purpose, illustrating clearly the idea you are presenting to your reader;

2. You may decide that two or three examples, explained in some detail, provide the best support for your topic; or

3. You may also find that in some cases, one long, detailed example is more useful than several shorter ones. ●To make the flow of thoughts smooth, you may use two ways to connect the paragraphs:

1. Use transitional expressions; 2. Use repetition of key words and phrases.

Sample A Read the following essay about college students’ out-of-class activities, and

● find the thesis statement, four examples and the conclusion;

● pay attention to how the writer uses the four examples to support a point;

● study the structural elements that hold the essay together.

Out-of-Class Activities

1. All work and no play can be almost as bad as all play and no work. Getting your degree should be one of your main goals. Your college classes should, and do, occupy much of your time, but you also need to develop friendships and get involved in other activities. Involvement in extracurricular groups promotes interpersonal communication and leadership skills. Many students think that the only place to meet people on campus is the student union or student center. -→thesis statement

2. First, activities focus on competition that encourages sportsmanship and leadership as well as improves health and gives fun.them develop friendships with others. Finally -→ four examples

3. ↓conclusion Sample B In colleges and universities, there are many students’ organizations. If you are going to write an essay about an organization in your university and tell people how good it is, how will you to support the statement that ―the Chinese American Students’ Association is a great organization for everyone.‖

Chinese American Students’ Association at Yale University

1. The Chinese American Students’ Association (CASA) is an undergraduate organization formed to promote 1

awareness of Chinese and Chinese-American culture and identity among all members of the Yale community, with special focus on issues that young Chinese Americans face today. Unlike many other organizations on campus, CASA is a multi-faceted (多方面的) organization that really has something for everyone.

2. Those of us that are involved in CASA think of CASA as a family. It is a smaller community within the larger Yale community. To cultivate this sense of community, CASA offers opportunities for freshmen to get to know CASA upperclassmen through ―CASA families‖. Freshmen that sign up to be in CASA families are given two ―parents‖, who are upperclassmen, and a ―sibling‖ (兄弟或姐妹), who is also a freshman. These families are often the basis for friendships that last throughout the college and beyond. CASA parents take their kids out for good food, give them advice about college life, and act as friends and mentors (导师).

3. CASA also holds many other social events throughout the year. There is an annual banquet which is a nice dinner and presentation in which one year’s executive board (理事会) ―passes the torch‖ to the next year. It is always an entertaining event that much of the CASA membership looks forward to. Other annual events are Eclipse, which is our 2nd semester dance, and our ski trip. We also hold study breaks and movie nights, which means free Chinese food and the company of great people. As you will learn, many of the social events at CASA revolve around food. We have a BBQ (烧烤) to welcome the freshmen, a hotpot (火锅) night around Chinese New Year, a huge cultural dinner in which the board cooks for everyone in CASA, and CASA-wide family days on and off campus that always involve plenty of good food.

4. While food is something we love, CASA is definitely about more than just food and social events. CASA also loves to celebrate Chinese culture. We have moon cakes for Mid-Autumn Festival, we always have a Chinese New Year celebration, and we make sure to have events frequently to celebrate and demonstrate our culture (whether it is by eating Chinese food or by watching Chinese movies). One of our largest events is our annual cultural show. Around 50 people were involved in the production of the show, and about 300 people attended last year. This show draws on the talents of the entire CASA community and is a huge event that involves acting, a Wu Shu performance, Lion Dance, Phoenix Dance Troupe (traditional Chinese dance), a hip hop show, a fashion show, and many other acts.

5. Finally, CASA prides itself on our involvement beyond the Yale community. We volunteer at local New Haven public schools in a Cultural Awareness Program. We have a mentorship with the local New Haven Chinese School (华文学校), in which the Chinese school kids are paired up with a big sib (大哥哥或大姐姐) at Yale. And one of my personal favorite events is our Chinese Adopted Siblings Program at Yale (CASPY), which pairs undergraduates with adopted Chinese children from the tri-state area. The undergraduates are able to form tight bonds with their CASPY sibs and

their families (I had Thanksgiving dinner with my CASPY family!). In addition to being very fulfilling to the Yale students that participate in the community events, these events provide a huge service to a larger community beyond Yale.

6. While I’ve categorized most of our events into social, cultural, or community categories, some of our events encompass (包括) all of those categories. One of our newest events is our largely successful ―Triad Night‖, which we have put on for the past two years. This event is a dress-up night in which CASA members get together for karaoke, mahjong, poker, and many other games. Everyone always has a lot of fun. The best part of this event, however, is the fact that we have donated over $1,000 to the China Aids Orphan Fund every year that we have held this event.

7. It’s hard to explain in one page just how great an organization CASA is, but I urge you to give it a chance. Come out to our events, meet the people that make CASA what it is and you will see why we all love CASA as much as we do. CASA puts on great, meaningful events, but the best part of CASA is the people — the people are what make the CASA community and CASA events as great as they are.

◆Question: What are the transitions the writer uses to make the writing smooth from one paragraph to the 2

next?

Para. 3: CASA also holds many other social events throughout the year.

Para. 4: While food is sth. we love, CASA is definitely about more than just food and social events. CASA also loves to celebrate Chinese culture.

Para. 5: Finally, CASA prides itself on our involvement beyond the Yale community.

Para. 6: While I’ve categorized most of our events into social, cultural, or community categories, some of our events encompass all of those categories.

Sample C Sample student essay

(CET-4) Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write a composition on the topic Practice Makes Perfect. You should write at least 100 words and you should base your composition on the outline (given in Chinese) below: 1.怎样理解―熟能生巧‖? 2.例如,在英语学习中?? 3.又如??

Practice Makes Perfect

As a well-known proverb goes, ―practice makes perfect.‖ We need to practice constantly when we set about a difficult task or begin to learn something new. Becoming familiar with an unfamiliar task is merely the first step. Only through constant practice can we master it thoroughly.

Many students complain that to memorize so many words is really a great headache. But if these students follow what the proverb says, that is, if they try to memorize the words at the very moment they come across them and review them time and again, they may find it not so difficult to master them after all. That is why our teachers tell us to seize every opportunity to read English, talk in English, and write in English, because only by so doing can we build up the so-called ―feel for the language‖.

practice may enable you to play the piano well but not beautifully. To excel, you have no choice but to practice hour after hour, day after day. You have to persist in practicing without any break. Only then will you have a good command of the skill. There are countless other examples. In a word, we must always keep the proverb in mind — practice makes perfect.

Write your own essay

The following essay topics are offered for your own writing practice. Select one or more topics in which you are interested and write your own essay(s).

1. Competition is taking all the fun out of recreation 2. Birds of a feather flock together.

3. More college students like to work for students’ organizations.

4. Participation in a particular sport (club, hobby, event) teaches valuable lessons.

5. University libraries are offering better services.

6. More college students are faced with roommate conflicts.

7. College canteens (cafeteria) are improving food services.

8. Failure is the mother of success.

Unit2 Sharing Our Interpretations Principles

A definition essay explains what a term or concept means. Some terms such as train, book or milk have concrete meanings, while other terms or concepts such as love, success or failure are abstract and may carry different meanings to different people. Definition essays are usually written for one or more of the following reasons:

● To clarify an abstract term or concept (e.g., ―happiness‖, ―hero‖, ―democracy‖).

● To explain the jargon or technical terms of a particular field of study, a profession or an industry (e.g., ―computer virus‖, ―Gothic architecture‖, ―French impressionist paintings‖).

● To offer information about a term or an idea to a particular interested audience (e.g., helping learners of the 3

Chinese language to learn about ―Chinese New Year‖ or ―handing out red envelopes‖).

● To provide a personal interpretation of a term or concept that the writer feels is vague, controversial, misused or misunderstood (e.g., ―competition‖, ―self-respect‖, ―assisted suicide‖).

When writing a definition essay, remember to present a clear and basic definition. A definition essay is not limited to any one method of development. You may use any of the following methods in your essay to define the term or

concept you have selected:

Use examples: Illustration by examples that can clarify a subject, group, theory, or object.

Classify: According to dictionary definitions, what classes does the subject belong to?

Compare and contrast: An unfamiliar subject may be defined by showing its likeness to a familiar one or its

difference from it.

Origins and causes: Where does the subject come from? How was it created? What is its history or background? Results, effects, and uses: Discuss the consequences and uses of the subject. Counterpoint: Discuss what it is NOT, what it can’t do, and what its limitations are.

Sample A Definition essays are often written about familiar terms that we use every day, but because such terms often have various connotations, that is, meanings that are not obvious, they may convey different ideas to different people. If you are going to define something that everyone has some idea about, you will need to provide

your reader with a new way of looking at the subject — your way. Read the following essay and note how the writer defines friendship.

Friendship ---- What Does It Mean?

In my definition, a best friend is a twin soul, a person with whom I feel totally at ease; one who accepts,

supports, values and celebrates my life efforts as I accept, support, value and celebrate theirs. It is being ―in love‖ with a person without any romantic cravings or romantic expectations. -→Introduction: a general definition of the term “best friend”

I believe that best friend status is earned over a long period of time, as opposed to a mere few months or a few

years. I think of ―best friend‖ as lasting friendship, and a best friendship (IMHO) must thrive and endure for a long time to qualify for ―best‖ status — through thick and thin, through ups and downs, through laughter and tears.

A best friend is a life constant in one’s heart. -→Explain the process of reaching the best friend status →Clarify the term by contrasting it with other terms) I certainly have many acquaintances and friends, but there are three people I consider ―best friend‖ (not counting my dad, who also qualifies as my blood-related best friend):

1. Ms. L — We met when I was six months old and she was 1 year old, and we have remained best friends for

47 years. We’ve come in and out of each other’s lives at different times, and we’ve experienced many changes throughout our lives yet our friendship is a bond that remains unbreakable.

2. Ms. R — R and I met in college, and we often joke that we share a brain. She lives ―up east‖ and we speak

on the phone on the average of once a week for anywhere from 2 to 3 hours per call. She is so often a muse for my creativity (she’s an enormously talented artist and writer) and, because we share similar childhood emotional and family experiences, we’re bonded in both creativity and emotional growth.

3. Mr. H — The love of my life and the male ―best friend‖ of my BF trio. We met in the mid 1980s and I fell in

love with him because of his kindness and gentle nature. Although I would happily spend the rest of my life with him, I have no ―need‖ for that to happen – I love him conditionally and I desire ―his‖ happiness, whatever that entails. -→ Cite three specific examples to illustrate the term

To me, unconditional love is the essential ingredient for a best friend. Best friends are the family one chooses

— and best friends are tried-and-true champions for each other. My best friends are 100% comfortable with telling me their truths, and I am 100% comfortable telling them mine — we know that there will be no judgment against 4

the other, only positive support toward whatever goals we seek. Also, our life experiences and personal growth compliment and parallel one another’s. -→Conclusion

Sample B The opportunity to define a term or concept is also an opportunity to be creative, to show how many people’s sense of something is faulty or inadequate and to show that there is a better understanding (yours!) to consider. In selecting a topic to define, look for something that you can define within your own experience and that will allow you to put your poetic imagination to full play. The following essay attempts to define the idea of heroine.

Family Heroine: Karla Diane Hurrell

by Sara

My heroine is not a movie star or a famous singer. She’s never created a marvelous invention that could change the world and she’s never won a Grammy, but she’s far more of a heroine to me than anyone else could be. My heroine is my Mom.

I see my mom as my life preserver who keeps me afloat in times of need, desperation, and in times when I feel as if my life has come to a brutal stop. Without her, I would be nothing. I would be lost and forgotten with no hope, no love, no family to call my own.

My mother has been a mother to at least 153 other children. She and my father have been foster parents for 12 years and have adopted five children. She has given so many children the chance to experience life without the trouble, sadness, or bitterness they might have experienced earlier in life.

She is one of the most patient, gentle, good-hearted people I know (besides my Granny whom I love very dearly). It takes a very gifted person to take in children of any age or color, no matter what sort of problems they may have, without hesitation.

I came to live with Karla when I was nine years old. My two siblings and I were taken from our home and never returned to our biological mother. It was tough being torn away from one life that at one time seemed to be so simple, and tossed into a wholly new one. I legally became a part of the Hurrell family in 1996, but in my heart I feel as if I have been a part of the family from the very beginning. My mom has given me so many things that I never would have had the chance to experience with my biological mother.

It was hard to have a new mom, but she made it seem simple. It was almost as if I could feel her love and her willingness to let us into her home. I knew she loved us from the start. She quickly became my protector, my guardian, and my shoulder to cry on. She’s all I could ever want in a mother, and she’s never failed to be there for me when I needed her. She is truly an amazing person. She’s never rescued anyone from a burning building or saved anyone from drowning in a river, but she’s still a heroine to me and to many others with whom she has shared her love.

Questions on content and structure:

1. Which sentence is the thesis statement in the introductory paragraph?

2. What reasons are given by the writer for considering her mom her heroine?

3. What details about Mom does the writer offer in Paragraphs 3 – 5 ?

4. What technique(s) does the writer use to define Mom as her heroine in the ending paragraph?

Write your own essay

Here are some terms or concepts that you may like to define. Choose some and give your definitions. Remember to tell readers what term or concept is being defined, present clear and basic information, and use facts, examples or anecdotes that readers can easily understand.

1. poverty 2. success 3. failure 4. happiness 5. youth 6. homesickness

7. prejudice 8. good parents 9. a good teacher 10. a good college student 11.honesty

Youth

by Samuel Ullman

Youth is not a time of life; it is a state of mind. It is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees. It is a 5

matter of the will, a quality of the imagination, vigor of the emotions; it is the freshness of the deep spring of life. Youth means a temperamental predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease. This often exits in a man of 60, more than a boy of 20. Nobody grows merely by the number of years; we grow old by deserting our ideas. Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, fear, self-distrust bows the heart and turns the spirit back to dust.

Whether 60 or 16, there is in every human being’s heart the lure of wonders, the unfailing childlike appetite of what’s next and the joy of the game of living. In the center of your heart and my heart there is a wireless station; so long as it receives messages of beauty, hope, cheer, courage and power from men and from infinite, so long as you are young.

When the aerials are down, and your spirit is covered with the snows of cynicism and the ice of pessimism, then you’ve grown old, even at 20, but as long as your aerials are up, to catch waves of optimism, there’s hope you may die young at 80.

Unit3 Where to live Principles In this unit, we will learn the writing strategy of development by comparison and contrast. Comparison explains how things are similar, and contrast explains how they are different.

Study the following points on using comparison and contrast:

●The purpose of comparison or contrast is to explain the similarities and differences between two things or to show the superiority of one thing by comparing it with another so that the reader can make a judgment. ●The items being compared or contrasted must have something in common. For instance, you could choose to compare or contrast two movies, two authors, or two sports figures, but you would not compare travel by train and an animal.

●Comparison and contrast often go together, perhaps with stress on one or the other.

●There are two major patterns of comparison or contrast:

a) Subject by subject. In this pattern, you first list points about A and then points about B, and finally summarize the similarities and differences.

b) Point by point. In this pattern, you alternate from one aspect of the first subject to the same aspect of the other subject before you move on to the next aspect.

Sample A Read sample A and pay attention to the pattern of development.

The Country Versus the City birds singing, crickets (蟋蟀) chirping, and leaves rustling in the breeze. I can breathe clean, fresh air and enjoy the blue sky, green grass and trees, and colorful flowers. I can see rabbits hopping around the backyard and squirrels playing in the trees.

But in the city I would be denied all this. Instead, I would hear the nerve-wracking sounds of city traffic: screeching brakes, rumbling trucks, and blaring horns. I would breathe only polluted air, full of exhaust fumes and incinerator (焚化炉) and factory smoke. Also, there would be only crowded, littered streets and sidewalks to look Having read the essay, we can see:

2.The pattern of development is subject by subject. The first paragraph explains fully one side of the contrast----country life; the second paragraph deals entirely with the other side of the contrast----city life.

3.Outline of the essay

◆Introduction

◆_Body_:

Country life City life

6

A. sounds (pleasant, relaxing)

B. air (clean, fresh)

C. animals (lovely)

◆Conclusion

Sample B On-Campus Versus Off-Campus

1.The following are some of the things for your consideration as you decide between on- and off-campus living. Which is best for you? The answer depends on what’s important to you.

2.Location: All residence halls are located on the northern end of campus within a 3-minute walk to the food service. Library, computer labs, post office are within a 10-minute walk to classes.

3.If you commute, there are a few apartment complexes and a mobile home park in Thatcher. Several of the rentals are houses or parts of private residences. Safford and Pima locations and some Thatcher addresses, including those in Daley Estates, are not within walking distance of campus.

4.Cost: A residence hall room for the entire year averages out to $5.41—$7.14 per night for the academic year. You do not have to worry about coming up with the rent every month or splitting the cost with roommates. Janitorial (看门的) staff cleans the hall each day.

5.Living off campus, you will need to budget to meet your monthly rent, food, cable, and utility costs. Balance the advantages of cost vs. privacy. How many people will you need to share your space with in order to cut costs? Will the quality of your food and living environment be conducive to your college success?

6. Food: If you have purchased a meal plan, you know that you will always have good, freshly prepared food whether you have a dime in your pocket or not! You have the option of an all-you-can-eat meal in the dining room or a light snack in Gila Hank’s Cafe. The meal plans average from $7.69 to $8.76 per day for the entire year.

7.Commuter students are welcome to eat in campus dining facilities. They can purchase any meal plan or eat on a cash basis.

8. Payment: Residential students have to pay room and board prior to move-in. There are no further payments required during the semester except for damages. There are no refunds for room and board unless the student completely withdraws from school before 60% of the semester is complete.

9.For students living off campus, rents are paid monthly. Money management is crucial to insure that you will have funds available late in the semester. If a lease (租) is required, you may be responsible for rent payments even if you have withdrawn from school.

10.Activities: Typically residential students have easier access to campus activities and can meet a wide variety of people.

11.Commuter students have to think about these questions: will your housing arrangement be conducive to your participation in college activities? Will it be easy to meet new friends?

Sample C Which is Better: a Small Town or City?

by Dave Duffy

Traveling has a way of giving you perspective. For the past several summers my family and I have traveled around the country, covering as much as 9,000 miles by car in one five-week summer trip. The trips are exciting and fun, great education for my kids, and make us all realize how different our lives are from lots of other people. Our destination is always a big city, like Boston or New York or Washington. I spent my first 29 years living in Boston, so I enjoy visiting my old South Boston neighborhood, riding the subway system I dreaded as a school kid, and taking in the museums and historical sites and entertainment I enjoyed so much when I lived there.

We stop in lots of small towns on the way to and from the city. Many are similar to our own Gold Beach, Oregon, a quiet, friendly town of 1,500 nestled in a fairly large expanse of open space, in our case the ocean and 7 A. sounds (nerve-wracking) B. air (polluted) C. animals (disgusting)

mountains of the Northwest.

I always gain insight into myself and my situation in life when I travel. Typically I feel fortunate to have made the transition from city to country life long ago because I feel at home and comfortable in the country. But the city is still exciting and impressive. Here are what I see as the major benefits and drawbacks between city and small town life:

Population density: Even as you approach the city on its main freeway or expressway, cars begin crowding closer together and dart in and out of lanes in an effort to get one or two car lengths ahead of a competitor. In the country there is no such competition. Once on foot, the population of the city seems staggering to a small town person. It reminds you of an ant colony, or a cage with too many rats.

Money: Most city dwellers would scoff (嘲笑) at the $10 jobs that are coveted (妄想[别人的东西]) in the small town, and they would decline to drive the beat up old pickups that seem highly prized in the country. But poverty is greater and more foreboding in the city, with its daunting tenements and sprawling slums. The best way to make money in small towns is to start your own small business, and a lot of people have done so.

Friendliness: When you walk around in the city few people smile at you. In fact, they are likely to regard you with suspicion if you smile at them. They are not purposefully being rude, just guarded. In small towns the friendly smile while passing is standard. And it’s sincere.

Clerks in city stores are vaguely polite but not friendly. In the country store clerks are lively and talkative. They may have children who are in the same school classroom as yours. They know your coworkers, maybe even go to your church. The women in small towns are particularly friendly and knowledgeable. They know everybody and everybody’s children, often by name.

Food quality and prices: The supermarkets of a city carry a lower grade of fresh produce, it is displayed poorly, and the prices for it are higher. In small towns the produce sections look neat, the food is fresh, and there’s always fruit on sale. There had better be because often there’s a farmer selling even fresher produce at his stand just around the corner.

Prices for food may be lower in small towns, but prices are higher for just about everything else. The city has the mega-stores (大商店) with their phenomenal bargains. When the small owner needs to do a lot of heavy duty non-food shopping, he goes to the nearest city.

Tranquility: To many youngsters, the city is exciting, while the small town is boring. To adults the city is noisy and unnerving, while the small town is calm and relaxed. In the city you are unaware of the night sky, while in the country it is obvious, huge, and black with millions of stars and several planets.

Crime: Not too far from the impressive sights of the city are the bad sections where tough looking young men loiter (闲逛). These danger zones do not exist in most small towns, and there are no gangs. The local newspapers of each locale portray things accurately: The city paper is full of murders and scandal, while the small town paper contains grammar school and high school awards and events.

Medical care: Small towns have their GPs but there are few specialists, even fewer great surgeons. If you get really sick, advanced medical care may be a couple of hours drive, or a helicopter ride, away.

Entertainment: No comparison. My town doesn’t even have a movie theater. We do have guest musical artists who visit town every couple of months or so. The city is an entertainment wonderland.

Community: There is a sense of order in the city, while there is a feeling of community in the small town. The best illustration I can think of are the growing number of photo-enforced traffic lights in the city. City folk don’t seem to mind them, while most people in small towns would not tolerate these Big Brother robotic traffic cops. Air quality: Boston air is not bad because it’s on the coast, but most cities choke in their own filth. Small towns in valleys often have bad winter air due to wood stove fires. My Gold Beach with its Pacific breeze going down the Rogue River valley has the cleanest air in the country.

Having spent my first 29 years in the city and my next 29 in the country, which is an adjunct to the small town, I am an expert on which is best. It’s the small town, in a walk.

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Population density, quality of daily life, crime, air quality, friendliness, and tranquility are all important to me. I’ve solved the money problem by starting my own business. I’ll just have to live with the inconvenience of expert medical care and lack of entertainment.

Every time I come back home from a long trip to a big city, I feel like I’ve just won the lottery.

Enlarge your vocabulary: Useful words and expressions to talk about similarities and differences Comparison: similarly, like, the same as, likewise, correspondingly, too, also, both, in the same way, resemble, as … as, be similar to; There are some similarities between X and Y. X is similar to Y in that (they) … X and Y are similar in that (they) … Like X, Y … In like manner …

One way in which X is similar to Y is (that) … Another way in which X is similar to Y is (that) … There is something common in the ways we do … … are just the same as yours.

Contrast

differ from, different from, unlike, contrast with, even, though, in contrast, conversely, however, although, despite / in spite of, yet, but, while, whereas, alternatively, nevertheless, on the contrary / to the contrary on the one hand, on the other hand; There are some differences between X and Y.

The difference between X and Y lies in …; Our ways of … are not the same as yours.

X differs from Y in a number of important ways.

Write your own essay

Write an essay on any of the following topics by comparison or contrast. Your thesis should indicate whether the two subjects are being compared, contrasted, or both. Organize the essay by arranging the details in a point by point or subject by subject pattern. Remember to use transitional words to help the reader follow your analysis of the subjects.

1. Emails and letters 2. High school and college instructors

3. Two methods of losing weight 4. Buying or leasing a car

5. Two athletes, coaches, or teams 6. Two talk shows, soap operas, or news programs

7. Past and current fads, customs, patterns of behavior

8. Chinese and American attitudes toward money, sex, marriage, or success

9. Your parents’ and your attitudes towards success 10.Living together with parents versus living separately

11.Living in a campus dorm versus living in a rented house off-campus

12.Children’s pastimes today and yesterday 13.Neighborhood stores versus shopping malls Sample D: Emails and Letters

It is important to be aware of the differences between emails and hard-copy letters. They are not the same. While they do convey information from one person to another, they can be very different.

Emails are impersonal. No matter how hard one tries, transmitting warm and emotional thoughts by way of email is a difficult task. The pressure of time, the need to spell check, the pressure to type in a correct representation of one’s thoughts – all these factors lead to an impersonal communication. An email also lacks a personal signature.

Letters, on the other hand, convey a much higher level of sincerity. There is little room for correction, unless a draft is first written and then a clean copy is made. People writing letters on paper must think through what they want to say, thought by thought, sentence by sentence, before it is written down. The letter-writer must go to the trouble of putting the letter in the mail.

With written letters, there is a tendency to rethink what has been said and therefore there is a delay in sending them – a safety period, so to speak. With emails, the tendency is to fire them off, once they have been written. One may not actually want to take the time to modify his or her first thoughts.

The writer of an email is also stripped of the trouble that the letter-writer must go through in order to mail a letter: address an envelope, find a stamp, and then remember to get the letter into a mailbox.

I suggest that, when writing an email, we take the time to go back and read it through and think about its 9

content, and more importantly, its tone before sending. Try to put ourselves in the place of the recipient. This would lend a little sincerity to our emails and mitigate their impersonal aspect. Principles

Division and classification are useful organizational strategies in writing. To divide is to break the whole into smaller parts or pieces. For example, a department store can be divided into many departments (see the following

英语说明文写作方法

↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ Infants’ Dept. Children’s Dept. Girls’Dept. Boys’ Ladies Men’s Cosmetic Dept. Accessory Dept. Shoe An essay on types of automobiles that analyzes and classifies automobiles according to their sizes is developed by division.

英语说明文写作方法

To classify is to put various objects or ideas into groups on the basis of their similarities. As major development methods, division and classification can be used separately, but they often go together. The following Football Dances Classes

Basketball Parties Studying

Track Club Meetings Tests

baseball

↓ ↓ ↓

Sports Activities Social Activities Academic Activities

When using division or classification in your writing, keep in mind the following guidelines:

●Divide your subject by a single principle. For example, students in your school might be classified according to their year: freshers, sophomores, juniors, seniors. However, including a group such as ―hard-working students‖ in this case violates the principle of classification.

●Make the division complete. Once you have decided on a principle of classification, check to see if the classification includes all members of the group. For example, if the students in a class were classified as brilliant or stupid, the average students would be left out. To avoid omitting members and oversimplifying the analysis, then, it is generally a good idea to divide the group into more than two categories.

●Like other types of essays, a division/classification essay must have a thesis. This thesis should identify your subject, count the categories you will discuss, and show readers the relationships of your categories to one another and to the subject as a whole. The thesis statement is usually stated in the introduction paragraph. In the subsequent body paragraphs, you treat the categories one by one in the order in which your introduction presents them. Finally, your conclusion restates your thesis, summing up the points you have made, and then perhaps moves on to consider their implications. Sample A Types of Tests

1. Many teachers dislike preparing and grading exams, and most students dread taking them. Yet tests are powerful educational tools that serve at least four functions. First, tests help you evaluate students and assess whether they are learning what you are expecting them to learn. Second, well-designed tests serve to motivate and help students structure their academic efforts. Third, tests can help you understand how successfully you are presenting the material. Finally, tests can reinforce learning by providing students with indicators of what 2. Multiple-choice tests. Multiple-choice items can be used to measure both simple knowledge and complex 10

concepts. Since multiple-choice questions can be answered quickly, you can assess students’ mastery of many topics on an hour exam. In addition, the items can be easily and reliably scored. Good multiple-choice questions are difficult to write.

3. True-false tests. Because random guessing will produce the correct answer half the time, true-false tests are less reliable than other types of exams. However, these items are appropriate for occasional use. Some faculty who use true-false questions add an ―explain‖ column in which students write one or two sentences justifying their response.

4. Matching tests. The matching format is an effective way to test students’ recognition of the relationships between words and definitions, events and dates, categories and examples, and so on.

5. Essay tests. Essay tests enable you to judge students’ abilities to organize, integrate, interpret material, and express themselves in their own words. Research indicates that students study more efficiently for essay-type examinations than for selection (multiple-choice) tests: students preparing for essay tests focus on broad issues, general concepts, and interrelationships rather than on specific details, and this studying results in somewhat better student performance regardless of the type of exam they are given. Essay tests also give you an opportunity to comment on students' progress, the quality of their thinking, the depth of their understanding, and the difficulties they may be having. However, because essay tests pose only a few questions, their content validity may be low. In addition, the reliability of essay tests is compromised by subjectivity or inconsistencies in grading.

6. Short-answer tests. Depending on your objectives, short-answer questions can call for one or two sentences or a long paragraph. Short-answer tests are easier to write, though they take longer to score, than multiple-choice tests. They also give you some opportunity to see how well students can express their thoughts, though they are not as useful as longer essay responses for this purpose.

7. Problem sets. In courses in mathematics and the sciences, your tests can include problem sets. As a rule of thumb, allow students ten minutes to solve a problem you can do in two minutes.

8. Oral exams. Though common at the graduate level, oral exams are rarely used for undergraduates except in foreign language classes. In other classes they are usually time-consuming, anxiety-provoking for students, and difficult to score unless the instructor tape-records the answers. However, a math professor has experimented with individual thirty-minute oral tests in a small seminar class. Students receive the questions in advance and are allowed to drop one of their choosing. During the oral exam, the professor probes students’ level of understanding of the theory and principles behind the theorems. He reports that about eight students per day can be tested.

9. Performance tests. Performance tests ask students to demonstrate proficiency in conducting an experiment, executing a series of steps in a reasonable amount of time, following instructions, creating drawings, manipulating materials or equipment, or reacting to real or simulated situations. Performance tests can be administered individually or in groups. They are seldom used in colleges and universities because they are logistically difficult to set up, hard to score, and the content of most courses does not necessarily lend itself to this type of testing. However, performance tests can be useful in classes that require students to demonstrate their skills (for example, health fields, the sciences, education).

10. Create-a-game exams. For one midterm, ask students to create either a board game, word game, or trivia game that covers the range of information relevant to your course. Students must include the rules, game board, game pieces, and whatever else is needed to play. For example, students in a history of psychology class created ―Freud’s Inner Circle‖, in which students move tokens such as small cigars and toilet seats around a board each time they answer a question correctly, and ―Psychogories‖, a card game in which players select and discard cards until they have a full hand of theoretically compatible psychological theories, beliefs, or assumptions.

11. 11

12. Take-home tests. Take-home tests allow students to work at their own pace with access to books and materials. Take-home tests also permit longer and more involved questions, without sacrificing valuable class time for exams. Problem sets, short answers, and essays are the most appropriate kinds of take-home exams.

13. Open-book tests. Open-book tests simulate the situations professionals face every day, when they use resources to solve problems, prepare reports, or write memos. Open-book tests tend to be inappropriate in introductory courses in which facts must be learned or skills thoroughly mastered if the student is to progress to more complicated concepts and techniques in advanced courses. In an open-book test, students who are lacking basic knowledge may waste too much of their time consulting their references rather than writing.

14. Group exams. Some faculties have successfully experimented with group exams, either in class or as take-home projects. Faculties report that groups outperform individuals and that students respond positively to group exams. For example, for a fifty-minute in-class exam, use a multiple-choice test of about twenty to twenty-five items. For the remaining test, the groups can be randomly divided. Groups of three to five students seem to work best.

◆Sentences by using division or classification expressions:

1. Vehicles can be categorized using three basic approaches: those for personal use, those for recreation, and those for work.

2. Depending on the amount of training they have had, nurses fall into three general groups — registered nurses, practical nurses, and aides — all with quite different responsibilities.

3. Chinese tea may be classified into five categories according to the different methods by which it is processed — green tea, black tea, wulong tea, compressed tea and scented tea.

4. There are basically three types of bus drivers: friendly, indifferent, and mean.

5. Clouds are further classified by altitude into four families: high clouds, middle clouds, low clouds, and towering clouds.

Write your own essay : Choose one of the following topics and write a division/classification essay.

1. The ways people cope with bad news 2. The ways students prepare for exams

3. Methods of losing weight 4. Types of off-campus housing

5. Types of vacation spots 6. The books you read

7. Types of lies people tell 8. Types of excuses students make up for missing class

9. Types of reading 10. Types of professors I have met

Sample B Methods of Losing Weight

Some people don’t mind being fat. In some countries a round stomach is nothing to be ashamed of. There is a West African saying: ―Laugh and grow fat.‖ Other people can keep slim without any effort. But a lot of people do put on too much weight and don’t like it. The question is, what do they do about it?

Some people put their faith in exercise. But the trouble with exercise is that it only works up an appetite. Others believe in slim pills and special clothes that make you sweat. It would be nice if they worked, but they don’t.

The only reliable solution is dieting. But what sort of diet? There are the extremists who believe in a dramatic, thorough-going attack on their waistline by eating nothing. There is another theory that if you eat things like hard boiled eggs, apples with their skins on, and lean meat which are hard to digest, the more you eat, the thinner you get. This is because you use up the fat in your body to get the energy to digest the food. For most of us these methods are too extreme or too eccentric. The simplest system is just to cut down on the carbohydrates or, if possible, to cut them right out.

Sample C Sample student essay(CET-4 )

Directions: For this part, you are given 30 minutes to write a composition on the topic: How I Finance My College Education. You should base your composition on the outline(given in Chinese)below:

1.上大学的费用(tuition and fees)可以通过多种途径解决 2. 哪种途径适合我(说明理由)

How I Finance My College Education

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Nowadays, if we want to go to college, we’ll have to pay a big sum of money. It has become a problem for many students. There are many ways to solve this problem, but the following ones may be the most effective: First, you can ask your parents for help if they have well-paying jobs. Another way to solve this problem is to apply for a bank loan. Or we can find a part-time job to earn some money.

I am in favor of the second solution. My reasons for this choice can be listed as follows: First of all, my parents are not rich enough to afford my tuition and other fees. Second, I won’t have enough time and energy left to study if I take a part-time job. Finally, I’m sure that I’ll get a good job after graduation and be able to pay back the loan. Through the above analysis, I believe that the best choice for me is to apply for a bank loan.

Unit 5 Improving Your Habits Principles In this unit, we will focus on the process essay. There are two types of process essays: directional and informational (or informative).

A directional process essay tells the reader how to do or make something. The language is usually in the form of commands, like ―do this‖ or ―push that‖. You are actually much more familiar with the directional process than you might think.

An informational process essay explains or analyzes a process. It is different from the directional one because it strives to make the reader understand the process or give information on the process — how, when, where, and why it is performed — even if the individual reader never performs it or witnesses it personally.

Although directional and informational process essays have different purposes, they can be developed using the same pattern of development and organization. Attention should be paid to:

●ordering steps or ideas chronologically; ●explaining each step clearly;

●completing the process thoroughly; ●defining new or unfamiliar terms if necessary;

●including a thesis statement persuasively;

●organizing your steps logically in three sections: 1) Introduction; 2) developmental paragraphs;3) conclusion. Sample A Read the following essay about how to be a top student, and ●pay attention to how the writer explains each step clearly; ●identify the new term the writer defines in the third step; ●find out the thesis statement and the organization of the essay.

How to Improve Your Study Habit

1.Perhaps you are an average student with average intelligence. You do well enough in school, but you probably think you will never be a top student. This is not necessarily the case, however. You can receive better grades if ↓(thesis statement) ↓

introduction

committed time such as eating, sleeping, meeting, classes, etc. Then decide on good, regular times for studying. Be sure to set aside enough time to complete your normal reading and work assignments. Of course, studying shouldn’t occupy all of the free time on your schedule. It’s important to set aside time for relaxation, hobbies, and entertainment as well. This weekly schedule may not solve all of your problems, but it will enable you to plan your activities so that you have adequate time for both work and play.→ Step 1 school library, but it should be comfortable, and it should not have distractions. When you begin to work, you should be able to concentrate on the subject. → Step 2 As you preview the material, you get some idea of the content and how it is organized. Later when you begin to read you will recognize less important material and you may skip some of these portions. Skimming helps double your reading speed and improves your comprehension as well. → Step 3

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where you can see and hear well. Take notes to help you remember what the teacher says. → Step 4 class as well as points you remain confused about. Read about these points in your textbooks. If you know what the teacher will discuss the next day, skim and read that material too. This will help you understand the next class. If you review your notes and textbook regularly, the material will become more meaningful and you will remember it longer. Regular review leads to improved performance on tests. → Step 5

The world won’t end if you don’t pass a test, so don’t worry excessively about a single test. Tests provide grades, but they also let you know what you need to spend more time studying, and they help make your new knowledge permanent. → Step 6

→conclusion

Sample B

People pay more attention to their physical fitness, and many young people try every means to lose body fat. If you are told to write an essay about how to lose fat and persuade people to change their lifestyle, how are you going to accomplish this task? The following is a sample essay of this type. Read the essay and study how the writer develops his thesis statement ―The best way to lose body fat is a change in lifestyle‖, and then answer the questions on content and structure.

How to Lose Fat

Here is another article about losing body fat. The Internet is riddled with (充满) such articles. Some propose complex diets; others give worthwhile valuable advice and most are trying to sell something.

The best way to lose body fat (other than surgery) is a change in lifestyle. The most important factor will be diet! Here are some simple ways to change the way you eat which will have a major impact on your health and body fat percent.

1.Fast foods Cut out fries, hamburgers, pizzas, etc. They are riddled with saturated fats, salt and simple sugars. Use negative association to help. Consider what goes into these products and you probably won’t want to eat them. Each bite you take is adding an extra layer of fat. If you’re serious about losing weight, then rid yourself of the burden of fast foods.

2. Soda and fizzy(有泡沫的) drinks If you can’t bear to be without them, first only buy diet versions. Then wean yourself from those. After a while you won’t want to drink them. Fizzy drinks contain large quantities of sugar. Once you have given them up, if you try drinking them again you’ll probably find that your body can’t cope with the refined sugar, and you’ll get very sleepy. You may also find a sensation of your teeth being coated with sugar.

3. Alcohol A glass of red wine with your dinner does the world of good. However, if you’re drinking one or two bottles of wine, or regularly visiting the bar for drinking sessions, you are probably fighting a losing battle. Ever heard the expression ―beer belly‖? Alcoholic beverages are full of empty calories. People are also more inclined to eat fast foods when they’ve been drinking. Cut down.

4. Snacks Consider how much fat and sugar a typical bar of chocolate contains. Would you eat a bar of butter or lard (猪油)? Imagine this is what you are doing when you eat a bar of chocolate and you won’t be too far off the mark. Look at the calorie content of confectionary. How long would it take to work off this much energy on an exercise bike? You have a choice, eat the confectionary and exercise it off, or don’t eat the confectionary. (Tip: When you’re grocery shopping, don’t buy snacks. If they are not in the house, you will not be tempted.)

5. Quantity The more you eat, the more calories and fat you are consuming. However, eating too little can be 14

disastrous as well. Your metabolism will slow down, making it easier for your body to gain fat. Unfortunately, there are no easy rules for this. Everyone is different and has different dietary requirements. If you’re still gaining weight and have followed steps 1 to 4 above, it might be time to either exercise more, or reduce serving sizes (减少食物定量).

Take your new lifestyle one step at a time. Cut out fast foods first, and when you’re happy with this, move onto the next step and cut out fizzy drinks. If you lapse, brush yourself down and get back on your horse (继续前进). Most importantly, don’t give up and remember that this lifestyle change is for life (or for however long you want to be slim). (Adapted from College English, 2006/4, p.17)

In writing a process or narrative essay, the writer usually uses connecting words to link each step. There are two kinds: transitional words to indicate sequence and subordinators in adverbial clauses of time.

◆In writing a process or narrative essay, the writer usually uses connecting words to link each step. There are two kinds: transitional words to indicate sequence and subordinators in adverbial clauses of time.

Words that indicate sequence

Transitional Words:

first / firstly, second / secondly, etc. at once last

first of all right after this finally

next then afterward

Words that indicate time relationships

Subordinators:

when before the minute that

while after once

whenever as soon as as until

Write your own essay:The following essay topics are offered for your own writing practice. Select one or more topics that you are interested in and write your own process essay(s).

1) How to organize a party (wedding, holiday, birthday, or some other celebration)

2) How to stop smoking (or break some other bad habit)

3) How to prepare for an English exam (CET-4, CET-6, GRE, TOEFL, GMAT, etc.)

4) How to kill stage fright or homesickness (or cure a cold, headache, insomnia, etc.)

5) How to get in shape / develop physical fitness

6) How to earn pocket money easily and legally

7) How to send an email (or do on-line shopping)

8) How something is made (e.g. egg-fried rice, spring rolls, a special dish)

9) How a machine or a piece of equipment works

10) How a historical event occurred

Sample C How to Get in Shape

There are many reasons for wanting to get in shape. It might be to improve your health, to look and feel better, to fit into that swimsuit, to attract the opposite sex, etc. Most people would agree getting in shape is not easy, and no sooner has the weight been taken off than it is put straight back on. Even so, there are certain steps each of us can follow to beat the bulge.

Firstly, it is vital to set yourself a target. What shape do you want to get into? Once you have a goal, all that remains are the strategies to achieve this.

Of course, key among these is diet. Cut out or at least reduce foods high in fat, sugar and salt. Increase your intake of fruits, vegetables, fish and chicken and eat red meat in moderation. Make your portions smaller, and do not eat till you feel full.

The second key way to get in shape is exercise. Choose a sport or exercise regime that you enjoy. Buying a dog is one of the best forms of exercise, as walking twice a day will have you in shape in no time! You will soon find 15

yourself in a positive circle: the better you eat and exercise healthier and more energetic you will feel, leading to more exercise and so on. For those staunch couch potatoes we also have some advice. Deceive the eye by wearing stripes. Doing so will make you appear thinner, and slightly.

If you find that you are one of the types who finds it hard to remain motivated in an exercise routine, consider participating in group exercise activities. Whether it be an indoor sports team or joining a group fitness class like aerobics classes, these can help keep you motivated in your goal to get into shape

Sample D How to Make Jiaozi

Jiaozi is my favorite food. Since childhood I have learned how to make it. There are five steps.

First you make the dough by mixing water into the flour. The container should be big enough lest the flour and water will overflow. Press the dough with your hands till it is not sticky. When the dough is ready, leave it there for use later, then go on to make the fillings.

The second step is to mince the meat, mushrooms and shrimps till they are mixed in a paste. Add some spice such as ginger and onion and stir them evenly.

The third step is to make the wrappings. Roll the dough with a round stick into small round pieces of wrappings, each two inches in diameter.

The fourth step is to put the filling in the middle of a wrapping. Then press the wrapping tight and a jiaozi is ready. When you have made enough Jiaozi, the next step is to boil them.

That is the last step. Put a pot of water on the stove. When the water is boiling, put the Jiaozi one by one into the water and cover the pot. When steam comes out, add more cold water and when it boils again add cold water a second time. When you see the Jiaozi floating in boiling water, you can put them in bowls or plates, get the chopsticks and be ready to eat. (Taken from the website: )

Unit 6 Meeting Challenges Principles

In this unit, we will focus on the causal analysis essay. Causal analysis explains the cause-effect relationship between two or more elements. When we ask: ―Why did/does/will this happen?‖ we are analyzing cause; when we ask: ―What did/does/will this lead to?‖ we are analyzing effect.

Some causal analysis essays focus mainly on the cause(s) of something; others primarily analyze the effect(s); still others discuss both causes and effects. However, whatever your essay focuses on, you should bear in mind the following principles:

● Sound reasoning or logic is of vital importance to causal analysis, though it is not always easy to explain causes and effects clearly and logically. The reason for this is that an effect may have many causes and a cause may have many effects. Therefore, you must be careful in choosing details and be thorough in discussing causes or effects.

● There are two basic ways of writing a causal analysis essay. The first is to state an effect, which serves as a controlling idea, and then analyze the causes. The second is to state a cause (functioning as a controlling idea) and then dwell on the effects.

● When discussing multiple causes for an effect, with related causes, you organize them from immediate (direct) to remote (indirect); with unrelated causes, you follow the most common organizing principles of order of familiarity (obvious to less obvious) or order of interest (less interesting to more interesting); with causes of unequal importance, you organize the paragraphs beginning from the less important to the most important, or vice versa.

Sample A

Read the following essay about why the writer wants to teach and then answer the questions that follow.

Why I Teach

1. ? My friend asked the question when I told him that I didn’t want to be considered for an 16

administrative position. He was puzzled that I did not want what was obviously a ―step up‖ toward what all Americans are taught to want when they grow up: money and power.

2. . Teaching is the most difficult of the various ways I have attempted to earn my living: mechanic, carpenter, writer. For me, teaching is a red-eye, sweaty-palm, sinking-stomach profession. Red-eye, because I never feel ready to teach no matter how late I stay up preparing. Sweaty-palm, because I’m always nervous before I enter the classroom, sure that I will be found out for the fool that I am. Sinking-stomach, because I leave the classroom an hour later convinced that I was even more boring than usual.

3. Sometimes I am amazed that my students actually take notes on what I say in class!

4. Why, then, do I teach?

5. reflection, research, and writing.

6. change — and, more important, my students change.

7. textbook, who is to say I can’t? Such courses may be huge failures, but we can learn from failures.

8. to bad questions. While teaching, I sometimes find good questions.

9. taught a course called ―Self-Reliance in a Technological Society.‖ My 15 students read Emerson (爱默生), Thoreau (梭罗), and Huxley (赫胥黎). They kept diaries. They wrote term papers.

10. by renovating it. At the end of the semester, we sold the house, repaid our loan, paid our taxes, and distributed the profits among the group.

11. So teaching gives me pace, and variety, and challenge, and the opportunity to keep on learning.

12. 13. One is Vicky. My first doctoral student, Vicky was an energetic student who labored at her dissertation on a little-known 14th century poet. She wrote articles and sent them off to learned journals. She did it all herself, with an occasional nudge from me. But I was there when she finished her dissertation, learned that her articles were accepted, got a job and won a fellowship to Harvard working on a book developing ideas she’d first had as my student.

14. Another reason is George, who started as an engineering student, then switched to English because he decided he liked people better than things.

15. There is Jeanne, who left college, but was brought back by her classmates because they wanted her to see the end of the self-reliance house project. I was there when she came back, I was there when she told me that she later became interested in the urban poor and went on to become a civil rights lawyer.

16. There is Jacqui, a cleaning woman who knows more by intuition than most of us learn by analysis. Jacqui has decided to finish high school and go to college.

17. These are the real reasons I teach, these people who grow and change in front of me. 18. A ―promotion‖ out of teaching would give me money and power. But I have money. I get paid to do what I enjoy: reading, talking with people, and asking questions like, ―What is the point of being rich?‖

19. other power matters?

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20. books and ideas, but also the love that a teacher feels for that rare student who walks into a teacher’s life and begins to breathe. Perhaps love is the wrong word; magic might be better.

21. (Taken from College English, BookThree)

Sample B

Let us suppose Mr. Short is not tall enough and he suffers a lot from being short. If you are told to write an essay entitled Being Short, how are you going to accomplish this task? The following is a good sample essay of causal analysis. Read it first and then complete the illustration that shows the structure of this type of writing.

Being Short

1. Being short is something that cannot be helped. One cannot choose one’s appearance; it is already decided at the time when one is born. And if it happens that one’s parents are both short, it is inevitable that one will remain short all one’s life, whether one likes it or not.

2. Being short is a lifelong pity. Almost everyone wants to look beautiful and to be moderately tall. For me, it has always been a bad time during medical examinations when I have to stand on that terrible scale and have my height measured and recorded. Year after year, the figure seems to remain the same. Although now I have been more or less reconciled to this unchanging fact, I just cannot help feeling regretful at times. How nice it would be if only I could be just an inch taller.

3. Being short is a ―handicap‖ and this is something that I hate most. During military training, I stood at the end of the line, because I was or was considered the shortest. And if they did not want too many students to march in review, they always discarded the shortest, never the tallest. Though I do not really mind a great deal about joining in a review, I just do not feel good.

4. I used to attend a volleyball-training class, and every time we needed to separate into teams to play a match, the coach would say, ―You twelve shorter ones go there, and you twelve taller ones come here, please.‖ It sometimes makes me furious about being treated so unfairly. Short as I am, I am not a poor player and should be reckoned with.

5. Being short is being inferior. Every day I live among people who are mostly taller than I am. Whether it is out of friendliness or whatever, very often, they pat me on the head, or throw one of their arms conveniently over my shoulder, and look down at me, while I have to look up at them. These gestures might not be ill intended, but I feel that these people are taking advantage of my shortness, and want to show they are superior to me.

6. Being short is an impetus. When we, the short, have to live with these day-to-day disadvantages — the pity, the handicap, and the inferiority, we turn to other things to gain self-confidence. We work industriously against prejudices to tell people that we are by no means inferior or handicapped. (Adapted from A Handbook of Writing) Questions on content and structure:

1. What is the cause (the controlling idea)?

The cause: Being short (a controlling idea). — First sentence of Paragraph 1

2. What is the first effect? Effect 1: A lifelong pity.

3.What is the second effect? Effect 2: A ―handicap‖.

4.What is the third effect? Effect 3: Being inferior.

5. What is the 4th effect? Effect 4: An impetus.

◆In writing causal analysis essays, writers pay much attention to logic since it plays a very important role in introducing causal relationships. In order to write logically and clearly, they often use the following words and expressions showing reasons, results or causes:

because of on account of as a result of as a consequence of

due to because as for since

one reason is …, another reason is …,

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as a result in consequence consequently therefore hence

so thus that’s why lead to contribute to

result in result from

Write your own essay:

The following essay topics are offered for your own writing practice. Select one or more topics that you are interested in and write your own causal analysis essay(s):

1. Why I came to college 2. Why people drink (or smoke)

3. Why people tell white lies 4. Why car accidents have increased in our city

5. Why people live longer 6. What causes obesity

7. What leads to poverty in some areas 8.Effects of being popular

9. Effects of being late for a dating 10.Effects of divorce

Sample C Effects of Divorce on Children

When a couple decides their marriage is over, a tremendous sense of grief and relief are felt. But there is also a sense of relief that the pain and anguish is now over and their healing can begin. For couples without children divorce is a far simpler process. When children are involved parents must learn their new roles and coexist quickly to minimize the negative effects of divorce on children.

The effects of divorce on children can be very traumatic. Some children blame themselves for the divorce, believing that they caused their parents' divorce due to their bad behavior or not listening. Some children just shut down after the divorce and find it very difficult to express their feelings. Often they look as sad as they feel, withdrawing from friends and activities they once enjoyed.

The effects of divorce on children can harm their future. The effects of divorce on children can be detrimental to their future relationships. Children sometimes feel betrayed by their parents, resulting in a mistrust of others. This inability to trust others hinders their ability to form intimate relationships.

Parents can minimize the effects of divorce on children. Parents can reassure their kids that the divorce is not their fault. It is also important for parents to make their children feel safe by reassuring their children that they are loved by both parents. The effects of divorce on children will be less severe if the couple is able to put aside their differences as much as possible and work together to provide a loving, safe and consistent environment in both parent’s homes.

Sample D Sample student essay (CET-6 )

Directions: For this part, you are given 30 minutes to write a composition based on the topic Haste Makes Waste. You should write at least 120 words and you should base your composition on the outline (given in Chinese) below:1. 为什么说―欲速则不达‖?2. 试举例说明。

Haste Makes Waste

Many people believe that the faster the better, thinking they can save time in this way. However, as a matter of fact, the result is far less than satisfactory and quite often goes to the opposite. I must say haste makes waste. There are two reasons for it.

Firstly, when one is in a hurry, he is likely to be heedless and careless. He cannot judge the situation fully and correctly. Therefore, he cannot get what he really aims at. Secondly, haste may cause accidents to take place. In that case, it will hinder one from reaching his destination.

Consider the following situation. Suppose a student is expected to show up and give his presentation in class soon. He is in such a hurry that he leaves his manuscript at home, or on his way rushing to school he meets an accident. We can imagine if a construction project is done in haste, it may well lead to a disaster.

Haste makes waste. Everything has its own rule in it. We mustn’t act rashly and ignore the rules. However, that doesn’t mean we can sit and wait for things to happen. Instead, we should try our best and at the same time comply with the objective laws.

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