Improve Your English

Improve Your English

No. of lessons 8
No. of exercises 23
Average duration 4-6 months

This course was written specially to help those who want to write straightforward, correct English. It is completely up to date in the use of current language and idiom, and shows the best way to deal with the complexities and anomalies of the English language. It teaches you how to avoid the traps and pitfalls of English grammar, and corrects common misconceptions of what is right and wrong, while showing you how to improve the style and content of your written English.

Many people will benefit from this course: young professionals, published and unpublished writers and journalists, those in business, and those who, having learnt English as a foreign language, find the course a means of reinforcing and practising the basic rules that they have already learnt.

It acts as an invaluable foundation course for English for Business, and as excellent practice before starting on a journalism or creative writing course. For a detailed review of the topics covered, look at the syllabus.

Topics covered include:

• Points of style
• Sentence structure
• Nouns and pronouns
• Using adjectives
• Verbs and adverbs
• Prepositions and conjunctions
• Punctuation

Syllabus: Improve Your English

The purpose of this course is to highlight the most common errors in writing English and to show students not only how such errors occur but how to avoid making them. It covers all major aspects of grammar and style, and explains each point in a clear, straightforward manner. We also teach you how to write clear and harmonious English and how to avoid the pitfalls of jargon, cliché and tautology. There are plenty of exercises dealing with the points raised in each lesson, as well as several opportunities for real writing, where your level of fluency will be assessed and areas for improvement suggested.

The course structure is as follows:

Lesson 1 - A Question of Style
The value of the written word - its beauty, power and influence; the evolution of language and the effect it has on us all. Steering a middle course between yesterday's and tomorrow's style. The importance of reading. Discriminating in your choice of words. The six rules of good writing.

Exercises include

• rewriting a passage of prose in your own words
• a series of ungrammatical sentences for you to correct

Lesson 2 - Order and Disorder
Correct sentence structure. The importance of syntax. Mood. Avoiding clumsy writing - striking a balance. Hanging and misrelated participles. Parallel constructions. Ambiguities.

Exercises include

• correcting faulty constructions
• writing an exposé on a controversial theme

Lesson 3 - What's in a Name?
Nouns: common, proper and abstract. Collective and compound nouns. Problems with foreign words. Agreement. Sexism and how to avoid it. Pronouns: Personal, Reflexive, Relative, Interrogative, Demonstrative and Indefinite.

Exercises include

• two sets of text to correct

Lesson 4 - The Correct Use of Adjectives
Description, qualification, limitation The definite and indefinite articles. Comparatives and superlatives. Choosing the right word - synonyms and pitfalls. Common examples of misuse. Clichés.

Exercises include

• two sets of text for correction.

Lesson 5 - Verbs and Adverbs
Active, passive, transitive and intransitive verbs. Choosing the right verb for impact and drama. Common misconceptions. What is a complement? Auxiliary verbs. Split infinitives. Gerunds and participles - errors of proximity. Some awkward pairs of verbs. The purpose of adverbs. Other adverbial phrases.

Exercises include

• two sets of text for correction
• one exercise in analysis
• writing a descriptive passage

Lesson 6 - Prepositions and Conjunctions
Preposition or adverb? Or conjunction? The avoidance of ambiguity. Which preposition to use - accuracy and idiom. Conjunctions for added fluency. Correlative conjunctions.

Exercises include

• two sets of text to correct
• writing a piece of narrative prose

Lesson 7 - Punctuation
A necessity not a luxury. The pathway to clarity. Changes in punctuation style. Abbreviations and acronyms. Taking each point in turn - full explanations and examples. Quoted and reported speech. Numbers, fractions and dates. Prefixes and suffixes. A special note about the apostrophe.

Exercises include

• rewriting a passage with correct punctuation
• further exercises on punctuation

Lesson 8 - Final Briefing
A further look at style - in particular, what to avoid. Jargon, euphemisms and circumlocutions. Some common words overused. Compound and polysyllabic nouns. Prepositional verbs. Vogue words. Tautology. Americanisms. The proper function of the paragraph. Good sentence construction. The use of tenses. A review of common errors.

Exercises include

• rewriting two passages of 'purple' prose