GUO1001 Orientation to Global University Learning (International)

Do you sometimes struggle to begin writing an essay when taking an exam? Good news! There is an important writing skill that will help you improve your essay introductions. This technique is called "paraphrasing", and it means rewriting something using different words. In this lesson, I will teach you how to paraphrase successfully and how to change essay questions into your own words. These skills are very useful for university and high school students, as well as any students writing English proficiency exams like the TOEFL or IELTS.

The paragraph is the most important unit of a well-written essay. The paragraph has a specific structure and standards that make it effective and enjoyable to read. In this writing lesson we will look at how to construct good paragraphs and improve writing with better flow and clarity.

Whether English is your first, second, or third language, developing your writing abilities will help you in educational, work, and social media contexts. In this lesson, I will talk about writing in general and discuss both formal and informal writing. It is critical to learn the difference between formal and informal writing, including differences based on vocabulary, grammar, and format. I will teach you some strategies for how to plan your writing. My five tips will help you improve your writing regardless of your current level. Watch the video, follow my advice, and your writing will improve.

Want to become a better writer? In this video, I will share five easy and quick tips that will improve writing in formal and academic settings. If you're in college or university or plan to study overseas, this video is for you!

In this video, I will go over the different parts of speech in English. We will be looking at the use of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverbs. You will also learn how to arrange them in a grammatically correct sentence. Also, I will teach you in what order to place the adjectives if you have more than one. For example, do you have a "big, white, excitable dog" or a "white, excitable, big dog"? Find out by watching this lesson and doing the quiz afterwards.

In this English lesson, I explain how to do that summary. Follow my simple system and learn better and more efficiently.

In this lesson, I give you a simple method for writing a good, effective essay in English. If you don't know where to start when you are given a writing assignment, start here and learn how to do it right!

Learn the method for writing the perfect essay introduction. A good introduction makes writing an essay easy and reading it fun. AND YOU'LL GET A BETTER GRADE, TOO!

The conclusion of an essay is where you must make your final argument clear. Many students struggle to write their conclusion because they don't know what to say other than just repeating their previous arguments. If you are taking the IELTS, TOEFL, or CAE English language tests, you need to learn how to write a good conclusion to get a high score.

Good writing makes use of transition words, thereby creating better flow and adding some style to the text. In this lesson we'll look at some linking words and transitions used to connect ideas, such as: "thereby", "thereof", "hereby", "therein", "wherein", "whereby", and more. This will make your writing clear and organized. Watch the video to improve your writing style.

Want to know a simple trick that will help you sound more academic in your speaking? This tip can also help you begin writing the introduction to your TOEFL and IELTS essays. In this video, I will teach you the importance of showing the opposing viewpoint in writing and speech. You will learn how to use words like "although", "even though", "despite", "in spite of", and "nevertheless". These words help you effectively introduce opposing ideas or facts in speech and writing. Despite it sounding complicated and fancy, it is quite easy to learn!

Dr. Randy Laist of Goodwin College describes five simple strategies for writing effective conclusions for academic essays.

Phrasal verbs are a part of everyday English language. But they can and should be used in academic writing as well, such as in essays, and reports. The key is to use more formal phrasal verbs, like “do without”, “account for”, “follow through”, “carry out”, “look into”, and others. In this lesson, we will look at some formal phrasal verbs to give your academic writing a touch of style. This lesson will help you become a confident writer, and as a result, you will appear to be more experienced to your reader. And if you are taking the IELTS or the TOEFL, then these will be certainly help you get a better score in the writing section of those exams.

Sequencers are words that organize your writing and speaking, words like “first”, “next”, “then”, “after that”, and “finally”. We often use sequencers in English when we give instructions, describe a process, or tell stories. Using sequencers is a simple trick that improves your writing and speaking because it organizes your ideas into sections and gives them an order. Watch the video and you will see how sequencers can help others understand you more clearly.

Stop making the two most common errors in English writing: run-on sentences and comma splices. These mistakes occur when two sentences are combined incorrectly into one sentence. I'll show you how to correct these mistakes with a period, a semi-colon, a compound sentence, and a complex sentence! One lesson, so much progress!

What's "academic writing"? If you're in school or university, you must know the difference between general English and academic English. Watch this important lesson to avoid the most common mistakes students make in academic writing. In your own language, the difference between these two modes of writing might not be that great, but in English, there are a lot of differences depending on the context. So even if you know your grammar and write a correct sentence, you might still be wrong because the structure or tone was not appropriate for an academic setting! Watch this video and learn how to write correctly and get higher grades in an academic environment.

Parallelism or parallel structure is one of the secrets of great writing. It gives greater balance and power to the way you communicate. It will help you get higher grades, improve your job prospects, and look more professional. In this lesson, I explain all about parallelism -- what it is and how to use it correctly. This easy but important lesson will take your English to a higher level.

What is a compound subject? It is when you combine several subjects together into one. This helps to avoid repetition in a sentence. But how do you make the verb agree with several subjects? For example, do we say "Bill and Kate is kind" or "are kind"? Do we say "Neither John nor his friends need help" or "needs help"? It all depends on subject-verb agreement, which is an important element of writing and speaking in English. In this lesson, we will look at compound subjects and how verbs react to these. I will teach you how to make the verb agree with the subjects in different kinds of sentences.

Do you know when to use capital letters in titles? It seems so confusing. Some letters are capitalized and some are not. In this lesson, I focus on the extra-confusing words -- the ones that are sometimes capitalized and sometimes not! You'll learn the easy capitalization rules for writing about subjects, courses, companies, workplaces, occupations, and job titles. You'll also learn how to capitalize the names of movies, shows, books, songs, reports, articles, and more. You can do this -- watch and learn!

Using proper English punctuation shows that you are a sophisticated and intelligent writer. Also, using punctuation improperly can often change the meaning of your sentence. In this lesson, I will teach you how to use two key punctuation marks: the colon and semicolon. The colon is made of two dots and has three uses in writing. The semicolon is made up of a dot and comma and has three different uses in writing. Even native English speakers often use these punctuation marks improperly. But I guarantee that after watching this video, you will master them fully.

Using participles correctly will dramatically improve the quality of your English writing. This advanced writing lesson is for you! You will learn to analyze sentences so that you can understand them fully and write your own. Often, English learners are unsure of whether an "-ing" word is an adjective or an adverb. In this lesson, you'll learn how the participle "having" includes the subject, verb, and conjunction.

Do you get confused when you see long sentences with lots of commas and sections? You need to learn about clauses! Once you understand and can recognize the different types of clauses in an English sentence, everything will make sense. What is the difference between noun clauses, adjective clauses, and adverb clauses? Adverb clauses show relationships, like reason, contrast, condition, time, purpose, and comparison. In this lesson, we will look at these relationship types that make adverb clauses so important in English. I will also teach you when to use commas with adverb clauses. This will help you understand very long sentences made up of several clauses. Remember that as long as you can break down all the components of a sentence and understand the relationships between them, you can understand any sentence in English!

Did you know there are only four sentence types in English? To improve your writing and reading skills in English, I'll teach you all about simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex sentences in this grammar video. You'll learn how to identify the independent and dependent clauses. Don't worry, it's easier than it sounds! By learning to identify and use these sentence structures, you'll make your writing more interesting and dynamic. I'll also share many example sentences in the lesson, so you can practice with my help.

Do you know how to use commas? In this lesson, you'll learn simple rules for using commas with coordinating conjunctions. Coordinating conjunctions connect two ideas or clauses in a sentence. We'll look at the most common conjunctions: 'for', 'and', 'nor', 'but', 'or', 'yet', and 'so'. Knowing how to place commas in your sentences will help you to write better, and will make your writing easier to read. This grammar lesson is essential for anyone who wants to improve their English writing. It is especially important for university writing, or if you're taking IELTS or TOEFL. So join me in this fun lesson, and learn to love the comma!

Want to know a simple trick that will help you sound more academic in your speaking? This tip can also help you begin writing the introduction to your TOEFL and IELTS essays. In this video, I will teach you the importance of showing the opposing viewpoint in writing and speech. You will learn how to use words like "although", "even though", "despite", "in spite of", and "nevertheless". These words help you effectively introduce opposing ideas or facts in speech and writing. Despite it sounding complicated and fancy, it is quite easy to learn!

One of the most common types of essays you will have to write at university as well as on the IELTS or TOEFL is a comparison essay. In this lesson, I will teach you some useful words that will help you to compare things. By the end of this video, you will be able to use terms such as "alike", "similar", "in the same way", "likewise", and more.

Do you know how to build a sentence in English? In this lesson, you will learn the basic parts of a simple sentence, or independent clause. Knowing this will make it easier to understand any sentence in written English. Understanding how these different parts of a sentence work together to form meaning will help you write better in English.

Learn how to use "therefore" and "thus" to show you have reached a conclusion. These transitions will improve your writing by helping you link ideas. In this lesson, we will look at transitions of conclusion and consequence to help ideas flow and improve our writing styles. I'll also teach you how you can use words like "so", "then", "hence", and "as a result" for the same purpose.