January 15th, 2014 Airlene Lugo Section 001 Journal II: Evaluative Comments about Files Studying a second

language can be seen as something easy, actually nowadays most of the people have to speak English because we need to communicate with people from different countries around the world and we need to learn a common way to speak, that is a well known true. However, when the purpose of the speaker is not only to communicate but also teach a second language the circumstances change a lot because teach is not only speak and read that language in a good way. Teachers have to know more than the basics stuff, that is why in the course of reading and writers future English teachers learnt about the reading and writing process, the structure of texts, how to make inferences or work with differed technique such as skimming and scamming and many other things that a teacher should know. In the paragraphs written below there are short summaries about the 14 differed topics that were developed in the Reading and Writing course in the Instituto Pedaggico de Caracas (IPC). Each one explains the experiences in my personal point of view, trying to express all that I have learnt. Writing Files I Writing as a process: In this file I learn what people should do to be an excellent writer. In my particular case, I remember, for example the three main steps that be supposed to be taken into a count to have a good final text those steps are: prewriting, drafting and editing. Also, it is important to keep in mind that the order can be different for every writer. I think it is very helpful to know them because with that information the writer can start to be clearer and the ideas will be received in a better way for the reader, no matter if the text is written in English or in another language. In my opinion, the file is easy to understand but it is a little difficult put the information in practice for a beginner. However, if the advice is seem as a tool, the student will be able to write high-quality texts. II Prewriting: The prewriting is the first step to have a good text. In this file is explained how to set up the writing process in order to make the writing successful. The first thing that the writer has to determinate is the topic of the text, for this, the author can use many techniques. For example, the brain storming, a list or a diagram with the intention of making the ideas comes to mind in an easier way. After that is very important to realize the audient for whom the writer writes and finally is fundamental to establish the difference between a general idea and a specific detail to facilitate the comprehension of the reader. Personally, I find this order not only important but also very useful for any person who wants to write things for other people to read them. The most difficult part of prewriting, I think, is to separate the contents from the general to the particular details. Nevertheless, if the student practices a lot it can become easier.

III Structural components of writing: It is a fact that a writer has to be in mind the sequence of the writing but something else that is very important is to know the structure in which sentences and paragraphs have to be done. In both cases grammar plays an essential role. However, the complex of the sentences or the paragraphs will depend on the level of the writer and also the reader. There are many ways in which an idea can be explain and there are many tools that can be used to it, too. Relative pronouns, introductory phrases, punctuations and correlative conduction are clear examples of that. The problem with the structure can be the place in which everything can be used, at least in my case the order is the hardest thing. IV Structural components of writing II: This file is one of the most important and interesting one for me. I learned that a good paragraph has to start with a good topic sentence with the purpose of revel what the writer is trying to explicate with the complete content. It sounds simple but the person should practice a lot to write effective topic sentences. I consider that the more people practice the most straightforward can turn out to write an excellent topic sentence. In one hand, the paragraph has to have a well-done topic sentence, in the other hand the paragraph most contain a number of three characteristics to be considered clever. The first characteristic is to be supportive so the main idea can be clarify , the second one is to be strong using as many evidences as possible in order to develop the main idea and the last one is to be considerate what means that the paragraph has to be coherent with the whole text. Something else that is very important is the four types of paragraphs (descriptive, narrative, persuasive and expository) which one should be used for a particular purpose depending of the writer. V Structural components of writing III: The main idea of this file is to show to the reader how a paragraph has to be built for that the paragraph may include unity and coherence, without those elements the text would be very complicated to understand and the ideas will not be explained in a clear manner. One of the most interesting things in the file is the explanation about how long a paragraph should be; in fact that is a common question and is good to know that there is not a specific limit for it, the important thing is to give enough reasons and explain everything as clear as possible so that the ideas will be entire developed. Furthermore, the writer has to be careful with commons mistakes like be redundant. It is very essential to be familiar with linking words and also how to use them in order to make the text as coherence as possible. VI Drafting Narrative Paragraph: As you may know, drafting is one of the steps of writing. However, it is not the only steps, there are two more mentioned before, there are also different kind of writing. A narrative paragraph tells a story about reality of fictions events that have to go after a sequence that makes the reader understands the story. That is why the writer has to make different decisions for instance, selecting the most important details, choose an appropriate topic sentence, if it is necessary, the writer has to select a second sentence to clarify the topic of the narrative paragraph and finally there should be selected a technique in which the writer explains the ideas depending of the type of content. One thing, that I consider very important, is the

voice that the writer chooses to tell the story because that can modify the way in which the reader interprets the text. VII Descriptive paragraph: Description can be seen as something very frequent. Nevertheless, when people make a description must be careful about the organization of the contents and what they want to illustrate. There are two different ways to organize a description, one is called a birds eyes view and the other one is a pedestrians view. The writer can play with any of them depending of the situation. For this kind of text the vocabulary is very important and the use of synonyms and antonymous of adjectives is a key to make a vast text. In my opinion, description is one of the types of writing that people use a lot so that it is essential to learn how describe in a appropriate way. VIII Expository paragraph: In this type of writing the writer can give details about a specific topic presenting facts and evidences to show the veracity of the text, it is also used o give directions and definitions. To draft an expository text exist a variety of methods that can be used by the writer. The first one is process in which the author explains how to do something using steps to organize the order, the second one is extended definitions in this type of expository paragraph the idea is to define, describe, classify and even explain the meaning of a word. The third one is comparison and contrast where the writer shows the differences between two things and also gives the reasons why those things are different and in many cases in what point they can be similar. Finally, causes and effects paragraphs demonstrate through investigations reasons for something, for example, why people act in different depending of the culture. In my opinion, it would be great that the students write one paragraph for each kind of expository text in order to make them understand the discrepancies among all of them. IX Persuasive Paragraph: The persuasive paragraph is applied to convince the audience or the reader about a particular point of view doing as effort as possible to prove that the idea is correct. To persuade the argument is fundamental so the reader can believe in the explication so that the reader changes his/her mind in relation to the topic. The argument has to have three fundamental parts: 1. Assertions which are statements that require support; 2. Evidence with the purpose of demonstrates the validity of that particular point of view; 3. Assumptions that are opinions. It is essential to know how to recognize a persuasive text and know how to write one, too. The file is well-organized and helps a lot in the labor of writing a good persuasive paragraph. Reading Files I Reading as a process: From this file I learned that there should be a specific propose for reading and also there is a process that should be followed to have a satisfactory reading. The pre-reading, the reading and the post-reading are the parts of the process; in each element the idea is to understand what the writer wants to say. In my opinion, I have to improve the post-reading in order to see if I really got the main idea of the text, because most of the time, we as students read only for obligation. I

would say that to facilitate the acquisition of the steps with this file would be great to add exercises that make the students read and pursue every part. II Guessing meaning from the context: For me, the information putted in that file was one of the most useful because it is very common to find words that we actually dont know in a text. I think the information is helpful because in English is very essential to know what it is the kind of word to guess the meaning or at least infer it. In that way the reader wont be bored of the reading. Of course, it is also important to be familiar with the concepts and the places in which should be write adjectives, verbs, adverbs, etc. All of this is related to grammar. The most appropriate way of obtain the knowledge is practicing a lot, first trying to identify the types of words that we usually read and after that we can try guessing meaning. The exercises are well done. However, it would be better to practice with different types of text, including one chosen by the student. III guessing meaning from the context (II): This file was more difficult to me because in this part the meaning can be guessed only if you understand the synonym or antonym of the word, so the vocabulary is essential to do it well. Nevertheless, I realized that exist more than just one way of understand a text in spite of the ignore of the exact meaning of words, that has help me a lot in order to improve my skills as a reader. However, I think that the technique needs to be use for in a different way maybe using longer readings and not only sentences as in the exercises we did in class. IV Scanning, main ideas, topic sentence: The file was very productive because in there, I have learn that there is more than way of reading depending of what the reader wants to do. In my case, I have applied the skimming (To understand the main ideas) scamming (To look for specific details) in my courses and in that way I think, I have improved my abilities to divide the reading into parts depending of what I need in a specific moment. The class and the file were easy to comprehend for the reason that are techniques that I had done before but not knowing them as methods. V Making inferences: The information of making inferences was quite short. However, it is practical because if we read something we should be know that every person thinks and writes in very different modes so it is good to recognize the kind of the writing and also the purpose that everyone has when writes something. That can facilitate the reader understanding of the text. I have learned that we shouldnt believe everything in written in a text because sometimes the purpose of the reader is to convince or confuse the reader so we have to be careful and dont forget to be objectives with every text, paragraph, etc.

As a conclusion I can express all my thankful for the knowledge I have acquired in the course through all the files and the exercises I have done. The reading and writing process are more complex than I tough but it is a fascinating world, it is also imperative to remember that it is not enough knowing the theory it is necessary to put the techniques in practice in order to become a better reader and a better writer, too. As an English teacher all the information was significant because even when speaking, grammar and listening are parts of the language reading and writing in a good way show than the level of the teacher has improved. All the material was excellent to get the improvement than every single teacher needs to rice the academic distinction.