AW1 Common errors

  1. Formatting problems.

①Font. Please use “Times New Roman” or “Century”.

②Name, date, title, etc. Do not put these in the header, but in the body of the document.

  1. Interference from Japanese:

①何かをしようと思った。X I think I want to  I want to

②I began to think that I want to play some wind instrument  ______

③Avoid over-using “think” or “thought”. Look for and use alternatives. E.g. X Through these experiencesI thought communicating with many foreign people is very important to expand my world. Through these experiences, I learned / discovered / realized / understood / appreciated that communicating with foreign people is important to expand my world.

④Avoid over-using “experience”. Look for and use alternatives. E.g. X I was exposed to many cultures. Through these experiences… Through being exposed to many cultures, ….

⑤

⑥X When I entered KPU  When I came to KPU

⑦X When I entered university  ______

⑧Claim. While one of the meanings of the English word “claim” is the same as that of the Japanese クレーム, it is not the most commonly used meaning. The Japanese クレームis best translated as “complaint” or “to complain”.

⑨Play.In English, “play” is what little children do. Teenagers and adults do not “play” with their friends. (Why not? Look up the meaning of “play with food”.) Instead, English-speaking teenagers and adults “hang out or meet up with friends.”

  1. Use a thesaurus to find alternatives to “play”, e.g. “have fun”.

①X They could play with their friends.  ______

______

  1. The exception is play + object, e.g. play an instrument or play a sport or a game (of cards, for instance), or play a role (in a movie or a play).
  2. Trivia: look up “play dead”, “play the fool” and “play dumb.”

⑩Challenge. This is not always the correct way to translate the Japanese チャレンジ。Consider alternatives such as “try”, “attempt”, “risk” or the noun “determination”.

  1. X The difficulty of playing the shakuhachi motivates me to challenge.  ______

______

  1. X They have challenge spirit.  ______

______

  1. X They take challenge overseas.  ______

______

⑪Misuse of pronouns, especially “we”. Pronouns REPLACE a noun. Generally speaking (with some exceptions), you can only use a pronoun in English AFTER YOU HAVE MADE IT CLEAR WHAT NOUN YOU ARE REFERRING TO.

⑫Hirai Ken is a famous pop singer. I like him.

⑬X I belonged to the brass band. We used to practice every day. (The PLURAL pronoun “we” cannot refer to “brass band”, a SINGULAR noun. Who are “we”?)  ______

______

⑭X I met a lot of people through the club, for example, our teachers  ______

______

⑮X We Japanese like fish. Most/Many Japanese (people) are fond of fish.

⑯X We Japanese take a bath every day.  ______

______

⑰X we employees must be smart.  ______

  1. Avoid starting sentences with subordinate clauses. English prefers putting the main clause first (generally speaking; there are of course exceptions).

①X When I came to KPU, I started to play the shakuhachi  I started to play the shakuhachi when I came to KPU.

②X When I was in elementary school, I liked playing the recorder  ______

③X In my high school days, however, the brass band had little attraction for me  ______

______

④X Getting along with the neighbors was the first hardship I experienced  ______

______

⑤X Because it is very difficult to see my own behavior objectively, their advice was very useful to improve my behavior ______

______

⑥X Thanks to their help, I made it through that difficult time.  ______

______

⑦X Precisely for this reason, we must cherish our connections ______

______

⑧X By his death, I knew that an unexpected farewell may be coming.  His death taught me that farewells may come unexpectedly.

  1. Logic problems.

①Putting two clauses together suggests a logical connection between the two. E.g. “I wanted to come to Japan to learn Aikido. Now, I am living in Japan and practicing Aikido.”

②X Now I am in the Law Faculty and I practice the shakuhachi once a week. Now I am a university student, and I practice…..

③“A teacher gives me lessons every week, so I can learn a lot from the very beginning.” “So” suggests a causal relationship, but here there is none. When we start learning something, anything, naturally there is a lot to learn. It is not BECAUSE the student is getting WEEKLY lessons that she is learning a lot, or BECAUSE of the weekly lessons, she is learning from the very beginning. She is a beginner, so of course she is learning from the beginning.  A teacher gives me weekly lessons AND there is a lot to learn as I am a beginner.

④Giving the specific before the general. As you are writing IN ENGLISH, you should imagine that your READERS are unlikely to be familiar with Japan and Japanese culture. Give them the general or the category BEFORE you give the specific. This will avoid creating confusion in the reader’s mind. E.g.

  1. X I like “yatsuhashi”. It’s a Japanese sweet.  I like a Japanese sweet famous in Kyoto called “yatsuhashi”.
  2. X Hirai Ken was born in my hometown. He is a Japanese pop singer. A famous Japanese pop singer was born in my hometown: (his name is) Hirai Ken.(His name is not important for, or likely to be known or remembered by English-speaking readers unfamiliar with Japan.)
  3. X In Japan, generally people say “Three years for ‘kubifuri’, eight years for ‘koro’. Both of them are shakuhachi techniques.  ______
  1. Avoid wordiness. Shorter is better, less is more.

①X When I was a junior high school and high school student, I belonged to the brass band club and played the trumpet. I played trumpet in my junior and senior high school brass band.

②X The experience in club activity led me to learn the basics of society My club experience taught me the basics of society.

③X our leader of the club  ______

④X I thought I must change myself at that time  ______

______

⑤X most of my time of teenage  ______

⑥X I had practice in brass band club activity ______

______

⑦X they gave advice to me  ______

⑧X She became the first person who was a female forestry engineer.  ___

______

⑨Xthe meaning of what Jobs said  ______

  1. Avoid non-academic vocabulary or expressions.

①E.g. X I don’t feel regret at all I feel no regret (whatsoever).

②X I was so surprised I was very surprised. (“so” + adjective is used in the construction “so…. that”, e.g. “I was so surprised that I burst into tears” or, “I was so frightened that I screamed loudly”.)

③X I was so happy  ______

④X I was so surprised with the thingsgoing on in my class. The underlined words are non-academic. - ______

______

⑤X Actually, the first time I went to school was in the UK.  ______

______

⑥X When I did sleepover with one of my friends  ______

______

⑦X A lot of  ______

⑧X get used to  ______

  1. Misuse of past tense and pluperfect.

①X When I was a junior and senior high school student, I had belonged to the brass band club.  … I belonged to…. (This sentence is also a #2 type error. Can you correct it?)  ______

______

②X The practice was not easy, but I had learned many things ______

______

  1. Run-ons. A sentence has ONE main verb. If it has more, the two clauses must be joined by a conjunction such as and, but, because, although, etc., OR the sentence should be divided into two, separated by a period. A sentence which has NO such joining words and which contains more than one MAIN verb is called a run-on. Here is an example. Can you correct it?

①X Sometimes customers smile and praise me and say” Thank you” it makes me very happy ______

______

  1. Fragments. In English, a sentence must have a main verb. A fragment does not have a main verb and so is NOT a complete sentence but only PART of a sentence, or a fragment of a sentence. E.g.

①X Thanks to the stay in Australia. This is not a complete sentence and should be combined with the previous sentence: “Now I’m living with purpose, thanks to my stay in Australia.”

②X I learned how to live. For example, making friends, ways to speak out, try anything and so on.  ______

______

  1. Combine sentences. E.g.

①X I had decided what I want to learn in the university when I was a high school student. The reason why I want to major in this course is thatI want to expand my world. In high school, I had decided that I wanted to learn Western cultures and languages in university, because I wanted to expand my world.

②X In Australian language school everyone need to speak up in class, because the student’s opinions plays an important part in the class. So I need to have my own opinion, and speak up.  ______

______

③X When she and I started making a doubles pair, we were not good partners at all. This is because we didn’t know much about each other.  ______

④X She was said to be the best student in my junior high school. She was good at both studies and sports, and she was the president of the student council.  ______

______

⑤X They always say ‘thank you’. So their fans want to continue supporting them.  ______

______

  1. Parallel constructions. E.g. X They taught me the importance of not to giving up, and of continuing to chase my dream and friends. The importance of chasing your friends?!?!? They taught me the importance of not giving up, of continuing to chase my dreams and of friends.  They taught me the importance of friends, of not giving up and of continuing to chase my dreams.

①X They visited many countries, such as USA, Europe and Asia.  _____

______

  1. Dangling modifiers. E.g. X I heard one of the most popular speeches in an English class. Compare this with “I heard one of the most famous speeches in the world.”
  2. Show, don’tell.

①X By listening to various ideas of many people, I understood the importance of seeing things objectively. The subordinate clause is not causally related to the main clause. Understanding the importance of seeing things objectively does not result automatically from listening to various people’s ideas. The first part is not connected logically to the last part. The writer needs to explain the connection.

②X This experience was valuable. How or why was it valuable? Explain. Show how or why it was valuable, don’t just tell the reader it was. This experience was valuable

Warrants. In Toulmin’s model of argumentation, a claim is supported by evidence (usually facts or data), and warrants explain why the data or facts support the claim. Warrants may be simply commonsense rules that people accept as generally true, laws, scientific principlesor studies, and thoughtfully argued definitions.

For example, at a crime scene, fingerprints are important evidence. Why? Because a person’s fingerprints are different from almost every other person’s, so a fingerprint can be used to identify a unique individual. This piece of knowledge is the “warrant” that supports or explains the importance of a fingerprint found at a crime scene.

Here is another example:

Year-round school is not a good idea. Year-round school changes students’ summer schedule. For example, some year-round schools have a 60/15 calendar where they’re in school for 60 days, then out of school for 15 days. This same schedule repeats all year long, which means no summer vacation. Students need a long break from all the stress of tests, quizzes, homework, and studying. We deserve a summer to take time off from school and recharge our batteries. Summer is to be enjoyed, not spent in a classroom.

Can you separate the above sentences into

Claim

Evidence

Warrant

Claim:______Evidence:______Warrants:______

Fact/evidence: I took the entrance examination of a public university, but most of my friends took the entrance examination of a private school, so they finished their entrance exams before me.

Warrant:explanation of why taking the entrance exam of a private university means finishing earlier. Can you explain? ______

______

1