6A News Reaction – Policy Address 2008: “Fruit Money” (Deadline: Nov 2 08)

Dear 6A

We are going to respond to the Letter to the Editor “Disappointed by Tsang’s U-turn” on the Editorial of South China Morning Post, dated Oct 28 08.

Please express your opinions concerning the policy on granting ”Fruit Money” to the elderly.

Ms Fong

4E News Reaction – Global Warming (Deadline: Nov 2 08)

Dear 4E

You are going to work on the article “A Price to Fight in Climate Fight” on South China Morning Post on Oct 29, 08. Please get your own copy and post your reaction here.

Ms Fong

Spooky Halloween!

 

To many of us, Halloween means ”Trick or Treat”, pumpkins, Jack o’ lanterns, vampires, witches, skeletons, blood and haunted houses.

 

Halloween dates back to a Celtic festival called Samhain. November 1 is the new year of the Celts, who lived in Europe more than a thousand years ago. This is the day which marked the end of summer and harvest. The Celts believed that on the night of October 31, ghosts of the dead would return to earth. The Celts celebrated Samhain by dressing up in costumes with animal heads and having bonfires. Many Celts settled in Britain and Ireland, where the festival became popular. Those who moved to America took the tradition with them.

 

Nowadays, most people celebrate Halloween not as a religious ritual but just for fun. Kids in America will dress up as devils or angels and will go from house to house calling “Trick or treat”, playing mischievous tricks and asking for sweets. In Hong Kong, young people enjoy going to Halloween celebration held in Disneyland and Ocean Park. Halloween parties are also held in the restaurants and clubs in Lan Kwai Fong.

 

Writing Varied Sentences + Learning New Words

Don’t fall into the trap of using the same word all the time. If you don’t vary your language you will make your writing very dull. Most importantly, exam markers don’t like it and you’ll lose loads of marks!

 

Using lots of different words, especially adjectives and verbs, paints a more interesting and vivid picture. Here are some examples:

 

I went to a fantastic Japanese restaurant yesterday. The waiters were friendly to us and the environment was cosy. We had a sashimi platter to start with and it was really tasty. Then each of us had a seafood tempura. After the meal the waiters served us some green tea ice-cream, which was kind of them.

 

I ran to the staff room with the exercise books, then I hurried to the tuck shop for some chocolate. Finally I raced to the classroom so I wasn’t late for class.

 

Compare the following sentences.

 

Every now and then, try to replace a short and simple word with a long and clever one.

 

 

Sporadically, endeavour to substitute a concise and elementary word with a complex and intellectual one.

 

Using different words is a good start. Get a dictionary or thesaurus and learn some new words today.

Feedback on Rewriting Hemingway’s Cat in the Rain

Writing Task 2  

Creative Writing: Rewrite Ernest Hemingway’s Cat in the Rain from the male’s perspective.

 

 

Feedback

Most of you have done fair work and have spelt out how George would have felt and reacted if the story was written from the male’s perspective. Some of you have put the focus wrong and made changes to parts that do not show George’s viewpoint at all, while a small number of you actualy have not made any noticeable changes to the story. But I’m glad a few of you have produced some very nice works based on your thorough understanding of the origianl story. Works that are worth discussing are those written by Catherine, Wendy, Heidi, Joey, Sister Man Wah and Gavin. Their works are nice in terms of ideas, style and language.

By the way, I’m still waiting for eight of you to submit your work! Please have it done within this week.

 

Guidelines for Revision

Revise your work by following the guidelines below.

1. Correct the mistakes, including ideas, language, punctuation marks and paragraphing,  I’ve marked on your first draft.
2. Perfect your work, following my suggestions for improvement, as much as possible because you’ll receive another set of marks in the revised version.
3. Underline the parts you’ve revised.
4. If you hope to rewrite everything, go ahead! But you must indicate it clearly on your work.
5. Think of a title for your work and put it in the centre. Please follow the suggested layout of page.
6. Type your work in Font 12 of Times New Roman, with double-lined spacing. Skip one line for every new paragraph.  (NEW)

 

Suggested Layout of Page

6A  Betty Boop (33)                                                                                                     Date   Creative Writing Cat in the Rain by Ernest Hemingway   An American Husband       The text

 

Deadline for Revision

Friday October 31 2008

Policy Address (2008 – 2009) II

Dear 4E and 6A

Apart from downloading the Policy Address from the internet, you may get a copy from any district offices. Check the addresses from the following link.

http://www.had.gov.hk/en/public_services/public_enquiry_services/ctec.htm

 

Ms Fong

4E News Reaction – Hong Kong (Deadline: Oct 26 08)

Dear 4E

This week you are going to respond to a star letter in Young Post of South China Morning Post. Please write your response (150 words) to the writer.

Ms Fong

 

Young Post, South China Morning Post

Spare a thought for Tai O residents

Tai O – often praised as the Venice of Hong Kong – used to be a water town that was popular with tourists. Unfortunately, after Typhoon Hagupit, most of the village is ruined.

Pang Uk has been transformed into rubble, and the beaches are littered with rubbish. The government has done little to revive the place.

I think the people of Tai O should be granted cash relief to help them clean up the mess and get their lives back on track. Most of them are elderly, have little personal savings and lack the physical strength to rebuild their homes on their own. 

Tai O is a part of our history. The Tai O Folk Museum, which shows how people lived a century ago by fishing and producing salt, was badly damaged.

I think schools could help by sending student volunteers on a field trip to clean up the museum. By doing so, I think they will learn more about early Hong Kong history and help others at the same time.

Anson Leung

6A News Reaction – Financial Tsunami (Deadline: Oct 26 08)

Dear 6A

Here are the guidelines for this week’s news reaction.

1. Pick an article about the recent financial tsunami from this week’s South China Morning Post.
2. Write clearly the title of the article and the date it was posted, for example, “Restaurants open door to reusable chopsticks”, October 13 2008, SCMP, before you write the summary (80 words) and comments (100 words).
3. Keep the article in your news clips file.
4. Do not post the news article in your response! Just the source, date and title will do.

Enjoy!

Ms Fong

News Reaction – Some Reminders

Dear 6A and 4E

I feel happy about the work you’ve done in news analysis so far. Most of you have maintained quality work and have respected deadlines. I’m sure you’re going to produce even better work in the days to come. I just have a few reminders for you before you do the next news assignment.

1. Read the article thoroughly so as to fully understand what it is about.
2. Ask a lot of questions concerning the ideas.
3. Relate the topic to other aspects of life.
4. Write your comments objectively, taking into consideration the different possibilities.
5. Proofread your work. Check your ideas and language before you submit your work. Pay special attention to spellings, tenses,  capitalisation, punctuation marks, spacing (a space after a punctuation mark), paragraphing, etc. Sometimes you may overlook typos you have made, so you are going to proofread your work carefully. 
6. Don’t use “XD” please! I should have reminded you to use proper English in this blog. All responses with this expression will be marked spam! If you hope to cheer your classmates and me up, you may use graphics instead.
7. Submit your work by the due date. Please note that all work submitted later than the due date will be considered late. All late assignments should be handed in within the following week or you risk penalty!

Best

Ms Fong

Introducing opinions

Introducing opinions

 - Argumentative essay
 – Letter to the Editor
 – Debate speech
 – Oral

There are various expressions and sentence structures you can use to express your own opinions.

1. In my opinion, / In my view, / As far as I am concerned, / From my point of view, + statement

Anything wrong in the following sentence?

In my opinion, I think euthanasia should be legalised.

 

2. Personally, I believe, /think (that) + statement

Personally, I believe that euthanasia is unethical.
I personally believe that ……

 

3. Personally, I agree with/ disagree with …… the statement/ the view (that) + statement

Personally, I agree with the statement that euthanasia should be legalised.

 

4. Personally, I support/oppose …… the view/ Mr X’s view (that) + statement

Personally, I oppose the view that dying patients should end their life prematurely.

 

5. I support / oppose the writer’s / Mr X’s views on + noun/ noun phrase

Personally, I oppose Mr. X’s views on terminally ill patients should seek euthanasia/ terminally ill patients seeking euthanasia .

 

6. It is a COMMON ERROR to use “For me, …” or “To me, …” incorrectly when introducing your opinions. These expressions can only be used if they are part of a verb + indirect object structure that has been “split and re-ordered”.

Do you know which of the following examples is/ are correct?

It seems to me that euthanasia is unethical.
To me, it seems that euthanasia is unethical.
To me, euthanasia is unethical.

The suggestion that patients with incurable disease should end their life earlier is not acceptable to me.
To me, the suggestion that patients with incurable disease should end their life earlier is unacceptable.
To me, patients with incurable disease should end their life earlier.

 

We seldom use “For me, …” to introduce our opinions. We will only use this when referring to the effect you think something would have on you, yourself, “me”.

I think legalizing euthanasia is a good thing for me/ Mr Tang Siu Bun, because I/ he would like to die in peace and with dignity.

For me/ Mr Tang Siu Bun, legalizing euthanasia is a good thing, because I / he would like to die in peace and with dignity.

For me, I think legalizing euthanasia is a good thing, because I / he would like to die in peace and with dignity.

 

Note:

“In my view point, …”  (WRONG)
“In my view, …”  (CORRECT)
“From my view point, …” (CORRECT)
“Let us look at the matter from another view point, …” (CORRECT)
“In my opinion, I agree with …”  (WRONG) (“I agree with” is unnecessary!)