Sentence Building Pretest Ch3

Paragraph Building Exercise: Irrelevant Sentences Exercise 2.3 Each of the following paragraphs has a sentence that is irrelevant. Draw a line through that sentence. Example: There are many things you can do to help the earth’s environment. You can recycle newspapers, clear plastic and aluminum cans. You can buy products made from recycled paper. Also, you can purchases drinks in glass bottles or aluminum cans instead of plastic containers. Glass and aluminum are easier to recycle. I enjoy recycling. 1. Responsibility is an important part of being an adult. We should meet our obligations by being reliable, accountable, and dependable. We should follow through on our promises. It is important to be one time for appointments that we have agreed to. I am often late for my appointments. Be someone your friends can count on. Students should do their homework on time. By creating a habit of reliability, people around us will see us as responsible individuals. 2. Bird watching is a great hobby. Many birdwatchers began watching birds as children or young people. Birds hold a fascination with many people because there are almost always birds around to see. Butterflies are great to watch too. Birds are easy to learn to identify and fun to watch. Backyard bird feeding is a good way to get started watching birds by bringing them to your yard. Sentence Structure Review Exercises: Subject-Verb Agreement Exercise 2.4 Rewrite all the following sentences by changing the nouns to plural form. Be sure to use the correct form of the verb. Use the simple present tense and correct capitalization and punctuation. 1. (chimpanzee) (be) smart ________________________________________________________ 2. the (tree) (have) brown (leaf) _________________________________________________________ 3. the (car) (be) clean _________________________________________________________ 4. their (house) (be) very big _________________________________________________________ Exercise 2.5 Rewrite the following sentences by changing them from singular to plural or plural to singular. Correct capitalization and punctuation should be used. 1. schools are for education ________________________________________________________ 2. a telephone is a useful tool ________________________________________________________ 3. apples are tasty _______________________________________________________ 4. a dog makes a good friend ________________________________________________________ 5. whales are mammals ________________________________________________________ 6. mothers know what is best for their children _________________________________________________________ Topic Sentence Review Exercises: Exercise 2.7 Choose the best topic sentence for each of the following paragraphs and put an “x” on the line next to it. 1. _____ a. Korea has a great variety of plant life. _____ b. Korea is great! _____ c. Korea is a nice place to visit. There's more to Korean plant life than just rice, apple trees and pine trees. Because of the diversity of Korean soil and environments, it has a wide variety of plants. A drive around the countryside will show you what an interesting assortment of plants there are. 2. _____ a. Flying in bad weather is difficult. _____ b. Pilots do a lot of work. _____ c. Pilots plan their flight carefully. They check their plane to make sure that it is working properly. They also make sure that baggage or cargo has been loaded correctly. They check the weather forecast to see if they will run into any bad weather on their trip. They then decide what route they should take, and how high and fast they should fly. 3. _____ a. Doctors work very hard _____ b. Doctors have an effect upon all our lives. _____ c. Doctors know a lot about medicine. When we are sick, they tell us what we have. They give us medicine and other kinds of treatment. They examine us and listen to us tell them how we feel. They tell us what is good for us to eat and how we can have better hygiene. 4. _____ a. Nepal has many colorful celebrations. _____ b. Anyone can be a relative in Nepal. _____ c. A day of feast in Nepal. One in particular is the celebration called Tihar. This is a day when "sisters" honor their "brothers" by giving tikka (a red powder mark on the forehead, which is a blessing). Quotes are around "sister" and "brother" because in Nepal these words can mean any relative in the same age range: cousins, children of in-laws, and so forth. During Tihar, special food is prepared and eaten, and everybody gets new clothes. Sentence Building Review Exercise: Using articles Exercise 2.8 Fill in the blanks with a, an, or some. Use some with non-count nouns. Then rewrite the sentences with the correct form of the verb using simple present tense. Use correct capitalization and punctuation. 1. ________ student (have) a lot of homework _________________________________________________________ 2. ________ people (be) at the office party _________________________________________________________ 3. ________ eagle (be) in that tree _________________________________________________________ 4. ________ equipment (be) useful _________________________________________________________ 5. ________ fruit (be) on the table _________________________________________________________ 6. she (have) ________ new furniture _________________________________________________________ Sentence Building: and, but As your writing skills improve you will want to use more complex sentences to keep your writing interesting. And or but can connect two sentences. When using and or but to connect two sentences, use a comma before and or but. That car is beautiful. It is fast. That car is beautiful, and it is fast. Dr. Park’s class is very interesting. Dr. Park’s class is difficult to pass. Dr. Park’s class is very interesting, but it is difficult to pass. When you use And it adds information to the first sentence. When you use But it adds surprising or unexpected information to the first sentence. She is a very rich woman, and she has a large savings account. She is a very rich woman, but she never has any money with her. Her house is expensive, but it is very dirty inside. Don’t use a comma when you use two adjectives and join them with and or but. The puppy is cute and playful. He is smart but lazy. Exercise 2.9 Rewrite the following sentences with the correct form of be. Use and or but to connect the two sentences. Correct capitalization and punctuation should be used. 1. Daegu apples (be) very delicious. They (be) popular. _________________________________________________________ 2. Daegu apples (be) very popular. They (be) hard to find. _________________________________________________________ 3. Jae-un (be) friendly ________ popular. _________________________________________________________ 4. Su-sun (be) friendly ________ unpopular. _________________________________________________________ 5. Samsung computers (be) high quality. They (be) inexpensive. _________________________________________________________ 6. Tae Dung computers (be) expensive. They (be) not reliable. _________________________________________________________ 7. There (be) good Chinese food at that restaurant. It (be) too expensive. _________________________________________________________ 8. There (be) good Chinese at that restaurant. It (be) not very expensive. _________________________________________________________ 9. His poetry (be) wonderful to read. It (be) easy to understand. _________________________________________________________ 10. His poetry (be) wonderful to read. It (be) difficult to understand. _________________________________________________________ Sentence Structure: Building Descriptive Sentences A common sentence structure for describing things is: Article + adjective + noun + verb (has) + adjective(s) + noun This type of sentence describes the characteristics or qualities of something. Example 1: A sports car has a powerful, noisy motor. Article + adjective + noun + has + article + adjectives + noun To put variety in your writing you can also write the characteristic or quality first, use the preposition of, and change the verb have to be. Then you must begin the sentence with the. Rewrite the follow sentences using this structure: The + noun + (of a/an) + noun + is/are adjective(s). Example 2: The motor of a sports car is powerful and noisy. The + noun + (of a/an) + adjective + noun + is/are + adjective(s). Exercise 2.10 Rewrite the following sentences using the structure in Example 2. 1. An airplane has a long, sleek body. _________________________________________________________ 2. A desk has a flat, hard surface. _________________________________________________________ 3. A hotel has big, comfortable beds. _________________________________________________________ 4. An eagle has strong, powerful wings. _________________________________________________________ 5. A giraffe has a long thin neck. _________________________________________________________ Exercise 2.11 Choose three familiar objects and write sentences like the examples above. 1._______________________________________________________ 2._______________________________________________________ 3._______________________________________________________ Paragraph Organization: Sorting Information Exercise 2.12 The following sentences are about the weather and how to dress while touring Beijing, China. There is too much information here for one paragraph. Some of the sentences are specifically about the weather. Put the number of those sentences in the box below marked Weather. Other sentences are about how to dress while touring Beijing. Put the number of those sentences in the box below marked Dress. Each set of sentences has one that is general enough to be a topic sentence. Circle those two sentences. 1. Winter is freezing cold. 2. Autumn is best as the temperature is mild and the sun is out a lot. 3. Beijing's four seasons are distinctly recognizable. 4. In the warmer months, T-shirts and light pants or shorts are the best bet. 5. It is easy to dress for touring Beijing. 6. In the autumn, jeans and a sweater are usually fine. 7. For touring during the day, wear casual clothes. 8. Bring nice clothes for going out at night. 9. The temperature in spring is nice, too, but it is very dry and windy. 10. Summer can be unbearably hot. 11. In the colder months, it is wise to dress in layers; long underwear and jeans, shirt, sweater and a down jacket. Weather Dress 1.________ 1.________ 2.________ 2.________ 3.________ 3.________ 4.________ 5.________ 6.________ 4.________ 5.________ 6.________ Exercise 2.13 Now, rewrite these two sets of sentences as separate paragraphs. Beijing’s weather: ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ How to dress while touring: ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ Sentence Structure: Describing Things To keep your writing interesting, describe things with the same information in a different way. Do this by using a different word order. This is a typical word order: The ___(noun)__ of a/an (thing) is ___________. shape size color weight height width length thickness texture etc. Example: A TV weighs ten kilograms. (weight) The weight of a TV is ten kilograms. The (noun)_ of a/an (thing) is __________. Exercise 2.14 Rewrite each of the sentences below using the descriptive structure in the example. 1. A wool blanket is soft. (texture) _____________________________ 2. A good pizza is two centimeters thick. (thickness) _________________________________ 3. An apple is round. (shape) _____________________________________ _____ 4. A Boeing 747 is large. (size) ________________________________ 5. My bowling ball is ten kilograms. (weight) ____ 6. That electric cord is four meters long. (length) __________________________________________ 7. His new Hyundai is black. (color) ___________________________________________________ 8. That building is over 1000 meters high. (height) ____________________________________ 9. The Mississippi River is a mile wide. (width) ____________________________ Exercise 2.15 Write four sentences describing the same object. Use both sentence structures from the previous exercise. 1.A._______________________________________________________ 1.B._______________________________________________________ 2.A._______________________________________________________ 2.B. _______________________________________________________ 3.A._______________________________________________________ 3.B._______________________________________________________ 4.A._______________________________________________________ 4.B._______________________________________________________ Read this paragraph about a common object in our lives. Chopsticks are common objects. We find them everywhere, usually in pairs. An individual chopstick is usually made of wood or steel. It is small in size. The length of a chopstick is about fifteen centimeters. It can be round or square in shape. It is also tapered from one end to the other. The color of a chopstick is often tan or silver, but could be any color. A chopstick is very light in weight. Sometimes we find a pair of chopsticks in a paper wrapper. Exercise 2.16 Write a paragraph to describe a common object. Use the paragraph above as a model and try to describe all the characteristics of the object using both sentence structures. Begin the paragraph with a topic sentence like this one: (plural noun) are common objects. ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________