After reading Drew's essay, one question that I always wondered popped out: is it okay to write a 'TOEFL' essay like a novel? I often considered the quote 'TOEFL' as a limitation that hinders me from writing freely, and the one that puts my writing style into a certain format. Therefore, I used to ask people, including friends, my brother, teachers, etc. if it is okay to write like one, but I never got the constant answer. So I just chose my perspective, which is that for 'TOEFL' essay, people should write it like a TOEFL essay, the one with a rigid format.
This is the first thing I want to point out in Drew's essay. I understand that the topic is not a 'TOEFLish' one, but my personal belief is that the essay should always stay in a limited format. Because writing a Toefl essay is just for preparing for Toefl, I think it would have been better if he wrote in a TOEFLish way, the one without 'us, you, lots of me'... etc. Second of all, I want to point out his thoughts. Though it is indeed a creative thought, I doubted if such thoughts are suitable to the topic, the change in 21st century. For me, the nuance of two things sounded a bit different, and I'm not sure if the topic asked for these thoughts or not.
On contrast, the good things Drew did was first of all, his creative thoughts as I mentioned. Although it may sound a bit paradoxical, because he drew out the thoughts the topic did not seem to ask, his thoughts approached me very positively. Another thing is that his style was logical. On every results and phenomenons, he wrote why this would happen, and why that is likely to happen. Reading his essay, there was no ambiguous points I wanted to raise questions about.
2012년 11월 19일 월요일
TOEFL Workshop Group #1
TOEFL Essay Workshop #2
Topic :The 21st century has begun. What changes do you think this new century will bring? Use examples and details in your answer.
Group : Park Hyogeun, Choi Changseon, Cho Munyoung, Yun Ungsang, Gwon Junho
Original Essay
What is the most fatal, inevitable enemy of all living things? Of all life-threatening matters, the answer is disease. Humans, especially, have coexisted with it, trying to research, find treatments, and overcome it. Thus, as technology developed more and more, people were able to find better and more effective cure for diseases, resulting in lengthened life expectancy. Similarly, I believe the largest change in 21st centuryis disease, in both positive and negative ways.
To begin with, some of the incurable diseases would not be called the same in 21st century. As I mentioned earlier, humans are able to conquer diverse illnesses through constantly growing technology. Humans have done so until today, so there’s no doubt that more diseases would be overcome. To give an example of the incurable disease in past, pest, best known as black plague, was one of the biggest threats to Europeans in mid-14th century. Millions of people lost their lives, and there was no hope at the time, as no one could figure out the cause of it. However, today, pest isn’t even conceived as a serious disease since vaccine was invented. Scientists were able to verify the cause through microscope, and inhibited the potentially dangerous germs from harming humans. Likewise, in 2012, there are lots of diseases thought to be formidable and insurmountable, such as AIDS and cancer. Though countless people are suffering from them these days, through extreme advance in technology in this century, I expect these diseases to take the same path as pest, and even longer life expectancy for humans.
On the other hand, developments in 21st century may even worsen the ‘disease matter’. To be specific, extreme developments today have harmed the environment largely. The thing is that the environment is not the only target. Humans are also influenced by boomerang effect, and the best example is cancer.Although cancer is known to be a contemporary disease, it is not, as an ancient Egyptian was found to have carried cancer when he was alive. However, it was not a usual disease for Egyptians, and such informs us that some change brought increase in occurrence of cancer, which is human activity. In fact, there are numerous evidences showing how human activity can affect cancer cells to be more active. As humans are always looking forward to advance in their civilizations, more pollution is being generatedevery second. Although humans might overcome the present diseases in the future, at the same time, it is possible for them to resurrect the deadly illnesses that haven’t been found yet.
To sum up, 21st century will open up a new age for diseases through vast enhancement in technology and development. However, it is not sure whether the situation would improve or deteriorate, as the chances are fifty-fifty. Whether it would be an innovation or a disaster, humans must be ready to absorb such changes in disease on the upcoming 21st century.
Anaylzing Changseon's TOEFL Essay
Our team members chose Choi Changseon’s essay to review strengths and weak points.
When we discussed about revising his essay, we focused on the next categories: ideas, organization, word choice, sentence fluency and proofreading.
1. IDEAS – Changseon chose ‘diseases’ to be the big changes in the 21st century. We liked his interesting and creative idea. However, His writing needed more support, so we added some more details.
2. ORGANIZATION - His essay had a quite well developed beginning, middle and ending. Changseon introduced his topic interestingly by asking a challenging question “What is the most fatal, inevitable enemy of all living things?” Middle part was composed of 2 paragraphs. To support details, he used ‘comparison’ about diseases in the past and at the present. But, the examples supporting his topic sentences were not enough to clarify his ideas. Thus we added more examples such as ‘nanotechnology’ and ‘super bacteria’ to make his writing clear enough to understand. His closing was effectively summarized the contents of his essay.
3. WORD CHOICE – A good writing should use the best words and avoid redundancy and repetition. So we carefully checked for any flaws in his writing and we corrected them when revising.
4. SENTENCE FLUENCY – For effective sentence fluency, we sometimes combined or divided the sentences to make them read more smoothly. To do this work, one of our members read the essay loud and we listened carefully for anything that could be awkward.
5. PROOFREADING – After finishing revising, we checked for any errors in punctuation, mechanics, and grammar.
Revising
We revised changseon's essay ;
(If you click the picture, you can see it in detail.)
After Revision(Final Draft)
What is the most fatal and inevitable enemy of all living things? Of all life threatening matters, personally the answer is diseases. Humans have coexisted with diseases, trying to research, find treatments, and overcome them. Some say that people will be able to find more effective cures for diseases, resulting in lengthened life expectancy as the technology develops more and more. Others, however, say that numerous diseases will be able to come out as the technology advances. As Humans and diseases are inextricably bound up each other, the changes in diseases will greatly affect the 21st century as followings:
To begin with, some of the incurable diseases nowadays will disappear in the 21st century. Humans are able to conquer diverse illnesses through constantly growing technology. As a result, in the end, there will be no more incurable diseases left. To give an example of the incurable disease in the past, pest, best known as black plague, was one of the biggest threats to Europeans in the mid-14th century. Millions of people lost their lives, with no hope remaining, since no one could figure out the cure for this disease. However, today, pest is not even considered as a serious disease ever since vaccine has invented. Scientists were able to verify the cause through microscopes, and inhibited the potentially dangerous germs from harming humans. Likewise, in 2012, there are lots of diseases thought to be formidable and insurmountable, such as AIDS and cancer. Though countless people are suffering from them these days, through extreme advance in technology in this century such as developing nanotechnology, I expect these diseases to take the same path as pest, perhaps resulting in even longer life expectancy for humans.
 |
| Will humans destroy themselves? |
On the other hand, human activity, especially technological advance caused by the development in the 21st century may even worsen humans' power against incurable diseases. To be specific, extreme developments resulting in numerous vaccines have ironically caused stronger diseases, which are incurable, to occur. In the past, the rate of mutants in various diseases was low due to the lack of cures. However, as the development of technology led to the invention of effective vaccines, the rate of mutants in these diseases skyrocketed. According to Darwin’s theory of evolution, organisms develop and get stronger as they get biologically threatened causing invincible mutants to appear. Likewise, increase on cure methods led to the increase of mutants. Ultimately, the development of cures led to the infinite routine of cure vs. disease. One example of this is the appearance of Super bacteria. Since the past, bacteria haven't been a huge threat to the human race. However, due to the constant changes and development of medicines, Super bacteria, which are incurable with current technology, occurred. Although, humans might overcome the present diseases in the future, at the same time, it is possible for us to create more deadly diseases.
To sum up, the 21st century will open up a new age for diseases through vast enhancement in technology and development. However, it is not sure whether the situation would improve or deteriorate, as the chances are fifty-fifty. Whether it would be an innovation or a disaster, humans must be ready to absorb such changes in diseases on the upcoming 21st century.
The words in red - grammatical errors are changed
The words in purple– sentences and phrases are changed
After Finishing the Project
After we finished our team project of TOEFL WORKSHOP, we learned that we should give a lot of time and efforts to write a good essay. We know that an effective essay needs prewriting, writing, revising, and proofreading. While revising Changseon’s essay, we could think of the essentials in good writing and learn a lot from one another. We are sure that this revising experience will make us write better essays from now on.
Thank You
2012년 11월 12일 월요일
In class essay #2: Are we better than the Nacirema?
The
world is comparatively a much vaster place than most of people think. There are
numerous tribes and small groups people are not aware of, so it’s reasonable
that some of the groups may not understand each other. The Nacirema tribe is
the best example, with rituals cruel and inhumane. However, such cruelty and
inhumanity is the stereotype and viewpoint I’m having, and it’s not a universal
idea. Likewise, lots of people consider unknown cultures like the Nacirema
inhumane and outdated, and believe they deserve being criticized. However,
people should think if their culture is better than theirs, and whether they have
rights to criticize them.
To
begin with, other cultures’ individuality should be respected. In this world
today, thousands of nations and tribes are developing their own cultures, in
their unique environment. The usual one today, which is the culture with highly
developed technology, is just one of them. Similarly, the Nacirema people had
their own ideas when creating their own culture. Thus, the only difference
between our culture and the Nacirema is the ‘idea’. When we pursued comfortableness
in our daily lives, they sought religious value and rituals. Though the method
may seem brutal and inhumane in our perspectives, does it mean people can
criticize other cultures when the only distinction is the pursued value? I
believe not, as our culture can be seen vice versa to groups like the Nacirema,
and our culture certainly cannot be called ‘a better culture’.
Moreover,
all cultures today are in the same position. These days, people look back in
history and say how terrible it would have been at the time to live without the
present technology and development. This often occurs as cultures are
constantly developing. The point is that the culture we believe to be highly
developed is not advanced compared to the one in the future. One of the reason
people use to criticize the Nacirema is that their culture is outdated.
However, from the viewpoint of the future culture, all of the cultures today
including the Nacirema will look alike; as such cultures are all outdated. Therefore,
actually, as the cultures coexist in the present world, it can be said that all
cultures are in the same level. Consequently, it can be inferred that people
don’t have any right to attack other cultures, so the Nacirema culture doesn’t
have any reason to be criticized.
To
sum up, all cultures are in the same position, coexisting nowadays. In
addition, people don’t have any reason or right to condemn other cultures. Thus,
I believe rather than criticizing others due to our own stereotypes and
thoughts, it is better to understand and respect other cultures so that
everyone can live together in harmony.
2012년 11월 9일 금요일
Suneung...
However, that was not it. When the test finished, I sent my mother the message 'how did he do?'. There was no reply for two hours, and when the answer finally came, it was 'piss off'. Soon, I knew from the instinct there was something bad going on. I later found out my brother was blaming himself for not taking the test well, as he got a lower score than the last year.
On Friday, when I came home, my brother started to do things he has never done before, such as suggesting me to go to karaoke with him. Everything he did, I could feel his sadness and desperation. Even after he came back home, he acted as if he was out of his mind, maybe to forget the misery he is experiencing.
I've always thought that the Suneung was the best way to choose students, as it shows how diligent and capable they are. Moreover, it is just one test. No other bothersome procedure is needed, so it is both effective and simple means to select great students. On the other hand, from the perspective of the applicant's family, it seemed a bit different. As I mentioned, the Suneung is just one test. Whether someone tried hard or not, a simple mistake can change his life, hindering one from achieving his dream. Though college is not wholly a life itself, it is indeed the most easiest, simplest way to succeed in the society. I know how my brother tried hard, waking up every 5 a.m. in the morning, and sometimes getting Ringer solution due to extreme tiredness. Although people say mistake is also one's ability, I thought the price of such 'mistakes' was too heavy for my brother. It took away his dream, effort, and everlasting smile from his face.
