Synopses & Reviews
The ESL Writers Handbook is a reference work for ESL students who are taking college-level courses. Because its purpose is to provide help with the broad variety of writing questions students may have when working on school assignments, the text focuses on
English for Academic Purposes. Unlike other handbooks on the market, this books sole purpose is to address the issues of second language learners.
This spiral-bound Handbook complements a student writers dictionary, thesaurus, and grammar reference book. It would be suitable as a text for an advanced ESL writing course when used together with the companion Workbook (978-0-472-03404-8). The Handbook is concise and easily navigated; is accessible, with clear and direct explanatory language; features information on both APA and MLA styles (including a sample paper for each); and includes many examples from ESL student writers to provide realistic models.
Included as special features in the Handbook are:
• The topic selection is based on ESL writers needs as observed by the authors over many years.
• The coverage of topics is more complete than the limited amount usually provided for ESL writers in first language or L1 handbooks.
• The explanatory language is appropriate for ESL students, in contrast to the more complex and idiomatic language of other English handbooks.
• The level of detail is more manageable for ESL students, compared to what is in other English handbooks.
Many of the examples of paragraphs, essays, research papers, and exercise sentences were written by ESL students; this encourages users of this Handbook to realize that they can also become effective writers.
Synopsis
Bookmarks: Fluency through Novels is a series of companion textbooks to novels that provide teachers with creative exercises and activities to supplement the teaching of a novel.
Bookmarks: A Companion Text for Kindred is an integrated reading-writing skills text that addresses each of the seven intelligences identified by Howard Gardner: there are tasks and activities for the linguistically, logically/mathematically, kinesthetically, spatially, musically, interpersonally, and intrapersonally intelligent students.
The textbook is designed to be used along with Kindred, a novel by Octavia Butler (published by Beacon Press), which tells the story of a young black woman who disappears from her home in 1970s California to save the life of her white slave-owner ancestor in the early nineteenth century. Through the novel and textbook, students learn about nineteenth-century American life, the origins of slavery in America, the conditions under which slaves lived, the Underground Railroad, important historical figures (like Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass), and the civil rights movement of the twentieth century.
Each of the six units begins with a preview of the reading and free writing topics, followed by exercises that improve comprehension and vocabulary building. Students use response journals to think about their personal connection with the novel. They are encouraged to discuss different topics and then write about what they've discussed. The Beyond the Novel section in each unit introduces factual background information in which students learn about slavery and other material mentioned in the novel. Puzzles and out-of-class activities are also included at the end of each unit.
Synopsis
A companion text for ESL students of the successful novel,
KindredSynopsis
Spelling Counts brings a new dimension to spelling instruction by emphasizing the relationship between the way that words look and the way that they sound. This workbook presents numerous classroom activities that teach students to listen for vowel and consonant sounds and to recognize patterns in the letter combinations that correspond to those sounds. Instead of memorizing lists of unrelated words, students learn spelling as a system of sound/symbol correspondence that can be applied in a variety of academic situations to support other skills. One important goal of the text is to equip students to hear a word in a class, lecture, or testing situation and to spell it with sufficient accuracy to later recognize it in a course text or to look up its definition afterward.and#160;
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The units and lessons address a full range of relationships between letters and sounds such as short vowels, consonant doubling, long vowel patterns including those with silent e, and more complex vowel combinations. Each unit also identifies and practices a number of sight words that may not conform to the relevant patterns being learned but that are words that English speakers are expected to be able to spell with confidence. Units end with a review that reinforces the patterns and the connections between the word spellings and sounds.
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Synopsis
A novel read and loved by manyand#8212;share in the experience with the companion text!
Synopsis
A Companion Text for Like Water for Chocolate provides exercises and activities for ESL students who are reading the English translation of the novel by Laura Esquivel (published by Doubleday). Set during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
Like Water for Chocolate is a story about an extended Mexican family and what happens when one daughter is not permitted to marry the man she loves. Cooking and food are central to the story line and help thread the story together.
A Companion Text for Like Water for Chocolate is made up of six units, each covering two chapters in the novel. Every unit contains a preview section, free writing exercises, a short glossary (to help with Spanish words), comprehension quizzes, vocabulary exercises and summarizing exercises, a section devoted to response journals, and topics for discussion. The "Beyond the Novel" section includes facts about U.S. and Mexican history and folk tales. Illustrations throughout the book help to engage students and offer visual support for reading comprehension.
Synopsis
A textbook to help students learn English and learn about major events in early to mid-twentieth-century America
Synopsis
Bookmarks is a series of companion textbooks that provides teachers with creative exercises and activities to supplement the teaching of a novel.
Bookmarks are integrated reading-writing skills texts that address each of the seven intelligences identified by Howard Gardner: there are tasks/activities for the linguistically, logically-mathematical, kinesthetically, spatially, musically, interpersonally, and intrapersonally intelligent students.
A Companion Text for Growing Up accompanies journalist Russell Baker's Pulitzer Prize-winning autobiography. Growing Up (published by New American Library) traces Baker's coming of age during the 1930s and 1940s. Baker's memoir draws the reader into America between the world wars and describes the struggles of family, adolescence, and hardship that accompanied his journey to adulthood.
Each of the six units in the companion texts begins with a preview of the reading and free-writing topics, followed by exercises that improve comprehension and vocabulary building. Students use response journals so as to think about their personal connection with the novel. The "Beyond the Novel" section in each textbook introduces factual background information from which students learn about history and other interesting material mentioned in the novels.
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Integrated reading-writing practice for stronger, more confident writers
Synopsis
Crafting Compositions guides students through the entire writing process, with exercises in planning, drafting, responding and revising, and polishing. In addition to completing free writing exercises, keeping a journal of informal responses, and revising sample compositions, students will draft, revise, and edit one composition per chapter.
The textbook features:
" Authentic readings to foster vocabulary development, show successful techniques, and serve as a jumping-off point for free writing.
" A "learning log" in which students write to practice the writing lessons and tips presented.
" A two-track system in which students simultaneously work with the writing of other students as they work on their own compositions.
" Toolbox mini-lessons to review common grammar trouble spots.
This mid-level writing text is appropriate for high school, community college, or university course
Synopsis
Although it is a natural way for students to improve their language skills, a classroom book club can also be challenging for teachers to facilitate.
Creating Book Clubs lays out a successful three-part model in which students read, discuss, and make Book Log entries that the authors developed in their own multilevel adult ESL classroom. The book explains how book clubs support students' need for extensive reading and high-interest reading. Chapters show how discussion and analysis are sparked by making personal connections, cultural connections, and media connections to book club texts, and by asking questions, making predictions, and drawing inferences.
Although Creating Book Clubs in the English Language Classroom was written with adult ELL learners in mind, it can be adapted easily to Adult Basic Education (ABE).
A list of books and texts that can be used successfully in student book clubs is included in the appendix.