English for Academic Purposes 12 12

English for Academic Purposes 12 – 12 Semester 1 Block 1

Objectives: expressing prior knowledge, comparing education systems, reading for information, note-making, skimming and scanning reading techniques, review of paragraph style and content Core 1C – S Describe the UK Education System.

1. Pre-reading

a) Write down three things you know about the UK Education System. ______

b) What are the major differences between the UK and Chinese Education Systems? ______

c) Why do so many Chinese students want to study abroad? ______

d) What problems might Chinese students face when adjusting to the UK system? ______

2. Skimming

Skim-read the text quickly and note down what you think the purpose of the text is. ______

3. Scanning Scan the text quickly and list the authors referred to and the dates of their publications. Which is the main source referred to? Note the line numbers of each citation. ______

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4. Reading to extract information and make notes

Find and highlight the topic sentence of each paragraph.

Note below all the other words that relate to the topic sentence in each paragraph. The first paragraph is done as an example

Para 1 class numbers At certain levels differences Class sizes Primary Junior certain levels Each class High school generally around 30, 500, 20 Sixth form varies enormously Numbers of students per University vary depending class

Para 2

Para 3

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5. Understanding main ideas (1) Look at the thesis statement (in the introduction), the topic sentences, and the conclusion – what is the structure of the text? What is the main idea of it all? ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………

6. Understanding main ideas (2)

Decide whether the following statements are True (T) or False (F) according to the information given in the essay.

a) A “2-1” degree is awarded to students who get 50-60 T/F b) Pronouns like “I” or “he” cannot be used in essays at High School T/F c) Teaching has a high social status in the UK T/F d) St. James (2008) suggests that class sizes are not allowed above 30 because of the risks of students injuring themselves T/F e) Students are behaving worse than in the past at lower age groups T/F f) Emirates (2005) reports that over 50% of students go to university T/F

7. Finding meaning from context

Find the following words in the text, study the context in which they are found, and then choose the definition given which you think best expresses the meaning.

Social Status (par. 3) Disruptive (par. 2) Injury (par. 1) Seminars (par. 1) Pinnacle (par. 4) Citations (par. 4) Enormously (par. 1) Reduction (par. 2)

a. position in a social hierarchy f. characterized by unrest or disorder or insubordination b. the highest level or degree attainable g. any physical damage to the body caused by c. acknowledging sources of information or of a violence or accident quoted passage h. a course offered for a small group of d. extremely advanced students e. the act of decreasing or reducing something

8. Synonyms (All definitions and synonyms from Mydictionary.com) Match each of the following words with its synonym in the vocabulary items above

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