All About English Creative Writing

[The Alternative Story]

Herbie:

Thanks TAS,


I have another qn.

1. There is no use in _______ learning to swim. The weather here is too cold for swimming.

a. I
b. my
c. me

Why is the answer b. Can help to explain?

Tx

Hi Herbie,

The 'learning' here is a gerund- it is a verb ending with 'ing' that functions as a noun. The 'learning' is the name of the action you are doing.

Therefore, the answer is 'my'. If 'learning' is a noun, then you can use 'my' as it is a possessive pronoun and possessive pronouns are used before nouns to denote ownership.

TAS

[The Alternative Story]

Herbie:

Thanks TAS,


I have another qn.


2. The dog escaped through the open gate and was _________ over by a car.
a. run
b. ran
c. being run

why is the answer a and not b?


Tx

Hi Herbie,

The verb here is a passive form of the verb-that means the dog did not run over itself. For passive forms of the verb, you need to use the past participle (for eg: The burger was 'eaten'), 'run' is the past participle of the verb run, hence it is used. 'Ran' is the past tense of 'run' so it cannot be used here.

TAS

[The Alternative Story]

Herbie:

Thanks TAS,


I have another qn.

3. All types of document are being forged. The problem is growing.

Forging ___________________________________________.


4. Andy was brave and calm when he faced the storm. His friends were afraid.
Unlike ______________________________________________.

5. My uncle would rather watch movies at home than go to a cinema.
__________________________________ prefers ___________________________


Can provide the answer? Tx

Hi Herbie,

For question 3, I do not think there is a possible answer. If the answer is 'Forging all types of documents is a growing problem' it can mean that the forgers are finding that it is difficult for them to forge documents and not that the forgery of documents itself is a growing problem so I don't think there is any right answer to this question.

Qn 4: Unlike his friends, Andy was brave and calm when he faced the storm.

Qn 5: My uncle prefers watching movies to going to a cinema.

TAS

[HyperKiasu]

Michteach:

Hi pokemon,


I find getting the children to pick out writing styles and phrases from storybooks really helped my students in school, I sometimes go to this website, lovereading.co.uk to source out what are the good books, they allow you to download extracts from their books and if I find it good, I get it from bookstores or book suppliers who bring in books not found in stores and use the books to teach the children to write from there.

I found using phrases from storybooks very effective as I am feeding the kids continuously with good vocab and effective writing styles from a wide range of authors.

I could let you know what books are especially good for this if you are interested

Hi, Michteach,
would you please share with us those good books? especially for lower level...

thanks

[tianzhu]

The Alternative Story:

Yes we do have English classes for secondary 1 and in the classes we cover both creative writing and comprehension strategies.

Hi TAS

Thank you for your reply.

Is there a website where we can see more details about the course?

Best wishes

[HyperKiasu]

their website is:

http://thealternativestory.blogspot.com/

any parent got any feedback there?

[The Alternative Story]

tianzhu:

The Alternative Story:

Yes we do have English classes for secondary 1 and in the classes we cover both creative writing and comprehension strategies.

Hi TAS

Thank you for your reply.

Is there a website where we can see more details about the course?

Best wishes

Hi Tianzhu,

Yes we have a website and Hyperkiasu has kindly given it. We showcase pictures of our holiday programs to give parents an idea of what to expect for some of our holiday programs. We believe that a picture is worth a thousand words:) In order to understand the methodology that we employ- for example, mnemonic strategies- we also have some write-ups about it on the website.

We do not have the details of each program for the different levels and subjects, if you want to know more specific details for the secondary program, you can email us at [email protected]

You can also join us on Twitter to garner more tips on writing.:)

TAS

[HyperKiasu]

Hi, TAS,


I PMed you. Kindly check…

thanks

[The Alternative Story]

Hi Hyperkiasu,


I have replied you:)

TAS

[The Alternative Story]

Hi Lynn2,


I have read your daughter’s second composition and again it is well-written with good vocabulary, it is really quite excellent. However, it can be improved in one area- it feels a bit stilted. This is because the sentence structure is all rather similar. Instead of starting most of the time with a pronoun like ‘I’, ‘She’, she can use a variety of sentence structures.

One example will be starting with ‘ed’

- Angered, he stomped towards the bully.

Another example will be having a one or two word sentence to punch in the action or heighten the tension.

- He peered anxiously into the darkness. Nothing. There was no one there.

When she uses a variety of sentence structures, it makes her writing more natural and it pulls the reader in more easily as the reader will not feel bored with a similar sentence structure. Although as readers, we do not consciously look out for sentence structures, our mind tends to wander when we are faced with repetition.

TAS