CLAUSES🎅🎅

⚛️An Independent clause can stand by itself. It is a group of words that contains a subject and verb and expresses a complete thought. An independent clause IS a sentence.

⚛️A Dependent clause cannot stand by itself. It does not express a complete thought. A dependent clause IS NOT a sentence.

 

CLAUSES

🧃An adjective clause is a subordinate clause that describes a noun or pronoun.
e.g

• The purse that she gave me is so cute.
  
• I lived in a town where everyone was tall.
  

 
🧃An adverb clause is a subordinate or dependent clause that modifies a verb adjective or an adverb.
e.g

• If it rains tomorrow, we will cancel the trip.
  
• Everleigh bought toys after her dance class.

🧃 A noun clause is a subordinate clause used as a noun. It can be used as a subject, a direct object, an indirect object, object of a preposition or a predicate noun.
e.g

• I am going to buy whatever she likes.
  
• He had nothing to do with what I did.

Cause and effect 👩‍💻

1. Because of the pandemic going on, lots of students are having online classes.

2. Social distancing has become a general rule to avoid spreading the virus. Therefore, everyone has to be 6ft away from other people out in public.

3. Covid-19 has proven to be a deadly virus that led the high-risk population group to be afraid and stressed about their health.

4. No one wants to become infected, so I have not seen my relatives in months.

5. Due to the mandatory use of facial masks, many people have learned how to make them themselves.

Practice 13 and 14. 🍨

r e s p o n s e e s s a y 📝

This essay was written by Ariela Cubillo and Mary Angel Brenes as a response to Alfie Kohn' essay "Kids may be right after all: homework stinks"

 Outline

Thesis statement:  Homework has no place in education as it lacks any proof of their benefits and actually has provided students with negative experiences rather than positive experiences. 

I. Teachers and parents believe that lots of homework is equal to successful education which is not true.  

1. No evidence that homework has to do something with students' success. 

1. It will not teach responsibility as the myth exposes. 

2. Excuse of teachers to make students “learn” by themselves

1. No matter the outcome of classes, homework will make them learn

II.  Homework provides students with negative experiences rather than positive experiences. 

1. Constant assignments steal time from children to be children.

1. Kids do homework for hours before having permission to play

2. Amount and purpose of homework has created a negative connotation around it.

1. Added value means stress, anxiety and many more negative feelings

Conclusion: Homework should be banned from schools as what is known right now because there is no evidence of any benefit rather disadvantages.

The Overestimation of Homework

School is where children spend the most part of their days; almost all daylight, you will find kids in an institution learning about all sorts of things. After the day is over, they go home just to face homework, topics that they already saw and discussed in class but supposedly need to review and practice again alone.  However, Alfie Kohn talks numerous times in his article “Kids might be right after all: homework stinks¨ how the existence of homework has basically no fundament. He talks about the non-existent data that supports the need of homework for kids throughout all of their educational life and its consequences. Homework has no place in education as it lacks any proof of their benefits and actually has provided students with negative experiences rather than positive experiences. 

Since a long time ago, teachers and parents believe that lots of homework is equal to successful education; however, they need to change their minds because that belief is actually false.  It is not fair to affirm that homework will help students to succeed in life when there is no evidence that homework has to do something with that. In his article, Alfie Kohn points out that there is no evidence that homework has to do something with achievements or if it is vital or helpful. People keep thinking that homework “raises achievement, teaches independence and good work habits” (164 ) but its non-existent proof says otherwise.  Homework will not teach responsibility as the myth exposes and it will not have an influence in the personal development of students;  in fact, only they can have it, with their effort and their responsibility sense. The amount of assignments that students make will not create a big difference, homework will not help students in their attitude changes, they are the only who can decide if they want to be responsible or not.  Also, it is not possible to have a successful education with a lot of homework when professors use it as an excuse to make students “learn” by themselves regardless of their performance as teachers. There are instructors that do not care about whether students learn or not  in class. They just wait for students to do homework and learn on their own to complete the assignments. That way,  their ineffectiveness is solved by how much homework they can leave. The belief that homework will create successful students does not have a scientific basis, for that reason it is not  accurate to think the more homework assigned and done the more success gained.

Around the globe, there is plenty of evidence that homework provides students with negative experiences rather than positive experiences.  Since the beginning of their academic life at the age of 5/6 all the way up through at least highschool kids have homework almost daily;  this constant pile of assignments steals time from children to be actually children. Parents are taught by society the rule of homework being the most important and first thing that kids have to do when home, leaving completely aside time to play, recreate and pick up hobbies. This practice robs kids from their mornings, afternoons, evenings and even nights. After a minimum of 4 hours in school they get home to go more hours of school. Homework in reality provides students with stress and negative emotions against learning as it takes a great portion of children lives away in exchange for a number. Most of the time, homework has a numeric value which functions as a threat for students. Indeed, assignments have lost the initial purpose of it as practice and have become a method to evaluate students' capacity to work over pressure and finish tasks. This leaves aside the quality of it or the knowledge acquired, as learners are forced to work for a score rather than learn. Because of this, there is proof as Kohn mentions that homework only effect is “more negative attitudes on the part of students who get more assignments”. (164) Feelings like excessive stress, anxiety and fear of failure are more and more present among students each day while assignments increase.

As expressed, kids primary activity has become school and only school. Regardless of the constant lack of data on the effectiveness of homework, teachers and professors keep leaving it persistently to pass on their job.  The educational stress is making students every day more frustrated and creating an unhealthy relationship with standardized school-knowledge. For professors it's basically just a way to excuse poor performance or delegate responsibilities without taking into account the repercussions in the students’ mental health.  Alfie Kohn has exposed very clear the reasons why kids are possibly right about the bad aspects of homework. Thus, homework should be banned from schools as what is known right now because there is no evidence of any benefit rather disadvantages.

Kohn, A. (2006). Kids May Be Right After All: Homework Stinks. USA Today. Recovered from www.alfiekohn.org

A podcast? 🎙️📻

This time, a classmate Ariela and I tried something different! The following video is about some topics regarding the book "Writers at Work". 

We talked about a response essay of the article "The end of privacy" by Adam Penenberg! Also gave information and opinions on the article "Kids May Be Right After All: Homework Stinks"  by Alfie Kohn!

As non-native speakers, there are plenty of mistakes in this video, we ask cordially to understand that we are learning. 😌

This is the chart that we talked about at the very beginning: 

Sources of identity theft

Video:

EMBEDDED Qs🤨❔

I made this short video about the topic (fun fact: i love PowerPoint) Select HD!                   

5 RULES FOR EMBEDDED QUESTIONS

Rule One

If the embedded question is part of a statement, use a period and not a question mark at the end of the sentence. Also, if the question is in the present or past simple verb tense, omit the auxiliary verbs do, does, and did and change the verb to its appropriate form, as in the example below.

Direct Question: What time did he leave? 

Embedded Question: I wonder what time he left.

Rule Two

If the embedded question includes an auxiliary verb or the verb "to be", reverse the positions of the subject and the auxiliary verb, as in the examples below.

Direct Question: What did he say?

Embedded Question: Could you tell me what he said?

Direct Question: Can you help me?

Embedded Question: I wonder if you could help me.

Direct Question: Is he a doctor?

Embedded Question: Do you know if he is a doctor?

Rule Three

Do not use a verbal contraction at the end of the sentence.

Direct Question: Where is she?

Correct Embedded: Question Do you know where he is?

Incorrect Embedded: Question Do you know where he's?

Rule Four

Embedded questions are introduced by whether, whether or not, and if when there is no question word in the sentence (yes/no questions).

Direct Yes/No Question: Will he be there?

Embedded Question: Do you know if he will be there?

                                   Do you know whether or not he will be there?

                                   Do you know whether he will be there or not?

Rule Five

The infinitive can follow a question word or whether in embedded questions, as in the following example.

Direct Question: What should I do?

Embedded Question: Please tell me what I should do.

Embedded Question with an Infinitive: Please tell me what to do.

NOUN CLAUSES🤠

A noun clause is a group of words acting together as a noun. These clauses are always dependent clauses (they do not form a complete sentence).

How to spot a noun clause? Look for these words (conjunctions)

⛭How, That, What, Whatever, When, Where, Whether, Which, Whichever, Who, Whoever, Whom, Whomever, Why

Example:

• I know that it happened.
• I know how it happened.
• I know why it happened.

Noun clauses act as different parts within a sentence! 

As subjects, direct objects, objects of the preposition, and predicate nouns.

NOUN CLAUSES AS SUBJECTS

Pizza is fine with me.

Whatever they want is fine with me.

NOUN CLAUSES AS DIRECT OBJECTS

Can you tell me the place?

Can you tell where it is the place for lunch?

NOUN CLAUSES AS OBJECTS OF THE PREPOSITION

I asked about Elise.

I askes about why Elise hate those boys.

NOUN CLAUSES AS PREDICATE NOUNS

Happiness is a cold beer.

Happiness is whatever just came out of the freezer. 

TRANSITIVE AND INTRANSITIVE VERBS 🕘

Transitive verbs are action verbs that have an object to receive that action. They transfer the action from the subject (the person or thing that does the action) to an object (the thing that has the action done to it).

Formula: 

Subject + transitive verb + object 

       I     +          love         +   you!

How can you know if a verb is Transitive and needs an object? 

Besides the use of a dictionary, use this simple trick:
If the idea that you want to explain in English can answer the questions "Who?" or "What?", your verb is transitive!

Intransitive verbs are the ones that do not have an object receiving the action. Usually, intransitive verbs are verbs that have to deal with movement of bodies or things  through space ( the environment). So they often instead of taking an object they use prepositional phrases, adverbs or nothing at all.

If you ask "Who?" or "What?" and there is not an answer to the question that means that there's not an object, ergo, an intransitive verb!

Formula: 

Subject + intransitive verb

    He    +     ran 

 *Even if the sentence is followed by "across the street" it still doesn't answer the question who or what.

♍This topic is quite easy once you get the hang of it, having in mind the tip of "Who" and "what" and practicing constantly is the key! IMO, grammar is not the most exciting or fun part of learning but I know the importance of it. For that reason you need to practice extremely often, to not forget things and to reassure yourself of what you know!
               

PUNCTUATION MARKS ❔❕

  

Punctuation has the role if helping to fully understand ideas making them easier to read. Punctuation symbols usually have vey simple rules to use them correctly!

There are actually 14 of them! 

*The period, question mark, exclamation point, comma, semicolon, colon, dash, hyphen, parentheses, brackets, braces, apostrophe, quotation marks, and ellipsis. 

Some of the most used symbols are:

💜The period: primarily used to indicate the end of a sentence. It appears as a single dot on the bottom line of the text, and it comes immediately after the last word of the sentence without a space.
💜The comma:  indicates a small break, it separates words, clauses, or ideas within a sentence.

💜The Semicolon: is to join two independent clauses without using a conjunction like and.

💜The colon: is used to separate two independent clauses when the second explains or illustrates the first

💜The question mark: is used in writing at the end of a phrase or sentence to show that it is a question.

💜The exclamation mark:  is used after an interjection or exclamation to indicate strong feelings or high volume (shouting), or to show emphasis, and often marks the end of a sentence.

♍ This is interesting! It is always nice when you get a text and understand everything because is well-written. 👽 

FANBOYS👦

lemme ✨𝓮𝓷𝓵𝓲𝓰𝓱𝓽𝓮𝓷 𝔂𝓸𝓾✨

Those are conjugations: words that connect other words, phrases, or sentences.  There are three types of conjugations: 

🔮Coordinating Conjunctions: join two words, phrases, or independent clauses, which are parallel in structure.

🔮Correlative Conjunctions: to show a contrast or to compare the equal parts of a sentence.

🔮Subordinating Conjunctions: joins elements of an unparallel sentence structure. These elements are usually a dependent clause and an independent clause.

FANBOYS is an acronym for the coordinating conjunctions: for, and, nor, but, or, yet and so!

                                                                                                     

                                                                         

♍ Mnemonic techniques are a blessing. The use of acronyms is a cool and easy way to learn and remember, specially with kids!

SENTENCE PATTERNS👀

 For this topic I made this!

♍This topic is extremely confusing to me, to master this you really need a lot of practice, reading and patience! 

FRAGMENTS AND RUN-ONS🧩🏃‍♀️

A complete sentence has three components:

1. A subject (the actor in the sentence)
2. A predicate (the verb or action)
3. A complete thought (it can stand alone and make sense—it’s independent

FRAGMENTS🧩

A fragment is an incomplete sentence because is missing one of these parts.

Example: 

Began 30 minutes ago.  (What began?

We've got a predicate but no subject, this is a fragment.

THE MOVIE BEGAN 30 MINUTES AGO.

That is a sentence!

A tip form the University of North Carolina: 

How do you find and fix your fragments? Remember the basics: subject, verb, and complete thought. If you can recognize those things, you’re halfway there. Then, scan your sentences for subordinating conjunctions. If you find one, first identify the whole chunk of the dependent clause (the subject and verb that go with the subordinator), and then make sure they’re attached to an independent clause.

RUN-ONS🏃

A run-on sentence is when you write two complete sentences but they are connected improperly (without using a coordinating conjunction or proper punctuation).

Example:

 I love to write papers I would write one every day if I had the time.

How to fix them?

Use a period: 

I love to write papers. I would write one every day if I had the time.

Use a semicolon: 

 I love to write papers; I would write one every day if I had the time.

Use a subordinating conjunction: 

Because I love to write papers, I would write one every day if I had the time.

♍Fragments and run-ons seem like beginner problems, but they happen more often than you think! Always check what you write, look for this kind of mistakes.

I know for a fact that I will screw texts up with these. 😗✌