College ESL Writers – Applied Grammar and Composing Strategies for Success (Hall and Wallace)

Writing is often a challenge, especially when you are writing in a second language. If you ever felt challenged to express yourself via the written word and in particular, in another language, this book is for you. We encourage you to explore it, use the exercises as opportunities to learn new skills, and most of all, to be successful in your achievement of your course objectives and goals. This text is available free online and is the result of the dedication of many professionals who share the common goal of increasing access to educational materials for all students. Please thank your instructor for choosing an open source text!

College ESL Writers: Applied Grammar and Composing Strategies for Success provides instruction in steps, builds writing, reading, and critical thinking, and combines comprehensive grammar review with an introduction to paragraph writing and academic essay composition.

Beginning with the sentence and its essential elements, this book addresses each concept with clear, concise, and effective examples that are immediately reinforced with exercises and opportunities to demonstrate learning. Each chapter that follows allows students to demonstrate mastery of the principles of quality writing. With its incremental approach, this book can address a range of writing levels and abilities, helping students prepare for the next writing or university course. Constant reinforcement is provided through examples and exercises, and the text involves students in the learning process through reading of student samples, problem solving, and practicing the writing process.

Each chapter also has integrated examples that unify the discussion and form a common, easy-to-understand basis for discussion and exploration. We are hoping that this will put students at ease and allow for greater understanding and demonstration of mastery of the material. Tips for effective writing are included in every chapter as well. These exercises are especially helpful for working with groups of students. Clear exercises teach sentence and paragraph writing skills that lead to common English composition and documents.

Imagine you are reading a book for school. You need to find important details that you can use for an assignment. However, when you begin to read, you notice that the book has very little punctuation. Sentences fail to form complete paragraphs and instead form one block of text without clear organization. Most likely, this book would frustrate and confuse you. Without clear and concise sentences, it is difficult to find the information you need.

For both students and professionals, clear communication is important. Whether you are typing an e-mail or writing a report, it is your responsibility to present your thoughts and ideas clearly and precisely. Writing in complete sentences is one way to ensure that you communicate well. This section covers how to recognize and write basic sentence structures and how to avoid some common writing errors.