Improve Your Writing Skills and Make Long Sentences in English
we’re back alright hi again everybody my
name is Alisha and today we are here
talking about improving your English
writing but we are having a few
technical problems so I hope that you
are able to clearly watch the stream on
YouTube this week so thanks very much
for your patience we’ve been trying to
fix everything here but I think we’re
gonna have to continue on without our
Facebook watches this week oh no I’m sad
okay so as I’ve said a few times now
today for those of you who have been
watching today we’re talking about
improving your writing so I’m gonna
introduce a sample essay and talk about
the structure of an essay and we’re
gonna get started in just a moment
we’re going on YouTube where you are you
- hi okay good so sorry for all that
stopping and starting but we’re gonna go
just with YouTube today Facebook
I’m sorry facebook viewers sorry guys we
don’t know I don’t know what happened so
let’s get started um couple of things I
wanted to share or know we can I share
anything no we can’t share anything okay
alright I’m just gonna go from over here
then so we’re gonna start today’s lesson
I want to begin with introducing the
basic structure of an essay so when you
are preparing your your text when you’re
preparing the thing you want to write
there are three parts to keep in mind
and those are these three things over
here so structure structure means like
the organization the way that you keep
your information organized so this
number one the first thing is your
introduction your introduction is the
beginning part oh great news our
Facebook watchers are there yeah
everybody’s here this week sorry that’s
a very magical magical things happen I
guess thank you guys thank you technical
to you
okay so you’re just joining on Facebook
today we are talking about improving
your writing I just started here I just
started here so let’s get back into it
so hi face back welcome sorry for the
delay today okay so I was just
explaining the structure the basic
structure of an essay so when we make an
essay we think of an essay in three
parts three parts so as I was explaining
the first part is your introduction so
the introduction to your essay is where
you share what’s called your thesis
statement your thesis statement this is
a word that’s used in like university
level courses your thesis statement
means your main point so like what’s
your opinion or what’s the thing you
want to communicate to the person
reading your essay so that’s called your
thesis statement your thesis statement
it’s very important to have a very clear
thesis statement so that your reader
understands your main point so this is a
key a key vocabulary word for today a
thesis statement okay so in your
introduction then - it’s a good idea to
include a couple other points so like
why are you writing this essay so in
other words like what’s the reason why
should we care why is this topic
important and then another thing to
consider why you why you so this part
when I mean why you I mean why are you
specifically writing this essay so
especially if you’re a university
student or if you’re preparing essays
for like sharing internationally in like
a journal this can be important to
indicate or to share why you personally
are writing this essay writing about
this topic so that’s in your
introduction your introductory section
is about like introducing these
ideas okay the second part part number
two an important keyword for this lesson
is the body the body of the essay so the
body is your main points all of your
main points this means your research
your data your opinions quotes from
other people so all of the things that
support this idea from your introduction
this all of this information is in the
body of your essay this is the biggest
part so this is usually quite a long
section the introduction is fairly short
so the body part is where you share all
of your main ideas like where you’re
sharing your opinions and you’re trying
to convince the other person okay good
his Facebook still okay mysterious okay
so finally the third point is your
conclusion your conclusion so conclusion
means end it’s the finished point for
whatever you’re writing in the
conclusion you need to recap
so to recap means like to cover
something again you summarize all of
your main points you summarize
everything you shared in the body and
you remind your reader of your main like
thesis point your argument your main
idea so these are the three points the
three key parts of an essay typical
English essay okay so those are three
introduction body conclusion and your
main argument so argument doesn’t mean
fight here your argument means the
opinion or the idea you want to
communicate to your reader so those are
the key points for the structure the
structure of your essay okay and then do
I can I share
today’s free things yes I will show it
here okay cool so before I continue on
to the main part of today’s lesson that
sa part I do want to share free stuff
with you guys this week so we don’t have
any big sales anymore
but thank you if you check those out
this week just a quick reminder if you
have not checked it out already we do
have a bunch of free I can’t come around
there can I can I come around here hi
camera we have a bunch of free PDFs
about a bunch of different topics this
one’s about business English I thought
that this one would be good for this
lesson because I know lots of you are
working on improving your English for
your careers or for your studies so this
is English PDF PDF here has lots of
phrases on the back for a business
meeting this says business meaning here
yes but there are some points here that
are really good for discussing like an
idea so discussing an essay so if you
have like a university course or even a
high school course with discussion you
can use some of these phrases for
example like what are your views on this
or I don’t really agree so this is the
business one yes but I think this is
good for like getting some phrases for
just formal discussions too so check
this out you can find this from the link
below the video if you’re watching on
youtube and if Facebook is up you can
find it above the video on Facebook okay
let’s carry on so as I said I don’t know
do we lose our facebook is
facebook.com/paes what’s still there
we don’t know Facebook is mystery today
okay Facebook it’s still there that’s
good okay so today I’m gonna move on
then to the second the big part of
today’s lesson which is an essay so I
prepared an essay Oh someone says Alicia
what is essay oh I keep saying that
expression
de si es si y si an Si and si is a piece
of writing a formal piece of writing we
write essays in high school we write an
essay or a paper in university an essay
that’s the word so not sa but es si why
that’s a piece of writing so I made an
essay today so let’s take a look at it I
have a lot to share with you I’m gonna
move over here okay okay
alright so let’s take a look I want to
first just read the beginning part here
and we’ll go through
each bit piece by piece so first this
part let’s look at this beginning part
so my essay is about smartphones I read
this about smartphones it is the first
line here smartphones while useful
present serious problems in this essay
I’ll talk about the harmful effects of
smartphones I’ll also share some ways to
minimize these effects so this is the
beginning of my essay this part right
here is my introduction so I talked
about the introduction how the
introduction is like the point where you
need to explain your main ideas your
introduction your introduction so I have
a couple points underlined here
so smartphones I have this while useful
while useful so this is a really handy
convenient expression to use while it’s
used to mean even though even though so
I could say even though smartphones are
useful they present serious problems but
that’s quite long so I used this pattern
smartphones , while useful , present
serious problems so we can use these
commas to kind of present a but or an
even though statement
in our writing it’s very quick and very
easy to use second I move on to this
expression I said in this essay or maybe
in this paper so here I’m clearly saying
this is what I’m going to write about so
in this essay I’ll talk about the
harmful effects of smartphones the
harmful effects of smartphones also
please note this is effects with an e we
use effects with an e when we’re talking
about when we’re using it as a noun the
harmful effects of smartphones then I
said I’ll also share some ways to
minimize these effects here I’ve got
also why did I do this because I’m
adding another key point so in my first
sentence here I said I’ll talk about the
harmful effects of smartphones that’s
one my second thing I’ll also share so
also comes before my verb here I’ll also
share some ways to minimize so to
minimize means to make smaller to
minimize these effects so this right
here these refers to harmful effects
these effects so you can see even in
this short introduction I’m connecting
my ideas together so I’m not repeating
the same thing like many times I’m using
words like these for this to refer to
the essay itself so this is my
introduction this is a sample
introduction okay let’s move on to the
next part this next part is big now
let’s read it in a group so first
smartphones affect us negatively in a
number of ways first smartphone use
increases stress levels according to a
survey by the American Psychological
Association people who continually check
their phones report higher stress levels
than those who do it less frequently
I’ll come back to this in a sec
then second checking notifications on
smartphones leads to decreased attention
span if it’s difficult that’s okay
third older workers may be better at
focusing than younger workers simply
because they don’t feel the need for
distraction okay let’s stop here let’s
look at just this part right here let’s
go back to this main are sorry this
first sentence so smartphones first
effect I mentioned this in the
introduction here this is using effect
with an a so effect with an a is used
when the word is being used as a verb
we’re using effect as a verb here so
smartphones effect us us means all
people here affect us negatively in a
number of ways in a number of ways this
is a really useful expression which
means in a lot of different ways or in
various ways so this is a one useful
thing you can do in your writing to show
that there are many possibilities in a
number of ways your preposition is in
here
okay then I’ve underlined a couple
points in this paragraph if you joined
our live stream maybe two or three weeks
ago we talked about sequence words so I
talked about using first next then
second and so on I did it in this
paragraph too so I used first and I used
second and I used third in this
paragraph to introduce three points so
this helps the reader follow along like
okay point number one point number two
point number three so this is really
good to help you organize your ideas
when you’re writing and it helps your
reader understand like the steps as they
are reading okay good um let’s take a
look at this next one I used this
expression which is very very useful for
quotes for data for research
according to so this is the most
important part maybe according to
someone in this case according to a
survey according to a book
according to a report so according to up
or an some kind of reporting or data or
research noun phrase according to this
shows us the reader this communicates
this is not my information I got this
next information from someone else and
this is super super important when you
are writing essays okay alright good so
in this case actually this is real this
is a real source actually according to a
survey by the American Psychological
Association this is true people who
continually check their phones report
higher stress levels than those who do
it less frequently okay so there are
some really important points here this
first these marks this and this so these
are called
it’s hard to see I know those tiny
little marks these are called quotation
marks quotation marks so we put
quotation marks when you’re talking
about information you got from a source
we put quotation marks around the text
that we took directly from the source so
in this case this marks the start and
this marks the finish point of the text
I took from a survey by the American
Psychological Association
so these marks show that this is not my
information this is something I took
from this source then I have to finish
this by showing where I got my
information so if I’m reading this like
paper or this essay and I want to know
where can I read more about this quote
where can I see more information about
this
I look at this thing so this is called
an in-text citation and in-text citation
in-text citation so this shows me there
are many different ways to make a
citation to make an in-text citation
this one uses my favorite which is from
the a style guide a very popular and
commonly used style guide called the
Chicago Manual of style
so for this one we use the author’s name
and the date or the year of publication
the author’s date our author’s name and
the year of publication in this case the
author’s name was bud the year of
publication was 2017 so at the end of my
essay I include a link or I include a
reference to where a person can read
more from this so this is extremely
important if you are a university
student or if you write essays for
publication for journals and so on okay
so let’s continue on so I mentioned this
second and third thing here and then I
want to go on to the next paragraph so
we’ve connected some ideas here
introduced some reasons or rather we
introduced some harmful effects of
smartphones and then here I talked about
something else a little different so
let’s take a look I said to practice
building focus studies recommend reading
books also make a smart phone smart
phone free time every day lastly users
can check their usage habits with
monitoring tools on their phones okay so
a few points I want to look at here to
practice building focus so a lot of
people ask like how do I know when I
should use the infinitive to plus verb
or the gerund form the ing form of the
verb using to
this year to practice building focus
think of this infinitive form as meaning
in order to in order to practice
building focus if that makes sense
then it sounds natural to use this
infinitive form here so the gerund form
doesn’t have that feel in this case
we’re talking about doing something like
there’s a reason there’s a purpose the
purpose is to build focus so we
recommend reading books so this is a
pretty good way to understand when to
use the infinitive or the gerund form
okay then on to this point I mentioned
this in the introduction as well this
also so I’m adding a point this sounds a
little better than and also in this case
sounds a little bit more it sounds a
little nicer in text so some people have
some very strict teachers maybe it will
tell you don’t use and at the beginning
of a sentence in informal speech in
informal writing it’s okay I personally
prefer also in something like this okay
um onward to this ah this next point
this is a really small point but I hope
that it helps you a lot in your writing
I know we can’t zoom in today but
there’s this tiny mark right here this
this is called a - a - or a - but
technically a - I have it here with
smartphone free time this is really
important to use when you need to
closely connect to words so in this case
smartphone free smartphone free means
time with no smartphone so why is this
important why is this - important if I
don’t have this - it looks like
smartphone free time and that doesn’t
really make any sense you might confuse
the person reading so when you need to
show a close connection like that
between two words like smartphone and
maybe don’t usually connect but it’s
important to connect them you can do
that with a - so this is a more advanced
writing point but this can be very
useful for making your writing a little
more clear okay let’s go on to the next
point I have to finish singing now I
introduced the last point here in my
body section with the expression lastly
lastly that means finally lastly users
can check their usage habits with
monitoring tools on their phones so this
part right here this is my body the body
of my essay this is the body of my essay
so it introduces all the main points
everything that I want to communicate to
support this argument this idea I
introduced at the beginning I put
everything in here I put it all in here
okay all right let’s go on to the next
part then so the conclusion the
conclusion part of this essay is
beginning with this expression down here
hard to see I think but it says in some
in some in some is like a short way of
saying in summary so to summarize
something means to put everything
together in a short easy-to-understand
way in some in some in some although
they are convenient and entertaining we
should all be aware of how smartphones
are affecting us negatively we should
take steps to ensure we minimize these
effects so we can lead well-balanced
lives okay a couple points here so this
part although they are convenient and
entertaining we should all be aware of
how smartphones are affecting us so this
they is connected to smartphones
they refers to smartphones so this part
right here underlined in red this is
like one big even though statement this
is very similar to the pattern I used in
the introduction here so while useful
here I used even though they’re
convenient so we can use this to show
kind of contrasting ideas in our writing
so you’re using while or even though
although and to so on ah some of a
couple of you wrote in the chat in some
yeah it’s in I n space some s um in some
or to summarize in some even so yeah ex
Caesar and the YouTube chat you have it
nice okay um so finally I ended this
with this part right here we should we
should so we should is a way to give a
recommendation so it’s like saying these
are this is what I think is the best
thing this is the next step okay so you
might see some some sa some articles
that finished with a recommendation or
they talk about like the next steps in
their research so this is quite informal
we should in a more formal essay you
might see like recommended next steps
are like the recommended next steps are
a B and C so actually this essay is
fairly informal I made this a fairly
casual essay but you can use the same
kinds of things the same sorts of things
to make your essay as well so this part
down here this is my conclusion
my conclusion point down here so this is
a really quick introduction really to
the basic structure of an essay
introduction body conclusion in my
conclusion I talked about my main point
again up here so as you write you can
revise so to revise means to rewrite
like to check things and write them
again angel this is somewhat formal yeah
this is
somewhat this is how we write a paper
how we write essays in English sir Khan
yes
to sum up yeah it is like to sum up so
to sum up yes you could use that to sum
up is used more in a meeting though I
feel we don’t use to sum up so much in
writing we use in sum or in summary more
in writing Selva thesis your thesis
statement is like your main point your
main argument your main idea that’s your
opinion your focus opinion okay good can
I use a great point Nickerson long time
no see can you use reductions like aisle
in an essay great question uh in this
case I used it here because it’s a
fairly informal essay if you’re writing
a formal essay I prefer I recommend not
to I recommend not using contractions
maybe when you’re presenting data like
the research showed we didn’t succeed in
this or this was some yes you can maybe
use it when you present data but I
personally don’t do that okay finally I
did want to mention a little bit about
citations but we’re kind of out of time
I will just say again if you want to
know more about citations you can check
style guides my favorite is the Chicago
Manual of style it’s good for like books
novels social sciences if you are
interested in journalism
you should try The Associated Press
style guide that’s great for newspapers
and other journalists other things are
the MLA style guide the Modern Language
Association style guide that’s good for
Humanities so those are three style
guides my favorite is Chicago Chicago
Manual of style that’s a great resource
and advanced resource if you’re
interested but I have to go for today
unfortunately so I hope that this lesson
was useful it was like a useful kind of
sample that shows you how to connect
your ideas and gives you the basic
floo for your writing so if you have
questions of course please do send them
in the chat please do send in the
YouTube chat I think we lost Facebook
today is too bad and then uh let’s see
what else do I need to do uh yeah if you
haven’t checked it out we do have free
stuff for you as always so please check
out the link below the video on YouTube
to get a bunch of free PDFs I showed the
business one earlier but there are lots
and lots of different topics so there’s
shopping ones and Hobby related ones
there’s food as well so please take a
look at this below the video the link is
below the video okay so I’ll finish
there we will be back again next week
next week’s live stream will be about
the third conditional the third
conditional a lot of you have asked
about this the third conditional is for
example if I had or if I hadn’t that
kind of thing
unreal situations so we’ll talk about
that next week please join us next week
9:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time
Wednesday evening that’s New York City
time so please check it out that should
be a good one a challenging one for some
of you I think so we’ll finish there for
this week thank you as always for
watching and liking and sharing we
really appreciate it
enjoy the rest of your week and I will
see you again soon bye