Week 4: Effects of Global Warming- Critical Reading

How will Earth's warming climate affect humanity's ability to feed itself? Effects of Global Warming!..

Please read the text, starting on the left and then on the right, and answer the following question.

1. Remembering the previous text we read in class on Monday and the author's factual but optimistic view on the future of our world, How does this text see the future of humanity:

a. purely pessimistic

b. very optimistic

c. complicated and pessimistic

d. complicated but optimistic

Response Questions
1. What does the most widely cited mean?
2. What are the two negative effects of temperature rise in developing countries?
3. What characteristic of the human being makes Rosenzweig hopeful about the future?
4. What’s the author’s impression about Rosenzweig?
5. What is your impression about Rosenzweig? She talks about winners and losers in her scenario about the future. As someone among the winners (living in a developed country), would she still be optimistic if she were living in a developing country?

Critical Reading
1. Why has this text been written?
2. What is this text about?
3. To whom is this text addressed?
4. How is the topic written about? (formal, informal, informative, report, in academic format)
5. What other ways of writing about this topic are there?

Vocabulary Focus

If you were asked to write an essay on the effects of global warming on the world's food resources, how would you organize your essay, and how would you consider using any of these words taken from the text?

2k families: afford_[1] agriculture_[1] caution_[1] chair_[1] cheer_[1] complicate_[2] crop_[4] decrease_[1] during_[1] elder_[1] especial_[1] essential_[1] forward_[1] frequent_[1] govern_[1] hunger_[2] inform_[1] international_[2] model_[5] probable_[1] pump_[1] rain_[1] scale_[1] temperature_[1] tool_[1] trap_[2] warm_[4]

AWL families: adapt_[1] affect_[2] assume_[2] challenge_[1] cite_[1] compute_[2] consume_[1] create_[2] data_[1] decade_[1] economy_[1] energy_[1] estimate_[2] factor_[1] globe_[4] insight_[1] institute_[1] major_[1] negate_[1] panel_[1] parameter_[1] policy_[2] project_[1] research_[1] respond_[1] scenario_[1] sustain_[1] topic_[1]

OFF types: atmosphere_[1] boost_[1] carbon_[1] catastrophe_[1] climate_[6] co_[1] collaborators_[2] credible_[1] dioxide_[1] disrupts_[1] droughts_[1] enthusiasm_[1] feed_[1] greenhouse_[1] huge_[1] humanity_[1] impetus_[1] irrigation_[1] latitudes_[2] levers_[1] optimistic_[1] pessimistic_[2] planet_[2] policymakers_[1] temperate_[1] tropics_[2] vulnerable_[1] worsening_[1] zone

Week 4: Cause&Effect- Eda's Essay

factors that lead to failure at university
COMING FAILURES WITH UNIVERSITY LIFE



Each student wants to be successful in their lessons. So, students compete with each other for passing the university exam. After they have entered university, they have many problems like having and wrong friendship. These are most common problems and they may cause to failure at university. [good, clear TS]

First problem is having responsibility. Responsibility is very important and difficult for students especially at university. For most of students live alone, they have to do all their works on their own. For example; they have to cook, clean their house. At the same time, they have to study hard. So, they have to be aware of their responsibility. If a student does not know his/her responsibility, his/her life will become complex and s/he becomes unsuccessful. [good, an if clause used to illustrate cause-effect relation]

Second problem is wrong friendships. University students, especially new comers, want to have a friend. Since they feel lonely, they need to talk with somebody, but some students could be unsuccessful because of bad friendship [you mean bad friends?].They can't understand if they do something which is good or bad because they have few friends [?; not very clear]. So, they do not want to lose them. [and what do they do, and how does this cause them to fail?]

In conclusion, there are many factors which cause to [cause failure, or cause students to failure]failure at university, but most common and most negative factors are having responsibility and wrong friendship. If students will [gr] give importance in having responsibility and
friendship, they will be more successful at university. [maybe you can suggest some advice here about how students should handle responsibility and be careful when choosing friends...]

Eda,
Good essay; clear thesis statement and topic sentences in the body paragraphs... Your paragraphs can be made longer with more discussion of the point and with more examples and evidence. And in the conclusion you could have suggested further advice...
Thanks
ps. You can also chect your essay's LFP (lexical frequency profile) on the lextutor.ca website. would be interesting to see if your essay is lexically rich enough...

Week 4: Cause&Effect- Anil's Essay

factors that lead to failure at university
UNIVERSITY LIFE AND FAILURES


All students want to go to university because all of them think that being a university student will change their personal status for their future life. I was also thinking like them, but i understood that it is not really like that because university life is the worst life which a person can have. Students at university search for somebody to talk, share, etc…, they have some problems with their house, dormitory, etc… and they have some responsibilities for themselves. [Nice hook and background; where is your TS?, what is the main focus of your essay?]

First, students need somebody to talk or share something with that person. As you know, a person, who is either a student or not a student, needs to share his\her feelings with anybody [somebody?]. So, it is a necessity for people. For a student doesn’t have anybody at university or the place in which university is in there [?; what you mean here is not very clear]. Therefore; people have a feeling to do whatever his\her friends want to do. If they have something which damages the person, even they know it is wrong they continue to do it because their friend(s) do that. So, friendship is very important for a student at university. [Your focus is not very clear in this paragraph; if this is a cause-effect essay, and if this paragraph is the first cause leading to failure, you need to state it clearly with a topic sentence somewhere in the paragraph! So, what is your main point here? So are you saying that being with wrong friends or having no friends to talk to leads to failure?..]

Second, students have many problems for finding a house, dormitory, etc… Even if they find a place to stay, they can still have some problems with that place. If they stay in dormitory, they may have problem with voice, [noise?] etc… For example; Ali has an exam tomorrow and he is studying. However, his neighbour is listening music loudly. This affects Ali negatively. It is a simple example for a student. [ok, good support and examples to what you are saying, but state the factor clearly, like The second factor that may contribute to failure is the problems a student experiences where s/he stays]

Also, students should have their own responsibilty because they don’t have anyone who will help them to cook, clean and so on… While students are in high- school, they don’t do anything for their house. So, they have big problem with their own house. They have to do everything themselves. [again, good examples to illustrate, but what is the main point here? Is it that the weight of responsibility is too much for some sts and they cannot handle it and this causes them to fail their studies...?]

In conclusion, students should really care about themselves. Also, they should think for not only themselves but for their family, relatives and country. They should be interested in only studying hard. Other things should be thought later. By doing this, students can be successful.

Anil,
Good ideas you have, but instead of saying them explicitly, you are expecting the reader to infer what you mean from the examples you give. For a more effective essay, you need to state a clear thesis statement giving the main idea of the essay, and firm topic sentences for each paragraph. Please revise your essay, and post it again.
Thanks

Week4: Cause&Effect- Quiz 1 POSTPONED

Dear class,
The first quiz we were supposed to have on Wednesday has been postponed to next Monday, 2nd hour (March 17 at 9:30) in class.
Thanks.

Week 4: Global warming- Tasks Answer Key

Dear all,

On the left and below are the keys to task sheets we did in class. The one on the left is the cause&effect language, and the one below is the referencial questions. Click on the images to see them larger.

Thanks,

Week 4: Cause & Effect- CemileGul's Essay

factors that lead to failure in college

The feeling of failure in college is a great obstacle that hinders students' education. Students need to get rid of these types of feelings, because these lead to failure in their education. The most three important of them are ; lack of motivation and attitude, educational backgraund [sp]and insufficient material. [nice intro, and clear TS]

First, lack of motivation is one of the most important reasons of failure in college. Otherwise, many problems and questions may appear in their [whose?] mind. For example;'' how am l feeling while learning?'', ''Am l generally positive coming to class?'' , ''do l feel friendly or hostile towards the culture?'', ''what is my attitude to teachers?'' If a student asks these types of questions to himself/herself, this means that the student is not well-motivated. This shows that these questions cause the student to fail in their college life [is it these qs or answers, or no answers, that cause failure?] . To sum up [use a different phrase (e.g. in short); use this in a conclusion paragraph], motivation and attitude have a special place in preventing students from feeling of failure. Clearly, special efforts will have to be made to students who have negative attitudes [by whom and how?]. [your paragraph starts well, but you need to support it better with more specific evidence and examples...]

Next, lack of educational background is the second factor that causes failures in college. The primary education is very important, as the content of the class will be different, because each student has different educational background and different degree of knowledge. These differences [may] cause failure , because if a student does not have [a] well developed educational background, then the student [use a substitute here; e.g. she or he] may be depressed and may fell [feel?] inferior. At the same time, educational experiences of students are important. Some students who have been previously unsuccessful may need more encouragement than usual. The style of their previous learning is also important . These are the reasons of having unsuccessful education; the absence of these can cause failure. [good; this paragrah reads better in terms of presenting the factor and giving evidence of how it may lead to failure...]

Finally, lack of materials is the last factor that causes failure. ln order to be successful, materials are very vital. Suppose that a college student who is studying architecture can not pass the courses without the necessary materials. As they create their projects with materials, it is not possible to be successful [what? having the materials or not having them?]. Another example is that an ELT student who is taking vocabulary lesson can face with [maye be omitted] difficulties , if he/she does not have any dictionary. Because of these reasons lack of materials can cause failure in college education.

In conclusion, lack of motivation and attitude, lack of educational background and absence of materials are the most important causes of failure. In order to be successful, students should be able to tackle with these types of problems. [how? here is the opportunity for you talk a bit more about what precautions sts can take to tackle these problems; you can suggest further solutions here...]

Cemile,

Nice essay with strong ideas; your essay is also rich in terms of advanced vocab use (as we observed from the Lexical Frequency Profile (LFP) software.

Take my comments into consideration, and please revise your essay. You can post the revised version on the web.

Thanks