My road to CPE

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Ольга
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My road to CPE

Postby Ольга » Sun Jul 09, 2017 1:41 pm

This topic is dedicated my preparation for CPE and the Output Challenge 2018.

It is my beautiful plan of preparation for CPE (created 09.01.2018):
January: Use of English and Reading
Lexical Cloze, Open Cloze, Word Formation, Transformations, Multiple Choice Text, Gapped Text, Multiple Matching.

February: Listening
Multiple Choice, Sentence Completion, Multiple Choice, Multiple Matching.

March: Use of English and Reading
Lexical Cloze, Open Cloze, Word Formation, Transformations, Multiple Choice Text, Gapped Text, Multiple Matching.

April: Listening
Multiple Choice, Sentence Completion, Multiple Choice, Multiple Matching.

May: Use of English and Reading
Lexical Cloze, Open Cloze, Word Formation, Transformations, Multiple Choice Text, Gapped Text, Multiple Matching.

June: Writing and Speaking
Interview, 2-way conversation, Long Turn, Essay, Article, Letter, Report, Review.

July: Writing and Speaking
Interview, 2-way conversation, Long Turn, Essay, Article, Letter, Report, Review.

August: Writing and Speaking
Interview, 2-way conversation, Long Turn, Essay, Article, Letter, Report, Review.

September: Use of English and Reading
Lexical Cloze, Open Cloze, Word Formation, Transformations, Multiple Choice Text, Gapped Text, Multiple Matching.


To be continued.
Last edited by Ольга on Mon Jan 08, 2018 9:20 pm, edited 4 times in total.
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Output Challenge 2018
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Words: 4732 / 50000

Ольга
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby Ольга » Sun Jul 09, 2017 2:04 pm

Does anybody know how to work on a native's corrections?
How to train the right variant and understand why my variant is not right?
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Output Challenge 2018
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Words: 4732 / 50000

aaleks
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby aaleks » Sun Jul 09, 2017 4:40 pm

My favourite movies, which I watched when I was a youngster, [differs –you should have “differ” here because you are talking about movies not one movie] greatly.

Well, I think, this correction is a quite obvious :)
and this:
All in all, it seems to me that such a director as him is the [expert – ok but seems slightly obscure in this context also consider “master”] of his work.

It's like in Russian "эксперт своего дела" vs "мастер своего дела". The first sounds strange in both languages, I guess.
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Ольга
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby Ольга » Sun Jul 09, 2017 4:48 pm

aaleks wrote:
My favourite movies, which I watched when I was a youngster, [differs –you should have “differ” here because you are talking about movies not one movie] greatly.

Well, I think, this correction is a quite obvious :)
and this:
All in all, it seems to me that such a director as him is the [expert – ok but seems slightly obscure in this context also consider “master”] of his work.

It's like in Russian "эксперт своего дела" vs "мастер своего дела". The first sounds strange in both languages, I guess.

Yes, this is understandable, what about other things?
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Cavesa
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby Cavesa » Sun Jul 09, 2017 6:26 pm

I hope you won't find it too daring, if I try to give you some input on some of the corrections. I am not native and know only very little of Russian, but I know what it is to struggle with writing, and I think I can see some of the troubles. And I wonder what would your native do, if use of the word "obscure" suddenly became illegal :-D

There is no doubt in my mind that every person has their [optional consider adding “own”] favourite book, film, and actor or actress. However, few would be able to surely say who their favourite film director is.
The problem here might be свой and его́ distinction, we have it in Czech too. "Their own" is the most precise equivalent of svůj or свой, especially when you are putting emphasis on it.

Nowadays, with a great variety of movies and series which are released [month by month – ok but obscure here consider “every month”], it is extremely difficult to opt for something.

I think what your native is trying to say is the fact that month by month, or day by day, or year by year, carries a different emotion than daily, monthy, every day, every month. The later options are more neutral, just descriptions. I would say month by month or day by day evoke some boring hardships you need to struggle against day by day.

Natives, am I wrong here?

And I wonder, wouldn't "which are being released" be appropriate here? Now I am trully asking, not suggesting.

Why would I choose the American film director, when we have lots of distinguished Russian, German, French, and Italian directors [and – ok but here consider “as well as”] those from other countries? Why do I adore him and his [works – ok but “works” is a bit obscure but correct. Consider “work”]?

I think there are more options here. To the first part: either you can use the "as well as those from other countries", or perhaps shorter and less repetitive would be "Why would I choose the American film director, when we have lots of distinguished ones from Russia, Germany, France, Italy, and other countries?

Work vs. Works: French equivalents. ses oeuvres=his works, son travail=his work. Both should be correct here, each is slightly different.

First of all, Steven Spielberg [works in the most different fields – ok but I’m not sure how accurate/natural that is here. Consider “directs films of different genres”. To me, if someone works in different fields it might mean for example they are an actor, director, scriptwriter and dancer, or do lots of things. ].
I agree that "works in the most different fields" seems to refer more to having various jobs. And "the most different" makes me think of Spielberg being a director, a surgeon, and a plumber. :-) I would also use the word "various" instead of different. This link looks good: https://english.stackexchange.com/quest ... -different I would say "different" is about comparing stuff. "Various" is about a heterogenous group.

His career thrives mostly because he shoots lots of entertaining, showy, and gaudy films, [and - correct however as you are about to change the tone (from praising him to criticising him) I think it would be better if you replaced it with “however”] many people consider him as [consider adding “just” here for effect] another creator of frivolous movies. However, Spielberg managed to shoot many serious, thoughtful pictures.
yes, I agree however would be better than and. You could also consider spliting the long sentence in two "....and gaudy films. However..." and one of the "however" in this part could be changed for "nevertheless", which is slightly more formal, and you'd avoid repeating the word.

The film director [could succeed – correct but consider replacing both words with “succeeded”] in so many [fields – see above about fields. Consider replacing with “genres”] that I cannot doubt [in –remove this] his talent. [From my point of view – ok but I prefer “In my opinion”], Spielberg is the master of cinema art. The obvious conclusion to be drawn is that Steven Spielberg is the film director, whose movies I eagerly watch. All in all, it seems to me that such a director as him is the [expert – ok but seems slightly obscure in this context also consider “master”] of his work. He may obviously be considered as a keen specialist in his area. I adore, respect and love him and his pictures.
I agree about succeeded and doubt. Why are you probably being recommended "in my opinion": I think it is the position you are looking at him and his carreer from. You are a fan, not a pro. I would say "point of view" would be more appropriate from an actor, from another director, from a journalist. Am I correct, natives?

I hope some of this was helpful. I know how frustrating it is to get horrible feedback. One of the reasons why I am unlikely to ever write anything more than a fb post in Czech without being forced is exactly this. I always remember the big red "Style!!!!" on my high school works, which came without any explanation or advice.

Edit:corrected a typo
Last edited by Cavesa on Sun Jul 09, 2017 10:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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aaleks
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby aaleks » Sun Jul 09, 2017 7:06 pm

I'm definitely not a native :) and my level isn't even C1, so I might be wrong but I think that there's some misunderstanding about this part of text:

His career thrives mostly because he shoots lots of entertaining, showy, and gaudy films, and many people consider him as another creator of frivolous movies. However, Spielberg managed to shoot many serious, thoughtful pictures.


To me the replacing 'and' with 'however' in the first sentence looks wrong, because the part after 'and' doesn't contradict the previous part of sentence but continues the same thought. Probably there could be used 'thus', 'therefore' or the like?
But it's just my non-native-not-advanced opinion, please take it with a grain of salt :)
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tarvos
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby tarvos » Sun Jul 09, 2017 8:19 pm

I think he missed a few corrections. I also think you're trying to produce texts too literally, by translating it from Russian. I know that in Russian it's normal to сомневаться в чем-либо, but in English we doubt things, without a preposition. These are things that simply are that way. Why don't you use a preposition in English in this case? Because you don't, end of story. There is no reason why we don't do so, we simply don't, period.

I would rewrite almost the entirety of your text. There's a whole lot of grammar in there that just doesn't work the way you supposed it did, and tenses remain a big issue. Not so much tense formation as tense usage, which is a completely different ball game (same way I still screw up aspect at times after all these years).

If you want to work on his corrections, you should understand two things:

a) a lot of tense usage has rules, but they can be subtle nuances and hard to render. Sometimes, your Russian thought doesn't differentiate between two options when English does. Sometimes, Russian does a grammar thing English doesn't (for example, English moves tense usage in reported speech back a tense).

He said that he would do it.
Он сказал, что он это будет делать.

Same sentence, different tense. I can give you another 300 of these examples where Russian and English don't coincide.

b) Sometimes, you translate a word directly from Russian using the first option in the dictionary, when another one would be more suitable. Words can be translated in different ways and sometimes another phrase is more natural in English.
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tarvos
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby tarvos » Sun Jul 09, 2017 8:27 pm

From my point of view and in my opinion are pretty much the same thing. However, the first implies a type of distance or a sort of helicopter view of the situation, and is less strong.

From my point of view/The way I look at it/From my perspective is much less strong than "I think that""In my opinion""I maintain that..."

I would also never use the word "consider" with "as". I would just say "He's considered a great director."
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Ani
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby Ani » Sun Jul 09, 2017 10:04 pm

Cavesa's post is excellent. I hope someday I understanding understand the nuances of French as well as she understands English :)

aaleks wrote:I'm definitely not a native :) and my level isn't even C1, so I might be wrong but I think that there's some misunderstanding about this part of text:

His career thrives mostly because he shoots lots of entertaining, showy, and gaudy films, and many people consider him as another creator of frivolous movies. However, Spielberg managed to shoot many serious, thoughtful pictures.


To me the replacing 'and' with 'however' in the first sentence looks wrong, because the part after 'and' doesn't contradict the previous part of sentence but continues the same thought. Probably there could be used 'thus', 'therefore' or the like?
But it's just my non-native-not-advanced opinion, please take it with a grain of salt :)


Yup something funky here. You can't use however twice in such close succession so the suggested correction doesn't make sense to me. The problem is that
and many people consider him as another creator of frivolous movies is enough of a change in thought to warrant a new sentence.
When you have a list of items "books, pencils, and backpacks" you can't follow that with another and used as a conjunction. It forms a run-on sentence. You need to end the sentence and start over with Many people...
After that you can leave out the way it is with However starting the next sentence, but since they are so closely related, stylistically, I'd combine them. Many people consider..., however...

Aaleks says it is not a contradiction, which is true, but you'd only use "thus" if it were a conclusion that followed from the fact that he made a variety of movies. If you meant it that way, it doesn't come through the text. It looks like you were admiring the variety of movies he made, then admitting that some people think that is frivolous, and then addressing that criticism with the sentence that starts with However.

Sorry for lack of formatting. I'm on my cell phone.
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Re: English: All skills. How to reach C2.

Postby Xmmm » Sun Jul 09, 2017 10:28 pm

Ольга wrote:After a thorough analysis, I have noticed that I have several crucial problems:

1) Pronunciation (Sounds, Linking, Intonation)
2) Collocations (starting from Intermediate Level)
3) Phrasal Verbs (starting from Pre-Intermediate Level)
4) Punctuation (commas, colons, semi-colons, hyphens)

My ex-teacher advised me to start from the textbook "Outcomes Intermediate".
Besides, I have the textbook "Using Collocations for Natural English (+ CD-ROM)", and I am going to receive my another textbook "Work on Your Phrasal Verbs".
Additionally, I want to try CPE Practice Tests just for fun.
For learning the theoretical base of phonetics I was recommended the following course "Фонетика английского языка. Нормативный курс. Учебник для ин-тов и фак. иностр. яз."/ Васильев В.А. и др.

Besides, my acquaintance (a native) frequently checks my essays.
It is a sample how he checked one of my last essays:
My favourite film director
There is no doubt in my mind that every person has their [optional consider adding “own”] favourite book, film, and actor or actress. However, few would be able to surely say who their favourite film director is. Nowadays, with a great variety of movies and series which are released [month by month – ok but obscure here consider “every month”], it is extremely difficult to opt for something. Nevertheless, if I had been asked who my favourite film director is, I would obviously have answered that it is Steven Spielberg.

Why would I choose the American film director, when we have lots of distinguished Russian, German, French, and Italian directors [and – ok but here consider “as well as”] those from other countries? Why do I adore him and his [works – ok but “works” is a bit obscure but correct. Consider “work”]?
First of all, Steven Spielberg [works in the most different fields – ok but I’m not sure how accurate/natural that is here. Consider “directs films of different genres”. To me, if someone works in different fields it might mean for example they are an actor, director, scriptwriter and dancer, or do lots of things. ]. My favourite movies, which I watched when I was a youngster, [differs –you should have “differ” here because you are talking about movies not one movie] greatly. Several of them are the most remarkable: «E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial», «Jurassic Park», and «Schindler's List». Steven Spielberg is able to cope with the most various tasks: he shot movies about the second world war and mystical movies about aliens and dinosaurs. His career thrives mostly because he shoots lots of entertaining, showy, and, and gaudy films, [and - correct however as you are about to change the tone (from praising him to criticising him) I think it would be better if you replaced it with “however”] many people consider him as [consider adding “just” here for effect] another creator of frivolous movies. However, Spielberg managed to shoot many serious, thoughtful pictures. One of them is “Schindler’s List”.

The film director [could succeed – correct but consider replacing both words with “succeeded”] in so many [fields – see above about fields. Consider replacing with “genres”] that I cannot doubt [in –remove this] his talent. [From my point of view – ok but I prefer “In my opinion”], Spielberg is the master of cinema art. The obvious conclusion to be drawn is that Steven Spielberg is the film director, whose movies I eagerly watch. All in all, it seems to me that such a director as him is the [expert – ok but seems slightly obscure in this context also consider “master”] of his work. He may obviously be considered as a keen specialist in his area. I adore, respect and love him and his pictures.



It [This] is my essay before his correction:
My favourite film director
There is no doubt in my mind that every person has their favourite book, film, and actor or actress. However, few would be able to surely say [to surely say is a split infinitive and a bit weird. Better "to say with confidence"] who their favourite film director is. Nowadays, with a great variety of movies and series which are [I would replace 'which are' with 'being'] released month by month, it is extremely difficult to opt for something ['opt for something' doesn't make sense here. 'to choose someone' is better]. Nevertheless, if I had been asked [should be 'if I were asked' or 'if someone were to ask'] who my favourite film director is, I would obviously have answered [should be answer, not answered unless you have changed your mind!] that it is Steven Spielberg.
Why would I choose the American film director, when we have lots of distinguished Russian, German, French, Italian directors and from other countries? Why do I adore him and his works? First of all, Steven Spielberg works in the most different fields [replace 'most different fields' with 'very diverse fields' or something like that. Different means different compared maybe to another director. Diverse means Spielberg can do many different things]. My favourite movies, which I watched when I was a youngster, differs greatly [not 'differs greatly', should be 'vary greatly']. Several of them are the most remarkable: «E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial», «Jurassic Park», «Schindler's List». Steven Spielberg is able to cope with the most various (varied, not various here) tasks: he shot movies ['has made films' is better. Mr. Spielberg is still working, maybe he will make another dinosaur film etc.] about the second world war and mystical movies about aliens and dinosaurs. His career thrives mostly because he shoots lots of entertaining, showy, and gaudy ('gaudy' has negative connotations and sounds like criticism) films, and many people consider him as another creator of frivolous movies (Xmmm is one of those people, lol). However, Spielberg managed to shoot many serious, thoughtful pictures. One of them is “Schindler’s List”.
The film director could succeed in so many fields that I cannot doubt in his talent [Preceding sentence needs a total rewrite. Something like 'He has succeeded in so many genres that I cannot doubt his talent']. From my point of view, Spielberg is the master of cinema art. The obvious conclusion to be drawn is that Steven Spielberg is the film director, whose movies I eagerly watch [Preceding sentence doesn't make sense to me. You already said you eagerly watch his films, so I don't need to draw conclusions, obvious or otherwise]. All in all, it seems to me that such a director as him is the expert of his work [better, "a director such as Spielberg is an expert at his trade"]. He may obviously be considered as a keen specialist in his area [Previous sentence has problems, not least of which it's somewhat redundant. I would just delete it]. I adore, respect and love him [to say you love him used to imply that you know him personally at some level. Usage is changing, it might be okay now but I personally thing it is a little over the top] and his pictures.



What do you think?
Do you agree with his corrections?



The corrections you posted seem okay. I gave you my own set of corrections. There is some overlap.

When I was in college, I tutored freshmen in English part-time. The best advice I could give them was "read all the stuff you write out loud. You'll hear if it's wrong." I don't know how well that works for people learning English, though.
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