Ultimate Phrasal Verb Book, The Review

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(More customer reviews)Get ready for a memorable showdown! Prepare to meet write off, check in, chat on, show up, kick back... and even more two-headed creatures that Anglophone people call Phrasal Verbs!
I had sought a textbook specialized in phrasal verbs for a very long time and this one is the first I found that deserves this appellation. You will find tons of phrasal verbs in there, almost 400, among the most popular.
The book is divided in 40 units or so containing a dozen verbs. Quick grammar rules relative to phrasal verbs introduce each unit. Here are treated, little by little, the following issues which are salient characteristics of the phrasal verbs, i.e. What is a particle? Is a particle always separable? How to make the difference between a particle and a "vulgar" preposition? Where is the accentuation of a phrasal verb? Is it possible to find a common abstract notion between some meanings of verbs that share the same particle (e.g. break in, call in, give in)? Yes, you'll have the answers to all these riveting questions!
In each unit, each verb is followed by its inflected forms (gerund, past and participle). Its different meanings are described and you'll see that sometimes the particle of a verb can go from a non-separable state to a separable state depending on the sense given to the verb! A couple of practical examples illustrates each meaning.
Now, exercises! You'll find a lot of them in the book. Five, six, sometimes more per unit, including a recapitulation exercise using verbs that you studied in previous units, so that you can train your memory and check your knowledge.
A unit will take you quite a certain time and sometimes you'll need up to 1 hour 1/2 if you do them seriously. Perhaps my mistake was to try hard to complete a whole unit in one time. Because of that, I admit I felt discouragement from time to time, especially because I had to interrupt my working session for domestic or professional reasons. If you don't get time, make two or three exercises a day and the day after, review the main points and carry on your training.
You'll quickly realize that mastering phrasal verbs is no child's play and requires steady and hard work. But it's a fascinating world and it's so funny to see the power a single particle can have over the meaning of a common verb and hence, over a sentence :)
This book is a premiere. If you already enjoyed it and are looking for a useful complement, buy the Cambridge international dictionary of phrasal verbs, it will give you a pretty thorough overview of the power of these verbs. But I would suggest it for people with at least an intermediate level.

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Written primarily for ESL and EFL students preparing to take language exams in English, this book presents 400 common phrasal verbs and the ways in which they are used in everyday American English. Phrasal verbs are word groups that include a verb combined with a preposition or an adverb. They are not used only as verbs but as nouns, such as comedown, breakup, or showoff. They might also be used as adjectives, such as spaced-out, burned-out, broken-down and many others. This volume places phrasal verbs within the context of sentences, and presents hundreds of examples and exercises.

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The CELTA Course Trainee Book Review

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(More customer reviews)I paid for this book because I read a previous review that said if I didn't take good notes, this would help me remember the content of the celta course. That is false. The book address TEFL generalisms but does not help with what is really important to pass the CELTA course. You have to learn the CELTA terminology and structure by heart if you want to pass. This book doesn't address CCQs, ICQs, ECDB, and all the other torturous acronyms involved in this course (aside from a glossary in the back). This book is irrelevant to passing and reviewing the CELTA course.

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The CELTA Course is the only CELTA preparation course endorsed by Cambridge ESOL. It provides full coverage of the CELTA syllabus in a ready-to-use course. The CELTA Course is divided into user-friendly sections: * Input sessions (40 units on 'The learners and their contexts', 'Classroom teaching', 'Language awareness', and 'Professional development')* Teaching practice* Classroom observation* Written assignments and tutorials* 'Resource file'The Trainee Book includes a range of material to be used in input sessions, helpful advice about the course, and a wealth of useful reference material. The Trainer's Manual includes suggestions on how to best use the material with trainees, as well as help and advice on how to prepare trainees for teaching practice, lesson observations, written assessment and tutorials.

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New Interchange Student's book 3: English for International Communication Review

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(More customer reviews)If you're an English language teacher stuck in classrooms with 20 plus students for 30-40 hours a week and your text is a disaster your whole life can be hell. You hate your work and your students hate you. What do you do? Teach something else ? But in the end you always have to come back to the text...This has been the dilemma for teachers at my school over the last few years. While Interchange 1 was pretty good and Interchange 2 OK Interchange 3 was a nightmare-the more so as we realized the weakness was in the book and not in our teaching.So New Interchange 3 is something of a revelation- the changes in this book are not merely cosmetic,they are extensive. The layout and presentation of the grammar is sometimes so good I am in awe of how good this is and how bad the original book was. You realize there is real art to writing an English language teaching book- an art only really appreciated by the hands-on teacher. The other stunning improvement in this book is the content. It's so much more interesting, more contemporary, relevant and personal.So on 2 counts; grammar presentation and content this book is a winner. It's only on the third pillar of communicative language teaching- activities- that there is a weakness. The "Teacher's" book is lazy, unimaginative and unhelpful most of the time. A teacher needs to look elsewhere or in his or her own head for activities. Nonetheless, the improvements in NEW INTERCHANGE 3 are such that I can walk into a classroom with enthusiasm rather than dread.

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New Interchange is a multi-level series for adult and young-adult learners of English from the beginning to the high-intermediate level.The Level 3 Student's Book builds on the foundations established in Level 2 for accurate and fluent communication, extending grammatical, lexical, and functional skills. Beautiful color photographs and illustrations facilitate the teaching of new vocabulary. The New Interchange series teaches students to use English for everyday situations and purposes related to school, work, social life, and leisure. As with the other levels of New Interchange, a complete set of ancillaries, including a video program, is available to make classes interesting and productive.

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American Accent Training (Book and Audio CD, 2nd Edition) Review

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(More customer reviews)I do agree with the other reviewers that it is an excellent book written by a professional with extensive experience. It comes with 6 CD and almost 200-page book with detailed explanations of intonation patterns and sounds. Additionally, in the appendix Ann Cook discusses in detail what are the typical accents of native speakers of common languages, and what specifically the native speakers of these languages should work on.
The chief difficulty with working with a course like this is that the learner should not only repeat after the speaker, but should also be able to hear his/her own words to make the necessary corrections. If you keep on repeating the same mistake, but do not hear it and cannot correct yourself - what's the point of practicing? My solution is to practice with a computer. I tried a simple sound recorder on a computer as well as a tape recorder, and it did not work - too complicated, invoves too much button pressing. You need a program which plays a phrase, then records you repeating it, then repeats the native speaker, then plays your recording, and does it all over again in a loop until you are satisfied. It turned out that it is not easy to find a program like this; after a long search, I found a shareware program called FollowMe, its trial version can be downloaded from tarsoft's site or shareware servers (perhaps there are other programs like this which I did not come across, I am talking about the learning concept here). For me personally working with a computer and using a program like described above made a tremendous difference, I really feel that I am getting the most from this book. I can hear my mistakes and I feel that I am correcting them.
While with a course like this the price is much less important than the result and productivity of learning, this book (in my opinion) satisfies both, good quality and reasonable price. Recommended.

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The second edition of the highly acclaimed American Accent Training, now on 5 audio CDs, is for foreign-born students and business people working, traveling or studying in the United States and Canada. Through extensive intonation and pronunciation exercises, students learn how to speak with a standard American Accent. At the same time, listening comprehension improves dramatically. Supplementary materials included detailed nationality guides for eight languages (Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Spanish, French, German, Russian and Korean), access to a comprehensive website, and referral to a qualified telephone analyst for an individual diagnostic speech analysis. Also included are colored markers for written exercises, and a mirror to practice accurate pronunciation.

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Teaching ESL/EFL Listening and Speaking (ESL & Applied Linguistics Professional Series) Review

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(More customer reviews)This book is very cool for ESL/EFL teachers of all backgrounds because the language has been kept simple and is free from academic jargon. I read it from cover-to-cover and will use it to plan lessons in an English language school in Japan. I lent this book to a friend at a Japanese university and he found it very useful too. His colleagues gave him good feedback on it - a couple of them occasionally grab it to gain quick ideas for lessons that require little planning and few resources. This book is unlike many practical listening and speaking textbooks because it is based on sound ESL/EFL theory. It is also unlike many academic textbooks because it contains lots of practical suggestions. The balance between theory and practice is nice. I can`t wait to get the accompanying reading and writing book.

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Using a framework based on principles of teaching and learning, this guide for teachers and teacher trainees provides a wealth of suggestions for helping learners at all levels of proficiency develop their listening and speaking skills and fluency. By following these suggestions, which are organized around four strands - meaning-focused input, meaning-focused output, language-focused learning, and fluency development - teachers will be able to design and present a balanced program for their students.Teaching ESL/EFL Listening and Speaking, and its companion text, Teaching ESL/EFL Reading and Writing, are similar in format and the kinds of topics covered, but do not need to be used together. Drawing on research and theory in applied linguistics, their focus is strongly hands-on, featuring easily applied principles,a large number of useful teaching techniques, andguidelines for testing and monitoring.All Certificate, Diploma, Masters and Doctoral courses for teachers of English as a second or foreign language include a teaching methods component. The texts are designed for and have been field tested in such programs.

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Teaching English as a Foreign or Second Language: A Teacher Self-development and Methodology Guide Review

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(More customer reviews)This is a book on language teaching for language teachers. The book takes the view that language teachers must be responsible for making the ideas in the book real for their own particular contexts. The book starts with self-development as a theme and then moves on to teaching skills. Jerry Gebhard is careful to point out that he is not providing a bag of tricks as each application is backed-up with a sound theoretical perspective. The references in each section are excellent if the busy teacher has some time to read in more depth. Also, each chapter has activities that teachers can explore in order to apply the chapter information to their own particular context. What I especially like is that these activities encourage teachers to talk to other teachers and colleagues. This is where real self-development starts. This book, then, is a welcome user friendly addition to the field of English Language Teaching. If the user is a teacher, you have found the right book!

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In our times, international travel and extended living arrangements abroad have become almost a normal occurrence in the lives of many people, particularly the young and college educated. Many of these people, often with little training, find themselves with the opportunity to teach the English language to foreign students. After a short stint teaching EFL students in a foreign culture, once-confident English -language teachers often realize that some teacher training would have been useful.This readable and creative new book by Jerry Gebhard is a textbook for the untrained ESL/EFL teacher. It is designed for use by self-motivated teachers who seek to maximize their potential as teachers and, in so doing, enhance the learning of their students. This guide stresses the multifaceted nature of teaching the English language to nonnative speakers and is based on the real experiences of teachers. It provides basic information that ESL teachers should know before they start teaching, as well as ideas on how language instructors can guide students in the skills of listening, conversation, reading, and writing.Teaching English as a Foreign or Second Language is unique in that it emphasizes self-development as central to being an ESL/EFL teacher. A variety of self-development tasks are included. Each chapter is guided by a set of questions directly relevant to teaching, including advice on teaching problems. An appendix provides addresses, phone numbers and information on professional second/foreign language-teaching organizations, as well as a list of professional journals and publishing houses.The author's practical and self-motivating philosophy is inviting to a wide audience: EFL teachers, teachers of teachers, and those who have found themselves in a position for which their training is incomplete. It is an excellent work for everyday use and will serve as a fine reference tool.

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Making Content Comprehensible for English Learners: The SIOP Model (3rd Edition) Review

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(More customer reviews)The book is a response by American educators to an increasingly diverse student population, at the primary and secondary school levels. This diversity is reflected in no small part by the many students for whom English is a second language.
The pedagogy described here is called the SIOP Model. It tries to teach students how to master academic English (ie. formal written English). But also to do this while learning a more informal spoken English. Both skills are necessary. Whereas perhaps traditionally only the former was emphasised, since it was assumed that students already had English as their primary language.
Without going into the details of SIOP, it seems characterised by an intensive interweaving of different modalities of teaching. Like having students learn written text [of course]. But also tying this into rich graphics. So that visual and written forms reinforce each other in the student's mind. Also, students are encouraged to use deductive skills to analyse a body of text, as independently of the teacher as possible.

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One of the most influential books in the field in years!Making Content Comprehensible for English Learners: The SIOP® Model presents a coherent, specific, field-tested model of sheltered instruction that specifies the features of a high quality sheltered lesson that teaches content material to English language learners. For twelve years, educators have turned to Jana Echevarría, MaryEllen Vogt, and Deborah Short for an empirically validated model of sheltered instruction. In the Third Edition of this best-seller, the authors include new research findingsand studies onthe Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP®) Model, which offers school administrators, teachers, teacher candidates, coaches, university faculty, and field experience supervisors a tool for observing and quantifying a teacher's implementation of quality sheltered instruction. Ringing Endorsements "A framework that will engage, support, and increase the academic achievement of our culturally and linguistically diverse students. The [SIOP Model went] from good to great!"—Socorro Herrera, Kansas State University"Readability, organization, and practicality! The SIOP addresses precisely the needs that my beginning teachers face…the CD for SIOP…makes it all understandable. I love the book!"—Danny Brassell, California State University, Dominguez HillsTake a Glimpse Inside the Third Edition:New, user-friendly format of the SIOP® protocol. Background Sections include descriptions of the eight components and thirty features of the SIOP® Model, and are updated to reflect recent research and best practices to help readers plan and prepare effective sheltered lessons. Practical Guidelines to help readers develop effective language and content objectives. Discussion Questions have been rewritten and are appropriate for portfolio development in pre-service and graduate classes, for professional development workshops, or for teacher reflection and application. A groundbreaking CD-ROM with video clips, interviews ofthe authors, and reproducible resources (e.g., lesson plan formats), make this the perfect professional development asset for any grade level or content area teacher!

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501 English Verbs: with CD-ROM (Barron's Language Guides) Review

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(More customer reviews)I purchased this book to review for our language school's ESL program. Though it is a useful tool in presenting all of the complexities of the English verb, as a practical tool for ESL students I cannot recommend it. It is needlessly complicated in its format. The book contains unusual and infrequent English verbs, such as "to cleave", "to yes" or "to be hemmed." It even provides two conjugations for "to hide," one meaning to conceal and one meaning to beat. However, this difference is noted only at the bottom of the page. These sorts of verbs permeate this book. It seems that English has plenty of high frequency verbs that make inclusion of so many bizarre and passive voice verbs unnecessary. This book bears little resemblance to its excellent cousins in the series: 501 French or Spanish verbs.

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ESL students quickly discover that knowing the meanings of commonly used verbs--then learning how to use them in all their many tenses and forms--is a vital part of becoming fluent in the new language.This brand-new edition of Barron's 501 English Verbs now comes with a bonus CD-ROM that offers helpful practice exercises in verb conjugation and a concise grammar review.The book presents themost common regular and irregular English verbs alphabetically arranged in table form, one verb per page, andcompletely conjugated in all tenses. The book also reviews rules of grammar applicable to verb usage, provides a bilingual list of hundreds more regular verbs, and offers tips on idiomatic verb usage. Tinted page-edge tabs offer language students quick alphabetical reference.

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102 Content Strategies for English Language Learners: Teaching for Academic Success in Grades 3-12 Review

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(More customer reviews)This is an excellent resource for content area teachers who have English Language Learners in their classroom. The book is well-designed and provides suggestions for all content areas. It also provides information on effective strategies for teaching ELL students in general. The theoretical information at the beginning of the book provides background information on teaching ELL students. As an ESL teacher who is now teaching students in a general education classroom, this book is a valuable resource since it provides comprehensive strategies for all subject areas.

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Are you looking for classroom-tested content strategies to help your English Language Learners achieve academic success? This easy-to-use resource offers 102 practical instructional and assessment strategies built on a strong foundation of second language acquisition theories and principles. Easy to incorporate into daily classroom instruction, all 102 strategies are concise and offer helpful guides that maximize students' performance potential at every level of development. Strategies address a variety of issues, including cultural considerations, instructional processes, traditional testing, alternative testing formats, grading, and accountability.Theory to Application: Guidelines for Practice are found at the beginning of each chapter to unify the theories and principles around which this text is designed. The Objective briefly states the goals of the strategies that follow. The Rationale explains the reasoning underlying each objective and the role it plays in your practice. Strategies offer activities and assignments to help you in guiding your English Language Learners toward academic success. In Concept introduces and explains the ideas behind each strategy and why it is important to your practice. In Practice provides instructions, examples, and illustrations to illustrate how each strategy can be used in your classroom.

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The ESL/ELL Teacher's Book of Lists (J-B Ed: Book of Lists) Review

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(More customer reviews)This books is incredibly resourceful. I'm glad that it was revised to 21st century! As an ESL teacher, I am always "reinventing my wheel" to accommodate all the children I teach every year. The lists that are put together in this book are very helpful in every way. It's definitely a "must have" in all the educator's library- not just ESL teachers.

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Everything educators need to know to enhance learning for ESL students
This unique teacher time-saver includes scores of helpful, practical lists that may be reproduced for classroom use or referred to in the development of instructional materials and lessons. The material contained in this book helps K-12 teachers reinforce and enhance the learning of grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, and writing skills in ESL students of all ability levels. For easy use and quick access, the lists are printed in a format that can be photocopied as many times as required. A complete, thoroughly updated glossary at the end provides an indispensable guide to the specialized language of ESL instruction.

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