Why reading is important to develop writing skills?



"Making mistakes while writing is part of the learning process." said Keng Lee, knowledge adventurer & technology explorer in self directed learning. "But what is critically important is getting regular and constructive feedback, either from your [knowledgeable] friends or your English teacher or tutor."



Read, and read some more



My mantra for writing without errors has always been this: Read, read and read. Read good, well-written books, standard newspapers, novels, magazine articles and editorials. Read commentaries, analytical pieces of writing (such as: What are the consequences of global warming?').



Read daily and widely. As you read, pick articles written by people who write well, without errors. Reading widely helps you to know what the correct words and phrases are for the context. (Consider this: Do we deny the disease or prevent it?). You learn how great writers use the language to make their meaning dear. You learn how to write concisely and directly, without wasting words. Most of all, reading well-written passages helps us develop our own style.



Strive to stand out



It is a good idea to remember this: Writing well needs discipline, imagination, and some degree of writing skill, knowledge of the mechanics of writing (how to organise adverbs/adjectives, how to place verbs, punctuations marks) and an easy style to connect with the readers.



People now have a huge amount of reading choice. Will your writing stand out so that they pick yours to read? For that to happen, go through the following tips.



Avoid spelling errors



Does correct spelling matter? Yes. Poor spelling gives the impression that you are careless about your work. Bad spelling will lead to your being misunderstood. Imagine a job application with spelling errors. You certainly won't get a teacher's job! You may have great ideas, interesting stories, but these will fall flat if they are told with errors in writing.



Errors distract the reader. So take time to proofread your work before you hit the "send" button. You can use the spellcheck, but beware. Spellcheck applications do not spot contextual errors. They may not spot this error: "It is possible you’re not listed in this classroom."



Avoid grammar errors



What are grammatical errors? The major one will be a lack of agreement of the verb with the subject. Traffic in these by-lanes are blocked by parked cars. It should be "Traffi..is.". Other errors can be wrong prepositions, wrong usage of words, apostrophe misuse, poor sentence construction, inconsistency in tenses or switching active-passive verbs without making other changes.



Sure, no one can know all the rules of grammar, but we all should be able to form simple sentences without basic grammatical errors. Poor grammar confuses the reader. Reading good authors will help you form well-structured, easy-to-follow sentences.



Write your thoughts down whenever you can



This is a habit that will help you write with ease. Writing your thoughts at least once a day improves your vocabulary. The simplest form of this exercise is to describe your surroundings wherever you find yourself - in the Metro (for instance: What could be that young woman's job?), at the bus stand, at the doctor's office, in the courtyard of your school.



Just answer the '5 Ws and the H' (when, who, what, why, where and how) and add your imagination to it. You already have a descriptive essay with you! See that your mind is filled with questions and answers and find time to write down at least a few of them.



Read aloud to a friendly audience



Two things will happen when you read your finished essay to someone who cares. If you keep stumbling over words when you read, it's clear your words are not arranged well. Are you switching from active to passive voice often? Are your sentences left incomplete? Is your word-order difficult to follow? All these issues can be sorted out when you read your work aloud. The second benefit is the constructive criticism you will get. Your audience will tell you if they can follow the story and can ask you to make a few changes in the story or the narrative style. Were they able to guess the ending straight away or did they find the suspense gripping? Did they appreciate your descriptive passages? Did they find your arguments valid? In sci-fi, are your assumptions of the future logical?



Such criticism will help you improve your writing. Do not hesitate to make the suggested changes if you find them appropriate.



Proofread



Never, ever submit your work without going over it with a fine tooth-comb. Check for spelling, for grammar slip-ups. See if the sentences are made well, there are no run-ons (sentences that go on and on). Have you got your punctuation right? Are full-stops close to the last letter of the sentence? Yes, the English language is complicated, but all your reading has prepared you to write your thoughts in a simple, lucid manner, hasn't it?



Writing without errors comes ahead of writing well. Make it a habit to write error-free prose. Whether a WhatsApp message, blog post, email or a simple note, write without errors. Be conscious about this. Say what you want to say politely and unambiguously.



Make your writing neat and clear



So many businesses have been lost because the selling company could not write a neat, clear proposal. Error-free writing often stands between you and getting a good job. Once you have that eye for detecting errors and correcting them at once, go ahead and develop your own style of writing.



Error free writing is the foundation on which we build the edifice of a passage, essay, short story or a novel.



 



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What do we know about the various abbreviations and acronyms used?



Social media platforms have changed the way we communicate in one big way: we now cannot write without abbreviations and emojis. We have embraced them passionately because they are brief, and convey emotions crisply and efficiently. Our abundant use of abbreviations has made people refer to social media messaging as an 'alphabet soup'. What do we know about the various abbreviations and acronyms used?



What they are



An abbreviation is an umbrella term. Abbreviations are shortened forms of words and phrases. Mrs., Dr., Rlys. are all examples of abbreviations. [Just drop the vowels!)



Acronyms are types of abbreviations. They are made by taking the first letters of the words involved and making a word out of them. These ‘initialisms’ may be pronounced as proper words, but are written in the upper case. Examples are: WHO, UNESCO, RADAR.



Is noob (internet-speak for "newbie") an abbreviation or an acronym? You decide!



TL; DR



Tl;dr stands for "too long: didn't read."



According to one report, tl;dr was originally an insult an expression of annoyance. It was used as a reaction to a post, comment or content that the reader found long winded and wordy. It meant, "This is way too long, so I didn't read it." By 2005, tl;dr had taken on a second meaning: it was short for "summary." People began to send a "tl;dr version" of longer accounts or articles. Tl;dr can be a genuine summary of a much longer piece.



You could call it a gist the big takeaway or the moral of the story. Tl;dr can also be a simpler, sarcastic interpretation of an essay on a complex topic It is the essence of the piece. Try writing the Tl;dr version of something you want to say. You will get more people to read what you write.



H/T



There was a time when men never went out without wearing a hat. When they met people they knew in the streets, hat-wearing men tipped the brim of the hat a little bit, as a mark of recognition (Hello!) or respect (Morning, Sir!). You can't wear a hat on social media, but you still want to show respect. So you use the acronym H/T (with or without the diagonal slash). It means hat tip, or tipping the hat.



When we attach H/T to a meme, expression, image, or idea on social media, we acknowledge the original source of that post. When you forward a quote, you say, "H/T to XXX." You can also thank people - "H/T YYY for the gift."



LBS



LBS can be wielded to convey an emotion via text and social media. LBS stands for "laughing but serious." Placed at the end of a text, it tells readers that you are not hurt by what has been said, you don't take yourself seriously, but will consider the substance of the post/text. A lot is said with these few letters of the alphabet!



IMHO



This is a familiar one, right? You've seen IMHO (in my humble opinion) in texting, email and social media. It was first used in the 1980s in online forums. After a while some people began to interpret IMHO as "In my honest opinion." Now more people understand the "H" as "honest." Fine! You are probably saying that you believe in what you say.



MUA



I suspect MUA (make-up artist) gained traction with the increasing number of make-up videos that are appearing on YouTube. And they are watched by millions! The minute you see the letters MUA, the artist believes, you will want to click on it. And his/her video gets an eyeball. MUAs get huge responses on Instagram and YouTube. Videos by MUAs tell you of the artist's techniques about how to make you look better.



SWAG



I always thought SWAG was a regular English word, but it turns out it is an acronym. It stands for "stuff we all get." and it usually refers to freebies given for promoting a product. If someone trying to sell you the latest mobile phone adds SWAG at the bottom, you'll definitely want to click on it right? SWAG is a direct outcome of our buying tendencies - no freebie, no buy! There is your next acronym - NFNB, how about it?



WYD and WTP



WYD is a texting and internet acronym for “What (are) you doing?" Friends say it can also mean “What (would) you do?" Like a lot of acronyms, it started as a literal question - "What are you doing at the moment?" Then texters found out that it can be a substitute for "What's up, buddy?" an informal greeting. Now, it has taken shades of meaning, like. "Hey, what are you doing? Are you sure that's right? I don't think I approve! Stop it!" I saw one that went "If you don't support your best friend when she's sad, then wyd?" [it is a rhetorical question, meaning, "You are not doing much.") WTP too asks a question: "What's the plan?" or "What's the play?" when you want to confirm a programme for the day/evening/ weekend. Type out WTP and you get your response. Great!



HMU



The abbreviation HMU stands for a slightly complicated "hit me up." Again, it gives us an idea of what young people feel at the moment. HMU is posted to announce that the texter is looking for something to do. He/she is bored, lonely and is looking for social interaction. It is a call for people to reach out to him/ her. It is generally a one-on one exchange, where it becomes an invitation for continued interaction. It means "text me," or "call me," or simply "let's talk again." HMU can also stand for "hook me up," which is typically a request to be connected with someone or something in which you have an interest.



 



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How to avoid unnecessary words in speech and writing?



A student just spoke to me. She said. "Madam, like, I, um, as I said before, I wanted to say this, but like....". I stopped her. I said. "What do you want to say? Form a short sentence about it in your mind and say it."



We often use words that mean nothing at all. Speaking/writing meaningless words wastes the listeners or the reader’s time. Few people have the patience to plough through the "likes" and "ums", the "as you knows" and the "as I said befores". Your examiner may even see this as a ploy to fill the page. He/she cannot be asked to wade through unnecessary words and pick the right ones.



When we use extra words and unnecessarily longer expressions, we confuse the reader. It is best to say what we want to say in a few well-chosen words. Unnecessary words are those that do not add to the meaning of what you say: they dilute your opinions and arguments: they annoy the reader/listener. While using superfluous words might be forgiveable when speaking, it is not so when you are writing.



A word which adds nothing extra to a sentence is called a pleonasm. Example: "We joined the wires together." Which word can be dropped here? [Answer: "together." Join means putting together.]



A word which merely repeats the meaning of another word in an expression is called a tautology. Pleonasm and Tautology refer to words that can be omitted. Example: DVD disc. [Omit "disc'].



Completely surrounded, completely destroyed, completely filled, completely opposite, completely finished - the modifier "completely" is redundant in all these verbs. When something is destroyed, finished, filled or surrounded, it is completely so. And opposites are not diametrically so. So the expression "completely opposite" doesn't mean anything.



Superfluous speech



The magazine "India Today" once came up with phrases that are redundant - words that are repeated and not necessary to convey your thoughts. One that jumps to mind is the expression free gift" Isn't a gift free, given with affection? There is no gift for which you pay. If you pay for something, then it is not a gift. So what is a free gift? Just say, "gift."



Then there is "general public." What is the word "general" doing here? "Public" means people in general. If you say "general public", you are saying "general, general people." This is unnecessary. Instead, say: "The public wants to know the amount spent on restoring the lake."



Watch what you say!



Ah, and this unbearable phrase "first and foremost." If something is foremost", it is clearly in the first position. Example: "There are many reasons for fevers increasing in the rainy season: the foremost among them is water stagnation." OR "First, let me give you the good news.” not "First and foremost let me give you the good news.



Have you ever said to friends/family. "I have/I want the exact same dress!" if you do, stop saying that. "Same" means "exact. If the two are not the same, we would say, "similar." By the way, you cannot have the "same" dress, unless the person wearing it is willing to give it to you. So the sentence will be. "I want a dress exactly like that one."



Another often-misused word is "advance". "Advance" means "beforehand". Similarly, "planning" is doing something beforehand. Then why would you say, "advance planning"? OR "advance warming" OR "advance reservations? "Warning" and "reservations are done before an event happens, right? The word "advance" in these expressions is superfluous. Just say. "Approach counter number one for reservations."



And please do not write "add up." The word "up is redundant here. It does not add to the meaning of this phrase. When you add, you make a sum. Why would you "up" it?



You do not "ask a question." You merely "ask. Asking means "posing a question." Example: "She asked if she could get a ticket for the movie."



What not to say



Why would you say "ATM machines" when ATM stands for Automated Teller Machines?



Why would you say "ECR Road” when ECR stands for East Coast Road?



Why would you say "LPG gas" when LPG stands for Liquefied Petroleum Gas?



When you use an abbreviation, it is a good idea to find out what the letters stand for.



And what is the meaning of "all-time record"? "Record" is when you achieve a goal that others have not. Any record is for all time, till it is broken. Say: "Winning all three awards was a record for India."



Think before you write!



Do not add "basic" to "fundamentals", "necessities", "essentials." By their nature, "fundamentals", necessities" and "essentials” are basic. So the word "basic" is unnecessary. Example: "Food, water and a roof are necessities for every human being."



How many times have we heard people say "brief moment" or "brief summary"? A moment is brief, and a summary is brief. If it is long, it cannot be called a summary. It becomes an essay. A moment cannot be long unless the author wants to create a feeling of time passing. So "brief moment" and "brief summary" do not make sense at all.



Objectionable phrases



Writers also object to the phrase "empty space." Their argument space refers to a continuous area or expanse that is free, unoccupied, available. "Space" is essentially empty. The word "empty is redundant. Example: "We have enough space for ten people here."



The expression "few in number” is wrong for several reasons. First, the adjective "few' means almost nil or negligible in number. The word "few" is used only with countable nouns. "Few" already means "a small number." Example: "Few people will support the idea that children need not know handwork." If you want to use "few" to convey a certain small number, simply say, "a few." Example: A few students have volunteered to help with the arrangements. NOT "A few in number'.



Avoid saying "new innovation" and "added bonus."



 



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What is the history of phrases based on colours?



Black Humour



Meaning: Black humour or black comedy is a style of writing where the author highlights serious issues through comedy.



History: The term comes from the French l'humour noire and was coined by Andre Breton around 1940. This phrase was first used in English in 1965. Dark humour and dark comedy refer to an extreme kind of satire.



The concept of presenting serious issues through comedy has been around for a very long time - only the phrase labelling it is relatively new. A famous example of black comedy is in Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal", published in 1729. [Jonathan Swift wrote "Gulliver's Travels too]. In the book, Swift made outlandish statements like "the British should eat Irish babies."



These statements brought attention to the problem of Irish poverty. The colour black was a natural choice for this idiom because of the horror involved in both the fiction (eating babies) and the reality (starvation).



A bolt from the blue/ out of the blue



Meaning: A complete surprise, like a bolt of lightning from a clear blue sky.



History: The earliest use of this phrase was in Thomas Carlyle's book "The French Revolution", published in 1837: "Arrestment sudden really as a bolt out of the Blue, has hit strange victims."



It is possible that the English version of this expression came from the work of the Roman poet Quintus Horatius Flaccus, better known as Horace. Carlyle probably read Horace's "Odes".



Red-Handed



Meaning: Caught in the act of a crime, as in "The thief was caught red-handed when burgling the shop."



History: The use of the colour red in the phrase comes from the colour of blood. There was blood on a murderers hand when he was caught in the act, so he was caught red-handed. Now it extends to all crimes. Scottish legal papers began to use the word "red-hand" in 1432. The phrase "red-handed" was first seen in print in 1819, when Sir Walter Scott used it in his novel "Ivanhoe". The hyphenated word became instantly popular.



Yellow Journalism



Meaning: Sensational journalism. It was a form of reporting that was extremely popular in the late 19th century. In yellow journalism, facts are exaggerated and unverified details are added, to make the report "interesting" for the readers.



History: In the final years of the 19th century, there was acute rivalry between newspaper magnates Joseph Pulitzer, owner of the "New York World", and William Randolph Hearst, owner of the "Journal". Each wanted to outdo the other in the sale of his newspaper and tried many methods to do this.



"New York World" published a popular cartoon that featured a character called the Yellow Kid, and the cartoon increased sales tremendously. The Journal at once lured the artist with better pay to work for them. And this started a "We'll pay you more war. In the meantime, the papers increased circulation by reporting on the Cuban struggle for independence, and both didn't hesitate to bend the truth to catch the readers’ attention.



Rose-Coloured Glasses



Meaning: Being optimistic as in "in spite of his failures he has learnt the art of seeing the world through rose coloured/rose-tinted glasses." It means he is hopeful that things will change for the better. The phrase has been in use since the 16th century. However, Merriam-Webster.com dates this idiom to 1926.



History: Why should the world be "rosy" (and not green, yellow or maroon?) when you have a positive attitude? One theory is from the Victorian times when it was believed that an artist could improve a painting by adding extra roses to it. The second theory is that early mapmakers wiped their glasses with rose petals to keep them clean so they could put in minute details in their maps. Maps, in those days, were drawn by hand. A third theory is even more interesting in the early 1900s, some farmers stuck rose coloured glasses (goggles) on their chickens so that they would not eat other chickens. The farmers believed that the glasses would prevent the chickens from recognising blood on other chickens, Blood made them attack those chickens. Were the fanners being overly optimistic?



Blue blood



Meaning: The blood which is supposed to flow in the veins of old and aristocratic families



History: The phrase comes from the Spanish "sangre azul.” Some old families in Castile in Spain said they had "pure" blood since they never married outsiders. Why "blue"? Probably because the veins of people who were very fair stood out in blue against their skin.



In 1834, this is what the Anglo-Irish children's writer Maria Edgeworth wrote in her novel "Helen."



"[Someone] from Spain, of high rank and birth, of the sangre azul the blue blood.” Today, a blue spot on your skin means you have knocked that part of the body against an object (for instance, your thigh against a table)



If your toes or fingertips are blue it may be because you have stayed out in the cold for too long. It shows poor blood circulation.



Baby blues



Meaning: Feelings of depression or anxiety, experienced by some mothers following childbirth.



History: Before World War II, the term "baby blue" simply meant a colour. If someone said, "Look, that's baby blue the listener would have thought he was talking about eye colour. A lot of babies are born with blue eyes because of a lack of a pigment called melanin. But this gets corrected when they grow a little older.



In the 1940s, people began to use the term "baby blues to mean the depression some mothers suffered after childbirth. In his best-selling baby-care book "Expectant Motherhood", in 1940, Nicholson J. Eastman wrote: "Most common among such reactions, perhaps is what is colloquially called the Baby Blues.



Tickled Pink



Meaning: This is an idiom meaning "delighted".  



History: The phrase came into use in 1922. It comes from the observation that your complexion becomes flushed and pinkish when you are tickled. If you are tickling someone, be careful not to hurt them. Then their face will go all red with anger! Laughing when being tickled is an automatic response.



 



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What is the history and unique features of the letters of the English language?



Here is something to think about. Would you agree if I said that alphabets are some of the most significant inventions in the history of human civilisation?



We use the 26 letters of the English language every day in some way or the other. We write notes, headlines, letters, stories, poems. Using these symbols with sounds. Have we ever stopped to wonder where these letters (or symbols) came from? And why do they look like this (example - "A") and not like something else? I read an interesting piece on the English alphabet by Richard Nordquist in ThoughtCo.com, where the author gives us quick facts about the English alphabet. Like many of the words we use, the word alphabet comes from two Greek words, 'alpha and beta'. 'Alpha' and 'beta' are the names of the first two letters of the Greek alphabet. These words were taken from Semitic names for the symbols ox (aleph) and house (beth). That makes Semitic one of the oldest languages in the world.



Semitic, Greek, Roman



The original Semitic language had a set of 30 signs. All these were consonants. This alphabet was used in ancient Phoenicia around 1600 B.C. Most scholars believe it is the ancestor of all later alphabets. One exception was perhaps the Korean Hangul script, created in the 15th Century.



Around 1000 B.C., the Greeks adopted the Semitic alphabet. When they found no vowels in it, they converted some of the symbols in the Semitic alphabet into vowel sounds.



Later, the Romans developed their own version of the Greek (or lonic) alphabet. Historians tell us that the Roman alphabet was adopted by the Irish and then reached England sometime during the early period of Old English (5th Century to 12th Century).



In the last 1,000 years, the English alphabet has changed a little. Some of the letters have been deleted, and new functions have been given to some of the old letters.



If you ignore these alterations, our modern English alphabet remains quite similar to the Roman alphabet we inherited from the Irish.



Languages that use the Roman Alphabet



According to Richard Nordquist, some 100 languages have adopted the Roman alphabet. That means nearly 2 billion people across the world use it. Well, it is the world's most popular script.



In 2004, David Sacks wrote in his book "Letter Perfect": "There are variations of the Roman alphabet: For example, English employs 26 letters, Finnish, 21: Croatian, 30. But at the core are the 23 letters of ancient Rome. (The Romans did not have J, V, and W.)"



That brings us to the number of sounds. How many sounds are there in the English language? There are more than 40 distinct sounds. These are called phonemes. Forty sounds and 26 letters to represent them? The math doesn't work out right? So, most letters stand for more than one sound



For example, you know how the consonant "C" works. It is pronounced in three different ways. Check out these words: case. cider, cherish (the last when combined with "h").



Majuscules and minuscules



The use of capital and small letters (upper and lower case letters) is a unique concept in English. Capital letters are called Majuscules (from Latin 'majusculus, meaning large). Small or lower-case letters are called Minuscules (from the Latin minusculus', meaning small).



The combination of majuscules and minuscules in a single language system (the dual alphabet) first appeared in a form of writing named after Emperor Charlemagne (742-814), the "Carolingian minuscule."



Have you come across a sentence that contains all the 26 letters? Can you form one? If you can, did you know that such sentences have a name? They are called pangrams. The best-known example of a pangram is: 'The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog."



Another interesting fact about the English alphabet is that a sentence or a paragraph can be written after deliberately excluding a letter of the alphabet. For example, try writing a short paragraph without the letter "d". If you do that, the text is called a lipogram.



The best-known example of a lipogram in English, is Ernest Vincent Wright's novel "Gadsby: Champion of Youth", published in 1939. It is a story of more than 50,000 words in which the letter "e" does not appear at all. Amazing! And I thought "e" was the most frequently used letter in the English language!



Zed or Zee?



We definitely want to know why the last letter 'Z" is pronounced in two different ways. Americans say "Zee" and the English, Canadians, Australians and those who speak English in other countries prefer to say "Zed" when they read "Z".



Here is why. "Zed" is the older pronunciation for the letter "Z". It came from the older version of the French language. The American "zee" is a dialect form heard in England during the 17th century (perhaps to rhyme with bee (B), dee (D), etc.). It was recognised by Noah Webster in his American Dictionary of the English language (1828).



Why is Z' the last letter?



No, it wasn't always pushed to the end. In the Greek alphabet, it came in at a respectable position - number seven. According to Tom McArthur in "The Oxford Companion to the English Language" (1992): "The Romans adopted z later than the rest of the alphabet, since /z/ was not a native Latin sound, adding it at the end of their list of letters and using it rarely." The Irish and English simply followed the Roman practice of placing "z" last.



 



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