English for Academic Study: Writing

English for Academic Study: Writing English for academic study: Writing is an integrated course designed to develop student writing on pre-sessional and pre-departure courses. The Course Book contains step-by-step activities written by EAP professionals at the University of Reading's Centre for Applied Language Studies. The activities are designed for use with authentic reading texts in an accompanying Source Book on the basis of an integrated approach to writing. EAS Writing is founded on an extensive review of recent research into EAP writing methodology, and reflects the most recent developments in language teaching for academic purposes. The 2009 edition of EAS Writing has been fully revised for ease of use. As well as a new format, the Course Book now comes with a book map, unit summaries, and a comprehensive glossary of terms. Each unit has weblinks offering additional information and activities, related to both writing skills and the topics covered in the units. A dedicated website, www.englishforacademicstudy.com, offers further teacher resources. This book can be used in conjunction with the following books in the English for academic study series, also published by Garnet Education: EAS Reading, EAS Extended Writing & Research Skills, EAS Listening, EAS Speaking, EAS Vocabulary and EAS Pronunciation. A separate Source Book contains all the texts featured in the Course Book. Key Features * The course adopts a four-fold approach to reflect the complex demands of academic writing: 1. The process approach; 2. The development of critical thinking in writing; 3. The micro-skills of writing, e.g., effective introductions and conclusions, and effective paragraphing; and 4. The importance of genre An accompanying Teacher's Book is also available.

Very useful for university students who are going to travel abroad to study --Sarah Dague, Carlos III University, Spain

These three slim, A4-sized editions are suitable for students learning to write at university level. With more and more foreign students entering English universities, as well as more Swiss academics preparing dissertations in English, some guidelines and conformity is desirable. The seven units in the Course Book enable students to learn how to plan and organise their ideas into proper paragraphs, using key and concluding sentences. In addition, students will learn how to separate fact from opinion, write proper definitions and use cause and effect language effectively. There are many short extracts from student writing which can be analysed and discussed in the classroom. It is assumed that students have C1 - C2 level of English. For this reason, grammar and vocabulary are not dealt with. Each unit in the Course Book has a different theme, suitable for students studying a wide range of academic areas. The topics focus on: Academic Achievement; Early Human Development; Mobile Telephones; Statistics; Climate Change; The Global Village and Linguistic Change. The Source Book contains three to six complete articles for each unit, thus giving the original sources that an academic writer might have read for an essay on that topic. According to the back cover, the same topics are also covered in the separate Academic Reading course, so a lecturer may well consider working with bot parts of this academic course. In the introduction, the author emphasises the importance of the writing process, from brainstorming ideas to writing up to three drafts, to self and peer evaluation. At all stages, revising and rewriting are essential. The Teacher's Book offers more support with answers and rationales for the more inexperienced teacher. If you are helping advanced learners to improve their written English for academic purposes, then these books can certainly be recommended --Beverly Langsch-Brown for the ETAS Journal, Vol 24, No 1, Winter 2006

This series is also designed following the approaches described in the review of EAS Reading so the student has two books at their disposal while the tutor uses his/her book for methodological advice. Academic writing remains a very important part of EAP and ESP courses, and this book is definitely a welcomed addition to any EAP/ESP library. The seven chapters cover the identical topics to those in the Reading book. I have noticed that one chapter (3 in this instance) has a different sub-topic in the Reading book, and a different one in the Writing book (in the case of the latter, it is mobile telephones). Therefore, a tutor may wish, should they want to do so, to integrate both books and use them in conjunction, either consistently throughout the course or on an ad hoc basis so that where appropriate writing is suitably enhanced by additional input from the other book. The author emphasises that the book uses a four-fold approach to account for the demands of academic writing, and this includes the process approach, the development of critical thinking, the microskills of writing, and the importance of genre. I like the academic content of the book, and the emphasis it gives to certain crucial aspects of academic writing, e.g., key words used in examination questions, the importance of a concluding sentence in a paragraph or language to express cause and effect. The book contains three very useful appendices which further enhance the value of the book, and which provide more guidance to EAP students. Again I have found this book very user-friendly and very attractively presented. I can see that a student is carefully led through the course book and the source book, and that there is in0built cohesive progression in the course book. All the seven chapters are colour-coded, i.e., each chapter has a differently-coloured strip to distinguish it from the others. The same approach has been used in the reading book, and I think it a very useful innovation for an EAP book. Like the book on Reading, this book can also be used either as a stand-alone book or in conjunction with the one on Reading. The two books reviewed here are also complemented by a third one (Extended Writing and Research Skills by Joan McCormack and John Slaght), but this publication will soon be reviewed in a separate academic periodical. In conclusion, the two books published by Garnet Education (and the University of Reading [where the prototypical books of this series were originally conceived back in the 1990s, and subsequently published by Prentice-Hall]) are an excellent new addition to the EAP/ESP portfolio currently available for EAP/ESP professionals, and I am certain that these three titles will soon be followed by additional titles to cover other EAP/ESP sub-skills (e.g., listening or speaking) --Mark Krzanowski for www.mkuked.co.uk