Search results for 'tag:Essays tag:Countable nouns' matching tags 'Essays' and 'Countable nouns'

Re: Articles ...

Mister Micawber — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 05:30:43 GMT

.
These are correct:

- You need to sit down with (a) pen and (a) paper in order to write your essay. -- They are singular countable nouns, but 'pen and paper' is also idiomatic.
- It has been a long time since I posted something here.
- I went to the stock market last night.
- It seems that history repeats itself.

Re: Please, lookthrough my essay, and make some comment about the contents.

T_nattawat — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 10:54:48 GMT

Here is my 2nd draft.

Topic: How movies or television influence people's behavior? Use reason and specific examples to support your answer.

   What type of media has the greatest influence on people's behavior? Surely, the only answer would be television. This is because television is everywhereâschools, malls, hospitals, and even in rural areas. People can get access to news and information easily. The influence of television can be in a good way such as promoting morals among people. Unfortunately, sometimes it could be as bad as producing propaganda. In order for viewers to avoid the bad influences, they should realise how television can influence people's behavior. There are three main aspects for this; mental behavior, role model, and propaganda.
   Firstly, television can have such an effect on people's mind. Television directors often play music along with message they want to pass on to the viewers. This makes the message more interesting and can effectively attract people's attention. Music, according to many scientific research, can affact human mind and mentality greatly. It can make people feel relaxed, happy, or even cry. Many movies have such an effect. For example, a lot of people especially ladies sometimes cry when they watch a drama.
   Secondly, children and teenagers see stars in television as their role model. As human nature, the young usually copies people around them including those in television, and behave like them. They are not capable of distinguishing whether something is appropiate or not. Lacking of experience, youth can be influenced easily. Presenters, actors, and actresses are usually very good-looking. Surely, many children want to be like them. For whatever the stars do, they too will do it. This has lead to a new trend in society. For instance, many stars smoke in movies today; this has caused such a wrong belief that it is cool and trendy among teenagers.
   Lastly, television can be used in spreading misinformation. People think television coverage is the most updated and therefore is the most reliable source of information. This can be quite dangerous since, in reality, messages in television can sometimes be a propaganda. Without thinking carefully about information that is presented, one might fall into a trap or get the wrong idea about certain issues. A good example of this is a political propaganda during election campaigns that each side try to damage a reputation of others
   In conclusion, being the most covenience way to access to information television can have a strong influence over people and society; it can affect people's mentality, it can influence the youth, and it can affect people's opinion in responding to certain issues. Certainly, television is, most of the time, reliable; but sometime it is not. In order to avoid bad influences and propaganda, one need to examine messages from television carefully, and weigh them whether you should believe it or not.

Is there any adjective that can be put before 'propaganda' to make the whole word means an information that cause separation among people's ideas, attitude, and behavior?(Also, what's the difference between 'attitude'(uncountable) and 'attitudes'(countable)?; in other word, how do I know whether I should use countable form or uncountable form?)

How should I fix âAs human natureâ? Human nature is uncountable noun which means that 'a' is not needed here. Also, I think 'As' can be used here too. Or there is a problem with the meaning?

Re: What this idiom means

Besthunter — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 07:18:38 GMT

Another help please,

My teacher told me to compose essay with the topic "American Education.. where is it leading?" Can you help me what does it mean: "where is it leading" Does he want me to tell about the situation of Vietnamese Edu or something??

Second, I'd like to ask you what does this mean:
"American Education has both dark side and bright side"
(Although I don't now its meaning, I think it should be "a dark side" rather than "dark side" because "side" is a countable noun" ??

how to align the list?

Believer — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 06:20:06 GMT

I clicked?? on this forums' what I think is hyperlink that said "learn English Letter Writing Grammar and Pronunciation" and saw this thing pop up and upon reading it, it got me thinking how best to align that or if it is aligned in the best way possible.

pop-up:

Learn and explore the English language with topics such as poetry, stories, ..., essay composition, and general chit chat

poetry and uncountable OK

stories and a plural countable OK with uncountable nouns

essay composition as a countable noun, Not OK??

chit chat as uncountable OK

When you have a list like this, should we make every effort to align them or is there room to deviate?? like what I think is in the above case (essay composition being the one deviated)?

Re: evidences

MrPedantic — Mon, 25 Dec 2006 00:43:25 GMT

Hello Believer

Believer wrote:

What is the difference between someone editing a book and writing a book?

If you compile a book composed of other people's work (e.g. essays), you have "edited" the book. If you yourself wrote all the text, however, you have "written" the book.

Believer wrote:

When a writer decides to use an uncountable word that deems to fit to turn around and being used as countable, does that person has to bear the burden of seeing the readers are aware reasonably of the picture depicted by his writing and will concur to its usage? I think CalifJim has said something to the line that a countable noun can be modified by the article "the" if a writer believes that the readers is mindful of the same thing, but in both cases, one being turning an uncountable noun into a countable noun and the other being the case of putting the infront of a countable noun thinking the readers are seeing the same thing, where does the reasonability of the mutual mindfulness of the matters on hand play out? Surely one doesn't at all have to be mindful of the fact whether the potential readers are aware of the matters that are brought out by one's writing.

I think Jim meant that a countable noun can be modified by "the" if the writer believes that the individual instance to which the noun refers is already obvious either from the context, or from what has preceded the reference.

Thus if I say "The building is very ugly", I am assuming that you already know which building I mean. (Perhaps I've already said "That's my old school over there"; or perhaps you've said "I'm visiting Buckingham Palace at the weekend".)

In the case of turning a noun that is usually non-countable into a countable noun, the writer gambles on the reader's understanding. I might say for instance:

1. Her consternation was very great.

That will be comprehensible to almost all readers. But if I say:

2. Her consternations were numerous.

it is almost certain to baffle many readers. (It will probably seem a little French to many more.)

Believer wrote:

...mannered...What do you meam by this?

By "mannered" I mean "artificial", "over-concerned with stylistic matters", "concentrating on words rather than meaning".

Does that help? Let me know if not!

MrP

Re: fewer and less than

Matress — Sun, 15 Jan 2006 16:34:31 GMT

Kccsnake wrote:

a) "Write an essay of not less than 350 words."

b) "Write an essay of not fewer than 350 words."

Words is a countable noun and the adjective fewer should be use with it.

So b is correct ?

Less - used before uncontable nouns. (little - less - least)

Fewer - used before contable nouns. (few - fewer - fewest)

fewer and less than

Kccsnake — Sun, 15 Jan 2006 08:29:50 GMT

a) "Write an essay of not less than 350 words."

b) "Write an essay of not fewer than 350 words."

Words is a countable noun and the adjective fewer should be use with it.

So b is correct ?

Re: Please review my writing "AIM HIGH IN LIFE"

Savvysavz — Tue, 01 Nov 2005 16:07:29 GMT

Hi Prasanna,

I have made some minor corrections in your essay. You seem to confuse the countable and non-countable nouns at times. History & mankind for example, are not countable. Wheras a rank, a promotion and the Wright Brothers are countable.

Regards,

Savvy

_____________________________________________________________________

AIM HIGH IN LIFE

The Past is history.

The future is a mystery.

The present is a present.

Our present is the result of our past actions. Our future is the result of our present actions. Many a times, we ask ourselves whether we are doing the right thing at the right moment. We are afraid that, the choice we make may be wrong. Why? We are anxious about our future. Why? We are afraid that we may be unhappy in the future. Why? We are afraid of being unhappy. Why? We want to be happy all the time.

We know the value of happiness because we know about (disturbance or sadness?). Hence, they actually complement each other. Happiness cannot be valued if there is no disturbance. Why are we disturbed? We have not the confidence that we will achieve our goal.

Each one of us needs to work towards some goal. For many students, getting a good rank may be one of the goals. For many employees, getting a promotion may be one of the goals.During any period of time, we may have more than one goal in life. Some say, we need to be careful that, the goals we set shouldn't be unrealistic and impractical. Some people say, goals like living in Mars are unrealistic and impractical and should not be set. According to me, setting a goal like that is practical as long as you are working towards achieving it. For example, the Wright Brothers' goal was to fly. Before them, many tried to fly but failed. What would have happened if all those people (who failed) before the Wright Brothers thought they should not try to achieve something that they cannot? All those failures from which the Wright Brothers learned so much about what they should not be doing would not be available to them. Then, the Wright Brothers certainly would not have been successful. The failures of all those people who worked on various plans and designs for flying were actually the stepping-stones of success for the Wright Brothers. It is wisely said, â Failures are stepping stones to successâ. Yes, those failures were the stepping-stones of success for mankind.

We should not be afraid to fail. We should dream the impossible. Our goals should be to reach higher than the sky. We need to work towards them to achieve them. May be some of us will fail. Those of us who fail are also fortunate. We are going to become the stepping-stones for others. The human being is a social being. We will(live?) in a society. The goal of the society is to develop and reach the highest level of social living. So, we need to work towards reaching that goal collectively by contributing towards it individually. Society is about individuals. Reaching the goal of the society depends on how high each individual sets his/her goal. Therefore, set your goal to reach the farthest star in the farthest galaxy and work towards it being confident that someday human beings will reach there.

Re: Please help me to correct my composition

Tearsofjoy — Mon, 19 Sep 2005 19:22:11 GMT

Some university universities(you need the plural when youâre using âsomeâ) are adopting Internet-based learning(or âe-learningâ for short) while others are sticking to the traditional, face-to-face teaching. Personally, I prefer the former.

Iâd like to explain the second change a little more fully than I could manage within the paragraph.chemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />>>

You have used the phrase âInternet-based e-learningâ. Now âInternet-basedâ and the prefix âe-â mean the same thing, so in effect you are using the same adjective twice, which is wrong grammar. Also, âInternet-based learningâ and âe-learningâ mean the same thing. Hence I have put the word âe-learningâ in brackets(parentheses if thatâs the term you are comfortable with), showing that it is an abbreviated form of the term âInternet-based learningâ.>>

With the rapid progress of modern technology, the taking-place replacement of traditional ways of living by electronics is inevitable(I think you would do well to change that to âit is inevitable that electronics replace the traditional ways of livingâ). And education is just part of the trend. This trend is surely not without reasons. Firstly, e-learning offers a more convenient access to the learning resource, since you can receive the lessons in your free time according to your schedule and neednât to ask for leave if you are ill,. You (I am shortening the sentences because it makes things clearer and adds a bit of emphasis) can receive your lessons anywhere, - in parks, in subway trains or in a cafÃ©, even on a beach. Whatâs more, you neednât waste several hours on the road to the classroom since with e-learning itâs on your fingertips. The e-learning method also can greatly benefit the disabled person who canât easily go to university to study. thus Thus e-learning gives more people the opportunity to gain knowledge.>>

Another advantage Internet-based e-learning learning has over the traditional learning is that e-learning it can bring the students into a colorful multimedia virtual world instead of burying them into piles of dull books. With computers, learning can be more fun and effective. The storage of a computer can make it possible to store millions of books into one chip while a normal classroom canât do this. The Internet offers resources incomparable of to those any traditional schools can offer.>>

I have a bit of a problem with this point. No matter in what form the information is fed to the students, the amount of material they have to study remains the same. Whatâs more, if the information is in a book you can vaguely estimate how much you have to study by the simple process of seeing how fat the book is [:;].

What you may argue is that the computer makes it easier to find relevant portions of information, instead of the students having to search through a hundred books for a single paragraph.>>

Whatâs more, e-learning also can make life easier for a teacher. In the traditional school, a teacher usually stands on the platform over for hours and this usually results in physical tiredness. After class, a teacher corrects the studentsâ assignments one by one, leaning by on the desk. After years of hard work a severe neck-ache is usually developed. Also in the traditional class much of the time is wasted on handing in and handing out of the assignments and test papers. All these are both time consuming and physically challenging. With Internet-based e-learning, many assignments can be corrected by computers, a teacher can sit comfortably in a sofa instead of standing on the platform and thereâs no need of handing assignments in or out. Everything is just a click away. Besides making a studentâs studying more interesting, e-learning also eases the teacherâs heavy work and brings them more freedom and gives them more time to enjoy lives.>>

Sorry to say I canât accept your reasoning here. It is much more tiring to sit for hours in front of the computer than to stand and interact directly with other people for the same period of time. Taking classes may be easier via the Internet, but when it comes to checking, I think it would be much better if teachers got to check handwritten sheets rather than brightly glaring screens. Staring too long at the computer screen is really bad for the eyes â I should know, mine are suffering.

Since e-learning has so much many advantages outweighing over traditional learning, I strongly recommend e-learning method.>> over the traditional face-to-face methods.>>

âMuchâ is used for uncountable nouns, while advantages are certainly countable. So youâll have to change to âmanyâ, Iâm afraid. And I think the usage âadvantages outweighingâ¦â is incorrect. Iâm not sure about that mistake, though I am perfectly sure the change I have made would be accepted by any examiner.

Subsequent posters, please check if the usage of âoutweighingâ in the last sentence is correct or not, Iâm a bit confused.>>

So far, all I have done is to correct the grammar and point out a few weak links in your essay. (The thin lines, in case you couldn't make them out, are strikethroughs, indicating deletion.) I think you would do quite well if you submitted this. It doesnât need further decorations and frills.>>

Thanks for the chance to edit. As youâve probably guessed, I really love editing and relish any opportunity to indulge my skills in that field.>>

Hope I could help you â even if a little bit.>>

- Tearsofjoy.

Re: People do not trust medicne these days

abbie1948 — Thu, 12 May 2005 10:27:54 GMT

I would like to mention that if the text is a little bit confusing (as Linh said) it is because of the fact that I put only some fragments of my essay in here

I didn't find it confusing, yogi, because you said that it was fragments of your essay.

"Medicine (part of medeicne that concerns treating people) and national health organizations as two things are a hot issue.

Sorry - I misunderstood there. Perhaps you could try:

"In many countries, medical treatment and national health organisations are a hot issue.

what is the difference "Money-oriented doctors work many hours a day" and "The doctors who are money oriented work many hours a day"?

Really, they both mean the same thing. Your original sentence is actually fine, if you just remove the definite article: Doctors who are money oriented work many hours a day

Can we not say "medicine fights diseases" or "medicine fights with/against diseases"?

I think I would opt for medicine fights disease, but use "disease" in the singular form, which becomes an uncountable noun, and means all sorts of diseases generally.

i think this is now better than my original answer, because it seesm to be what you want to say, and more in your own words.

Keep up the good work!