TOEIC Day 14 - Grammar Practice 4 เทคนิคการเตรียมตัวสอบ toeic ภายใน 16 วัน

เทคนิคการเตรียมตัวสอบ toeic ภายใน 16 วัน
TOEIC Day 14 - Grammar Practice 4

   In this article, I'll teach you my secret method on how to learn grammar. I don't memorize the rules. I create them by myself. WARNING! As far as I'm concerned, this is not accepted academic method. I came up with it and I would like to share it. If you find it's sensible, feel free to use it. If not, you just have to find other ways.

   There are three steps in this method.

   Step One: Choose a representative.

Problem: Between VS Among, And VS Or

   Some people still don’t know how to use 'between' and 'among'. And should it be used with 'and' or 'or'. For me, I can search this on Google and get the answer right away but I will forget it in one hour since I have bad memory. So I'll just choose one sentence that wll represent them all.

Between -> Between you and me, this is good.
Among   -> You have to choose among chocolate, lemon, and, strawberry.

   Step Two: Form the formula or rule

   From the representative sentence, I form patterns.

Between + something + and + something
Among + something + something + …… + and + something

   So, 'between' is used with two things or people. 'Among' is used with three or more. Both words are used with 'and'. However, I remember the sentences, not the patterns because it's easier.

   Step Three: Apply the formula or rule

Whenever I have to use 'between' and 'among', I think of the sentences then the formula.
I can't choose …………………. black …………… white.
Formula -> between + something + and + something
Correct answer -> I can't choose between black and white.

   How to succeed?

• When you choose the representative sentence, choose the one that is short and easy to remember. You can even come up with it by yourself. Choose something that is you are familiar with. For example, 'You have to choose among chocolate, lemon, and, strawberry.' Chocolate, lemon, and strawberry are my favorite ice cream flavor. 
• This may be easier for someone who is good at Mathematics because it is similar to the way you substitute the height and base length into in the formula for the area of a triangle. 
• Maybe you should have a notebook to keep record. Writing down those sample sentence is another way to make you remember better.

This article was originally published on chulatutor

TOEIC Day 13 - Grammar 4 (Overall review) เทคนิคการเตรียมตัวสอบ toeic ภายใน 16 วัน

เทคนิคการเตรียมตัวสอบ toeic ภายใน 16 วัน
TOEIC Day 13 - Grammar 4 (Overall review)

 
   I'll make list of most common grammar errors.

Collocation (verb and preposition)

   A verb has its own collection of prepositions to be used with. Different preposition means different meaning of the verb. 

	Sarah is married with John.
	Sarah is married to John.
	Sarah is the oldest kid so she has to look after her brothers.
	He looks down on the delivery boy and spoke harshly to him.
	Bobby looks up to his father and follows his footsteps.
	Josh was looking for the car key when the phone rang.

Participial adjectives

   What's the different between bored-boring, interested-interesting, frightened-frightening. For those who are still 'confused' with these adjectives. Let me explain.

The book interests me. (interest as a verb)

The book is interesting.

(the -ing adjective is used for describing the source of that feeling)

I'm interested in the book.

(the -ed adjective is used for describing the person who has that feeling)

Now, remember these formulas and you can apply them to any participial adjective.

Every

	Every members of the club is at the welcome party.
	Every member of the club are at the welcome party.
	Every member of the club is at the welcome party.
	Here is the formula. Replace 'one' with singular noun
	Everyone is happy.

Adverb placement

   Where should we place an adverb in a sentence? Place the adverb as close as possible to the noun or adjective that is being modified. However, if you want to emphasize the adverb, you can put it at the beginning (with comma) or at the end of the sentence.

	I drove to furiously her house.
	I drove to her furiously house.
	I drove furiously to her house.
	I furiously drove to her house.
	Furiously, I drove to her house.
	I drove to her house furiously.

Plural Noun

   'People' is the plural form of person. 'People' is plural noun. 'Police' is also a plural noun. There are many nouns that are ALWAYS plural.

Scissors	glasses	goods	clothes	stairs
Firearms	outskirts	surroundings	trousers	shorts
Headphones	head	quarters	socks

Uncountable noun

   Here is the list of UNCOUNTABLE nouns that you may not know.

Money	music	luggage	furniture	electricity
Wine	water	information	advice	travel
Work	scenery	rice	coffee	accommodation

   Go to this website for a full list of uncountable nouns.

Check this out: https://www.englishclub.com/vocabulary/nouns-uncountable-list.htm

Want / Need / Like

	I want go to the mall.
	I want to go to the mall.
	I need to your approval for this.
	I need your approval for this.
	I like to see what happens next.
	I like the movie so much.

   want / need / like + to + Verb   VS  want / need / like + noun

Themselves

	They went to the camp by theirselves.
	They went to the camp by themself.
	They went to the camp by themselves.

This article was originally published on chulatutor

TOEIC Day 10 - Grammar Practice 3 เทคนิคการเตรียมตัวสอบ toeic ภายใน 16 วัน

เทคนิคการเตรียมตัวสอบ toeic ภายใน 16 วัน
TOEIC Day 10 - Grammar Practice 3

   I'll give you a list of websites where you can find sample grammar tests because practice makes perfect.

1. www.toeic-online-test.com
   This website gives you over 3,000 TOEIC questions covering every part of TOEIC test. The questions are categorized in different levels, from easy, intermediate, and advanced. Here are the links that lead you straight to the grammar test.
2. www.englishclub.com
3. www.goodwinenglish.com
4. www.english-test.net
5. www.englishstore.net
6. www.businessenglishsite.com
7. www.learnenglishfeelgood.com

   But if you're bored with the conventional form, you may want to take a break and try these website for kids. Trust me it's not too easy and it's more fun.

Check this out :

http://www.funenglishgames.com/grammargames.html

http://www.eslgamesplus.com/sentence-monkey/

   However, for some people, doing many and many practice doesn't feel right. What are other options?

• Observe if the English grammar is similar or different from Thai grammar in what aspect. The most obvious difference is tense. The most similar aspect is conjunction.
• Read a lot of English and listen more.
  When I do grammar test, I don't memorize the rules. I mostly rely on experience and usualness which come from reading and listening. Reading and listening a lot will give you a database and from that you can create the rules by yourself. I will explain this method in Day 14 article. 
• Write more often
  Not only practicing grammar exercises but also learning from your mistake. Know what your common mistake is about and focus on that topic. If you do the same mistakes for ten times, I believe you will not make them again. Right? So make mistakes as many as possible and learn from them. 
• Ask your teacher or personal tutor
  Everyone has difficulty with different topics. Even with the same topics, their understanding seems to be different. Therefore, you should consults your teacher or tutor personally to clarify the specific issue.

This article was originally published on chulatutor

TOEIC Day 6 - Grammar Practice 2 (เทคนิคการเตรียมตัวสอบ toeic ภายใน 16 วัน)

เทคนิคการเตรียมตัวสอบ toeic ภายใน 16 วัน
TOEIC Day 6 - Grammar Practice 2 

Don't worry if you are not good at vocabulary. There are other ways to succeed the sentence completion test. By analyzing grammar structure, you can eliminate the incorrect choice, thus increase your probability of choosing the correct answer. I can guarantee that studying grammar is more useful than memorizing a large bunch of vocabularies. Grammar is fixed rule that can be applied to any context. Meanwhile, there are too many vocabularies. No matter how many of them you can memorize, there is not much chance that they are going to be in the test.

I'm not saying that vocabulary is unimportant but I think you should spend more time on grammar. Here are more examples on how to analyze the test.

Conjunction

His self-confidence, values ------------ sense of responsibility enabled him to achieve success.

A. or B. and C. also D. but


As you can see that 'self-confidence', 'values', 'sense of responsibility' are the characteristics that support success. Due to the agreement, we can eliminate D. but. We can also eliminate C. also because it's usually used in a separate simple sentence.

A. or suggests that there only one of the characteristics is enough for building success. However, the meaning this sentence is trying to deliver is that the combination of all three qualifications is the key to success. Therefore, B. and is the right answer.

Tense

I would like to receive the correct merchandise as quickly as possible and will ---------------- your expeditious handling of this matter.

A. appreciate B. appreciated C. appreciating D. appreciates

When it comes to Tense, there is always a clue in given sentence. Adverb of frequency typically suggests present simple tense. A past simple sentence always includes time indicator such as yesterday, two months ago, last Tuesday. If it's a compound sentence, use parallel structure. If it's a complex sentence, consider the accompanying clause.

As for this example, the signifier is 'will'. You know that this is a future simple tense. Will must be followed by a Verb in infinitive form. Therefore, A. appreciate is the correct answer.

Word type

The dancers exhibited complete -------------------------.

A. confident B. competent C. confidence D. confidential

Sometimes, it could be very easy. You just have to know what type of word that should be filled in. As for this sentence,

The dancers	+	exhibited	+	complete	+	?????
Subject	+	verb	+	adjective	+	?????

Exhibit is a transitive verb, which requires an object. This sentence lacks an objective which means the missing word must be a noun. From this analysis, you can eliminate A. confident, B. competent, and D. confidential, which are adjectives. The remaining choice is the right answer, C. confidence.

The second part of reading test is text completion. The text may be an e-mail, company memo, facsimile, or letter. This part also relies on good knowledge of grammar but mostly on vocabulary. The grammar topics are about the same as the sentence completion. 

This article was originally published on chulatutor