Preface
This book has been written to assist students here in Taiwan learning English as a foreign language to speak, in fluent English, about things that happen in their daily lives. It has been planned for students at the advanced high school as well as college/university levels. In the article quoted on the previous page, an American writer of Chinese books in Taiwan advocated a text that would enable students here in Taiwan to describe and explain their own culture. According to him, many Chinese students in his classes could not even talk about what they had for breakfast in English. Instead, they had been learning terms for American food and other things with which they had no direct contact. The author hopes this book will fill a real need by providing culture-specific items along with well-established English translations or proper English equivalents.
This book originally consisted of fifteen units. A totally new unit entitled "Receiving Foreign Guests-Proposing a Toast" has been added to this edition, in response to great demand by readers as well as by agencies that plan to hold international conferences in the years to come. Section I in each unit is divided into two parts: the first part lists words or expressions that are very likely to be used when a particular topic is being discussed; the second part those that are used in dialogues, some of which may be commonly used only in that particular context. Some words are followed by a parenthesized L and number, which indicate that they will be further noted and discussed in Section III (Linguistic & Cultural Notes) under the same number. The addition of many more vocabulary items, the marking of English pronunciation, and the alphabetic arrangement of words in both Section I and Section III are particular features of this enlarged and revised edition.
Section II is made up of two relatively long dialogues and, in most units, one or two more short dialogues. Those long dialogues, however, are aimed at helping students to put the words they learn into real conversational contexts and to improve their comprehension after listening to the recorded CDs. It is thus not advisable that the instructor ask his students to memorize a whole dialogue; he may instead ask them to read it aloud several times. Students may benefit more if the instructor asks them either to summarize a dialogue in their own words or to create a similar dialogue of their own.
Section III consists of notes and comments on words with certain cultural connotations not evident to most Chinese speakers or on words that are linguistically noteworthy. These notes are arranged in the order in which they appear in Section I. All the notes in Section III are written in Chinese, some with English equivalents. It is believed that Chinese students can understand such explanations more clearly. In Section III, the author has also attempted to correct misconceptions or misinformation that students may have acquired from other texts or outside readings. Mistranslations found in some English conversation texts as well as Chinese-English and English-Chinese dictionaries published here in Taiwan are also pointed out and discussed.
In Section IV, twenty or twenty-five questions are provided to test the readers comprehension of that unit. Many of these questions can also serve as topics for further in-depth discussions. Section V (Suggested Class Activities) is geared toward student-centered discussions, games, and role plays in the classroom. The instructor may adopt the type of activities that he considers most appropriate for his students English proficiency.
If there are any defects or mistakes in this book, no one except the author is responsible. Criticism or comments of the text will be greatly appreciated.
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