How to improve English writing skills without going to college?

Mabbit

Mabbit

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I got two degrees from college. I have above 3.00 GPA from both degrees.

However, I'm not satisfied with their English systems of teaching how to write English grammar. Most of time, they were focusing on how to write essays, not grammar.

I dislike the idea of going back to college to learn English writing skills.. again. It will waste my money.

So, I'm wondering what are the best options for me to learn English without going back to colleges?

Getting books and teaching myself to learn how to write, will that be helpful?

Any suggestions?

Please don't say keep reading books. I read about 2 books a week. And no, it didn't helped me at all.

Reading books may help you to understand English but it may not be helpful for others, like me.
 
Mabbit said:
Please don't say keep reading books. I read about 2 books a week. And no, it didn't helped me at all.
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Are you sure it didn't help? I only see two mistakes in that whole post.

I am not an expert in language education, but I would think that there would be three aspects to improving your grammar. One is being aware of the rules, which you can get from a good book (sorry I don't have recommendations here) and maybe a good mentor. The second is to expose yourself to as much good grammar as you can, so I think the fact that you read 2 books a week is a good thing. The third is to keep writing and get feedback on your own grammar.

I can give you some feedback if you want, but correcting people's grammar on this board can get into some sensitive history. If you're interested, keep posting - after 5 (I think it's five) posts you can send private messages.
 
Yes I'm sure reading books won't help.

Let say, I wrote 11 pages of essay, I normally get 20 grammar errors per page. That's bad to have 220 grammar errors for one essay.

I just got a basic grammar English book. Soon, I'll have to review the basic rules again.
 
First idea I have is something of a long shot: find texts that are commonly used in Advanced Placement English Language and Composition. While those courses definitely have an essay-writing slant, I also think the texts they use really focus on the nitty gritty grammatical points I suspect you might be concerned with.

I remember taking a course on Second Language Acquisition, and whether English is your mother tongue or an L2, something the professor emphasized was that ability to self-correct is hugely important at improving proficiency. So those eleven page papers, go to town and correct everything you can. If you're like me, you saved a great deal of course work and papers, so you have plenty of source materials once you find a reference text you like. I've never been able to do the journal thing, but perhaps starting a private blog would generate material to edit if you're not such a pack rat




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Are there local colleges that sometimes have English tutors on site? I understand that students often have access to free tutors. I don't know if you're a student or not, but it won't hurt to ask.

Secondly, it really means nothing to have read 2 books if anything cannot be learned from either books. I wonder if you got any benefits from either books.
 
i know exactly what you are talking about essay structure, transitionals, contrasting words, etc it doesnt help much...

couple ideas...
English Grammar for Dummies? -does this book exist??
or English Proses

find some books that discuss one thing...tactics of English proses...(thats' my guessing, hell thats what im going to do)

read up on ... adj and verb agreements, singular/plural rules...for every situations possible

maybe try google...
1) how to write in first person...for novels
2) how to re-order long sentences into paragraphs
3) how to do particitapals...

hope this help, sorry if it doesnt
i know the frustration too well too
univeristy is not 'teaching' its just 'grading' its gone off tracks of its own teaching traditions..why? because universitites have now gone to 'rating systems' much like hotels, for rich students from around the world to go on 'holiday'..before taking 'paid interenrtship' to take place of their rich daddies....

and universities now runs like a business...for qualifying not for teaching...weird, sad but true
 
Wirelessly posted

PowerON said:
Read book, then you'll become like a nazi grammar.
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I agree. Read books and keep journal to write freely no rules for grammar. It will improve your writing skills.
 
It might help to be more specific about what kinds of books should be read to improve grammar. Not all books are created grammatically equal.
 
OK. This has been my goal as well and here is what I have learned:

Writing, in almost any form, is a poor(at best) replication of spoken language. I've been studying the origins of this for about 4 months now and I can tell you this is true. Furthermore, English, from the beginning, was a hack of a language put together with borrowed words and taken from an incomplete predecessor(Latin). I could do a whole thesis on this and not scratch the surface.

Rules for English grammar are not carved in stone. If you study things such as comma rules, you'll know that these things change not only over time but place as well(notice no comma before the word "but" a correlative conjunction). To understand grammar correctly you have to understand what you are writing. Writing a newspaper article is different than writing a novel or class paper. The approaches good authors take are different.

You cannot learn grammar and writing from a book because, like any tool, semantics of the tool don't show application. Instructions for a hammer don't tell you how to build a house.

Here is what I would do. Take a paper you wrote and analyze just one error at a time. Don't just say: Oh that's a mistake. Take the time to think of why it is a mistake. And, you may also find that the people correcting your work are wrong or just like to nitpick.

I think you are going to find that 99% of your mistakes are from not proof reading. If you read over your work, you catch a lot of stuff.

If you think writing is hard, I suggest you look at syllabification of English words. You'll have loads of fun there.

I'm sure there are plenty of errors in this post, but I've only failed if you've failed to be able to read it. Fair enough?


P.S. You don't need to correct ALL errors. You just need to correct YOUR errors. Only focus on the errors you make, otherwise, you're going to be wasting time learning things you already know.
 
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On a perhaps similar note as VacationGuy, I highly recommend John McWhorter's books on language in general but in particular

Word on the Street:Debunking the Myth of a Pure Standard English

Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue: The Untold History of English

Both books give insight to English's roots and make are good advocates for a descriptivist approach to language and grammar instead of ye olde schoolmarm's prescriptivist rantings.


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Mabbit said:
I got two degrees from college. I have above 3.00 GPA from both degrees.

However, I'm not satisfied with their English systems of teaching how to write English grammar. Most of time, they were focusing on how to write essays, not grammar.

I dislike the idea of going back to college to learn English writing skills.. again. It will waste my money.

So, I'm wondering what are the best options for me to learn English without going back to colleges?

Getting books and teaching myself to learn how to write, will that be helpful?

Any suggestions?

Please don't say keep reading books. I read about 2 books a week. And no, it didn't helped me at all.

Reading books may help you to understand English but it may not be helpful for others, like me.
Click to expand...

your writing & grammar skill seem fine so I'm guessing you mean... how to "write" as in... how to convey your message in a literal form. that is the most difficult skill to acquire. it takes years.

I would recommend you to read all editorial sections in newspapers/magazines such as New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg Market, etc... so you can see how an editors write out their opinions.
 
I like the idea of reading, I think it would help absorb the language. Just don't read any of Laurell K Hamilton's later books, she's a hack ;)

Can I ask you why? You already have 2 degrees I didn't see any glaring foopahpahs in your post. Why do you want to grammar nazi yourself?
 
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