academic writing week 2

1. Academic writing in English
week 2

2. Today’s objectives
• How to make a good summary
• Cornell note-taking
• Identify the structure of an academic scientific article
• Work on your academic vocabulary
• Work on grammar

3. 3 main requirements
1. The summary should cover the original as a whole
2. The material should be presented in a neutral register
3. The summary should be a condensed version of the
material, presented in your own words (avoid plagiarism)
• Do not include facts which do not not appear in the original
(do not include your comments or evaluation).

4. How to write a summary-Preliminary steps
• Read the text, highlighting important information and
taking notes
• In your own words, write down the main points of
each section
• Write down the key support points for the main topic
(leave the details aside)

5. How to write a summary-
highlight important information and taking notes
• Cornell note-taking:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vOsVKWeyAA
• http://coe.jmu.edu/learningtoolbox/printer/cornellnotes.pdf
• Here you can find a template

6. How to write a summary
• Start with WHY (ask yourself WHY did the author write
the article? What did he want to communicate?)
• https://www.startwithwhy.com/

7. Choose a text from the text bank on the blog
• Follow the preliminary steps (highlight, take notes> main
points)
• Using the Cornell template, take notes and write key
words of the article you have read)
• Write a summary of the article using one of the following
frames as opening sentences

8. Frames-opening sentence (introductory paragraph)
• In his/her article “ (title, first letter capitalized)” autor’s last
name (year) argues, claims, reports, contends, maintains,
states that main idea/argument.
• Example: In his article “Michael Dell turns the PC world inside
out”, Andrew E. Serwer (1997) describes how Michael Dell founded
Dell Computers and claims that Dell’s low-cost, direct-sales
strategy and high quality standards account for Dell’s enormous
success.

9. Other examples of frames
• According to ___________________ (year), ________________________________________.
(author's last name) (main idea; S + V + C)
• ___________'s article on ______________ (year) discusses the ____________________.
(author's last name) (topic) (main idea; Noun Phrase)
• ___________ (year), in his/her article, "________________" argues that ________________.
author's last name) (title of article) (main idea; S + V + C)
• According to "Title of the Article" (year), ____________________________________________.
(main idea; S+V+C)
• _____________ has a major impact on ________ (author's last name, year).
(topic/NP) (NP)

10. Vocabulary task
• Go to one of your favourite science websites in English
(i.e. http://www.sciencemag.org/)
• Choose any article piece of news you find interesting
• Copy a part of the text you find interesting and paste it
on the AWL highlighter (google the AWL highlighter)
(https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/alzsh3/acvocab/awlhighlig
hter.htm

11. Vocabulary task
• Try the settings on levels 1,5 and 10. Notice the
difference in words that are highlighted.
• Take 10 of the words at level 9 or 10 and copy them into
a separate blog post> Academic Words week 2.
• Translate these words into Dutch
• Go to http://www.visuwords.com and check out other
words related to the words on your list

12. Grammar
• a or an (do the exercise on blog post-a/an); post the
answers on your blog
• Word order-do the exercise on the blog post word order
• Post the answers on your blog

13. Sources for this PowerPoint
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsFGmvR2-84
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqg7CXm2ZMA
• http://academics.smcvt.edu/cbauer-
ramazani/AEP/EN104/summary.htm