ENGLISHCOURSESUSA | LEARN ENGLISH IN THE USA
  • ABOUT
  • Get Started
  • Services
    • ARGO
    • COLLEGEY
    • CORT
    • Cturtle
    • ELSA
    • Unilodgers
  • GET SMART

Why Writing is Difficult for Students

11/30/2018

 
Picture
When you’re a student, writing can simply seem like an impossible task. Throughout our school years, we were always taught that the only reason for us to write was to get a grade and we always tried to get it over with as soon as possible. If you’re now a college student, you might be thinking that not many things have changed. 

Depending on what you’re studying, there are many reasons why writing could still be difficult for you. You might feel like it is simply not important or even not that useful in what you do. The reality is that writing as a skill, can help you even make a stable income at some point in your life. Here are some reasons why students tend to think that writing is a hard task to accomplish.

Coming up with creative ideas
​

One of the most common difficulties for students is finding what to write about. Even if the topic is set and all they have to do is the writing, this task can still be intimidating for some people. Writing is a task that requires for the person to be a little creative and to be able to express their thoughts on paper with ease. 
For many students, expressing themselves and their thoughts isn’t always the easiest of tasks and that can bring quite a lot of problems in time where they have to write without putting too much thought into it. Even if you are great at arts and crafts, writing can still be tough for you if you are a little introverted or maybe even too much of an extrovert! 
The best way to overcome this is to start reading more. Reading anything from books to short stories can really help you expand your creativity as well as your vocabulary. Learning new words and understanding how to use them in a sentence can help you express yourself better and become more creative. The more you read the easier writing will seem to you. 

Doing research

Another thing that most - if not all students dread when it comes to writing, is doing the research to support what they wrote. If you have to write about a more particular topic, such as a historic or a medical one, you will have to cite all the sources you used and write down things about studies and relevant information. 
When it comes to writing papers, everyone would find writing difficult as it is so much more than just simply being creative and expressing your ideas and opinions. This kind of writing is more demanding as 
it is as you will have to have extra knowledge in order to pull such an essay through correctly. The best thing you can do about this is ask your professors for directions and try following them as closely as possible. The more you do this during your college years, the easier it will become. 

Staying focused for a while 
A common problem for young people and especially young students is focusing their attention on one thing for a long period of time. The way this generation was raised always included cell phones, video games and other kinds of fun activities, which in many cases seemed much more interesting and entertaining that finishing homework assignments. As a result, most people are now getting easily distracted and that can’t be helpful in tasks like writing. 
The best way to go about this is to keep all distractions away. Find one room to study in where your electronics, including your phone, are not present. Have your necessary notebooks and pens there but keep everything else away. You can even try and study in your local library or college’s library and see if that can help you concentrate a little bit better. 

If you’re having problems concentrating the best thing you can do is keep distractions away. If you procrastinate often and without a reason, you will come to find that even the simplest of writing tasks will seem like difficult and never-ending tasks. Make sure you keep your priorities straight and you manage to stay focused in order to make things easier for yourself. 

Finding the time to write

Writing can usually take quite a bit of time. A student’s life is usually very busy and most will feel exhausted at the end of every day. That is absolutely normal and expectable if you take into consideration how many assignments and classes students have to follow. 
Writing can seem very difficult if you have a million other things to do. You will simply find it impossible to write if your head it tired and if it’s the third assignment you had to do that day. While that is understandable, there is also a solution to it. 
You should leave writing for whenever you know you will have a little bit of extra time and nothing else to do. You will need to be rested and focused in order to better write your thoughts and produce a better outcome. If you leave your writing assignment for the last minute, you will only manage to become nervous and not write up to your expectations.

Writing doesn’t have to be difficult

Even if most students find writing to be quite a difficult task, it can actually be quite enjoyable. If you write about a topic you enjoy, you are bound to find it less difficult and more fun to do. While college and school assignments don’t always have to be fun, they can be less difficult if you pass them up as something you actually like doing. 
​
By keeping distractions away and being more focused on what you write, you can finish your writing tasks in less time, That can help you feel more relaxed and allow you to see writing from a different perspective. Lastly, the more time you spend reading and expanding your knowledge on how other people write, the easier it will be for you to write something yourself, even if that is a boring college paper. 


Author’s bio: Jerry is a professional writer and he loves to help students. He has spent the majority of his career in the writing industry, gaining experiences in areas such as editing and writing. Currently, Jerry is a blogger and a Head of CD at WOWGrade.com. Jerry also enjoys reading books and traveling. 

New ELS Center Opens in the Heart of NYC!

11/14/2018

 
Picture
ELS has just opened a new flagship center in Manhattan, New York, New York where students from around the world can come to learn English and immerse themselves in American culture.
 
“It’s inspiring,” Frank Prieto Pinto, an ELS student from Colombia, said of the classrooms in ELS/New York – Manhattan. “When I was living in my county I saw pictures, I saw movies, and now I feel like I’m in the movies,” he said, gesturing to the wall-sized mural of Times Square behind him. Pinto, who is a professor of Strategic Thinking and Management Skills at EAN University in Bogotá, stressed the importance of having a positive learning space. “As a student in this moment, I need a good place to study, and the classrooms are so beautiful.”
 
The new space boasts a lounge and cafe as well as collaborative spaces for students to learn and socialize.
 
“... I am confident that this [space]—together with our great staff and great program—will ensure that all of the students at this center will have a priceless and memorable experience,” said Reiji Terasaka, Chief Operating Officer at ELS.
 
About ELS Educational Services ELS Educational Services, Inc. offers more than 55 years of success in assisting international students—more than 1.2 million to date—achieve their personal and professional goals through English preparation and university study skills. ELS assists international students to identify and gain entry to higher education institutions around the world, including in Australia, Canada, India, Malaysia and the United States.
​
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture

​For more information:  ELS Language Centers

Creative Writing Prompts That Will Help You Learn a New Language

11/12/2018

 
Picture
Having creative writing prompts that help you learn a new language is a great idea. A lot of people really don’t know a lot about all this, but we got you covered. We will help you understand this and learn that dream language faster. Now, let's do a little introduction about this. First, I'll break down each of these terms, so get comfortable and keep on reading.

Creative: It involves the use of your imagination or original ideas to create or make something.

Writing Prompts: This is a simple topic where you start jotting down ideas. The prompt could either be a complete paragraph, a single word or a short phrase. A writing prompt helps you get inspired for creativity.

One nice thing about writing prompt is the fact that it is free writing; the main deal isn’t what you write, but the simple fact that you do write. It doesn't even require a story or a story structure; it’s just designed to get you thinking. You can also use prompt as a source of good exercise to help build your creativity level and can help you develop new skills and also come up with ideas. As we know, practice makes perfect. One nice way write prompts so it looks less like a chore and makes it fun is by choosing interesting topics that’d bring up that fun part of you. So try to choose wisely.


How Can I Learn to Write a New Language With Writing Prompts
Writing prompts brings you out of your comfort zone. It allows you to write about something that you really wouldn’t write about on a normal day. When writing about a wide variety of topics or subjects, you'll need to learn about many different words. If you’re learning on your own, try writing these prompts daily. You can set a time variation of about 15-20 minutes per day, this would be an excellent way to practice your new language. Try to use some of the vocab words you learn to write when working through your vocabulary list weekly. If you want to even learn how to speak well, you can start by writing your thoughts down. Learning how to write sentences is a step towards learning how to say it out loud.
So here are some creative writing prompts that will help you learn a new language;
Express Your Family
Family comes first you know, so this is our first creative way. By writing about your family, you won't only use family related vocabulary, but you will also practice defining an age, color, height, favorite food as well as occupation.

Your Friends
It’s great writing about friends because you’re familiar, and talking to them in a simple way or manner should be fun and easy. If you have gotten more advanced with your writing prompt level, you could also write about your great friendship experiences; problems your friends faced; birthday parties; and also how your life was influenced by them. You could also write on what you like about them. Personality description can also be a great way to express more vocab, or you can also clarify how you met using the reciprocal verb concourse.

Tasks
Another good way to practice writing a new language is to write down your tasks. You can pick up two or three of them you would like to accomplish in a day. I know you would be wondering the type of tasks you’ll finish in a day, well here are some simple goals like getting a haircut or grocery shopping. This is also an exercise that gives you two benefits of practicing the new language and also making you productive.


Write on Your Experiences Yesterday
Writing about the previous day's event is also a way to practice, but you could also write about your accomplishments over the past year, month or even week. Making use of this creative way would allow you to practice your writing in the past tense, which is also a nice way for beginners and advanced persons. Talking about your past life or your relatives should be nice too.

Weekend Breaks
Writing about your plans for the weekend is also a great way your future tense. This is also an opportunity for beginners, and advanced persons to practice the future tense. A beginner could write about fun things that they might have been involved with during a previous weekend, while those in an advanced level could write on what their ideal weekend could be if they were given a free vacation or a date with a celebrity.

Night Dreams
If you can remember your dream when you wake up from your bed, you put it down in your journal. You can start by jotting down quick notes to avoid forgetting it. You don’t have to worry about analyzing your dream. Once you make your notes, you can then spend enough time writing down all that you remember relating to your dream. Writing dreams as your prompt is a way to have fun, it is an interesting topic. You can imagine writing all the strange things that must have happened at night.
We have given you five creative writing prompt but here are some other prompts that could be of help to you;

Writing a One-Paragraph Biography of Your Life
Writing about your biography might include varieties of past tense to describe one time actions as well as a description of events that have happened before. You can also practice using sequencing and transition words.

Recount an Event
The event could be historical, personal or even both. You can try to rewrite in the present tense, future tense or even perfect tense. This exercise assists you to become accurate and even faster at verb conjugation in any tenses.

Describe a Joke or a Funny Event
​
This kind of prompt will challenge you to make up sentences using informal expressions and vocabularies that are exceptional and would get you to think out of the box for distinctive vocabulary.

Write a Short Story
While containing lots of action verbs, try making it very expressive. It can be a story with an unexpected angle or an imaginable twist, the most important part is that you should have real fun doing it.

Discuss any Issue That Affects The Public
Issues like a drought or an electricity outage, for example, can be a nice writing prompt topic. Try expressing the impersonal in various ways to bring up suggestions for people and also solutions that might help out.

Write a Letter to Another Student
You can explain your likes about learning a new language, include the difficulties you experienced while learning it and maybe the reasons why you decided to learn a foreign language.

Convince Someone to Adopt Your Pointview Of an Issue
Make use of persuasive language to try and convince them on your reasons and your strengths and their weakness about the argument. You can make use of a personal decision or political matters or anything or topic that can be argued on.

Write a Short Gratitude Note
You can express your thanks with words of gratitude. You can write a note to someone you feel must have made your day an awesome one with presents or a smile.

Pick any Conversant Topic
When you have an object in front of you, it's easier to try describing the object as descriptively as you can. You could also make use of comparisons and superlatives.
Creative writing helps in influencing your language, try out exercises for better improvement. I hope we helped you with the information you needed, have a great day!


Author Bio:
 Kristin Savage has graduated from Columbia University where she was majoring in Germanic Languages. Besides English as her mother tongue she also speaks German and Dutch fluently. Currently Kristin is studying Spanish and planning to obtain her PhD in Applied Linguistics since she is interested in how to use her to some extent practical knowledge of language processes in everyday life. She has been a writer at 
Pick Writers for a few years and is known for her thorough approach to all the tasks and aspiration to fulfill assignments with flying colors. 

How to Host an American Thanksgiving

11/9/2018

 
Picture
Thanksgiving is a national holiday and American tradition where families and loved ones gather on the third Thursday in November to spend time together, give thanks and share a meal. During the holiday, universities typically close the campus and grant students a long weekend so they can be with their families. Though there are many similar holidays celebrated around the world, American Thanksgiving has some specific traditions that can be fun to try while you are in the United States. This year, invite all your international friends for a new experience and use these tips to throw a truly American Thanksgiving celebration in your apartment.
  1. Plan Your Feast
    Thanksgiving is all about the food, so plan out your menu carefully and make sure you have all the cooking equipment you need. A few days before Thanksgiving, decide what traditional American Thanksgiving foods you’ll treat your friends to, and make sure you have enough room to prepare the meal in your apartment. Head to the grocery store in advance so you have plenty of time to find what you’re looking for. The last thing you want is to be in the middle of cooking and realize you don’t have what you need to complete a recipe. You can even put your own culture’s spin on an American dish for a fun blend of flavors and traditions.

  2. Clean Your Apartment
    Inviting all your friends for a Thanksgiving celebration means your apartment may feel a little cramped. A good way to prepare for your guests is by cleaning up your apartment and putting away anything that could limit your space. The day before Thanksgiving, throw away loose trash, vacuum the floors, clean the kitchen and living spaces, and make sure all rooms look tidy and ready for your friends.

  3. Add Fall Flair
    Thanksgiving is the perfect time to make your apartment feel festive and create an inviting environment. New throw pillows for your seating areas can create warmth and add a pop of seasonal color. Decorate your table with nuts and pinecones to add texture and color to your holiday table and add a fall-themed wreath to your door to welcome guests. Lastly, scatter battery-operated candles throughout your space to create a warm ambience, while not having to worry about melting wax.

Thanksgiving is a fun way to gather your friends and try a classic American tradition for yourself. Invite one or two close friends to cook with you and share the joy of making your dinner together or watching American football after your Thanksgiving meal. No matter how traditional your Thanksgiving Day is, these tips can help you host a successful gathering of your friends and celebrate the holiday.



​Rob Johnson is an experienced international traveler and Director of Higher Education Sales at CORT Furniture Rental, where he works directly with students and higher education institutions.

8 Surprising Things about American Culture for International Students

11/8/2018

 
Picture
From slang to restaurant etiquette, you should be prepared for many surprises about American culture when you decide to study in the USA. International students come here with impressions based on movies. TV shows and movies may represent real life from time to time, but they cannot fully prepare you for the real experience.
Whenever you visit a foreign country, you immerse in its culture. Foreign cultures always manage to surprise you in one way or another. Studying in the USA will be an enhanced experience of the same type, since you’re going to spend more time here.
So what are the most surprising things about American culture you should be prepared for? Let’s list them!

1. The Food Portions Are HUGE

When you order food at an American restaurant, you get a huge portion that you couldn’t possibly eat. If you were used to European portions, expect to be served a double-sized meal. 

For foreign students in the USA, food is a culture shock of its own.


2. People Are Polite

Truth be told, it depends where you come from. But most foreign students find Americans to be really nice. A foreign student at Utica College asked 33 international students to identify the most surprising things about America and Canada. They were mostly talking about the food, but you’ll notice comments about people being nice few times.

All cultures have kindness imprinted in them, but not all of them express it to third parties. British people, for example, are perceived as cold and overly intellectual. They make small talk about the weather and don’t care much about the person they are talking too. At least that’s how foreigners see them.

Americans, however, are usually very communicative. They are eager to make contact with foreigners and they will invite them to go out together.


3. Tons of Writing at Universities

The educational system is part of the culture. In America, it’s practically based on writing. Students are writing papers all the time, and to be honest - they are not that good at them.

As a foreign student, you’ll have to fit into that culture.

Maria Olivier, writer for EssayOnTime, explains: “The most surprising things about foreign students in the USA is the volume of writing they have to do. Essays, research papers, term papers, book reports, lab reports, case studies, business plans... you name it. It’s a challenging aspect of education that they have to adjust to.”

Oh, maybe it’s time to start polishing up your academic writing skills before you head off to America?


4. Mega, Super, Giant Stores!

You go out to get some oranges and you go back with complete supplies and at least $300 spent at the superstore.

When you first enter an American superstore, you’ll wish you had a map to navigate through it. On your way out, you’ll notice people buying everything they don’t need.

5. The A/C Goes Nuts

Expect to freeze in closed area during the spring and summer. You might consider taking a sweater when you go for groceries... in summer!

People here go crazy on the air conditioning.

6. People Leave Big Tips at Restaurants

If you plan to work as a waiter while studying, you’ll love this. If you’re just a student who likes the occasional restaurant dinner, you won’t enjoy the fact that you’re expected to provide a generous tip.

In most European countries, people are used to leaving coins on the table as a “thank you for the good service.” In America, you’re expected to tip 15% - 20% of the pre-tax bill. If you’re using coupons, you’re expected to tip on the full amount; not on the discounted price.

If you tip lower or you don’t tip at all, the servers will hate you and might spit in your coffee the next time they see you.

Oh; you’ll also need to tip taxi drivers, hair stylists, and the pizza delivery service.

7. Cheerleaders

When college teams play, the cheerleaders are more fun that the games themselves. If you haven’t seen any movies with cheerleaders, we’d recommend you not to do it. That’s how you’ll get really, really surprised when you see them in person.

These are not your usual sports team fans or audience entertainers. They take it to a whole other level. They are practically gymnasts, so you might start wondering why they don’t use that talent for a more useful purpose.

8. The Super Bowl and the World Series

Oh. My. God! If the Super Bowl doesn’t surprise you, I don’t know what will. This is the culminating game of a regular season in the annual NFL (National Football League) championship. It’s such a big event that people won’t stop talking about it. Brands pay $4 million for a commercial of 30 seconds during the broadcast.

Take a moment to process that.

Speaking of sports, Americans are also crazy about baseball. The annual championship is called The World Series, although only American teams participate in it. Okay; there’s one Canadian team, too.

Go figure.


One Thing Is Definite: You’ll Enjoy It!

Yes; you’ll find the USA surprising. But you know what? This experience will be great because it will surprise you. Embrace the differences and enjoy your stay!

Author Bio: Serena Dorf is a social media savvy Los Angeles-based content writer. She is interested in marketing, writing, and public speaking. In her free time, she is reading classic American literature and learning Swedish. You can find her on Google+ and Twitter.

    EnglishCoursesUSA

    Your one-stop destination for English language programs, tools, products and resources.

    Picture
    Picture
    Top ESL Blog Site Badge

    Archives

    February 2023
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    August 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    August 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

EnglishCoursesUSA.com

Do you want to learn English ?

Connect & Apply to  English language programs, secondary schools, universities and colleges with the assistance of our advisors.
 
Learn & practice  English online with our quizzes, games and podcasts or download ESL books and more!

Picture

About     Advertise     Contact     Submit     Product     Partners     Privacy     Refunds     ​Terms

ESL.COM Copyright 2022
  • ABOUT
  • Get Started
  • Services
    • ARGO
    • COLLEGEY
    • CORT
    • Cturtle
    • ELSA
    • Unilodgers
  • GET SMART