• EXCELLENT introduction!!! 😍

• Overall, great introduction, but

• Overall, good introduction, but be careful to 

• This sentence would be stronger if it listed an example or two that you explain in more detail later in your essay—make sense?

• X, this introduction paragraph is too long. How could you best break this introduction into 2–3 logical paragraphs? 😉

Hook

• GREAT choice of hook to immediately engage your audience! 😍(Though given this assignment’s word limit, can you think of any way you can shorten your hook without weakening its effectiveness?)

• Good hook to engage your audience

• Your introduction’s “hook” could be strengthened by including a relevant quote, high-interest or shocking fact, statistic, or anecdote in its first sentence—make sense? (For examples, see Chapter 7 of our eText at https://canvas.illinois.edu/courses/44566/assignments/891465?module_item_id=3149931) (=8)

• X, why did you not apply my feedback on your 2nd draft about your introduction needing a "hook"? 😭 (For more information, see Chapter 7 of our eText at https://canvas.illinois.edu/courses/44566/assignments/891465?module_item_id=3149931)

• X, I can see you were attempting to hook your audience with engaging visual description, though because of your first sentence’s dangling modifier, this didn’t quite work. Nevertheless, I don’t think it’s fair to take points off for one mistake in two different sections of our rubric, so I’ll do so only under the “Clarity of Language” category

• Except possibly in business writing, it’s unusual for an introduction paragraph hook to be an imperative sentence. Can you think of any other way to “hook” your audience into WANTING to continue reading your paper?

• Why is your introduction's hook on a new line from the rest of your introduction paragraph? 🤔 (=9 in ESL 112)

Contextualizing your topic

• Your introduction does a GREAT job of contextualizing your topic

• X, it’s unusual for writers in their introduction paragraph to provide readers SO little background information/context about their topic. What other background information would it be helpful for your readers to know? (See Chapter 7 of our eText for ideas) 

• What other background information could you provide to prepare readers to accept your stance on whether remote or in-office work is better? (See Chapter 7 of our eText for ideas) 

• Your introduction could be strengthened by contextualizing different points of view on whether/how our single-use plastics situation should be handled—make sense? 

• Your introduction does a good job of contextualizing your topic in terms of how COVID-19 forced education online around the world (though it would be better if you explicitly mentioned. . . .)

  •  Your introduction does a good job of contextualizing your topic in terms of overviewing supporters’ vs. opponents’ perspective on banning single-use plastics, but it would be better if you more completely overviewed supporters’ perspective by at least mentioning what you explain later, namely that one major reason is that PEOPLE can’t afford the cost but another major reason is that our EARTH/ENVIRONMENT can’t afford the cost—make sense?

• Although you MENTION both the banning and non-banning perspectives, it’s not IMMEDIATELY clear which perspective you take—e.g., readers will find your stance against banning a BIG surprise given what you say earlier about “banning the use of garbage bags in stores can effectively reduce pollution”—can you clarify the connection between these ideas to better contextualize these different points of view?) 

• Hmmmm. . . .isn't standard introduction structure: (1) hook, (2) background information, and then (3) thesis statement? Therefore, shouldn't this be BACKGROUND INFORMATION contextualizing your topic (NOT an introduction to the main point of your first body paragraph? 😉)

Moving from general to specific

• You do a good job of moving logically from the GENERAL context of XXX to your SPECIFIC stance that YYY

• You do a good job of moving logically from (1) life before the pandemic to (2) the instructional online/hybrid instruction innovations forced on universities by the pandemic to (3) your specific stance that the hybrid mode is most beneficial

• Your introduction does a good job of moving logically from the GENERAL context of sports injuries and their long-term effects to the problem that universities aren’t required to provide healthcare afterward to your SPECIFIC recommended solutions of (1) preventing injuries beforehand and (2) providing surveillance after injuries

• Outstanding/Good/Clear thesis statement! (with body paragraphs aligning with the thesis to establish coherence)

• Where is your introduction paragraph's thesis statement? (See Chapter 7 of our eText to learn what thesis statements should include) 

• Should your thesis statement be located in its own single-sentence paragraph? 

• Hmmmm. . . .isn't standard introduction structure: (1) hook, (2) background information, and then (3) thesis statement? Therefore, why have you also located this thesis statement in the MIDDLE of your introduction paragraph? 🤔

  • Your introduction would be stronger if your thesis statement were the LAST sentence of your introduction paragraph 😉 

• At first, I thought this sentence was part of your introduction’s background information, not its thesis statement. Can you think of a way of combining this sentence with the following sentence to make it more clearly part of your thesis statement/road map for readers letting them know what they can expect your essay to talk about?  

• Check your thesis statement logic—how can you make clear to readers that you’ll be discussing the detrimental effects of PLASTIC on the environment and human health but the detrimental effects of IMPOSING A BAN on the economy? 

• X, I’m so confused—your thesis statement appears to argue that full-time remote work is better than office work, but your body paragraph topic sentences and support appear to argue the opposite. Which do you really believe?

Stance

• Your thesis statement clearly expresses your stance 

• Although it is clear from your introduction paragraph that you think single-use plastics do more harm than good, your introduction paragraph does not include a thesis statement CLEARLY (i.e., EXPLICITLY) expressing your stance on our argumentative essay question of “Should single-use plastics be banned?” 😭 (Just FYI: American and other Western cultures, in contrast to many Asian cultures, make a big deal of CLEARLY/EXPLICITLY stating your ideas!) (=7)

Preview of main points

One preview point mistake = 8, two mistakes = 7, three mistakes = 6

• Both your thesis statement and body paragraphs would be stronger if your thesis statement included a preview of the main points your body paragraphs will discuss (and your body paragraphs aligned with the ordering of your preview points in your thesis statement, of course)—make sense? (See Chapter 7 of our eText for more information.) (If you feel like this will make your thesis statement too long, feel free to break this info into two sentences 😉) 

  • Your thesis statement would be stronger if it previewed the main points discussed in your body paragraphs (See Chapter 7 of our eText for more information.)

• Your thesis statement clearly expresses your stance and previews the main points of your first two body paragraphs but should also preview the main point of your 3rd body paragraph

  • Hmmmm. . . .it’s hard as a reader to match up your thesis statement’s preview points to your FIRST body paragraph in particular—to avoid making this same mistake in future papers, please review Chapter 7 of our eText on how to write effective thesis statement preview points (=8)

• Will your readers be able to guess from this preview point what SPECIFICALLY you will say about this? (Can you revise this thesis statement to make this preview point more IMMEDIATELY clear to readers?)

  • Mostly good thesis statement aligned with your body paragraphs to establish coherence, except how can you revise your 2nd preview point to make it more IMMEDIATELY clear to readers that the specific lack of resources your 2nd body paragraph will discuss is lack of ACCESS TO HEALTHCARE? (=9)

• Mostly good thesis statement aligned with your body paragraphs to establish coherence, but do your preview points accurately summarize the MAIN point of your 1st body paragraph? (=8)

  • Hmmmm. . . .does this preview point accurately summarize the main point of your 1st body paragraph?

    • Hmmmm. . . .don’t “lack of education and awareness” and “misunderstandings” mean basically to the same thing? I’m therefore confused based on this third preview point how what you’re planning to talk about in your 1st vs. 3rd body paragraphs differs—make sense?

    • Mostly good thesis statement aligned with your body paragraphs to establish coherence, except that the difference between your 1st and 3rd preview points is not clear (primarily because your 3rd preview point doesn’t fully summarize your 3rd body paragraph) 

  • Hmmmm. . . .in light of this preview point, it's a little confusing that actually your first as well as second paragraph discuss how the link between animal abuse and domestic violence add stress 🤔

  • Hmmmm. . . based on your 3rd body paragraph, I think you mean "emotional trauma ESPECIALLY FOR CHILDREN for children living in abusive environments" but the phrasing of this preview point suggests you mean "abusive ENVIRONMENTS WHICH INCLUDE CHILDREN" (in contrast to abusive environments where no children are present? 🤔

    • Only with EMPLOYERS? (Aren’t one’s relationships with COLLEAGUES also important? Your body paragraph on this topic indicates BOTH are valuable. How could you have rephrased this thesis statement preview point to better align with this body paragraph and thereby maintain coherence?) 

• Mostly good thesis statement aligned with your body paragraphs to establish coherence, but do any of your body paragraphs discuss remote work “expanding a company’s reach”? (If not, should your thesis statement be mentioning it? 😉)  

  • Hmmmm. . .do any of your body paragraphs discuss John Hocevar’s use of the emotional appeal? Why not? Inclusion of this in your thesis statement is functionally a promise to readers that you WILL discuss this! 😭 

  • Hmmmm. . . .is fitness a MAIN point of any of your body paragraphs? (Check your body paragraph topic sentences to find out 😉) If not, should your thesis statement be mentioning fitness? 

• Hmmmm. . . .I'm afraid it's confusing that your thesis statement makes it sound like you will discuss three solutions in detail, but in fact, you discuss education WITHIN your introduction but your other two solutions in their own respective sections—I'm confused! 🤔

• Hmmmm. . . .it’s hard as a reader to match up your thesis statement’s preview points to your research paper sections, which is a little confusing. Using the same vocabulary for both would be helpful—make sense? 

  • Your thesis statement would be stronger if its preview points more clearly matched up to the MAIN POINT of each of your body paragraphs—make sense? 

Logic

• Your thesis statement would be stronger if its preview points more clearly matched up to the MAIN points of each of your body paragraphs IN THE ORDER YOU WILL DISCUSS THEM—make sense? 🤔

  • Good thesis statement except that its order of preview points is different than your order of body paragraphs, which is a little confusing.

    • Acceptable thesis statement except that its order of preview points (ethos, then logos, and then pathos) is different than your order of body paragraphs (logos, then ethos, and then pathos), which is confusing

• Hmmmm. . . .currently your thesis statement's preview points are ordered as a positive, positive, and negative, which is a little confusing. Can you rephrase them as all positive?

• Hmmmm. . . .currently the order of your thesis statement's preview points is a little confusing. Wouldn't it be more logical first to discuss how a wealth tax can raise the country's revenue and only then how increased national revenue will (1) help families have a better lifestyle and (2) help lower the national debt?

• Hmmmmm. . . .is this order of preview points/body paragraphs best for convincing a SKEPTICAL audience of your stance?

• You have clearly mastered academic paragraphing norms in English—outstanding!!! 😍

• X, this body paragraph is too long (so that its topic sentence cannot overview ALL of the paragraph's main ideas) Please review Chapter 6 of our eText to learn how to decide how best to break your paper into logical paragraphs 🤔

  • X, sometimes your body paragraphs are too long (so that their topic sentences cannot overview ALL of the paragraph's main ideas) and other times they are unusually short (sometimes just 2–3 sentences). Please review Chapter 6 of our eText to learn how to decide how best to break your paper into logical paragraphs 🤔

• Also, many of your research paper body paragraphs are unusually short (sometimes just 2–3 sentences)—which would be more effective if combined?

  • Academic writing rarely includes one-sentence paragraphs. Could this sentence logically be combined with either the previous or following paragraph?/Why not combine your currently three "Suggestions" paragraphs into one? 🤔

• Hmmmm. . . .could a paragraph break here be helpful as well as adding a signal/connecting/transition word or other cohesive device to make the logical relationship between this sentence and the previous sentence IMMEDIATELY clear to readers? 🤔

  • This main point wasn’t mentioned in this body paragraph’s topic sentence. What about moving the rest of this paragraph to its own body paragraph? 🤔

  • Hmmmm. . . .although this sentence DOES fit with the first sentence of this paragraph, could a paragraph break here nevertheless be helpful for presenting  your two proposed anti-corruption reform in parallel grammatical form, namely one paragraph about strengthening the legal framework related to corruption and one paragraph about specialized anti-corruption organizations? 🤔

  • Hmmmm. . . .although this sentence DOES fit with the first sentence of this paragraph, could a paragraph break here be helpful to enable you to avoid needing to add a signal/connecting/transition word or other cohesive device to make the logical relationship between this sentence and the previous sentence IMMEDIATELY clear to readers? 🤔

  • Hmmmm. . . .is this the most logical place for a paragraph break? (Could another earlier sentence provide a stronger body paragraph topic sentence? 🤔)

Cohesion

• Please see my comments in your essay about making sure it’s clear to readers how your sentences connect to each other and to your overall argument 

• Your sentences/paragraphs are cohesive, moving smoothly and logically from one to another 

  • What signal/connecting/transition words or other cohesive devices can you add to make the logical relationship between your sentences/paragraphs more IMMEDIATELY clear to help readers move smoothly from one paragraph to another? (For ideas, see https://www.touro.edu/departments/writing-center/tutorials/transitional-words/ and https://web.citadel.edu/root/images/academic_support_center/cohesive%20devices.pdf) (Haven't yet checked if these are the BEST resource to link!!!) (1 error=19; 2 errors=17; 3 errors=16, 4+ errors=15)(2 errors=19; 3 errors=17, 4 errors=16, 5+ errors=15)—Research paper=17 for 2+ errors)

    • Mostly your sentences/paragraphs are cohesive, moving smoothly and logically from one to another but see my comments in your essay about how your use of transition words/cohesive devices could be improved so readers IMMEDIATELY understand the logical relationship between sentences 😉 

  • Hmmmm. . . .does this match standard English signal/connecting/transition words or other cohesive devices for making the logical relationship between BODY paragraphs immediately clear to readers? (To find out, see https://www.touro.edu/departments/writing-center/tutorials/transitional-words/ and https://web.citadel.edu/root/images/academic_support_center/cohesive%20devices.pdf)

  • X, it’s sometimes unclear WHY you are connecting particular sentences to one another. How can you help your readers better understand the logical relationship between your ideas? (and therefore hopefully convince them of your thesis) 

    • How can you reorder this sentence so its logical connection to the previous sentence is more immediately clear to readers. (Hint: The previous sentence said nothing about “experts,” so it’s hard for readers to see the connection between these two sentences if you start there.) (cf. writers can help their readers move smoothly from one idea to the next by using overlap, a pro-form, a semicolon, or signal words—see Hilary Glasman-Deal’s Science Research Writing, 2nd Ed., pp. 56–62, for more info)

      • Please see my comment on one place in your ethos paragraph where, without better explanation, readers are likely to have trouble following the logic of your argument 😉 

      • Hmmmm. . . .how could you MORE CLEARLY connect this conclusion sentence to the topic of this sentence about plastics products polluting the ocean? 

      • Check your logic here. How does this sentence relate to its previous sentence? 🤔

      • Check your logic here. How does this sentence relate to its previous and following sentences? 🤔

      • I’m confused—How do the following sentences from your 3rd paragraph support that paragraph’s topic sentence about hybrid instruction enhancing students’ and teachers’ digital literacy? 

• What signal/connecting/transition word or other cohesive device can you add to make the logical relationship between this sentence/paragraph and the previous one more IMMEDIATELY clear to help readers/connect these two sentences more smoothly? 🤔 (See https://www.touro.edu/departments/writing-center/tutorials/transitional-words/ for ideas) 

  • What signal/connecting/transition word can you add to better connect these two sentences, so it is IMMEDIATELY clear to readers whether your second sentence expresses OPPONENTS’ perspective vs. YOUR perspective? 

    • This sentence is confusing because, without a transition or other word showing you disagree with this interpretation, it sounds like you are confused about which side you agree vs. disagree with—which will definitely damage readers’ trust in what you say. Make sense?

• Hmmmm. . . .are you sure this signal/connecting/transition word accurately expresses the logical relationship between this sentence/paragraph and the previous one? (Maybe you mean something like “nevertheless”?)  (1 mistake = 19)

  • Hmmm. . . .do you mean something like “In addition to” vs. “Instead of”?

  • This is tricky, but the connecting word you need here is “where”

  • X, you have mostly integrated your sources using only ONE vs. DIFFERENT appropriate signal/transition/connecting word (i.e., “hence”) 

    • Hmmmm. . .. it's a little boring/confusing to have two sentences/paragraphs in a row that use the exact same transition word (e.g., “also”)/begin with "in conclusion"? (Can you think of any other logical 

• • Don't "in addition" and "as well" mean the same thing? (Therefore, do you need to include both? 😉) 

  • Hmmmm. . . .do you mean "ALSO, ANOTHER method"? 🤔

  • Just FYI—English requires “and” (or another conjunction) before the last item in a list

• Hmmmm. . . .this is tricky, but in this case you need “in contrast” (“conversely” only works if the situation you are about to describe is in some way the opposite of the situation you have just described)—see https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/conversely (Except that no major browser currently supports Adobe Flash, given its serious security issues, http://sana.aalto.fi/awe/cohesion/signposts/contrast/exercises/3x.html would be a good exercise to practice with)

• "On the other hand” can only be used when there are ONLY two sides to an issue. Otherwise you need to use a different transition word, such as “in contrast” 😉 (Need to check if this is the best explanation/link)

  • I’m not following your logic here—“On the other hand” is used to contrast TWO different points, facts, or opposite ways of looking at a situation. How does this sentence CONTRAST with the previous sentence? 

  • Hmmmm. . . .does the second half of this paragraph support your argument (that students and schools must meet dozens of conditions to conduct successful online teaching) by CONTRASTING with the point you made in the first half of your paragraph (online learning requires students to be motivated to learn on their own) or by ADDING an additional point? (See https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/on-the-other-hand for more info)—Need to check if this is the best resource to recommend

• Should this be “on the contrary” or “in contrast”?

  • Should this be “on the contrary” or “however”  (or “nevertheless”)?  (And is this the best LOCATION in your sentence for a contrasting transition word? Why or why not?)

  • Hmmmm. . . .this is tricky, but in this case you need “on the contrary” or “rather” or “instead,” not “conversely”—(Except that no major browser currently supports Adobe Flash, given its serious security issues, http://sana.aalto.fi/awe/cohesion/signposts/contrast/exercises/3x.html would be a good exercise to practice with) 

• Hmmmm. . . .“at the same TIME” doesn’t fit with “in the FUTURE”—can you think of another transition word that would better express your intended idea?

• “Lastly” is characteristically used to introduce your last body paragraph’s main point, not your conclusion paragraph. Better options for introducing your conclusion paragraph would be something like “In sum” or “To summarize”—make sense?

• “Meanwhile” means “at the same TIME”—but is your point really to talk about TIMING here? 🤔 (Maybe you mean something like "In addition"?)

• Check your "such as" logic here—is this really an EXAMPLE of social inclusion measures? 🤔

• transition/connecting word that could replace one of these instances/"in conclusion" here?) (See https://www.touro.edu/departments/writing-center/tutorials/transitional-words/ for ideas)

• Because your sentence beginning with “the possibility of absolute authority” explains or illustrates your previous sentence beginning with “This possibility of authority,” these sentences should actually be connected with a colon, not a period.  (See https://www.thepunctuationguide.com/colon.html) 
  • Because your phrase beginning with “as long as” explains or illustrates the previous sentence beginning with “Today there is such a shortage of” these sentences should actually be connected with a colon, not a period. (See https://www.thepunctuationguide.com/colon.html) 
  • This should not be a comma but a colon because the following phrase explains or illustrates the previous on  (See https://www.thepunctuationguide.com/colon.html) 
• Because the part of this sentence beginning with ”A study” explains or illustrates the earlier part of this sentence that says “First, working fully remotely can help people have more rest time,” these two parts of this sentence should actually be connected with a colon, not a comma. (See https://www.thepunctuationguide.com/colon.html) 

• What about connecting these sentences with a colon because your this sentence explains or illustrates the previous one?)

• When two sentences are separated with a conjunctive adverb such as “thus,” how should they be punctuated?

• This “while/because/since” sentence is not a complete sentence according to English grammar—can you figure out how to fix this?

  • Currently, this sentence is not a complete sentence because of “not only. . . .AND”—can you figure out how to fix it?

• I’m afraid “that” is a tricky word. This sentence should actually be phrased as “that THEY pose a great danger to human health” because in this case “that” is introducing what is called a “that-clause,” which requires an additional, explicit subject, NOT as a relative pronoun that can function simultaneously as a connecting word and as the subject of its relative clause—hope this makes sense!

• The grammar of “if” clause requires that they include a verb—can you figure out how to rephrase this to include a verb? (Hint: Change “use” to passive voice)

• “Based on” can be confusing because not only can it mean “according to,” but also the very different meaning of “founded on/rooted in/due to/caused by.” It’s best either to locate your “based on” phrase somewhere where it CAN’T be misunderstood (often the beginning of the sentence) or use alternative phrasing (e.g., “according to”) readers will IMMEDIATELY understand and CAN’T misunderstand (even for half a second)—make sense?

  • (Here your end-of-sentence “based on” could be initially read as saying older drivers’ inadequate surveillance and misjudgment are CAUSED by the NMVCCS 😉)

• Is this "as for" sentence introducing a slightly different subject than what your previous sentence discussed? (Or do the two sentences talk about the same subject?)

• “Properties” is a noun, but what you’ve listed here are adjectives, so a colon (which basically means =) grammatically can’t work here. Can you figure out a way to rephrase to avoid this problem?

One central point supporting thesis

• All of your essay’s body paragraphs discuss one central point that supports your thesis

• X, your 3rd paragraph expresses a great point, but it’s not what your thesis statement indicated you would talk about. . .unless this is what you mean by “teaching quality” or adults’ freedom of choice—in which case, you need to explain HOW protecting the environment relates to teaching quality and freedom of choice. (In other words, you need either to change your thesis statement to match this paragraph or change this paragraph to match your thesis statement.)

• X, your 1st body paragraph makes a related point, but it’s not what your thesis statement indicated you would talk about. (In other words, you need either to change your thesis statement to match this paragraph or change this paragraph to match your thesis statement—make sense?)

TEA

• In other words, your research paper body paragraphs do not currently follow standard TEA + (C) structure:

T-Topic sentence

E-Evidence from your sources

A-Your analysis of how the evidence from your sources relates to your topic

(C)-Concluding/summarizing sentence and/or connection to your next topic sentence (optional)

• Hmmmm. . . .in this paragraph, pure TEA structure is confusing (topic sentence, T-individual savings #1, company savings #1, individual savings #2, and company savings #2). I think in this case the alternative TEAEA structure—topic sentence, individual savings, company savings—will be easier for readers to follow—make sense? 

  • Your body paragraphs do a good job of supporting your topic sentences via convincing evidence and analysis, but work on improving their logic by choosing whichever TEA alternative will be easiest for readers to follow: TEA, TEEA, or TEAEA?

• Remember your thesis statement preview points and body paragraph topic sentences can and should use different words but their ideas should match each other

  • Hmmmm. . . .because your thesis statement preview points indicated to readers this paragraph will discuss remote work offering a “better working condition for workers,” it’s confusing that your topic sentence mentions ONLY that remote work helps people have more rest time. Your thesis statement preview points and body paragraph topic sentences should match—make sense? 

  • Hmmmm. . . .because your thesis statement preview points indicated to readers this paragraph will discuss work-life balance, it’s a little confusing that your topic sentence indicates the first (most important?) topic this paragraph will discuss is working style. Could this topic sentence still be accurate/clear if you were to delete this? 

• Hmmmm. . . .will your readers be able to guess from this topic sentence what SPECIFICALLY this paragraph will talk about? (Can you revise this topic sentence to make the topic of this paragraph more IMMEDIATELY clear to readers?) (See Chapter 6 of our eText to learn how to write strong topic sentences) (1 mistake = 19)

• Remember body paragraph topic sentences (and your introduction paragraph’s thesis statement 😉) should preview ALL main points that paragraph will discuss. (After all, a reader of this topic sentence would have NO idea this paragraph will also discuss how COMPANIES benefit by employees working remotely, right? 😉/Where is your topic sentence?)

  • X, topic sentences should preview for readers all main topics the paragraph will discuss, right? However, this topic sentence indicates your first body paragraph will discuss BOTH of the opposing schools of thought, yet nothing in this paragraph discusses the opposing school of thought 😭 Therefore, because these sentences preview content discussed in BOTH body paragraphs, shouldn’t they be located in your INTRODUCTION paragraph as part of your thesis statement? (And shouldn’t your next sentence be revised so that it DOES preview all main topics this paragraph will discuss including“single-use plastics provide an unmatched level of convenience” AND “the environmental impact of the substitutes of these polymers is also quite detrimental”?

  • Your 2nd body paragraph’s topic sentence provides a great overview of what that paragraph will discuss, but your 1st and 3rd paragraphs’ topic sentences could more clearly preview what these paragraph will discuss

  • This main point wasn’t mentioned in this body paragraph’s topic sentence. What about moving these suggestions to their own body paragraph/it to its own 4th body paragraph? (Of course, revising your thesis statement also to reflect this change?) 🤔

    • Hmmmm. . . .how does this point connect to this paragraph’s topic sentence/the previous sentence?

  • Your 1st and 2nd body paragraphs’ topic sentences should more completely preview what these paragraphs will discuss

• Remember a topic sentence should preview for readers all main topics that ONLY THAT PARAGRAPH will discuss

• Hmmmm. . . .why does the topic sentence of this paragraph mention this when the rest of your paragraph does not? (Remember, topic sentences should provide readers with an ACCURATE summary of what their paragraphs will discuss 😉)

• Overall, GREAT evidence for each body paragraph’s central point and GREAT analysis connecting this evidence to your point! 

• Generally VERY strong use of MULTIPLE pieces of evidence to support your ideas—wow!!! 😊 

• How do you know? (Source?) (Remember for any information that is not common knowledge, you need to indicate via in-text citation where you got the information 😉)(In almost all my previous jobs, I HAVE been allowed to leave my office during lunch, so based on my experience, this claim sounds untrue. Remember that if it is likely that people with an opposing view may argue one of your points, it’s particularly important you have a reliable source to support your claim. Make sense?) 

  • Although you have done a good job of citing the source of many of your claims that are not common knowledge, have you cited ALL claims that are not common knowledge?

    • Don't forget to include an in-text citation for ALL studies you cite 😉

    • X, be sure to include an in-text citation (even if it’s to the same source you cited immediately previously) if you think there is any chance readers might get confused about WHICH information is evidence from your sources vs. your own analysis—make sense? It’s MUCH better for clarity and academic integrity to OVERcite than UNDERcite. Make sense?

  • (Don’t forget that for any information that is not common knowledge—especially that which people taking an opposing stance are likely to challenge!—you should be citing a credible source for it 😉) 

    • X, be careful not to make claims that without evidence from credible sources open the opportunity for readers (particularly those already biased AGAINST your stance, e.g., Baca) to question “Is that really true?” (or if you do, don’t forget to cite your source for this information—make sense?)  

    • X, be careful not to make claims that are too strong or otherwise might cause readers to wonder “Is that really true?” (or if you do, don’t forget to cite WHERE you have gotten all this information—make sense?) 

    • X, be careful not to make claims that might cause readers to wonder “Is that really true?” without citing WHERE you got your information—make sense?

• Overall, GREAT evidence for each body paragraph’s central point, except how do you KNOW that waste plastics ALREADY in the environment will finally be recycled and eliminated? 

• Generally good evidence for each body paragraph’s central point, but remember that if it is likely that people with an opposing view may argue one of your points, it’s particularly important you have a reliable source to support that claim—make sense? 

• Your body paragraphs appropriately include topic sentences + analysis but (1) don’t provide evidence supporting your claims (e.g., expert opinions or quotes, statistical data, or facts) or (2) you forgot to cite where you found your evidence (See Chapter 6 of our eText of our eText for more information.)

• Your 1st and 3rd body paragraphs do a GREAT job of arguing for your thesis statement through the use of clear topic sentences supported by convincing evidence and analysis, but while your 2nd body paragraph includes a good topic sentence + analysis, in this paragraph either (1) you don’t provide evidence supporting your claims (e.g., expert opinions or quotes, statistical data, or facts) or (2) you forgot to cite where you found this paragraph’s evidence (See Unit 2, Chapter 2 of our eText for more information.)

• Your 1st body paragraph includes a good topic sentence + analysis but in this paragraph either (1) you don’t provide evidence supporting your claims (e.g., expert opinions or quotes, statistical data, or facts) or (2) you forgot to cite where you found this paragraph’s evidence (See Unit 2, Chapter 2 of our eText for more information.)

• X, your 1st paragraph follows the “TEA” structure described in Unit 2, Chapter 2 of our eText, but in your 2nd and 3rd body paragraphs, though your analysis is excellent, (1) you provide very little evidence supporting your claims (e.g., expert opinions or quotes, statistical data, or facts) or (2) you forgot to cite where you found your evidence (See Unit 2, Chapter 2 of our eText for more information.)

• In part, your body paragraphs do a good job of supporting your topic sentences via convincing evidence and analysis, but most of your evidence comes from sources that disagree with your conclusion that remote work is better than office work—see my comments highlighted green. (Although it is not impossible to use such sources to support an opposing argument, in this case your analysis needs to help readers see that even though the authors of your evidence conclude the opposite, even their evidence in fact shows that remote work really IS better.)

• X, to get help in finding appropriate sources of evidence to support this idea, have you considered booking (or dropping in for) a free Writers Workshop Research and Writing (RAW) Consultation? (Gaining experience now with Writers Workshop services and resources will also be useful for helping you identify later for future classes when taking advantage of their services—free to University of Illinois students because you’ve already paid the tuition that funds these services 😊—could help you learn more/perform better and thereby get better grades) 

• X, while you are allowed to use additional outside sources as well, according to our Compare/Contrast Essay assignment prompt, “Students must include evidence from at least two of the provided sources.” However, currently your Compare/Contrast Essay evidence is not using evidence from any of this assignment’s provided resources at all—this needs to be fixed 😉

• X, these data are very old, which could very likely cause readers to question their credibility NOW—make sense?

  • X, this source is quite old, which could cause readers to question its accuracy/relevance NOW—make sense? (However, since I haven't commented on this earlier in the semester, I WILL go ahead and accept this as one of your sources for this assignment 🤗)

  • Generally good choice of credible sources relevant to your research topic, but how can you avoid readers questioning whether your 1980s sources have become outdated and therefore may no be longer credible?

• Better and more effective solutions such as. . . .? (Although you make the claim that there are better and more effective solutions to preventing single-use plastic pollution than banning it, you don’t provide credible evidence/examples in your body paragraphs to DEMONSTRATE this claim is true—make sense? (If you can fix this, it will make a BIG difference in the credibility of your argument!)

• Can you give examples? (I wonder because what comes to mind when I read this is that when I work remotely, I find electronic email/Microsoft Teams notifications can still be distracting and also I might be distracted by family and household tasks in way I’m not at the office. Therefore, though I think that in a way you’re definitely right that in-office work can be more distracting than remote work, I think you need to provide specific examples of HOW in-office work is more distracting to convince your readers it really is—make sense?)

• X, why do your secondary research paper body paragraphs address each of your sources one by one vs. synthesizing them? Surely you remember from writing your PhD dissertation that this does NOT match graduate-level research-style writing norms? 😭 

• In general, GREAT analysis connecting your evidence to your overall argument!

• X, analysis is not simply repeating your evidence in different words—it should include your own additional explanation of how/why (This might be easier if you analyze your two pieces of evidence for this point together vs. separately following the alternative TEEA paragraph structure.) 

  • X, analysis is not simply repeating your evidence in different words—it should include your own additional explanation of how/why (including why/how this point relates to your thesis) (You might find this easier if you delete your analysis #1.1 and #2.1 and instead of structuring your body paragraph as TEAEA, you instead structure your body paragraphs as TEEA—make sense?) 

• Hmmmmm. . . .this paragraph's structure is more like TAE than TEA—so skeptical readers don't stop reading because they think you're just making claims without any support, shouldn't you first present your EVIDENCE that this is a real problem and only after that your ANALYSIS of why it's occurring? 😉 (=17 if occurs in one paragraph)

  • Why in most of your paragraphs is your evidence not FOLLOWED by explanations discussing why/how your point relates to your thesis? (i.e., Why are most of your paragraphs ordered as TAE, not TEA?) (See Chapter 6 of our eText to learn how to write strong body paragraphs) (=17 if still nevertheless basically works)

• What about moving these analysis sentences IMMEDIATELY after your Powell quote evidence? (Just FYI: One acceptable—and very common—alternative to TEA paragraph structure is TEAEA 😉) 

• Although conclusions in TEA + (C) body paragraphs can be useful, they're usually only useful if the body paragraph has discussed multiple pieces of information you now need to tie together—otherwise, readers will find them redundant—make sense?

• Since you've provided two DIFFERENT types of evidence to support your point in this paragraph, I recommend going ahead and including the optional conclusion component of TEA + C body paragraphs—make sense?

• Hmmmm. . . .would this sentence more accurately summarize this paragraph if it mentioned not only the marine ecosystem, but also us? 🤔

Logic

• Remember to check your writing for missing information/logical errors—or even better, have an outside reader take a fresh look at your paper specifically looking for these (e.g., via a Writers Workshop appointment at https://writersworkshop.illinois.edu/ 😉) because, especially when they occur early in your paper or multiple times, logical errors can SUBSTANTIALLY reduce your credibility in readers’ eyes 😭—make sense?  (Research paper = 17 for 2+ errors)

  • Hmmmm. . . .check your logic here: 

• Is this sentence located in the best place in this paragraph? 🤔 (Hasn’t this paragraph already discussed safety before this sentence?)

  • Hmmmm. . . .is this the most logical location for these sentences? Would readers have an easier time following the logic of your ideas if these were located immediate after your earlier sentence ending with "ensures the local governments and communities support tiger conservation efforts"? Or should all of these sentences instead be moved into your next paragraph where you deal with the cultural and generational impacts of asking communities to relocate? 🤔

  • Hmmmm. . . .is this the most logical location for this sentence? Wouldn't readers have an easier time following the logic of your ideas if all unique ideas from this sentence were instead moved into the previous section discussing your solution "Use offline and online public platforms"? 🤔

• Logically, won't this need to happen in the opposite order, i.e., FIRST revised tax laws need to be written up and THEN Congress will need to approve the revised tax code?

• Check your cause/effect logic here. How do you know that it was BECAUSE OF this flexibility that remote workers were more efficient? (Source?) (i.e., make sure your analysis logically follows from your provided evidence 😉) 

• Hmmmm. . . .at least according to American logic, your current order of information here is a little confusing. Could it make sense first to provide a COMPLETE overview of your solution (sort of like a thesis statement provides a COMPLETE overview of the main points discussed in a paper) and then after that overviewing the BENEFITS of implementing this solution? 🤔

• Hmmmm. . . .logically, is this the best order to present these solutions? (Based on your "Suggestions," wouldn't the opposite order be more logical? 🤔)

  • I’m afraid how your ethos paragraph’s topic sentence introduces the idea that (1) Hocevar’s use of ethos is weak (2) despite referencing credible sources, whereas the rest of your paragraph addresses this info in the opposite order is confusing

• Hmmmm. . . .I think your logic in this paragraph would be easier for readers to follow if you discussed ALL of the author’s strengths in terms of logos and then all of the author’s weaknesses in terms of logos, instead of going back and forth—make sense?) 

  • Hmmmm. . . .it’s confusing that this paragraph’s order of ideas talks first about employees saving money, then about companies saving money, and then about employees saving money again. Why not finish discussing one point before you start talking about the next point? 😉

• Hmmmm. . . .I'm not quite following your logic here. Is this sentence missing a word?

• Remember to check that the noun each of your pronouns refers back to will be UNMISTAKABLY clear to readers (not only logically but also grammatically!😉) 

  • Who is "they" here? 🤔 (Logically, I can guess, but grammatically this is not clear—make sense?)

    • ONE animal = them? 😉Remember to check that the noun each of your pronouns refers back to will be UNMISTAKABLY clear to readers (not only logically but also grammatically!)

    • "it"/“them” = a conventional folded cascade amplifier/people’s bodies? (LOGICALLY, I don’t think that’s what you mean, but GRAMMATICALLY, “a conventional folded cascade amplifier/people’s bodies” is the closest singular/plural noun that “it/them” could be referring back to. . . .) 

    • What does “it” refer back to here? A drug? A war? US drug policy? (LOGICALLY, I can guess/it's clear, but GRAMMATICALLY, it’s not clear—make sense?) 

      • In WHOSE houses? The adults' own houses or houses owned by the Department of Agriculture? (Logically, I can guess, but because this sentence includes TWO possible referents, it's better to clarify so your meaning is UNMISTAKABLY clear—make sense? 🤗)

    • Hmmmm. . . .it’s a little unclear here what “its” is referring back to—how could you make this more clear? 

    • Hmmmm. . . .I can't figure out here what “it” is referring back to—how could you make this more clear? 

      • You haven’t talked about a reliance on importation of energy before, so what is “this” referring back to?

    • Each of these instances of "it" refers to something different, making them a little hard for readers to interpret—how could you make this more clear? 

      • Having “they” and “their” refer back to differ things is confusing—how could you make your intended meaning more clear? 

      • What does “this” mean? (It’s confusing because your previous sentence talks about online instruction, but I don’t think that can possibly be what you mean. . . .)

• Such as? (Readers may be able to think of a few possibilities, but how can they know which you're thinking of unless you tell them, right? 😉)

• WHO? (Hmmmm. . . .mentioning earlier that it is particularly RURAL populations in India who struggle with quality healthcare would enable readers to IMMEDIATELY understand what you mean here—make sense?)

  • WHOSE law? (Contextually, I can guess, but it would be better if this paragraph’s conclusion sentence EXPLICITLY stated this information) 

• Hmmmm. . . .WHAT is a frequent situation? I'm confused 🤔

  • Damaged by WHAT? (Contextually, I can guess, but it would be better if this paragraph’s conclusion sentence EXPLICITLY stated this information) 

  • WHAT has more flexibility in time? (This sentence is missing its subject, which English grammar requires)

  • "Even more" compared to WHAT? (If this isn’t important, maybe replace “even more” with ellipses to avoid confusing readers)

• WHO/WHERE is Snyder?  (i.e., How many in your target audience will likely know unless you tell them?) 🤔

• WHY? (i.e., your 1st and 2nd body paragraphs do a good job of arguing for your thesis statement through the use of clear topic sentences supported by adequate evidence and analysis, but Herberz (2020)’s finding described in your 3rd body paragraph that banning single-use plastics in fact led to INCREASED damage to the environment is likely to surprise many in your target audience, right? Therefore, if Herberz hypothesized WHY this unexpected result happened, wouldn’t your target audience find this unexpected result more believable if you explain WHY it likely happened? Then, if they believe this explanation is credible, won’t they be more likely to accept your claim that, in fact, banning plastics WON’T work to accomplish their goal of protecting/saving the environment?

• HOW? (Readers may be able to think of a few possibilities, but how can they know which you're thinking of unless you tell them? Such vague writing STRONGLY suggests overuse of AI 😭)

  • HOW? (i.e., How many in your target audience will likely already know how this tax evasion strategy works? If not, wouldn't they be helped by you briefly overviewing the strategy for them?)

• FINANCIAL STRESS reveals these things?  😉 (LOGICALLY, I’m sure that’s not what you mean, but GRAMMATICALLY, that’s what it looks like—make sense?)

• What year did COVID-19 attack our world??? (If you make a factual mistake readers can easily identify, won’t they worry that you might also have made other factual mistakes they CANNOT easily identify and so not trust you? 😭)

  • Check your logic here—these data are two years old, so would a more accurate summary of this information from your source be "During the period of largely online schooling due to COVID lockdowns"? 🤔

• It’s only 2023—why do you say John Hocevar’s 2022 article is an OLD review on plastics??? 🤔 Such an obvious mistake (in your first sentence!) is likely to SUBSTANTIALLY reduce your credibility in readers’ eyes 😭—make sense?

• GREAT integration of sources! 🤗 (including outstanding use of a wide variety of appropriate reporting language!) 

• Good integration of sources—just consider whether your target audience are likely to recognize John Hocevar’s name or not and therefore whether or not it is helpful to mention his full name in your essay

  • Is Lindwall so famous that all your target readers are likely to recognize his name and therefore using an integral (vs. parenthetical) citation here will help build your ethos in their eyes? What information could you add so that using an integral citation COULD help build your ethos among your target readers?  🤔

  • Is John Hocevar so famous that all your readers will recognize his name? Is that why you’re including his full name? (Check APA’s in-text citation guidelines for this) 

  • X, you’ve done a GREAT job applying the ethos strategy of using an integral (vs. parenthetical) citation for this American Chemical Society article, but. . . .

  • Hmmmm. . . .how much focus do you want readers to put on this paragraph’s main idea(s) vs. which specific section/paragraph in your source you’re citing from? 😉 Therefore, should you include this info as an integral in-text citation (= integrated within your main body text) or as a parenthetical in-text citation (= located within parentheses)? 

  • Hmmmm. . . .how will Storey's master's degree in international relations from Melbourne University help convince readers that he's an expert in hydroelectric power in China??? I'm confused 🤔

• Please see my source integration comments within your essay 🤗 

• X, why did you not apply my 2nd draft feedback on your source integration? ☹️

• Only if sources clearly appear legitimate and authoritative can they help build your ethos among your target readers, right? For this reason, if readers likely won’t recognize an abbreviated source name, I recommend checking the website’s footer and/or “About” page in order to try to identify the full name that’s being abbreviated, so you can include the full name in your integral citation/reference list, e.g., “National Resources Defense Council [NRDC]”—make sense? 

• X, remember how “ethos” affects whether or not readers trust what you say? In your other classes outside ESL 111, how do you think your use of a source like GradesFixer will impact your professors’ trust in you/what you write? 

• As far as I can tell, you have acknowledged all your sources (though for university-level writing, it would be better if your paper were more balanced in terms its use of external evidence vs. your own analysis)

• Isn’t this common knowledge? (Do you really need to cite a source for this?) 

• Continue to work on integrating sources smoothly to make HOW they relate to the sentences before/after clear to your readers—make sense?

• Hmmmm. . . .did Megan Leonhardt actually DO this research or did she just report others’ research?

• X, did you use any sources to draft your essay? According to our Argumentative Essay guidelines, 

• Just FYI: APA italicizes Latin scientific animal genus + species names 😉—see https://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2017/02/-how-to-format-scientific-names-of-animals.html

• Just FYI: APA (and many other style guides) format JOURNAL ARTICLE TITLES mentioned in text using quotation marks, but JOURNAL TITLES mentioned in text using italics)—how should this title therefore be formatted? 😉 (For more info, see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/italics-quotations)

• GREAT choice of what to quote vs. paraphrase! 😊 

• X, paraphrasing is the most common method of integrating sources in academic writing, yet currently your essay includes only quotes—why?

  • X, your essay currently includes MANY quotations—which might be better if they were paraphrased instead? 🤔 

  • X, why did you choose to quote vs. paraphrase this source? (Although this information is useful, is its phrasing especially powerful and therefore “quote-worthy”? 🤔) 

  • X, why did you choose to quote vs. paraphrase these few words? Is their phrasing especially powerful and therefore “quote-worthy”? 😉 (P.S. Even if you DID decide quoting vs. paraphrasing is the best strategy for these words, you would need to separate them from the rest of this quotation using ellipses. . . .can you figure out why?)

  • Hmmmm. . . .is the specific PHRASING of your Nicholas Bloom quotation particularly impactful and therefore “quoteworthy”? 

• Check that quotations EXACTLY match the original source 😉 (=7 if caught on 2nd draft, =8 if caught only on final)

  • Check that you’ve quoted your sources accurately (especially since your quotations includes SEVERAL grammar/phrasing mistakes 🤔) 

  • X, be sure your use of quotations accurately represents your their original meaning within your source. For example, your original source’s next sentence indicates “But [job satisfaction] STOPPED INCREASING” beyond 15 hours worked remotely. Is it honest, therefore, for your quotation to omit this important and highly relevant point? 

• How can you better integrate sources through/connect this source to the previous sentence by introducing them with an introductory phrase or reporting verb (vs. just dropping a "quote bomb")? (See https://www.brandeis.edu/writing-program/resources/students/academic/creative-arts/verbs-for-introducing-souces-quotations.html for ideas or maybe connect this quote to the previous sentence using a colon 😉)

• To better fit the grammar of your sentence/your research paper context, why not start this quotation at “research” instead of “but”? 😉 

• X, why have you not followed APA style in formatting your quotations? 

  • Remember APA (and nearly all other style guides!) require reference lists to use hanging indentation ((NOT the first-line indentation used for body paragraphs 😉) 

  • Per APA style, should the first letter of this quotation be capitalized, since “the quoted material is a FRAGMENT OR ONLY A PIECE of the original material’s complete sentence”? 😉 

  • X, according to APA style quotation guidelines, you should “always include a full citation in the same sentence as the quotation” (even if whatever you’re quoting ends with a period in the original source)—make sense? 

  • Why does your essay include a quotation mark NOT on the same line as your quotation? 🤔  

• Your quotations will be stronger if you use ellipses to omit any included words that are unnecessary for supporting your point (though, of course, it’s not okay to use ellipses to change a quote’s basic meaning, and you do also need to check that whatever part of the original quote you include fits the grammar of YOUR sentence—make sense?) (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/punctuation/quotation_marks/extended_rules_for_quotation_marks.html) 

• Your quotations will be stronger if you use ellipses to omit words that don’t fit the grammar of your sentence (while avoiding changing the original meaning of the quotation, of course!) (so maybe “found. . .in the guts of sea turtles is no different than plastic”)—make sense? 

• GREAT quotation to support your point, but, when using ellipses to omit unnecessary words, be careful that whatever you quote still makes logical sense and is grammatically correct 😉

• Since you started/end this sentence with “she explained,” should you include "she said" in your quotation? (Why not use ellipses to omit any included words that are unnecessary for supporting your point  😉) 

• What does “they” refer back to? (Just FYI: You can use brackets to add clarification inside quotations)

• Check your grammar here (Just FYI: You can use brackets to add clarification inside quotations 😉—see https://www.thepunctuationguide.com/brackets.html for more information)  

• Where is your in-text citation for this quotation? 🤔 

• X, for any information that is not common knowledge, you need to indicate via in-text citations where you got the information no matter whether you quote or paraphrase. The only difference is that if you quote, you also need to provide the exact page or paragraph number where the quote comes from—make sense? (See the "Summary or Paraphrase" subheading of the Purdue OWL's "In-Text Citations: The Basics" page) 

• The Purdue OWL website provides the following guidance for how to punctuate a quotation inside your quotation: “Use single quotation marks to enclose quotes within another quotation.” (So this should be “‘I’m better rested. I can devote more time to my work,’ she said. ‘Just saving the time and money of commuting, I really like this personally.’”) 

• Please check Cramer & Zaveri—are these their EXACT words? 🤔 (If not, should they be located INSIDE quotation marks?) (Just FYI: Paraphrases should NOT be enclosed in quotation marks 😉) 

  • X, quotation marks can only be used for EXACT quotations. You need either to finish paraphrasing what Su said by restructuring these sentences and probably also changing a few additional words (which is what I recommend you do in order to gain skill at paraphrasing) or quote the original source EXACTLY—make sense? 

  • Hmmmm. . . . . I can see you’re trying to use sources properly, but this is not your original source’s EXACT words, so it shouldn’t be enclosed in quotation marks. However, it also is not an adequate paraphrase because its order of ideas is mostly exactly the same as the original. Let’s chat more about this either during my office hours or during our individual conference about your argumentative essay because I want to make sure before you leave ESL 111 that you understand WHEN your best strategy is to quote and HOW, in all other cases, to paraphrase effectively to avoid structural plagiarism, etc. 

  • I can see you’re trying to use sources properly, but remember only a source’s EXACT WORDS should be enclosed in quotation marks—paraphrases SHOULD be cited but NOT enclosed in quotation marks 😉) 

  • Be careful to locate ONLY the words of your original source—so NOT your own analysis—within quotation marks. Make sense?

• To help the grammar of this sentence flow more naturally, why not begin this quotation at “research” instead of at “but”—make sense? 

• Good job paraphrasing this information by reorganizing its ideas, but be sure that your paraphrase still FOCUSES READERS’ ATTENTION ON THE MAIN POINT that is the reason you are citing this info (e.g., by locating this information at the END of your sentence, cf. “One professor at Stanford University, Nicholas Bloom, found that compared to their peers working in-person, workers doing their job remotely HAD A 13% HIGHER EFFICIENCY”). Make sense? 

• Good job paraphrasing this information by reorganizing its ideas, but be careful not to reorganize a source’s ideas in a way that breaks apart a single idea, as this is likely to confuse readers (e.g., I got confused when I started reading “the average time of American who drives to work is 54 hours. . . .” A clearer revised order of ideas would have been “the average time stuck in traffic for Americans who drive to work is 54 hours per year”—make sense?) 

• Technically, APA style does not requires for paraphrases that writers specify paragraph/page number (However, if you do choose to include this info, does the formatting for this quotation's paragraph info match APA’s in-text citation formatting guidelines (including regarding its location before vs. after the quotation? 😉) Also, check your spacing and do you mean “p.” (= page) or “para.” (=paragraph)? 😉 

• Just FYI: Technically for paraphrases (vs. quotes), APA style does not require in-text citations to include the paragraph/page number, though if you expect readers will want to check out the original source, it IS considerate to nevertheless provide this info 🤗 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/paraphrasing)

• Hmmmm. . . .are you sure this ACCURATELY paraphrases the ideas of this source? 🤔

• X, you have mostly integrated your sources using only ONE vs. DIFFERENT appropriate reporting styles (For additional reporting language options, see https://www.uts.edu.au/sites/default/files/Reporting%20Verbs%20Reference%20Sheet.pdf)

• I can see that you’ve tried to use a variety of techniques to integrate your sources well and mostly you have succeeded, except that "says” is a VERY weak reporting verb since it provides zero guidance to readers about HOW they should interpret the quote—see https://www.brandeis.edu/writing-program/resources/students/academic/creative-arts/verbs-for-introducing-souces-quotations.html for stronger reporting verbs 😉)

• If you don’t agree with him, will your readers be able to recognize based on this NEUTRAL reporting verb?

• Just FYI—writers usually say “According to [PERSON] (or organization, if no individual author is listed)” or “According to the [article] “[article title]”

• X, if you use the introductory phrase “according to,” you don’t need to include a reporting verb also 😉 

• Can you change the grammar of your reporting phrase so it matches the grammar of your quote?

• X, why did you not apply the following comment from your 2nd draft? 😭: 

• Almost perfect APA-style in-text and reference page citations —wow, wow, WOW!!! (Just please see my comments on a few minor corrections needed) (=9 on final draft after APA reference list citation feedback on 2nd draft)

  • Almost perfect APA-style in-text and reference page citations —wow, wow, WOW!!! (Just please see my highlighting in your reference list where a few minor corrections are needed) 😉

  • I can see you’re trying to follow APA-style formatting in your in-text and reference list citations, but I'm afraid both contain MANY APA-style mistakes 😭—did you use a citation generator such as Citation Machine or Scribbr without verifying its recommended citations are accurate? 😭: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples  (=7)

    • I can see you’re trying to follow APA-style formatting in your in-text and reference list citations, but please see my highlighting in your reference list where a few minor corrections are needed 😉

    • I can see you’re trying to follow APA-style formatting in your in-text and reference list citations, but please see my comments within your essay on a few corrections needed 🤗 (=7)

    • Although your in-text and reference list citations are definitely better than in your second draft, I'm afraid they still contain MANY APA-style mistakes—did you use a citation generator such as Citation Machine or Scribbr without verifying its generated citations are, in fact, accurate? 😭 (=7)

  • X, why do almost none of your in-text and reference list citations follow APA style? Did you use a citation generator such as Citation Machine or Scribbr without verifying its recommended citations are accurate? 😭 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples)

    • X, I'm afraid NONE of your in-text or reference list citations follow APA style 😭: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples

  • X, why did you not apply/apply only SOME of my 2nd draft rubric feedback about NONE of your in-text or reference list citations following APA style: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references? 😭

    • X, why did you not apply my source documentation feedback on your 2nd draft reference list? ☹️(=7)

• Why didn't you complete our title page? 😭

• Does your working thesis statement describe a PROBLEM? 🤔

• Why aren't ALL your annotated bibliography sources cited in your rough outline? (=6 if only 2 sources cited)

• Why are NONE of your annotated bibliography sources cited in your rough outline? (=5)

• Almost perfect APA-style in-text and reference page citations —wow, wow, WOW!!! (Just please see my highlighting in your reference list where a few minor corrections are needed) 😉

  • I can see you’re trying to follow APA-style formatting in your in-text and reference list citations, but please see my highlighting in your citations where a few minor corrections are needed 😉

  • Almost perfect APA-style reference list 😍, but reference lists should be formatted using hanging indentation 😉 (See how at https://youtu.be/_m7n0OUF968?si=xRRkS_P9WyaBG7EN) 

  • Check your hanging indentation

  • Hmmmm. . . .does APA style use numbering to organize reference list sources?

  • Why is this entire citation italicized? 🤔

  • Journal volume and issue numbers? 🤔

• Hmmmm. . . .where are your relevancy statements' explanations of how sources could be used in specific sections of the upcoming research paper? 😭 (=15)

• Why don't your evaluations of reliability include 2–3 sentences providing SPECIFIC reasons each source is trustworthy/credible/reliable? 😭 (=15)

• Your reliability and relevancy statements are FAR longer than technically allowed by our Annotated Bibliography Prompt & Rubric 🤭(=4)

In-Text Citations

• PERFECT APA-style in-text citations! 😍

  • X, why have you not followed APA formatting for your in-text citations? (e.g., in terms of use of author family/last names ONLY (not GIVEN/FIRST names) (and also in terms of NOT using personal/professional titles, e.g., “Mr.”); consistent inclusion of the publication year; inclusion of a paragraph or page number for quotations (but NOT paraphrases!); use of the uncapitalized abbreviation “para.” when citing a paragraph; use of a period/full stop when citing paragraph/page number; standard English spacing; quotation mark located BEFORE and period/full stop located AFTER the in-text citation; etc.)? 

• Check the location of this in-text citation using the Purdue OWL sample student paper at https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/documents/APA%207%20Student%20Sample%20Paper.pdf 😉

  • Is this the most logical location for this in-text citation? 🤔

  • Where did you get this info? (Maybe from the World Bank you cite later? If it will help your readers avoid confusion about WHERE you found a specific piece of info, cite your sources multiple times)

  • Does EVERY source cited in the last sentence of this paragraph include ALL of this sentence's information?

• How does APA style format in-text citations including multiple sources?  Please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/basic-principles/multiple-works)

• Can you make this author-prominent/narrative in-text citation more concise? 😉 (See https://guides.lib.monash.edu/apa-7/getting-started/in-text-citation)

• Is this year in the correct location for an author-prominent/narrative in-text citation? 🤔 (See https://guides.lib.monash.edu/apa-7/getting-started/in-text-citation)

  • Is this year in the correct location for an author-prominent/narrative in-text citation? Is ALL the other information you've included in this in-text citation necessary? 🤔 (See https://guides.lib.monash.edu/apa-7/getting-started/in-text-citation)

• Is this author-prominent/narrative in-text citation formatting correct? 🤔 (See https://guides.lib.monash.edu/apa-7/getting-started/in-text-citation)

• How does APA style format narrative in-text citations? Please check for this problem throughout your paper (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/basic-principles/parenthetical-versus-narrative 😉)

• How do APA-style narrative citations cite papers by two authors? Please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉(See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/basic-principles/author-date)

• How do APA-style narrative citations cite papers by three or more authors? Please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉(See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/basic-principles/author-date)

• Check this in-text citation's spacing against APA style at https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_author_authors.html 😉

  • Check the spacing and location of this in-text citation vs. period against APA style at https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guidein_text_citations_author_authors.html 😉(Please check your other in-text citations for this problem also 😉)

• Check your in-text citation paragraph/page number spacing (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations)

• Check APA guidelines re: in-text citation spacing and location of periods when citing a quotation’s paragraph number at https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations/no-page-numbers 😉(Please check your other in-text citations for this problem also 😉) (one error = 9; two errors = 8)

  • Check APA guidelines re: in-text citation spacing and location of periods when citing a quotation’s page number at https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations/page-numbers (Please check your remaining in-text citations for this also 😉)

• X, is "Justin" this author's family name or given name? (APA-style in-text citations use authors' LAST/FAMILY names only 😉—see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html)

  • X, why have you not followed APA formatting for your in-text citations in terms of using author family/last names ONLY (without given/first names or initials)? 🤔 (For more info, see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html)

• How do APA-style in-text citations cite a work by two authors? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_author_authors.html)

  • How do APA-style in-text citations cite a work by two authors WITHIN YOUR TEXT? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_author_authors.html)

  • How do APA-style in-text citations cite a work by three or more authors? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_author_authors.html) (Please fix this for all your Gandhi et al. citations 😉) 

    • Hmmmm. . . .check the difference in APA-style comma usage for narrative vs. parenthetical in-text citations that include "et al." 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

• Is the Li the ONLY author of this paper? 

• Who is the author (or if individual author is not mentioned, what is the author organization) of these two sources?

  • Are you missing this paper's first author's name here? 😉

• Do APA-style in-text citations include AUTHORS’names or PUBLICATION names? 

• Does your reference list include TWO sources published by someone with the last name of Cramton in the year 2000? 

• Unless using BOTH given/first and family/last name together (in that order per English norms, e.g., "Bo-Yu (Ian) Chen"!) will better help readers recognize a trusted source (i.e., in order to use an ethos appeal), in sentence contexts English uses only an author's FAMILY/LAST name—make sense?

• Be careful not to cite “THE author” without first letting readers know WHICH author you’re talking about 😉—make sense?

• WHICH author? How can you better make this IMMEDIATELY clear to readers? 😉

• Do APA-style in-text citations include personal/professional titles, e.g., “Dr.”) 🤔 (For more info, see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa6_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html)

• Check your spelling of this author's name here and throughout your essay

• Per APA's in-text citation guidelines, what is the date for this source?

  • Why is your in-text citation year wrong for this article? 🤔

• Do APA-style in-text citations include both the publication year AND month? 😉 (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_the_basics.html)

• Check your dates’ order of elements (here and for all your other electronic sources) relative to APA’s electronic source date formatting guidelines 

  • Why is your order of elements for dates different across your three sources? Which order does APA style require?

  • Is the superscript ᵗʰ included in APA-style dates?

• X, if you cite an author in text,  this should be IMMEDIATELY followed with a parenthetical in-text citation including ONLY the publication year—make sense? (Check out examples of this APA in-text citation guideline at https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_the_basics.html)

  • Check where APA style locates the year in in-text citations 😉

• Incorrectly punctuating "n.d."—Check this punctuation at https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/missing-information

• Remember that for quotations APA style requires in-text citations also specify paragraph/page number 😉—for more info, see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations/no-page-numbers OR https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations/no-page-numbers

  • X, remember that if you quote (vs. paraphrase) a source, APA style requires your in-text citation to provide the exact paragraph (or page) number where the quote comes from—see the "Summary or Paraphrase" subheading of the Purdue OWL's "In-Text Citations: The Basics" page

  • Technically, APA style does not require for paraphrases that writers specify paragraph/page number 😉—for more info, see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations/no-page-numbers (However, if you do choose to include this info, does the formatting for this quotation's paragraph info match APA’s in-text citation formatting guidelines (including regarding its location before vs. after the period 😉)  

  • Definitely, it IS hard to count paragraphs when articles are long!!! Only if you QUOTE a source does APA style require you to include either page number (for sources that include pages) or paragraph number (for sources without page numbers)—but be sure to check your in-text citation punctuation and spacing 😉 If you have PARAPHRASED (vs. quoted) a source, paragraph or page numbers are NOT required by APA style, so authors generally provide this information when paraphrasing only if they think doing so would help interested readers locate the info within their original source—make sense?

• Do you mean “p.” (= page) or “para.” (=paragraph)? 😉 

• Although “p.” is the correct abbreviation for a single page, “pp.” is the abbreviation used for multiple pages—see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations/page-numbers for more info

• Does the formatting for this quotation's paragraph info match APA’s in-text citation formatting guidelines? (including regarding its location after vs. before the end-of-sentence punctuation and quotation mark) 😉

  • Does the formatting for this quotation's page info match APA’s in-text citation formatting guidelines? (including regarding its location after vs. before the end-of-sentence punctuation and quotation mark) 😉 

• Should this period be here? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_the_basics.html)

• Why does your paper include sources cited in-text but not cited in your reference list? 😭

  • Which of your reference list sources is this evidence from? 🤔 (Don’t forget that for your readers to be able to check out your original sources for themselves, the source information in your in-text and reference list citations must match) 

  • X, although you’ve done a great job of letting readers know where you got your information via in-text citations, this is probably not enough to help a reader know where to look if they wanted to find out more, so for your final draft, could you please provide a reference list/bibliography that provides at least the URL of your sources?

  • X, although you’ve done a FANTASTIC job of integrating your sources via in-text citations, this is probably not enough to help a reader know where to look if they wanted to find out more, so for your final draft, could you please provide a reference list/bibliography that provides at least the URL of your sources?

  • Why is this source not included in your reference list?  

  • Why do you mention Hocevar’s essay but not cite it?

• Is this a source you will include in your research paper or one Xuehui & Zhan included in theirs? If the latter, here’s how your in-text citation should cite it according to APA style: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/secondary-sources 

  • Hmmmm. . . .shouldn’t this source be cited via in-text citation here as well as in your reference list? (If you found this info in one of your other cited sources check out how APA handles secondary source citations) 

  • Hmmmm. . . .this is not a COMPLETE secondary citation per APA style (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/secondary-sources) 

• X, if you mention the TITLE of one of your sources in the text of your paper, how does APA style require that you capitalize/punctuate this title?

• Shouldn’t journal/book titles be italicized (even within body text)? 

• X, you are correct that IF WE MENTION ARTICLE TITLES IN TEXT, we put the article title in quotation marks. However, does APA style put online new article titles in quotation marks IN REFERENCE LISTS?

Reference List

• X, where is your reference list?  😭

• X, why have you not followed APA formatting for your reference list? (e.g., in terms of alphabetizing vs. numbering sources, hanging indentation, author family/given name ordering & abbreviation, sentence vs. title capitalization for article titles, etc.) (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/apa_sample_paper.html)

  • X, you've cited an impressive number of sources, but I'm afraid many of your source citations (e.g., for webpages and government reports) fail to follow APA style: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples

• APA style (and probably other style guides also 😉) require the reference list to begin on a new page. Here's how you can insert a page break in Microsoft Word: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/insert-a-page-break-in-word-eb0e569c-8e3f-4db4-9b13-7bfe1cabdbd7

• According to APA style, your references list page should be titled “References" unless it cites only ONE reference (Check out the formatting of the Purdue OWL’s example "APA 7 Student Paper" references list for what this should look like 😉)—For more info, see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_basic_rules.html. To see what this should look like, check out the formatting of the Purdue OWL’s example "APA 7 Student Paper" references list: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/apa_sample_paper.html. 

  • Per APA style, shouldn't "References" be formatted in bold? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/apa_sample_paper.html)

  • Compare your font size for "References" (and line spacing afterward) to https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf 😉 (Also, is this font Times New Roman?)

  • Per APA style, should "References" be followed by a colon? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/apa_sample_paper.html)

• Oops! Why is your reference list not doublespaced? 😉

  • Oops! Why does your reference list include an additional line break between each reference? 🤔

  • Basically perfect APA-style in-text and reference page citations—wow, wow, WOW!!! (Its only VERY minor error I noticed in my quick check is that, technically, per APA style your reference list should be doublespaced exactly like the rest of your paper (i.e., without any additional line spacing between references—see https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

• Remember APA (and nearly all other style guides!) require reference lists to use hanging indentation: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_basic_rules.html. Here's how to create hanging indentation in Microsoft Word: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/create-or-remove-a-hanging-indent-11428fed-a282-4dd6-adf2-98bb8282c1ce

  • It looks like you've tried to create hanging indentation manual. It's MUCH easier (and much more reliable!) to use Microsoft Word's hanging indentation setting instead 😉—here's how: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/create-or-remove-a-hanging-indent-11428fed-a282-4dd6-adf2-98bb8282c1ce

  • What happened to your hanging indentation here? 🤔

  • Did you accidentally press “Enter” here? The hanging indent should only be applied to the FIRST line of each reference.  

• How does APA style order references? (Alphabetically? By the order they’re mentioned in your essay? In some other way?—to find out, see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_basic_rules.html)

  • Check your alphabetizing of your sources that begin with "B" 😉

  • Are reference lists in APA style numbered?

• Hmmmm. . . .are you sure this reference is following standard reference formatting for your field? 

• X, I can see you repeatedly press "Enter" to start your references list on a new page, but this pushed your references list TOO far down the page per https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf. To avoid this problem in the future, instead push content to start at the TOP of a new page using Microsoft Word's insert-a-page-break function: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/insert-a-page-break-in-word-eb0e569c-8e3f-4db4-9b13-7bfe1cabdbd7

• Hmmmm. . . .I’m afraid this reference doesn’t quite follow APA reference formatting for journal articles: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references

• Does APA style italicize author names? 🤔 (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html)

  • How does APA style format authors' names? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html)—please check for this problem throughout your reference list 😉

• Hmmmm. . . .is this the indicated author’s FAMILY (i.e., “last name” per American naming conventions) name or GIVEN name (i.e., “first name” per American naming conventions)? (It should be his or her FAMILY name—see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html) 

• How does APA style format authors' names? (Does APA require authors’ given/first names be written out in full or abbreviated?—see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html)

  • How does APA style punctuate author initials? 

  • Check APA style regarding spacing between author initials

  • Do APA-style reference lists use capitalize EVERY letter of author names? 😉 (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html)

• This is minor but how does APA write “and” in reference list citations including more than two authors?  

• Per APA 7 (vs. APA 6) style guidelines, how many authors should be included in reference list citations? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html)

• Does APA reference list formatting include authors’ Ph.D./M.D. degrees, etc.? 

• Check your spelling of this author's name here and throughout your essay

• Check APA date format for journal articles: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references

• Check where you’ve located this date compared to APA reference list guidelines: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references

• Doesn’t APA-style sentence-case capitalization capitalize the first word of not only TITLES, but also a SUBtitles? 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/capitalization/sentence-case for more information) 

• Just FYI: APA (and I think most other style manuals) do not require any additional punctuation following a title ending with a question mark 😉 (See https://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2011/07/punctuating-the-reference-list-entry.html)

• I know it’s confusing, but it’s more important not to change a title you’re citing than to edit out its contractions—make sense?

• Mostly good, but why are some of your titles not accurate? (Did you use a citation generator such as Citation Machine or Scribbr without verifying it had correctly identified a source's author, title, etc.? 😭)

  • Why is this title not accurate? 🤔 (Did you use a citation generator such as Citation Machine or Scribbr without verifying it had correctly identified a source's author, title, etc.? 😭)

• Doesn't APA style use sentence case vs. title case capitalization for journal/magazine ARTICLE titles? What about for JOURNAL/MAGAZINE titles?  (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_articles_in_periodicals.html 😉)

  • X, your article title capitalization is inconsistent, I think because you’ve been inconsistent in how you’ve entered this info into your citation manager. (Technically, APA style use sentence case for ARTICLE titles and title case for JOURNAL titles. However, I don’t really care about this as long as you are CONSISTENT in matching whatever the norms are for your field about this—make sense?) 

• Does APA style italicize journal/magazine ARTICLE titles or JOURNAL/MAGAZINE titles? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_articles_in_periodicals.html 😉) 

• Doesn't APA style use title case vs. sentence case capitalization for JOURNAL/MAGAZINE titles? What about for journal/magazine ARTICLE titles? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_articles_in_periodicals.html 😉)

• Doesn’t APA italicize JOURNAL titles (but not journal ARTICLE titles) and journal VOLUME (but not issue) numbers? Please check for this problem throughout your reference list (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_articles_in_periodicals.html 😉) 

  • Doesn't APA style italicize a journal’s VOLUME number, not only the journal’s TITLE?

  • This is tricky, but does APA italicize BOTH the journal volume AND issue number? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_articles_in_periodicals.html)

• In what journal was this article published? (And which volume/issue numbers, if available?)

• Where are this article’s journal volume/issue number and page numbers or article number required by APA style? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_articles_in_periodicals.html)

• Hmmmm. . . .is this the TITLE OF THE JOURNAL this was published in or the PUBLISHING COMPANY? 😉

  • Do APA-style reference lists use abbreviated journal titles?  🤔 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

• How does APA style handle journal articles without issue numbers? (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references#3)

• How does APA style format journal volume/issue numbers? 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

• Check your punctuation here 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

• Check this page number 😉

• How does APA style format journal article page numbers? 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

• Here’s how APA handles journal articles that don’t include page numbers: https://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2015/05/how-to-cite-an-article-with-an-article-number-instead-of-a-page-range.html 

• Hmmmm. . . .does APA style italicize journal article page numbers and URLs?

• • Why is your reference list formatting inconsistent in that some entries include live links but others plain text links? 😭 (APA style indicates that live links should be used for online (vs. printed) content—see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/dois-urls)

  • Just FYI: APA style formats DOIs as hyperlinks—see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/dois-urls 😉

    • FANTASTIC source documentation, but both for consistency and to make direct access to your sources easiest for readers, I recommend making all your reference list DOIs/URLs live links—make sense? 

  • Per APA style guidelines/our rubric criteria, why do NONE of your journal article citations include a DOI/URL? 😭 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

    • Per APA style guidelines, where is this journal article's DOI/URL? 🤔 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

  • Doesn't APA style require the DOI link to this article? (For what this should look like, see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

  • For consistency, can you provide the DOI (vs. journal) link to this article? (For what this should look like, see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/journal-article-references)

  • Only readers having University of Illinois credentials could access this paper via this DOI—therefore, what's this paper's PUBLIC DOI? (Check for this problem throughout your reference list 😉)

    • Only readers having University of Illinois credentials could access your annotated bibliography sources via your provided DOIs—therefore, what are these sources' PUBLIC DOI? 

  • Technically, the ERIC database URL should only be used in the case of manuscripts with only limited circulation (e.g., those directly submitted to ERIC by their authors)—if at all possible, a work’s DOI or other stable journal article URL should be used instead. Make sense? 

  • Did you read the full text of this paper or only its abstract? (Technically, you should read—and cite—its full text, NOT just its abstract entry from the PubMed/APA PsycNet database 😉)

• Hmmmm. . . .is this following APA 7 reference list formatting for webpages? 😉 (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

• Is this the FULL name of this source? 🤔

• Does this source REALLY have no author? (Did you look for the author's name at BOTH the top and bottom of the article?) 🤔 

• Check how APA 7 cites works by a group author (or truly unknown author)

  • Per APA style, shouldn’t the organizational author here be the World Bank?

  • Where no individual author is listed, cite the associated website’s government agency as the publisher (so “Centers for Disease Control and Prevention”) 

  • punctuation following the name of this article's organizational author—and check for this problem repeated throughout your reference list 😉 (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

  • What punctuation mark is missing after this organizational author's name? (See the example in the "Report by a government agency or other organization" section of https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_other_print_sources.html 😉)

• • How does APA format the date of webpages indicating a specific date of publication? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

    • Just FYI: Per APA style, if a specific piece of web content includes an updated date, use the updated date INSTEAD OF the original publication date.

  • Is this source REALLY not dated (i.e., "n.d.")? 🤔

  • Do APA-style reference lists use abbreviated month names?  (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

  • Check your punctuation following this web page's publication date—and check for this problem repeated throughout your reference list 😉 (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

• • Why is this title not accurate? 🤔

  • Per APA style guidelines, should the title of webPAGES (as well as the name of webSITES) use sentence case or title case capitalization? (Check for this problem repeated throughout your reference list—see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

    • Per APA style guidelines, should the name of webSITES (as well as the title of webPAGES) use sentence case or title case capitalization?

    • Unless an online news publisher has an associated newspaper, doesn't APA italicize the title of online news articles (matching APA style for webPAGES), but NOT the name of the online news publisher (matching APA style for webSITES)?

  • Doesn’t APA style italicize the title of webPAGES (but not webSITES)? (Check for this problem repeated throughout your reference list—see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

• Check your punctuation following this web page title—and check for this problem repeated throughout your reference list 😉(See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

• Per this website's "About" page, shouldn’t this site name be only IEEE Computer Society? (See https://www.computer.org/about)

  • Per this website's "About" page, should this site name be formatted as all capital letters (a.k.a. "all caps")? (See https://www.crossrivertherapy.com/about-us)

  • Check your punctuation following this site name—and check for this problem repeated throughout your reference list 😉(See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

• Why is your reference list formatting inconsistent in that some entries include live links but others plain text links? 😭 (APA style indicates that live links should be used for online (vs. printed) content—see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/dois-urls)

• Per APA style guidelines, how should website URLs be formatted? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

  • Browsers do not need the part of URLs that begin with "?" (or "/#~") or anything after to locate a web page/article, so this information should be deleted from reference list URLs (The purpose of this part of URLs is just to provide the target website information about your original search—please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉)

  • Hmmmm. . . .does APA style italicize/use bolded website URLs? (Check for this problem repeated throughout your reference list—see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_electronic_sources.html)

  • Hmmmm. . . .this link is to the Statista website overall, not its page(?) about real estate in Indonesia—can you provide a more complete direct link? 🤔

• Who authored this report? 😉 (See how to cite this in the "Report by a government agency or other organization" section of https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_other_print_sources.html)

• Do APA-style reference list citations include the publisher when the author and publisher are the same? (See the example in the "Report by a government agency or other organization" section of https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_other_print_sources.html 😉)

• This is tricky, but does APA style use title case vs. sentence case capitalization for government agency research report titles? Also, does APA style italicize government report titles? 

• Just FYI—here's how APA style cites press releases 😉: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/press-release-references

• Per APA style guidelines, should BOOK titles use title case or sentence case capitalization?

• Doesn’t APA style italicize book titles?

• Doesn’t APA style italicize newspaper titles? (See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_articles_in_periodicals.html)

  • Doesn’t APA style italicize newspaper titles? 

  • I can see you’re trying to follow APA-style formatting, but just FYI: APA reference list citations for online news publishers with an associated newspaper follow the same pattern as for paper newspapers (= a different pattern than for websites 😭)—i.e., the article title is NOT italicized, but the newspaper’s title IS 

• Here’s how to cite YouTube videos using APA style

  • Doesn’t APA italicize the title of YouTube videos?

  • Per APA style guidelines, should video titles use sentence case or title case capitalization? 

• X, Google did not PUBLISH this article. Here’s how APA cites foreign language TRANSLATIONS: https://apastyle.apa.org/blog/citing-translated-works

• Here's what APA style recommends for secondary source citations: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/secondary-sources

Mismatched in-text/reference citations

• Your in-text and reference page citations follow APA style nearly perfectly, but why does your essay include a source not mentioned in your reference list and your reference list include a source not cited in your essay? ☹️ (=8)

  • Don’t forget that for your readers to be able to check out your original sources for themselves, the source information in your in-text and reference list citations MUST match 😉  

• Why does your essay include an in-text citation that cites a source not mentioned in your reference list? ☹️ (=9)

• Why does your paper include a source cited in your reference list but not cited in-text? 😭(=9) 

  • Where have you used this source in your paper? ☹️ 

  • X, I can see you’ve tried to follow APA-style formatting in your reference list, but WHERE in your essay have you used the sources you’ve cited? (Please check APA’s in-text citation guidelines) 

  • X, WHERE in your essay have you used the sources you’ve cited? (Please check APA’s in-text citation guidelines) 

  • WHAT information did you use from Hocevar/Baca? (Why is Hocevar/Baca cited in your reference list but not anywhere in your essay?)

• OUTSTANDING conclusion!!! 🤗

• I recognize this is what you REALLY prefer, but because strong conclusions do not introduce new ideas not already mentioned earlier, I'm afraid because our assignment asks you to focus on only the full-time remote OR full-time in-office options, even in your conclusion you'll need to focus on these options only. I'm sorry!

• Your conclusion would be stronger if it EXPLICITLY reviewed the purpose of your paper 

• Hmmm. . . .your conclusion expresses a different thesis than your thesis statement, (i.e., that “Whether online or F2F learning is best depends on the individual student”)

• The topic sentence of your conclusion appears to partially contradict what your essay so far has demonstrated, namely that F2F learning is superior to online learning

  • Hmmmm. . . .everything you’ve written so far suggests online learning is NOT a great way to learn because it has many serious disadvantages

• Hmmmm. . . .did your essay mention before its conclusion that instituting a wealth tax could face constitutional challenges? (Remember strong conclusions do not introduce new ideas not already mentioned earlier 😉) (=8)

• Please see my comment in your essay on my finding your conclusion logic confusing 

• Your conclusion would be stronger if it ended with a final evaluative statement 😉 

• FINALLY, I know clearly what YOUR stance is!!! 😅

Reviews the essay's main ideas

• Your conclusion would be stronger if its first sentence reviewed the main ideas of ALL your body paragraphs, including your 3rd body paragraph—make sense? (=8) 

  • Hmmm. . . .does your conclusion paragraph accurately review the topic of your 2nd body paragraph? (i.e., Should it say "the marine ecosystem" or "DAMAGE to the marine ecosystem"?) (=8) 

    • The first sentence of your conclusion paragraph effectively reviews your main ideas (except your essay never talked about “more eco-friendly for online learning”)

    • Your conclusion paragraph reviews only the main idea of your 2nd paragraph, but not that of your 1st and 3rd paragraphs

  • Your conclusion would be stronger if it EXPLICITLY reviewed/specified EXACTLY which problem your research paper investigates—make sense?

    • WHICH food insecurity problem? (Contextually, I can guess, but it would be better if your conclusion's review of your paper's main points EXPLICITLY stated this information—make sense?) 

• Please see my thesis statement preview points comments above, as you've accidentally repeated the same mistakes here 😉 (no points taken off here b/c they were taken off earlier where the mistake was made originally)

• Also, why does your 3rd paragraph include a review of your main ideas/restatement of your thesis statement? Doesn't this information belong in your conclusion paragraph? 🤔

Reminds readers of topic's significance

• Your conclusion highlights the significance of your topic: "X"

• Your conclusion restates the significance of an unstable Internet issue as a key weakness of online learning

• Your final sentence POWERFULLY highlights the significance of your topic (helping your conclusion’s ideas move logically from specific to general)—wow, wow, WOW!!!

• Although your conclusion does highlight the significance of your topic (“All these factors make plastic will remain one of the most widely used materials for some time”) and does look to the future, it would be stronger in terms of (1) highlighting the significance of your topic and (2) progressing in a logical manner from specific to general ideas if its last sentence drew readers’ attention to the expected POSITIVE results of our “[reducing] the damage to the environment”—make sense? 

• Your conclusion would be stronger if it also reminded readers of the significance of your topic (This would also help your conclusion’s ideas move logically from specific to general) (=13)

• Your conclusion would be stronger if it reminded readers of the OVERALL SIGNIFICANCE of your topic given its FUTURE IMPLICATIONS—make sense? (This would also help your conclusion’s ideas move logically from specific to general)

Future implications and/or actions

• Your conclusion does a good job of looking to the future, helping your conclusion’s ideas move logically from specific to general 

• Your conclusion does a good job of looking to the future, recognizing that some of the current difficulties with online teaching may improve over time

• Your conclusion would be stronger if it suggested future implications and/or appropriate action readers should take in light of the information in your essay (This would also help your conclusion’s ideas move logically from specific to general)

• Your conclusion does not point out future implications or otherwise look to the future (Fixing this would also help your conclusion’s ideas move logically from specific to general)

• Your conclusion does not point out future implications or otherwise look to the future— which is especially a problem because the future is likely to be skeptics’ #1 concern with your stance, right?) (Summarizing how your stance will NOT, in fact, result in the future destruction of Earth’s environment will also help your conclusion’s ideas move logically from specific to general)

Moves logically from specific to general

• Your conclusion moves logically from specific ideas (your points about single-use plastics) to the general big picture (what would REALLY be the most environmentally friendly solution) 

• Hmmmm. . . .your conclusion does not progress logically from specific to general ideas by ENDING with either the general idea of (1) why this topic is significant or (2) suggested future implications and/or actions

• The ideas in your conclusion do not lead readers back out from your specific topic to why it matters in terms of general, real-world significance

• Your conclusion does not currently move from reviewing your specific body paragraph main ideas to the general, real-world future significance if people do what you suggest—make sense? 

• Hmmmm. . . .this last sentence of your conclusion REITERATES your proposed solutions, but would be stronger if it instead left readers focused on and motivated by the picture your last sentences paint of the positive real-world impacts that would happen if your proposed solutions were adopted—make sense? Therefore, reordering the last few sentences of your conclusion something like this would likely impact your readers more strongly: 

Logic

• Your conclusion would be stronger if it reviewed your essay's main ideas IN THE ORDER YOUR BODY PARAGRAPHS ORIGINALLY DISCUSSED THEM (or its reverse) —make sense? (=9) 

  • Your conclusion would be stronger if it reviewed your essay's main ideas IN THE ORDER YOUR BODY PARAGRAPHS ORIGINALLY DISCUSSED THEM or its reverse as well as combined chronic disease and diet-related issues like they're combined in your body paragraphs—make sense? (=8) 

• Please check out via the links on our course website homepage our "Academic Writing for English Language Learners" (AWELL) eText's chapters on academic tone: "Chapter 22: Vocabulary in Academic Style," "Chapter 23: Academic Style Troubleshooting," "Chapter 24: Cohesion in Academic Style," and "Chapter 25: Writing Concisely" 

• Except for a couple of (highlighted) instances of more spoken vs. written academic forms, your use of academic tone in this paper is FANTASTIC 😊 

  • Your essay’s “academic tone” is much improved, but in a few places it still sounds more informal/conversational than academic—make sense? 

  • X, I can see you’ve worked hard to use academic vs. informal, conversational lanaguage—great job! However, I’m afraid I was confused by your phrasing at several points. Can you please check your essay in terms of my language-related comments to make it more transparent for readers to understand?

• I’ve stopped here in checking your essay for this specific problem, but please check the rest of your essay for this issue as well 😉 

• Hmmmm. . . .this is not a complete sentence, and though a “heading”/summary statement like this might appear at the beginning of bullet points, etc., in journalistic writing, it doesn’t match academic writing style. (The inclusion of ChatGPT-style list items (as well as several other aspects of your essay) STRONGLY suggests overuse of AI 😭

(1 error = 0 points off, 2 errors = after the first error, one point per error)

• X, I’m concerned that busy readers could find this paper’s lack of conciseness at least frustrating, if not confusing. In addition, multiple instances of redundancy suggests failure to carefully edit your paper, which can make readers wonder if you failed in being careful in other, less visible parts of the research process—make sense?) Let’s talk about possible ways of strengthening your ChatGPT techniques to improve this. Also, please check out via the links on our course website homepage one of our "Academic Writing for English Language Learners" (AWELL) eText's academic tone chapters, "Chapter 25: Writing Concisely" 😉  (specifically by taking the opportunity while you’re still a grad student—as long as there is no risk of giving away research or company secrets— to ask ChatGPT to edit your writing sentence-by-sentence for grammar. Although, of course, you must first review its suggested changes first to fix anywhere it has accidentally changed your meaning, which can be problem [check out ChatGPT’s editing weaknesses!]. Then I recommend reading its edited version aloud to yourself so you can automate your OWN use of its more natural English phrasing for the future—make sense? 

  • A few times your body paragraphs repeat the same info in multiple places, which is confusing—for the sake of conciseness, can you delete these redundancies? 

    • Didn't your "Decades of this policy have produced an age structure with a disproportionate number of elderly citizens relative to the working-age population" AND "Furthermore, the shift towards an older demographic has profound implications for the labor market and economic structure" sentences already express this idea? ☹️Therefore, for conciseness, why not combine these sentences' unique ideas into just one sentence/just one or two sentences logically located in a single paragraph? (Just FYI: Such redundancy strongly suggests overuse of AI 😕)/This redundancy (as well as several other aspects of your essay) STRONGLY suggests overuse of AI 😭/(Just FYI: Especially if you use AI, check carefully for redundancy issues because they're a very strong indicator to teachers of overuse of AI 😕) 

    • X, doesn't this paragraph basically exemplify the ideas your previous two sentences already expressed in your paragraphs "X" Therefore, for conciseness, why not combine these paragraphs' unique ideas into just one paragraph addressing this topic? 🤔

    • X, doesn't this sentence basically repeat the ideas your previous two sentences already expressed? Therefore, for conciseness, why not combine its unique ideas into these earlier sentences? 🤔 (Just FYI: In essay-length writing, conclusion sentences at the end of each paragraph are optional) 

    • X, doesn't this sentence basically repeat the ideas your previous sentence already expressed? Therefore, for conciseness, why not combine these sentences? 🤔 (Such redundancy STRONGLY suggest overuse of AI 😭) 

    • X, doesn't this phrase basically repeat the ideas already expressed in this sentence? Therefore, how can you combine this sentence's unique ideas more concisely?🤔

      • X, doesn't this phrase basically repeat the ideas already expressed in this sentence?  (i.e., Can it be deleted for conciseness? 🤔) Such redundancy STRONGLY suggest overuse of AI 😭) 

      • X, you mentioned wanting to see if you could publish this—I don't know anything about the Indian publication context, so I'm not sure whether that's possible or not, but if you do decide to try, I want to let you know that to maximize your chances of being accepted for publication, I think you need to cut probably a full page of redundant phrasing/information. In general, where you (currently often!) have multiple phrases/sentences expressing the same idea, their unique ideas should be combined, usually into just ONE sentence. Otherwise, I'm concerned that even though your deletion of redundancies is now adequate for ESL 112, publishers may still reject your paper for overuse of AI—make sense? 🤔

• How could you express this more concisely?  (I think you could easily cut its word count in half and still express the same meaning/all of its key ideas  😉) 

  • Is this phrase NECESSARY to clearly express your intended meaning in this sentence? (i.e., Can it be deleted for conciseness?/Can one of them be deleted for conciseness? —Please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉)

  • Hmmmm. . . .what’s the difference between “importance” and “SIGNIFICANT importance”? (Isn’t “significant” here redundant? 😉) 

• Hmmmm. . . .why is this/are these sentences duplicated? Just FYI: Duplication of the EXACT SAME WORDS as well as multiple sentences repeating the EXACT SAME IDEAS let teachers know students have overused AI by not adequately checking their AI-edited before submission 😭

  • • Why are the exact same pollutants mentioned multiple times in this sentence? 🤔

• Your essay does a good job of avoiding the use of first-person or second-person pronouns

• Remember written academic tone avoids/minimizes the use of first-person (such as "I/me/my/the writer") or second-person point of view (such as "you/your") to make writing sound more objective (vs. subjective). (Please check for this problem throughout your essay—see Chapter 22 in our eText on "Vocabulary in Academic Style" for more information and/or http://elss.elc.cityu.edu.hk/ELSS/Resource/Academic%20Style%20and%20Tone%20ICOSA%20Version/) What about using "one's" instead of "your"?/What about expressing this idea in passive voice instead? – “a new maize cultivar can be obtained” You might also want to check out this research on how a research article’s style impacts its number of citations 😉) (one error = 9; two errors = 8, 3+ errors = 7)

• To follow academic writing norms about "hiding" oneself as author, what about "This essay uses"?  🤔

• Good job using first-person pronouns (e.g., “we”) ONLY where they help your argument (that protecting the environment is our shared responsibility)

  • Who is “we”? 😉 (Since you’re writing this paper as an individual, you’ll need to use “This paper” (or “It”) or “This analysis,” etc. Make sense?) 

  • Who is WE? This mistake STRONGLY suggests overuse of AI 😭

• Is the pronoun “you” commonly used in research articles in your field? 

• Remember contractions in English are considered informal and therefore should not generally be used in academic/scholarly/research writing 😉 (See Chapter 23 in our eText on "Academic Style Troubleshooting" for more information and please check for this problem throughout your paper) (one error = 9; two errors = 8)

• Technically, academic-style writing avoids phrasal verbs 😉 (See Chapter 23 in our eText on "Academic Style Troubleshooting" for more information) (one error = 0; two errors = 9)

  • Just FYI: Although this is not mentioned in our eText, academic-style writing tends to avoid ending sentences with a preposition—can you think of any other way of expressing your intended idea? 

  • This is tricky, but for your meaning here, “lot” is informal vs. academic. Can you think of any alternative? (See Chapter 23 in our eText on "Academic Style Troubleshooting" for more information.)

    • This is tricky, but even though because “kids” IS very common phrasing, it might be okay to use this term OCCASIONALLY in an essay on your topic, your essay’s VERY high frequency of use of the word “kids” substantially reduces how “academic” your essay sounds—make sense?

    • This is tricky, but if you compare the frequency of the phrasing "tons of"/“spot on” (in quotation marks) in Google vs. Google Scholar, you’ll see that this phrasing is more spoken/informal than written/academic. Can you think of any alternative? 

  • Hmmmm. . . .this is more conversational/spoken phrasing vs. academic-style phrasing—can you think of another, less conversational way of expressing your intended meaning? (Please check for this throughout your essay)

    • Please see my comments in your essay about writing with an appropriately academic/professional WRITTEN vs. more casual SPOKEN style 🤗—you may also want to check out our eText's 4 chapters related to academic tone: "Chapter 22: Vocabulary in Academic Style," "Chapter 23: Academic Style Troubleshooting," "Chapter 24: Cohesion in Academic Style," and "Chapter 25: Writing Concisely." 

• NEED TO UPDATE TO REFLECTING CHANGING GUIDELINES (see updated "so" info below and https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/conjunction)—Although “and” is commonly used at the beginning of sentences in text messages and casual (vs. professional) emails, traditionally coordinating conjunctions such as “and” (and “but” and “or” and "so") have been viewed as only appropriate for connecting ideas WITHIN a sentence, not ACROSS sentences, so you may not want to begin a sentence with “and” in professional/academic writing—make sense? Please check for this problem throughout your paper. (Just FYI: “Also” or "in addition" are often good alternatives.) (See https://www.grammarly.com/blog/starting-a-sentence-with-a-conjunction/)

  • Although “but” is commonly used at the beginning of sentences in text messages and casual (vs. professional) emails, traditionally coordinating conjunctions such as “but” (as well as “and,” “or,” and "so") have been viewed as only appropriate for connecting ideas WITHIN a sentence, not ACROSS sentences, so you may not want to begin a sentence with “but” in professional/academic writing—make sense? Please check for this problem throughout your paper. (Just FYI: “However” or "nevertheless" are often good alternatives.) (See https://www.grammarly.com/blog/starting-a-sentence-with-a-conjunction/)

  • Although “so” is commonly used at the beginning of sentences in text messages and casual (vs. professional) emails, traditionally coordinating conjunctions such as “and” (and “but” and “or” and "so") have been viewed as only appropriate for connecting ideas WITHIN a sentence, not ACROSS sentences, so you may not want to begin a sentence with “so” in professional/academic writing—make sense? Please check for this problem throughout your paper. (Just FYI: “Therefore” is often a good alternative.) (See https://www.grammarly.com/blog/starting-a-sentence-with-a-conjunction/)

  • Many people consider it incorrect to begin sentences with coordinating conjunctions like “and,” “but” and “or” in formal/professional English writing, e.g., an email to someone of higher status you don't know or a research report. Doing so can therefore be risky, i.e., probably not worthwhile (unless you’re a maverick willing potentially to sacrifice your reputation as a competent English writer in the eyes of traditionalist readers so you can protest this continued guideline 😉). Whether you’re a maverick or not, however, you should almost certainly only begin sentences with a coordinating conjunction when 1) you have strong stylistic reasons for doing so and 2) your writing is basically free of all real English grammar errors (so that your email recipients know that your occasional use of sentence-initial conjunctions is intentional and stylistic, not due to inadequate mastery of “standard” English grammar!) (Additional helpful answers to common sentence-initial-coordinating-conjunction questions can be found here.)

• This is tricky, but because “incredibly” suggests subjective EMOTIONAL assessment, it’s used much more frequently in speaking than in academic writing. In academic writing, a more objective (i.e., easily defensible using data) phrasing, such as “HIGHLY dependent,” is preferred—make sense? 

• “Some” is a very vague word—how can you express your intended meaning more clearly/completely? (See Chapter 23 in our eText on "Academic Style Troubleshooting" for more information.) (Please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉)

• Good job using cautious language as required by academic tone (including avoiding language that makes unjustified generalizations)

  • Good job mostly using appropriately cautious language/avoiding language that makes unjustified generalizations (but check my comment in your essay about “the health of marine animals and humans being GUARANTEED”?—Please note I have highlighted all my academic tone comments in red)  

  • FANTASTIC hedging—wow!!! 

• Good job avoiding language that makes unjustified generalizations

• Just FYI: Academic tone places a high value on cautious language, including avoiding language that makes unjustified generalizations (i.e.,Is this universally true? Do ALL teenagers experience this? 🤔) 

  • Remember academic tone places a high value on cautious language, including avoiding language that makes unjustified generalizations (i.e., Is plastic waste the ONLY cause of our environmental crisis and pollution? Therefore, are we justified in expecting that limiting the production and use of plastic will END the environmental crisis and pollution?) 

• Readers will find your argument/writing more convincing(i.e., harder to refute) if you use more cautious, “hedged” language (e.g., that avoids making unjustified generalizations, cf. “Human exposure to harmful substances in plastics is ALWAYS insidious”)—make sense?

  • Readers (especially academic readers) will find your argument/writing more convincing (i.e., harder to refute) if you use more cautious, “hedged” language—after all, while definitely energy shortage IS a major cause of human conflict, exploitation, and oppression, do you REALLY believe—and will your readers believe—that it is the ONLY cause? Therefore, is it reasonable to think solving the problem of energy shortage will solve ALL of these problems? 🤨)

• “Prove” is a VERY strong word that is therefore easy for opponents to attack. In academic writing, therefore, alternative (more “hedged”) phrasing is preferred (e.g., “demonstrate”)—make sense?

• Perfect? This is a VERY strong statement. FYI: Academic writers tend to avoid making such strong statements (that other scholars can easily argue against or even disprove!) by "hedging" their claims. What hedging vocabulary can you add to this claim so that you don't cause your readers to immediately question it because it's soooooooooooo strong? (See our our eText’s Chapter 22 introduction to hedging, the excellent explanation and quiz on hedging found on the The Hong Kong Polytechnic University's Centre for Independent Language Learning website at http://www2.elc.polyu.edu.hk/cill/eap/hedging.htm and also the basically reliably ordered lists of hedging vocabulary at https://www.usingenglish.com/teachers/articles/how-to-teach-hedging-generalising.html

• Hmmmm—I realize you have been arguing for banning single-use plastics throughout your essay but “best” is still VERY strong phrasing. Readers will find your argument stronger—i.e., harder to refute—if you use more cautious, “hedged” language vs. extreme language. . . .make sense?

• Is this true for ALL chemical additives? (Readers will find your argument stronger—i.e., harder to refute—if you use more cautious, “hedged” language vs. extreme language that suggests you are willing to exaggerate—against logic!—in order to make your point. Make sense?)

  • Is this really true? (How likely would a gun rights advocate be willing to continue reading an essay that begins with a claim like this?) 

• In other words, while “no doubt” is commonly used in spoken English and casual communication, it is not commonly used in academic communication is because it is TOO strong

• In ALL aspects? That’s a pretty extreme claim. Do you believe your essay successfully argues that offline teaching is superior to online teaching in EVERY way? Although news-style writing sometimes gains audience attention by making extreme claims, in academic writing, this practice is not respected because such extreme claims are almost never, in fact, true—Does this make sense? (Let’s talk about this if it doesn’t because it’s a REALLY important difference between everyday communication—where we often use exaggeration to make our point—and respected academic communication.) Actually, you can make a convincing argument for your stance just by demonstrating (as your essay, in fact, already successsfully does!) that offline education works better than online education IN TERMS OF THE KEY CONCERNS OF YOUR AUDIENCE

• X, per our Problem Analysis Essay guidelines, "Essays should be 2-3 pages (about 600-800 words) in length and formatted to include Times New Roman, size 12 font. Paragraphs should be indented and double-spaced, with 1-inch margins on all sides. The first page of the assignment should include your name, section, date (remember to update your title page's submission date to match the current draft! 😉), assignment name, and draft number (if appropriate). Final drafts should include your UIN (9-digit number)" 

• GREAT job following our formatting guidelines for this assignment 🤗

• Mostly your essay follows this assignment's formatting guidelines, except that paragraphs should be indented/essays should be double-spaced/have 1-inch margins on all sides (=4; two errors=3; three errors=2; missing first page elements=1 point for every 2 elements, up to 2 points lost)

• X, why did you not apply my formatting feedback on your 2nd draft? ☹️(=0)

• Please see my comments in your paper on a few minor formatting corrections needed 😉  

• Mostly your essay follows this assignment's formatting guidelines, except "Essays should be 2-3 pages (about 600-800 words) in length." Writing clearly and concisely IS harder than writing longer, but I want you to learn this important skill because no one likes reading more than necessary—including your future boss, colleagues, clients/customers, etc.😉—right? Therefore, can you look for redundancies you can cut to bring your word count down to at least 825 words?  

  • Although your essay flows VERY well, it is a little long at around 100 words over our 800-word limit 😉 

  • X, your essay is a little longer than allowed by our assignment guidelines. Is this sentence NECESSARY to successfully demonstrate your point?/Could you combine the ideas in these two sentences into just one sentence to cut a few words?/Although this might be true, would your intended meaning still be clear if you cut the highlighted part to reduce your word count?/To cut a few additional words, could you cut this phrase and still express your intended meaning?

  • X, although your essay mostly flows well, it is only 624 words, substantially shorter than our Rhetorical Analysis Essay guidelines’ 800-word minimum 😭 (=4 for 700-750/1050+ words, 3 for 600+)

• X, per our Research Paper guidelines, "Essays should be 5-7 pages in length," but yours is only ~4.5 pages 😭

  • X, per our Research Paper guidelines, "Essays should be 5-7 pages in length," but if your spacing were corrected, yours would only be ~4.5 pages 😭

• Overall,/Mostly your body paragraphs do a GREAT job of arguing for your thesis statement through the use of clear topic sentences supported by convincing evidence and analysis (Maybe a little too much evidence/analysis, however, given our assignment guidelines very limited word count?/but make sure you include all evidence/analysis necessary to convince your reader and only the evidence/analysis necessary to convince your reader—make sense?/but please note that academic writing—unlike journalistic writing—frequently presents its evidence BEFORE its analysis, not its analysis before its evidence like you have done in this paper) (You even mentioned a possible counterargument and refuted it effectively—wow!!!)

  • Your third paragraph does a GREAT job of further developing your second paragraph topic about the relative risk of distraction in online vs. face-to-face courses. Unfortunately, in a short essay like our Compare/Contrast Essay, our word limit gets in the way of such extensive development of any single topic. Instead, your third paragraph should present a third reason demonstrate the validity of your thesis statement, along with associated evidence/analysis. Make sense?

• X, per our Secondary Research Paper guidelines, “Documents should include a legible, widely available font style such as Calibri or Times New Roman at size 11-point or 12-point.” Why is your paper using 16-point font?

• Is this font Times New Roman? 😉 

• Can you subscript this "2" here and throughout your paper? 😉 (See https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/format-text-as-superscript-or-subscript-in-word-507cdffd-8169-4872-96ec-909ea5888dc6#:~:text=Select%20the%20text%20or%20number%20that%20you%20want.,(Do%20not%20press%20Shift.)

• X, per our Argumentative Essay guidelines (and APA style more generally), your essay should be double-spaced 😉

  • Also, just FYI—you don't need to add line breaks BETWEEN paragraphs/references—please check for this problem repeated throughout your essay 😉

  • Also, as you'll see by checking out the APA Style website's sample annotated student paper at https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/paper-format/student-annotated.pdf, APA style does not require added line breaks between references 😉

    • Why is there a line break between these two paragraphs? 

    • Why is there a line break between these two references? 

    • Check the consistency of your double-spacing both within and between paragraphs/references—see how to fix the extra spacing between paragraphs at https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/change-spacing-between-paragraphs-ee4c7016-7cb8-405e-90a1-6601e657f3ce 😉—please check for this problem repeated throughout your essay 😉

    • Check the consistency of your double-spacing between these two paragraphs vs. your other paragraphs—see how to fix the extra spacing at https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/change-spacing-between-paragraphs-ee4c7016-7cb8-405e-90a1-6601e657f3ce 😉

• X, per our Problem Analysis Essay guidelines (and APA style more generally), paragraphs should be indented 😉 (See HOW at https://support.microsoft.com/en-au/office/indent-the-first-line-of-a-paragraph-b3721167-e1c8-40c3-8a97-3f046fc72d6d)

  • X, I can see you tried to manually indent your essay's paragraphs as required, but just FYI: for long documents such as essays, the safest way to ensure CONSISTENT paragraph indentation/avoid accidentally forgetting to indent one or more paragraphs is to use Microsoft Word’s automatic “first-line indentation” setting (See HOW at https://support.microsoft.com/en-au/office/indent-the-first-line-of-a-paragraph-b3721167-e1c8-40c3-8a97-3f046fc72d6d 😉)

• Good job indenting your paragraphs, but technically, per APA style, the first line of each paragraph of text should be indented only 0.5 in. from the left margin. Please check for this problem throughout your essay 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

  • X, why is the margin for this paragraph, your second paragraph, and your last paragraph around 1 cm more rightward than that of your 2nd and 4th paragraphs? 🤔

• Just FYI: APA style uses left, not justified, paragraph alignment, since left alignment makes reading easier as well makes it easier to check for possible spacing mistakes 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

• Just FYI: although not technically required for ESL 112, I highly recommend checking out the formatting of the Purdue OWL’s example "APA 7 Student Paper" title page at https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/apa_sample_paper.html—just remember that if you do choose to follow this example, you must still include all the first page elements required by our assignment guidelines, including assignment name, draft number, and UIN (9-digit number) for final drafts 😉

• X, I can see you tried to manually locate this title as required, but technically it should be located at the top of this page, not one line down. Just FYI: for long documents such as essays, the safest way to ensure CONSISTENT paragraph indentation/avoid accidentally forgetting to indent one or more paragraphs is to use Microsoft Word’s automatic “first-line indentation” setting (See HOW at https://support.microsoft.com/en-au/office/indent-the-first-line-of-a-paragraph-b3721167-e1c8-40c3-8a97-3f046fc72d6d 😉)

• X, I'm confused—why is your title here different than your title on your title page? Per APA style, they should be the same (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

• GREAT title for this essay!!! 😍/🤩

  • Let's discuss during our individual conference ideas for improving this title 😉

  • Will your readers be able to guess from this title what SPECIFICALLY your essay will discuss? (Can you revise this title to make the topic of your essay more IMMEDIATELY clear to readers?)  

  • Do APA-style titles end with a period? 😉(See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

• Hmmmm. . . .does this match APA guidelines for how to format your first page of content? (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf) 🤔

• Check this title's alignment here and below😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

  • Check this title's alignment 😉(See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

• Check this title's line spacing 😉(See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

• Check this title's font size against https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf 😉

• Check your title case capitalization here and below 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/capitalization/title-case)

• Technically, this should be your full name, e.g., “X,” in part because this could help instructors who have multiple students named X. 

  • X, Americans are likely to interpret NOT capitalizing people’s names as a sign that you disrespect them—and failure to capitalize your OWN name as a sign you don’t respect yourself (or maybe were just EXTREMELY lazy when writing). Probably this is NOT the impression you want to give readers the very first line of your essay, right? 😉 

  • Be careful to spell your own name correctly because carelessness regarding something you clearly COULD do correctly if you had tried can make readers wonder if you were equally careless in less obvious ways and therefore wonder if they can trust the quality of your work—make sense?

• X, technically “the first page of the assignment should include your [ESL 112] section” (so in this case “ESL 112, Section I”)—make sense? 

• Almost perfect, but per our Problem Analysis Essay guidelines, the first page of the assignment should also include the submission date (of the CURRENT draft, of course!😉) 

• Remember to update your title page's submission date to match the CURRENT draft 😉

• I know it’s not logical, but US date ordering is [month] [day], [year] 😉 

• X, technically “the first page of the assignment should include [the] assignment name” (so in this case “Problem Analysis Essay”) and "draft number" (so in this case "2nd Draft")—make sense? 

  • X, remember “the first page of the assignment should include [the] assignment name” (so in this case “Research Paper”) and "draft number" (so in this case "Final Draft") 😭

• Remember to update your title page's draft number and submission date to match the CURRENT draft 😉 (=4)

• GREAT job following our formatting guidelines for this assignment—just remember that final drafts should include your UIN (9-digit number)" 🤗

• Also,/Just don't forget that final drafts should include your UIN (9-digit number)! 😉

• Just FYI: Your final draft should include your UIN (i.e., 9-digit number, NOT your NetID, though I do understand these are easily confusable! 😉) 

• X, why did you not apply my reminder on your 2nd draft that final drafts should include your UIN (9-digit number)"? 😭 (=4)

• • Where are this assignment's required page numbers? (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

    • Is this page number located correctly per APA style? (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

• Where are this assignment's required section's headings? (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

  • Hmmmm. . . .this section heading is not very descriptive. . . . (cf. https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf)

• Why is there a line break between this heading and the previous text? (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/paper-format/student-annotated.pdf) (Please check for this problem throughout your paper) 

• Should APA-style headings be followed by a period/full stop/colon? (See https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf to find out and please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉)

• Check this heading's alignment based on https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/documents/APA%207%20Student%20Sample%20Paper.pdf OR https://apastyle.apa.org/instructional-aids/student-paper-setup-guide.pdf (Please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉)

• Check APA-style heading capitalization guidelines at https://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2012/03/title-case-and-sentence-case-capitalization-in-apa-style.html 😉

• X, I didn’t immediately realize you intended this to be a level 2 instead of level 1 heading. Please make sure you are following your chosen citation style’s formatting for different heading level (maybe by using Microsoft Word’s “heading styles” to automate consistent heading level formatting, a feature that’s especially useful for long documents like a thesis/dissertation)

• Hmmmm. . . .how does the info under your level 2 headings in your methods section relate to that in your results/discussion section? As a reader, it’s a little hard to figure out—can you clarify so that even a reader who is just scanning your headings before deciding whether or not to read your paper will IMMEDIATELY understand from your headings what each section will discuss?

• (Also, could you please submit ALL future papers as Microsoft Word vs. pdf docs? Word docs are easier for me to grade 😉)

• X, just wanted to let you know that your Microsoft Word default font is a Chinese font that includes very difficult-to-read English letters. Therefore, for this document, I have updated this document’s “Normal” style to use Times New Roman font instead. Alternatively, you could update your Microsoft Word default font for all documents to a more English-friendly font—but just a warning, this might complicate your using Microsoft Word to write Chinese—I’m not sure.

• I think there is a problem with your Microsoft Word software. Your Compare/Contrast Essay final draft is breaking up text in the middle of words (and it's not REALLY displaying Times New Roman font even though it says it is 🤔). I have tried to fix this so I can grade your Compare/Contrast Essay final draft, but this appears not to be something I can fix on my end. I think you'll need to fix it and resubmit it—let's plan on working on this together after class to figure out what's wrong and how best you can fix it. Thanks!

• This is tricky, but how does APA style numbers below 10 in text? 😉 (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/numbers/numerals and please check for this problem throughout your paper)

Report on External Tools

• Where is your "Report on external tools" disclosure? (=grade reduced by 1 point 😭) 

• Just copying and pasting our example "Report on external tools" disclosure doesn't count—where is YOUR "Report on external tools" disclosure? (=grade reduced by 1 point 😭)   

• HOW did you use these tools?—"For example, if you used Grammarly, ChatGPT, translation apps, or an additional internet resource to help you complete any step of our research paper assignment, write a brief (100 words or less) statement in the "Comments" box disclosing all external (outside our course site) tools or resources used, describing how you used each in your research paper assignment process" (=grade reduced by 1 point 😭) 

Plagiarism

• IMPORTANT!!! X, remember that plagiarism is commonly defined as more than 3 words in a row (not including technical terms) the same as the original source. Therefore—so that I don’t have to report your currently plagiarized phrasing to the University of Illinois FAIR system as an academic integrity violation, please re-paraphrase their words by (1) starting with a different piece of information than the original source and (2) substituting words and/or changing their grammatical part of speech category. Important!!! (=10% off for one instance of plagiarism in 2nd draft)

  • Plagiarized from Jin et al. (2023) 😭

    • Technically, plagiarized from Yu, et al. 🤭

    • Technically self-plagiarized from your November 9 PPT group presentation with XXX and YYY on your generative AI topic—could you please work on growing your paraphrasing skills by rephrasing these sentences to avoid even self-plagiarism (including structural plagiarism)? Thanks! 

  • Technically, structurally plagiarized from Han et al. (2020) 😭 (Please re-paraphrase by STARTING WITH A DIFFERENT PIECE OF INFORMATION than the original source 🤔)

    • X, if this were your final draft, it would have to be reported to the University of Illinois' FAIR system for plagiarism from earth.org because of inadequate paraphrasing 😭

    • I'm afraid that although you cited your source for this information, because it is inadequately paraphrased, technically it's still plagiarized 😭— i.e., even if there are no direct synonyms for most of its WORDS (though do change any you can!), definitely you can change this sentence's/phrase's STRUCTURE, right?

  • X, if this were your final draft, it would technically have to be reported to the University of Illinois' FAIR system for plagiarism because you forgot to put quotation marks around this quote (although you did cite its source adequately). This is a BIG deal that, if it were to happen again, could hurt you for the long term! 😭 Let’s please talk about this, so I can make sure you know how you can avoid getting in trouble for an academic integrity violation! (See https://provost.illinois.edu/policies/policies/academic-integrity/students-quick-reference-guide-to-academic-integrity/)

    • (I also recommend that when you collect quotations from source material to possibly quote in your paper, (1) highlight each copied quotation in the same color and (2) verify before removing your highlighting that your paraphrase ENTIRELY follows APA style (including by NOT being confusingly enclosed in quotation marks)—make sense? 😉)

  • X, it looks like you’ve cited ONLY the sources you QUOTED (but not those you’ve paraphrased)—this is a BIG problem because it suggests YOU are the source of your paraphrased info! So I don’t have to report this to the University of Illinois FAIR system as plagiarism (defined by the University of Illinois’ academic integrity guidelines as “representing the words, work, or IDEAS of another as your own"), please fix this!!! 😭)

  • Please see my plagiarism comments within your essay 😭

    • Please see my (admittedly minor!) plagiarism comments within your essay 🤭

Fabrication of Sources

• Does this quotation REALLY exist in this source? If so, why haven't you cited its paragraph or page number? (See https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/citations/quotations) (If not, if this were YOUR information report, I'd have to report you to the FAIR system for the academic integrity violation of fabricating sources (almost certainly due to overuse of AI)!!! 😳😭😳)

• I have searched and cannot find this source anywhere—source appears fabricated/not a real source 😭

  • IMPORTANT!!!—X, for many reasons, I am concerned you overused AI (e.g., ChatGPT) when writing this essay. One reason is that your reference list sources do not lead to any real websites—please remember that according to our ESL 112 First Day Handout, “Students are responsible for ensuring that their own AI use is ethical since some uses of AI tools (e.g., ChatGPT) violate Student Code. For example, cheating may occur when content is generated by a third party, including AI, instead of by the student. Fabrication of sources or evidence and misrepresentation of ideas may also occur when using AI tools, and students are liable for an AI-generated submission with these violations. . . .Should an incident arise in which a student is thought to have violated academic integrity, the instructor will initiate procedures outlined in the Academic Integrity Policy  (See https://studentcode.illinois.edu/article1/part4/1-401/) via Faculty Academic Integrity Reporting (FAIR—see https://my.atlas.illinois.edu/fair/index.asp), the system for reporting academic integrity allegations and violations”—IMPORTANT!!!

• WHERE does your WHO (2020) source say this??? 😭😭😭—Lydia, for many reasons, I am concerned you overused generative AI when writing this essay. One reason is that nowhere does the WHO (2020) source you cite in your 3rd body paragraph say what you have "paraphrased" it as saying 😭—please remember that according to our ESL 112 First Day Handout, “Students are responsible for ensuring that their own AI use is ethical since some uses of AI tools (e.g., ChatGPT) violate Student Code. For example, cheating may occur when content is generated by a third party, including AI, instead of by the student. Fabrication of sources or evidence and MISREPRESENTATION OF IDEAS may also occur when using AI tools, and students are liable for an AI-generated submission with these violations. . . .Should an incident arise in which a student is thought to have violated academic integrity, the instructor will initiate procedures outlined in the Academic Integrity Policy  (See https://studentcode.illinois.edu/article1/part4/1-401/) via Faculty Academic Integrity Reporting (FAIR—see https://my.atlas.illinois.edu/fair/index.asp), the system for reporting academic integrity allegations and violations”—IMPORTANT!!! I'm afraid I therefore have no choice but to report this Problem Analysis Essay final draft violation to FAIR 😭😭😭

• WHERE does your Deloitte (2024) source say this??? 😭😭😭—Yixuan, for many reasons, I am concerned you overused AI when writing this essay. One reason is that nowhere does the Deloitte (2024) source you cite here say what you have "paraphrased" it as saying 😭—please remember that according to our ESL 522 First Day Handout, “Fabrication of sources is violation of academic integrity." If this were your final draft,  I'm afraid I would have no choice but to report this academic integrity violation to FAIR 😭😭😭 

Apparent overuse of ChatGPT/DeepL

• X, please see my comments in your paper about its MANY aspects that STRONGLY suggest overuse of AI (i.e., overuse of AI appears to be damaging both your logic AND your writing 😭)

• X, it appears you have overused DeepL/ChatGPT in ways that are not helping you grow as a writer and have hurt the quality of your writing, so let's plan on discussing appropriate vs. inappropriate uses of AI for supporting YOU growing as a writer and making sure you don't get in trouble for an academic integrity violation. 

• X, your paper is VERY hard to understand. Is this because you first wrote it in Chinese and then translated it DeepL or another translation apps? (e.g., What do "INCREASE in public awareness INCREASE," "with new information reaching known," or "While it has to note that it is the current status in a test phase of this means of chemical protection" (etc.! 😳 ) mean?

  • Your paper currently looks like it was first written in Chinese and then translated via one of the many translation apps available. This is a problem, because if you successfully graduate with a University of Illinois diploma, employers will understand that diploma to mean not only do you know the CONTENT of your chosen major but that you know this content in English AND can independently communicate it in English—and therefore are qualified for an English-medium job in your major. The university does NOT want to lose its reputation among employers by awarding diplomas to students who are NOT independently ready to work English-medium jobs—make sense? For this reason, writing an ESL 112 assignment first in Chinese and then using a translator app to convert it to English runs ENTIRELY against the purpose of ESL 112  because this does not build YOUR English writing skills—make sense?

• X, why did you not apply the following comment from your 2nd draft? 😭: 

• Is the grammatical structure of this heading parallel with that of your other headings of the same level in this section?

  • Is the grammatical structure of this heading parallel with that of your other solution? 🤔

• How can you phrase these so they are parallel in terms of part of speech? (i.e., currently this list consists of a noun, noun, and adjective, but a better parallel list would be either noun, noun, and noun OR adjective, adjective, and adjective—make sense?)

  • How can you phrase these attributes of plastic so they are PARALLEL in terms of part of speech? (i.e., currently this list consists of an -ing verb, noun, and noun. While figuring out how to make lists parallel CAN be challenging, what about for this list something like “its qualities of BEING waterproof, lightweight, and good as an insulator”)

  • Verb phrase, verb phrase, verb phrase, [and] clause? (These list items are not parallel in structure) 

• X, you have CLEARLY been very wise in your use of AI!!! 😍 Because I can see you are trustworthy in how you do (and do not!) use AI, I recommend test improving the phrasing/grammar within your information report paragraph-by-paragraph (instead of sentence-by-sentence, like I recommended during our cover letter individual conference) using the prompt "Proofread this paragraph. Provide feedback as an editor in the paragraph using editing marks, such as strikethrough formatting, to signal deletions and additions. Provide a bulleted list of reasons for any revisions that are more than 3 words." (Just remember that to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google/Google Scholar to (1) verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions accurately express YOUR meaning (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned; and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?) 

• X, I'm proud of you! It looks like you used ChatGPT exactly how I recommend with FANTASTIC results 😍—I've just highlighted in pink a few remaining minor grammar/phrasing/punctuation/spelling/capitalization errors you may still want to check using ChatGPT (via the prompt "Proofread this sentence:") 😉. (Just remember that to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google/Google Scholar first to verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions truly ARE more standard English phrasing (as well as accurately express YOUR meaning!); (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned; and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?) (=9)

  • X, your ideas are clear, but I've highlighted in pink a few remaining minor grammar/phrasing/punctuation/spelling/capitalization errors you may still want to check using ChatGPT (via the prompt "Proofread this sentence:") 😉. (Just remember that to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google/Google Scholar first to verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions truly ARE more standard English phrasing (as well as accurately express YOUR meaning!); (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned; and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?) 

  • X, overall your ideas are clear, but unless you're writing about personal/company/research secrets that might be shared with others 😳, please use Grammarly or ChatGPT (via the prompt "Proofread this sentence:") to check your grammar/phrasing/punctuation/spelling/capitalization errors I've highlighted in pink. Also, to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, please use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google/Google Scholar first to verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions truly ARE more standard English phrasing and do not change your meaning [which CAN be problem—check out ChatGPT’s editing weaknesses at https://www.pcguide.com/apps/can-chat-gpt-edit/ 😳] and (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?) 

  • X, mostly your ideas/language and logic in this paper are clear, but/X, I'm afraid that your English writing is currently hard to understand, but I KNOW you can grow in this—PLEASE  unless you're writing about personal/company/research secrets that might be shared with others 😳, please use Grammarly or ChatGPT to edit your writing sentence-by-sentence for grammar/phrasing/punctuation/spelling/capitalization, including the errors I've highlighted in pink using the ChatGPT prompt "Proofread this sentence:"—also, to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, please use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google/Google Scholar first to verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions truly ARE more standard English phrasing and do not change your meaning [which CAN be problem😳] and (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?) 

  • Check your grammar/phrasing/punctuation/capitalization/spelling/spacing here (and in other phrases/sentences I've highlighted pink 😉) via the ChatGPT prompt "Proofread this sentence:" (Alternate working prompts: "Check this sentence for grammar and clarity"/"Copyedit this sentence")

• Please see my comments in your essay about a few places I found your phrasing a little confusing, but 

  • Please see my comment in your essay about the one place I found your phrasing a little confusing 😉

  • Hmmmmm. . . .this phrasing is hard to understand 🤔

• Hmmmm. . . .did you forget to do a final edit of your paper? 😝

• Overall, your language in this essay is both clear and highly effective, but please check your essay for several language-related comments (Because you did SUCH a good job in structuring your essay, so I didn’t have to provide many comments there, I had time to provide you more language-related comments than normal—please let me know if you have any questions!)

• X, if you're still not confident you can proofread effectively, please let me know so we can chat about this! (Although you might not be able to catch ALL of your English grammar/phrasing mistakes by yourself right now, I think you could catch MANY mistakes on your own and I would LOVE to talk with you about how to optimize your strategy for doing so!) 

• Mostly your language in this essay is both clear and highly effective, but please check my few comments for how it could be even clearer

  • In which scenario? Remote work or in-person work? (The end of the sentence makes this clear, but how can you make sure this is clear to readers from the beginning?) 

  • X, as mentioned in my comments, I’m afraid I was confused at several points in your essay, the most important being I’m still not sure how COVID-19 contributed to habitat loss. Often having a second person read your essay before you submit it can help you catch these confusing points that can be hard to catch as an author. 

  • Overall, your language in this essay is clear (but please check my comments on your essay for a few places I struggled to understand WHY you included certain information)\X, why does your research paper contain many careless editing errors I KNOW you could have caught if you had just done a final check of your paper? Such carelessness could easily reduce readers’ trust in your paper as they wonder if you were just as careless in your research that they CAN’T see as you were in your editing which they CAN see—make sense? 

  • X, did you write this essay in a hurry? Not only could/should you have developed each of your ideas more fully, but also it includes multiple editing mistakes (including many missing commas) that I’m sure you could have caught if you’d tried 😭

• I'm confused—what does "drug testing REGULATIONS were HOSTED" mean? 🤔

  • Can you clarify what you mean here? (word choice)

• Hmmmm. . . .are you sure "popular" is the right word for expressing your intended idea? (Check your phrasing here via ChatGPT using the prompt "Proofread this sentence:" 😉) (Maybe you mean "results in"? 🤔)

• Hmmmm. . . .I think you mean "effective," not "efficient"

• “e.g.,” means “for example” ” (Notice/remember both begin with “e” 😉), so it is used when you’re providing an INCOMPLETE list of one (or more) example(s) of what you just said

• “i.e.” means “in other words” (Notice/remember both begin with “i” 😉) so it is used to provide a COMPLETE rephrasing of what you just said.

• Is your paper really a published ARTICLE? (See https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/article 😉)— Maybe instead you mean the more generic "this PAPER"? 😉) 

  • Just FYI: Research articles and essays actually refer to DIFFERENT types of writing. Research articles describe a systematic study/experiment/model, whereas essays generally express a writer's OPINION, though they do often cite outside sources as support.

  • Hmmmm. . . .is your research paper an experimental STUDY?

  • Your upcoming assignment is actually to write a research paper (NOT an essay) 😉 

• Hmmmm. . . .do you really mean "SEEMINGLY common" or just "common"? 🤔

  • Hmmmm. . . .do you really mean "POTENTIALLY leading to" or CURRENTLY "leading to"? 🤔

• What’s the difference between “published ON” vs. “published IN” vs. “published BY”? (Google all three options within quotation marks to find out which is preferred phrasing for expressing your intended idea)

• Use Google Scholar to search (in quotation marks) “more RELATIVE information” vs. “more RELATED information" to find out which is preferred phrasing for expressing your intended idea

• Use Google Scholar to search (in quotation marks) “play an important role in” to find out whether the verb form it should be followed by is “reduce” vs. “reducing”—can you figure out why? 

• Google “certificated” vs. “certified”

• Both words mean the same thing but Google (in quotation marks) to find out whether this idea is usually expressed as “synchronized online courses” or “synchronous online courses”

• Hmmmm. . . .either the phrasing “has emerged” or “has surfaced” would work, but if you Google “has emerged upon the surface” (in quotation marks), I think you’ll see “has emerged upon the surface” isn’t standard phrasing (and could confuse readers)

• What’s the difference between “much MORE better” and just “much better”? (Google both options within quotation marks to find out which is preferred phrasing for expressing your intended idea)

• X, compare the phrasing “is called as a” versus “is called a” via the “See frequency by country” option in the NOW corpus’ “Chart display” that is available at http://corpus.byu.edu/now/ -- Which phrasing is preferred in English for expressing your intended idea?

• Check this phrasing in Google by searching it (within quotation marks). . . .can you think of any alternative ways of expressing your intended idea?

• Check this phrasing in Google by searching it (within quotation marks). . . .can you identify a more standard phrasing?

• Check this phrasing in Google by searching (within quotation marks) the phrase “well-behav* adults”

• Google this phrase (in quotation marks) to verify whether it expresses your intended meaning

• If you check Google, I think you’ll see that the word “footmark” is only used for literal footmarks vs. as a substitute for the figurative use of (environmental() footPRINT

• What is PMOS? Have you already indicated what the UNabbreviated form of this term is/these are? Will all your paper’s intended readers already know? 🤔

  • What does the abbreviation "IP" mean? Have you already indicated what the UNabbreviated form of this term is/these are? Will all your paper’s intended readers already know?

• Will ALL the likely readers of these highlights already know what MCI means? (Especially since the topic of this paper is likely to attract readers from across a wide range of disciplines?)

• X, this should be “Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a way. . . .” -- so that your readers know from this explicitly defined abbreviation that throughout the remainder of your paper whenever you refer to “CSR,” it means “Corporate Social Responsibility.” If you don’t explicitly define CSR (or other similar abbreviations like ICT), you’re forcing your reader to go back to what they’ve already read in order to try to figure out on their own what you mean by “CSR.” This is not fair. It’s not your readers’ job – it’s your job to clearly define all new terms in your paper, so that your readers can read directly from beginning to end and understand each point your paper makes without needing to go back to an earlier part of your paper to figure something out. Make sense?

• After you’ve introduced an abbreviation once, you can then use just the abbreviation by itself (unless your initial introduction was so much earlier that you think readers need a reminder)—make sense? 😉 

• Hmmmm. . . .because your research paper has mentioned TNR only once so far and that was in the previous section, would your readers be helped by you reminding them again of its definition here?

• “In the face of” combined with “news” is a little confusing—can you figure out why by searching this exact phrase in Google Scholar? 

• Isn't "health" a POSITIVE—not NEGATIVE—effect? (LOGICALLY, I’m sure you mean "health PROBLEM," but GRAMMATICALLY, this is not clear—make sense?)

• Some fine plastic USES PLASTIC PRODUCTS like drinking from a plastic drinking cup, etc.???  (Although LOGICALLY, I can figure out what you mean, how can you rephrase to make the meaning of your “when” phrase GRAMMATICALLY clear?)

• Hmmmm. . . .SINGLE-USE PLASTICS can protect our environment and health? (LOGICALLY, I’m sure that’s not what you mean, but GRAMMATICALLY, that’s what it looks like)

• This is tricky. Do you mean “instructions” (https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/instructions) or “instruction” (https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/instruction)?

• Hmmm. . . .how can a COURSE struggle? What does “introduction” mean here? What is a “mat”? I’m not sure what “self-display” means/what you mean here by “accessible” (Can you rephrase this to be clearer?) (Maybe you mean “SUCCEEDS in maximizing”?)

• Hmmm. . . .maybe you mean/do you mean “adopting”? (I’m not sure how “face-to-face education” COMBINES the advantages and disadvantages of online and offline teaching models)

• Don’t you mean the opposite, namely “computer ILLITERACY”?

• Hmmmm. . . .the phrase “according to ME” is very uncommon. What about something like “In this essay, I will argue that” or even “This essay aims to demonstrate that”?

• “Observe” can be confusing because not only can it mean “obey,” but also the very different meaning of “notice.” It’s better here to use a word readers will IMMEDIATELY understand and CAN’T misunderstand (even for half a second)—make sense?

• I can’t figure out how “social resources” relate to faculty struggling to prepare content able to pass regulatory censorship. Can you rephrase this paragraph’s topic sentence to more clearly express your intended meaning?

• How was overrepresentation defined?

• I’m afraid this is confusing—what do you mean by this phrase?

• “Economic incentives” and “providing access to education for women” describe “solutions,” not “China,” right? Therefore, where in this sentence should this “such as” phrase be located? 

• Check your verb tenses, especially in regard to the following common research writing errors:

  • In research writing, one very important and common use of the present perfect tense (“have/has” + verb) is to mark something as (1) having HAPPENED in the past that is (2) IMPACTING now (to show the relevance of whatever has happened to your analysis/current point—make sense? Hilary Glasman-Deal’s Science Research Writing (2nd Ed.) includes the best explanation of this I have ever read, but you could also check out American Journal Experts’ “Verb Tense in Scientific Writing” at https://files-aje-com.s3.amazonaws.com/www/row/_assets/docs/AJE-Choosing-the-Right-Verb-Tense-for-Your-Scientific-Manuscript-2015.pdf

  • What verb tense does English use for actions that began in the past and are still continuing now?

  • Are you stating that something happened totally in the past (= requires past tense) or stating a fact (= requires present tense)? For this reason, if researchers are confident their study findings are replicable, they frequently express them using the present tense. If they are not, they use the past tense.

  • Verify that every time you have used the past perfect verb tense (= “had” + past tense verb) that that verb happened before ANOTHER ACTION YOU’VE MENTIONED—see https://www.grammarly.com/blog/past-perfect/ and https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/grammar/british-grammar/past-perfect-simple-or-past-simple for more info.

  • Remember “would” or “could” should only be used to describe [hypothetical or possible future] situations not facts (that require the present tense)

  • (For more information, I HIGHLY recommend checking out pp. 53–55 in Hilary Glasman-Deal’s Science Research Writing for Native and Nonnative Speakers of English, though unfortunately it’s not easily available from our University of Illinois library 😭)

• Check your verb tense (here and afterward)

• Check your verb tense (Are you describing a present or past situation? 😉)

  • Do you mean PROVED (in the past) or PROVES (i.e., present tense used to express statements of fact)?

  • Depending on your level of confidence in the replicability of your findings, your verb tenses in this paragraph should either both be present tense “are” (if you’re confident your findings are replicable) or both past tense “were” (if you’re not confident your findings are replicable. (See Hilary Glasman-Deal’s Science Research Writing, pp. 53–55 for more information.) 

    • (In fact, your verb tenses should be improved throughout but because I wasn’t sure of how confident you are in either the relevance or replicability of many of the different things you say, I was not able to fix this.) 

• X, you characteristically use present tense verbs (e.g., “attempt”) where English requires the past (e.g., “attempted”)—I have highlighted the first three places where you made this mistake but please see if you can find and fix other places you made this mistake also. (I know that Chinese does not change verbs to mark time, but although for this essay, this mistake did not hurt my understanding, in other writing scenarios, it would (e.g., if you were comparing something that happened in the past with the present)

  • Should actually be “Did you ever imagine”—can you figure out why?

  • X, the years 2013–2015 are totally in the past. They are not continuing now. 

• Is the government ALREADY providing financial incentives? (That’s what this present tense verb indicates—please check the remainder of your paper for this issue)  

  • Which English verb tense is used for stating a fact that is widely accepted?

• I’m confused here. Are you talking about what your present paper WILL do or what researchers USUALLY do? (Your “will” in this sentence suggests the former, but the fact that in no place does this sentence explicitly say anything like “in this paper” suggests that the sentence is continuing to talk about what researchers usually do (just like your previous sentence did). I’m SO confused! Please clarify. (Also, if this sentence IS talking about the present paper, is it best located here or later in your introduction?

• Are you talking about an EXISTING scenario or a HYPOTHETICAL BUT EXPECTED scenario? (=”would”)—check throughout the remainder of your paper for similar verb issues 

  • Here you’re setting up a hypothetical scenario vs. describing a real situation, so the verb you should be using is “would be”—make sense?

  • Here you’re setting up a hypothetical (because future) scenario vs. describing a real (i.e., current) situation, so the verb you should be using is “WOULD also BE”—make sense?

  • “Would” suggests you’re talking about a (FUTURE) POSSIBILITY, but at the end of this sentence, you say “CURRENT environmental burdens”—I’m confused!

  • Check your verb tense (Are you describing a present or [possible] future situation?) 

  • Check your verb tense and/or mood (Are you describing a future or past—or possible—future situation?)

• X, do you mean “can” or “could” here? (Are you making a general statement about what is possible? Or are you talking about something that is possible, but not certain?)

  • Here you’re setting up a POSSIBLE scenario vs. describing the CURRENT scenario, so the verb you should be using is “COULD become”—make sense? 

• I know it’s confusing, but for descriptions “contrary to fact,” you should use the verb “were,” not “is”

• X, what verb tense does English use for actions that began in the past and are still continuing now?

  • X, the present perfect tense (“have/has” + verb) is used to mark something as (1) having started in the past + (2) continuing until now, so this should be “HAVE had”

  • X, the present perfect tense (“have/has” + verb) is used for something that started in the past and continues until now—but currently most US schools have returned to in-person vs. online instruction. Therefore, a past tense verb like “were operating” is better.

• X, one key use of the present perfect tense (“have/has” + verb) is to mark something as (1) having HAPPENED in the past that is (2) IMPACTING now, so this should be “HAVE been found”—make sense? (Please check the remainder of your paper for other sentences where your intended meaning requires use of the present perfect tense.) 

  • Are the findings of this previous research impacting present research? Therefore, what verb tense should you be using here according to Science Research Writing, pp. 4-7?

  • X, your use of the very important but notoriously difficult present perfect verb tense of English is AMAZING!!!

  • X, given your dream career, it’s VERY important you learn to use the past and present perfect verb tenses of English correctly—Hilary Glasman-Deal’s Science Research Writing (2nd Ed.) includes the best explanation of these I have ever read, but you could also check out American Journal Experts’ “Verb Tense in Scientific Writing”

• Did this happen BEFORE another action you’ve mentioned? (i.e., Should this be expressed using the simple past or past perfect verb tense?) (See also https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/grammar/british-grammar/past-perfect-simple-or-past-simple—haven't decided which is the best explanatory resource)

• Should be the passive voice “is implemented”—can you figure out why?

• Hmmmm. . . .Did the ban establish itself or did lawmakers establish it? (You might want to review how we use passive voice when we don’t know who or it doesn’t matter who did something)

  • How can an AREA predict anything? (Hint: Should this sentence use an active or passive voice verb?)

  • Who is “they”? (If it’s not important, maybe use the passive voice—“More green space is continuing to be cleared.”)

  • (Maybe change this phrase to use a passive voice verb, since it’s obvious that it’s people—vs. animals or things 😉—that are using them)

• Do your readers need to know WHO needs to amplify small signals to large signals? If not, what about expressing this idea in passive voice instead? – “For any electronic device, small signals need to be amplified to large signals”

  • Does it need to be you who designs this? Could someone else do it and get less power consumption, less noise and better offset voltage performance? If yes, wouldn't it be better for you to express this in passive voice?

  • Where is “there” referring to in this sentence? (Or do you mean “. . .various ECUs, the CAN (Controller Area Network) bus, which has many ECUs connected to it, has been introduced” – passive voice is the #1 way research writers avoid specifying who it is who did an action [usually because it doesn’t matter WHO did it – the point is that it was DONE])

• Hmmmm. . . .English grammar does not allow sentences to include two main verb phrases like this. Can you figure out how you can change one to a present participle phrase instead?

• Hmmmm. . . .English grammar does not allow sentences to include two main verb phrases like this. Can you figure out how you can change one to an adjective clause instead?

• Hmmmm. . . .English grammar does not allow sentences to include two main verb phrases like this. Can you break this one sentence into two?  

• Faculty and staff needs? (“Faculty and staff” is your most recent plural noun, so although logically, I know you’re not referring to them, grammatically it looks like you ARE referring to “faculty and staff”. . . )

• Culture or cultures?

• I’m confused—Should this be “models” or “model”?

• Is “mode” a countable or uncountable noun? If countable, what article (“a” vs. “an” vs. “the”) are you missing here?

• "Data" is a tricky word because we basically never use its singular form "datum." However, if you check a dictionary, you'll see the word "data" is actually plural—so you'll need to check your subject/verb agreement here.

• This is another tricky word. I know it’s illogical, but is the word “research” in English countable or uncountable? https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/research

• X, the English noun “research” is not countable, so can’t be made plural. . . .and apparently, this is an error that irritates language editors, so it’s probably one you want to pay particular attention to avoiding

• X, you're right that the English word "culture" can be uncountable -- but are you using it uncountably here? (Check in COCA to see how the word "[culture]" is sometimes used uncountably and sometimes countably)

• Is this technical term ordinarily used countably or uncountably? 

• Is “effect” generally used countably or uncountably in your field?

• This is tricky. Is there only ONE kind of disadvantaged background? If no, use “a” instead of “the” (For example, a child’s parent may have become disabled; a child’s parent may have died; one or both parents may have had a disadvantaged background themselves, with the result they didn’t get a good education and so now don’t work a good job; etc.)

• “Pros IS obvious"? (Check your subject/verb agreement here and throughout the rest of your paper) 

• Do you want the noun (resistance) or adjective (resistant) form here?

• Should actually be the noun form “receipt"

• Are you here continuing to talk about the group that have been the focus of this paragraph? If so, you need to precede the word “group” with “this” (i.e., “this particular group”) in order to let readers know you’re continuing to talk about the topic currently under discussion.

• We all live the same ONE life? (Check your noun/pronoun agreement)

  • transistors = it? (Check your noun/pronoun agreement)

• Hmmmm. . . .“this” here should actually be “that”—can you figure out why?

• This is tricky, but “it” here should actually be “this”—can you figure out why?

• Should be “its” vs. “the” to let readers know WHICH ineffectiveness you’re talking about (It is true that they could guess based on logic, but grammatically it’s currently unclear—make sense?) 

• To help readers recognize that the data you’re referring to here is the data you JUST MENTIONED in the last sentence (vs. any other data previously discussed in your essay), should be “these” vs. “the”—make sense? [Is this an accurate explanation??? Still haven't been able to locate any article on when to use "this" vs. "the"]

• Google this phrase (in quotation marks) to figure out what word consistently precedes it (Can you figure out WHY this is the case?)
• X as indicated in Science Research Writing, pp. 50-55, singular countable nouns in English need a determiner (e.g., the articles "a" or "an" or "the"). Check in COCA -- is the English word "reputation" a singular, countable noun? Which article, therefore, should precede it?
• X, as indicated in Science Research Writing, pp. 50-55, singular countable nouns in English need a determiner (e.g., the articles "a" or "an" or "the"). Check in COCA -- is the English word "economy" a singular, countable noun? Do you think it would therefore be better for you to change “economy” to its plural form (so no article is required) or to insert an article here?
  •  Do you mean possible “social causes”? If yes, then is “the” the right article to use here?
• X, as you'll see if you ask ChatGPT to copyedit this sentence, the noun phrase “modern industrial development” premodifies your singular noun “process,” making it clear to readers exactly WHICH process you’re talking about—See section 2b of this excellent, easy-to-understand article from the University of Toronto on figuring out when you need “the” and when you don’t: https://advice.writing.utoronto.ca/english-language/definite-article/  😉 

  • X, is “estimated” here DEFINING EXACTLY WHICH data you mean or just describing the data? (Point to remember: A DEFINING modifier requires “the”; a DESCRIBING modifier doesn’t.) 

  • Check this phrasing in Google by searching it (within quotation marks)—is it usually preceded by “the” or not? (Can you figure out why? [Hint: Is “human” here DEFINING whose health you’re talking about or just providing additional DESCRIPTION] 
• X, as you'll see if you ask ChatGPT to copyedit this sentence, the “of” phrase here postmodifies the noun “proceedings,” making clear to readers which SPECIFIC “proceedings” you’re talking about and therefore requiring the definite article “the” — See section 2b of this excellent, easy-to-understand article from the University of Toronto on figuring out when you need “the” and when you don’t: https://advice.writing.utoronto.ca/english-language/definite-article/ 😉 
  • X, your essential/restrictive appositive, “1 Terabyte,” postmodifies your noun “size,” making it definite and therefore requiring the definite article “the” — See section 2b of this excellent, easy-to-understand article from the University of Toronto on figuring out when you need “the” and when you don’t 
  • X, WHICH SPECIFIC results you’re talking about will be clear to readers because your “shown in Table 2 and 3” phrase DEFINES it—so “the” needs to precede “results.” Point to remember: A DEFINING modifier requires “the”; a DESCRIBING modifier doesn’t.
• Are you talking about a new technology that BOTH YOU AND YOUR READERS ALREADY KNOW ABOUT (because you’ve already introduced it)? Or are you talking about new technology IN GENERAL? Don't you therefore need “the” here? (For more information, see the first question on this “Writing Advice” page from the University of Toronto or, for an even clearer explanation, pp. 121–126 of Hilary Glasman-Deal's OUTSTANDING Science Research Writing for Native and Non-Native Speakers of English, Second Edition) 
  • X, have you previously mentioned these specific researchers (so that both you and your readers already know which specific researchers you're talking about here)? Or is this your initial introduction of these researchers to readers? (Therefore, according to Science Research Writing, pp. 50-55, therefore, do you need to use “the” here?)
  • Have you previously mentioned the idea of/defined what you mean by “abundant benefits” for your readers? Or is this your initial introduction of this general topic to your readers? (According to Science Research Writing, pp. 50-55, therefore, do you need an article here?)
  • You’re expecting your readers to know which specific company you mean (i.e. whatever employee the company works at), so you need to use “the” to mark that you're talking about something specific that both you and your reader know about (See SRW, pp. 53-54 or #2b here for more information)
  • Are you talking about a new technology that BOTH YOU AND YOUR READERS ALREADY KNOW ABOUT (because you’ve already introduced it)? If not, shouldn't this be "A," not "The"?

• Are you talking about a SPECIFIC new technology BOTH YOU AND YOUR READERS ALREADY KNOW ABOUT (e.g., because you've already mentioned it)? Or are you talking about new technology IN GENERAL/MORE GENERALLY? Do you therefore need “the” here? (For more information, see the first question on this “Writing Advice” page from the University of Toronto or, for an even clearer explanation, pp. 121–126 of Hilary Glasman-Deal's OUTSTANDING Science Research Writing for Native and Non-Native Speakers of English, Second Edition) 

• As you'll see if you ask ChatGPT to copyedit this sentence, in English, there's one word that basically always precedes "United States" (or "U.S." or "U.S.A" or "United Kingdom" or "U.K" or "United Arab Emirates". . . .and other countries and organizations that begin with the word "united.") that you missed in your self-introduction above. . . .can you figure out via ChatGPT what that word is? (FYI: Basically the only time this word doesn't precede these places and organizations beginning with "united" are when the place/organization is being used as an adjective instead of a noun.)
  • X, if you check in COCA, you'll see that when the word “Internet” is used as a noun, it's preceded by “the” (because there's only one, so your readers will know exactly which Internet you're referring to) – Make sense?
  • X, should you say "at THE PwC" or just "at PwC"? 😉 (To find out, see https://www.pwc.com/us/en/about-us.html—also, after the career fair, let's plan on talking together about how generally you can figure out when to use "the" with names vs. when not to 🤗)

• Here "this" would be better than "that"—can you figure out why? 😉 

• Need to find an article on "the" vs. "this/its"

• Here “its” would be clearer than “the”—can you figure out why? 
• “The” or “their”? (Do both you AND your readers KNOW for sure WHICH unimaginable harm you’re talking about?)

• Can you think of any alternative for "of" for at least one of these phrases, maybe verifying your proposed replacement by searching it in Google (inside quotation marks)? Because readers use one prepositional phrase to interpret the next phrase, multiple phrases beginning with the same preposition (e.g., "of") can be hard for readers to interpret.

• Should this be one sentence or two? (Although in many languages, including Chinese, it’s okay to connect two closely related sentences with just a comma, this is considered a comma splice error in English. Two complete sentences in English can only be connected with a coordinating conjunction + comma, a semicolon, or a dash. Otherwise, they need to remain two separate sentences—please therefore check your writing for run-on sentences) (See https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/articles/comma-splice/ and  https://grammar.yourdictionary.com/sentences/run-on-sentences.html) (Please check for this problem throughout your paper 😉)

• X, I’m impressed by your ability to write high-interest content that clearly communicates convincing arguments. . . .but for maximum impact, be sure to check your writing for run-on sentences, as this essay contains a LOT (See  https://grammar.yourdictionary.com/sentences/run-on-sentences.html for more info)—Need to check if this is the best resource to recommend

• Check COCA regarding how two sentences connected with "but" should be punctuated
• In English, when subordinate clauses (beginning with subordinate conjunctions such as "though") are located before the main clause of a sentence, how should they be punctuated?
• Check in Google—What punctuation mark follows beginning-of-sentence phrases that start with “Based on”?
• Check in COCA – What punctuation mark usually follows beginning-of-sentence adverbs such as “Generally”? (Compare the number of results for the [exact] COCA search term ". Generally *" that are and are not immediately followed by a punctuation mark. When is a punctuation mark needed and when isn't it? (Also, check to see whether your findings are relevant in general to beginning-of-sentence "-ly" adverbs via the [exact] COCA search term ". *ly *" -- I think you'll find the results of these searches very informative! )

• X, if you omitted the name of the specific database system you're talking about here, there is no way we could know which specific system you’re referring to. When an appositive is thus essential to readers' understanding, is it okay in English to include a comma separating the appositive from the noun it defines? (See https://www.englishgrammar101.com/module-8/verbals-and-phrases/lesson-9/restrictive-and-nonrestrictive-appositives to find out.)

• X, the phrase “both government-funded entities and entities in the private sector” is a nonessential appositive, so should be enclosed with commas

• This is tricky—is this "such as" phrase essential or nonessential? Therefore, should it be enclosed in commas?

• Is a comma needed for lists of two? 😉
• What is list structure/punctuation in APA? (i.e., “X and Y, and Z” or “X and Y and Z” or “X, Y, and Z”?) 
• X, this sentence is not following the English rule regarding commas in lists
• It’s true that if English speakers were to speak this sentence aloud, they would likely pause here. However, while basically all commas required in English occur at places where speakers are likely to pause, not all places speakers are likely to pause necessarily require a comma. You should only include a comma at a likely pause point if you know it’s required by some rule of English punctuation. 
• Is it okay in English to separate the subject of your sentence “The major problem” from its main verb “is”? (See https://www.grammarly.com/blog/comma-with-subjects-and-verbs/ to find out)
• What's missing in punctuating this (very useful!) appositive? (See http://www.chompchomp.com/terms/appositive.htm to find out)
• X, your writing ability is strong in so many ways, but currently it contains MANY (especially comma) errors that distract readers and/or slow down reading (because they often can't rely on your comma usage to guide their interpretation of where your ideas logically should/should not be broken). Given your career goals, will this likely pose a problem for you? If yes, please especially check out https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/articles/comma-splice/ and https://grammar.yourdictionary.com/sentences/run-on-sentences.html about one of your most common comma error types (=comma splice, a.k.a. run-on sentences), but also do consider learning how to use ChatGPT as I've recommended above as a tool to help you improve your self-editing skills over time—make sense?

• Remember English uses semicolons if one of the list items includes an internal comma—can you figure out where semicolons are needed here?

• Check your end-of-sentence punctuation here

• "single use" should be hyphenated as “single-use” because these two words combine together to produce a SINGLE description of the following noun "plastic." (See About.com's easy explanation of this for more information. Please also check for this issue throughout the remainder of your paper.) 

• Technically, this should be an em dash (not en dash)—see https://academicguides.waldenu.edu/writingcenter/punctuation/dashes 😉 

• Technically, this should be an em dash (not hyphen)—see https://www.grammarly.com/blog/hyphens-and-dashes/ 😉 

• • Check your consistency in using title-case vs. sentence-case capitalization

  • Check the capitalization of this organization’s name

  • Be careful not to capitalize words you shouldn’t—I have marked one example, but see if you can find any others

  • Should be “education delivery mode”—I’m sorry this was misspelled in our assignment guidelines!

  • I haven’t checked carefully, but even so I’ve noticed MANY capitalization mistakes 😕 

• • I’m confused—why did you put your thesis statement on a new line separate from the rest of your introduction?

• X, Americans are likely to interpret NOT spelling people’s names correctly as a sign that you disrespect them. Probably this is NOT the impression you want to give readers, right? 😉 

  • Check your spelling of this author's name here vs. in your reference list/paper

• The two spellings “affect” and “effect” ARE easy to confuse, since they are similar in meaning, so always doublecheck you’ve chosen the right one 😊

• I know it’s weird, but the spelling here should be “cannot” (as one word) 

• Hmmmm. . . .is this website called "My Kids Vision" or "My Kid Vision"? (Your spelling of this website's name is inconsistent  😉)

• Hmmmm. . . .throughout this paper, your spelling for "net worth" vs. "net-worth" is inconsistent—which is the preferred spelling?😉

• Also, check the consistency of your spelling of "eFuels" vs. e-fuels"? (I'm sure both are used across the articles you read, but in that case, you should choose a single spelling and be consistent in using it, except that if you quote, you should use the spelling of the original source, of course 😉—make sense?)

• Because I missed in my feedback on your first draft to comment on the location of your thesis statement phrase “thereby improving work efficiency,” I won’t take points off for this on your final draft, but just FYI—if I were taking points off, your score here would be “8” 😉 

• This is not a complete sentence/clause according to English grammar because it does not have a subject/main verb—can you figure out how to fix this?

• Hmmmm. . . .academic/professional/formal writing by far prefers complete vs. noncomplete sentences. Noncomplete sentences like this one are almost solely used in casual spoken-style writing (e.g., text messages)—make sense? Therefore, can you combine this sentence with the previous one? 

• English requires every sentence/clause to include an explicit subject (even if it’s just a pronoun like “it,” so what “is going to be”?

• X, English requires explicit direct objects (even if they’re just pronouns), so here you would need to say “loading it into memory” —make sense?

• X, I’m afraid this dangling modifier makes the first sentence of your introduction very confusing—although your title gives me some idea of how you intend them to LOGICALLY connect, this first phrase and the rest of your sentence don’t GRAMMATICALLY connect. Make sense?

• Hmmmm. . . .I think Chinese grammar is affecting your English here—in English, standard word order for a prepositional phrase like this is “AFTER the polystyrene ban in Hawaii,” right?

• It’s a little hard as a reader to figure out the meaning of “today already” when these words are located together. Can you move one of them elsewhere in your sentence to make your intended meaning more IMMEDIATELY clear to readers? 

• Maybe add “(sic)” to show that this mistake was in the original: https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/sic-meaning-usage-editorial-citation

• This is a VERY long sentence—can you figure out a way to break it into (at least) two sentences (checking whether any transition/connecting words need to be added or subtracted)?

• Would combining these two sentences help your paper sound more fluent vs. choppy? 🤔

• X, your writing includes MANY subject/verb agreement errors, e.g., the incorrect "conditions which PRESENTS" vs. the correct "conditions which PRESENT." Although this type of error does not affect understanding, it can be distracting, so please do work on this 😉

• X, WHICH AI tools did you use? (See our Ethical Use of Generative AI pdf at https://go.illinois.edu/ESLEthicalAI for examples of how this information can/should be disclosed 😉)

• X, which AI tools did you use and for what purpose? (See our Ethical Use of Generative AI pdf at https://go.illinois.edu/ESLEthicalAI for examples of how this information can/should be disclosed 😉) (=4)

• X, I'm confused—how did YOU use AI when completing this assignment? 🤔 (=0 for just pasting in the ESL Program "How to disclose AI use" figure ☹️)

Introduction

• Hmmmm. . . .isn't this telling your boss/the executive team what they already know? Is it really NECESSARY to say? 🤔 (You don't want your boss/the executive team to feel you're wasting their time, right?)

• Hmmmm. . . .how can you make it clearer why you think it's important for your (busy!) boss/the executive team to be reminded of this in your one-page information report?

• Maybe discuss this first from the perspective of society (in your introduction), the overall industry impact, and then the opportunity for Zurich?

• X, why is your informational report's introduction located in the MIDDLE of your informational report? 🤔 

Reasons / Findings /Support

• Hmmmm. . . .will your readers be able to guess from this topic sentence what SPECIFICALLY this paragraph will talk about? (Can you revise this topic sentence to make the OPPORTUNITY this paragraph is talking about more IMMEDIATELY clear to your boss/the executive team?) 

• Hmmmm. . . .if I were your (busy!) boss/the executive team, how am I likely to feel about this paragraph repeating almost exactly the same information multiple times?

• If I were your boss/the executive team, I would be confused WHY you're telling me this because it doesn't sound like an opportunity OR problem. It's just reviewing our company's goals (which, as management, we already know and don't want to spend time reading unless you're reminding us of this info to make an additional point)

Conclusion

• X, where is your informational report's conclusion? (= 0)

Source integration

• Hmmmm. . .why did you choose to quote vs. paraphrase this info? (Also, does this follow APA formatting for quotations? See https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_the_basics.html)

• 
  

Source documentation

• Source?

  • Would a source here be helpful?

• Page 7 of WHAT? 😉

• WHICH MarketLine source?

• Remember APA (and nearly all other style guides!) require reference lists to use hanging indentation: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/create-or-remove-a-hanging-indent-11428fed-a282-4dd6-adf2-98bb8282c1ce 

• Is this reference list citation accurate?  (You can find how to cite different Hoover's database resources using APA style from this University of Illinois Library resource: https://guides.library.illinois.edu/citingadsources/dbhoovers 😉)

• If you scroll down, you can see how APA style handles two sources by the same author published the same year 😉: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_author_authors.html

• X, your reference list citation currently have MANY problems, including that they are not following APA citation style at all—for example, . . . . How would your boss likely feel about your report having SO MANY mistakes? 😭😭😭 

• Hmmmm. . . .does this source really not indicate any individual author(s)? 🤔

• How is your boss likely to feel about your incorrect date here?

• Why is this title inaccurate? (As your boss, this would worry me as a potential indicator of unethical AI use  😭)

  • X, why are many of your titles not quite accurate and/or don't mention their subtitles? (As your boss, this would worry me as a potential indicator of unethical AI use  😭)

• Hmmmm. . . .is this the PUBLIC URL for this source?

• Hmmmm. . . .please check this URL (because it currently doesn't lead to a source matching your indicated title)

• For visual consistency/attractiveness and ease of use for your boss/the executive team, shouldn't this URL be a live link?

  • Hmmmm. . . .what are your boss/the executive team likely to think about the inconsistency of your URL colors?

  • Overall, GREAT source documentation, but how can you make your reference list URLs more visually consistent/attractive to your boss/the executive team?

Understanding of purpose

Tone and concise language

• Hmmmm. . . .how can you make your introduction/conclusion more concise?

  • Is this adjective NECESSARY? (What about "ExpirING patents" for parallelism with your next point "GrowING demand")

  • Is this adjective really adding any valuable information?

Clarity of language

• X, you have CLEARLY been very wise in your use of AI!!! 😍 Because I can see you are trustworthy in how you do (and do not!) use AI, I recommend test improving the phrasing/grammar within your information report paragraph-by-paragraph (instead of sentence-by-sentence, like I recommended during our cover letter individual conference) using the prompt "Proofread this paragraph. Provide feedback as an editor in the paragraph using editing marks, such as strikethrough formatting, to signal deletions and additions. Provide a bulleted list of reasons for any revisions that are more than 3 words." (Just remember that to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google/Google Scholar to (1) verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions accurately express YOUR meaning (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned; and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?)

• Check your verb tense throughout to make clear you're talking about an opportunity Zurich could take advantage of IN THE FUTURE, not what the company is doing NOW 

  • Check your verb tense to make sure you're phrasing this as a (future!) OPPORTUNITY

  • How can you rephrase this to make clear exactly what the OPPORTUNITY is (using the Aon collaboration as an example)?

  • Check your verb tense in this paragraph so it's clear to your boss/the executive team that you're pointing out an OPPORTUNITY, not what they company is ALREADY doing (which they probably already know)

Formatting / design

• How can you make this memo line more informative? 🤔

  • Your memo's subject line includes some helpful info (i.e., "for next quarterly meeting"), but how could you make it even more informative? 🤔

• Hmmmm. . . . have you CONSISTENTLY incorporated formatting elements such as headings, subheadings, bullet points, white space between sections/paragraphs, etc., to help your boss/the executive team find your memo (1) visually attractive and (2) easy to understand? How are they likely to feel about this inconsistency? 🤔

  • Check for consistency of spacing between your memo's header and first line 😉

• X, if I were your boss, I would be VERY upset about your apparent disregard for my specific request for a ONE-page memo because both I and everyone else on the executive team are busy. Why did you ignore our informational prompt's length guidelines: "The length should not exceed 1 page, single-spaced (Reference list does NOT count in the 1-page requirement)" 😭 (=5)

• If I were your boss/the executive team, I would wonder, "Why is she bolding THIS information?" Am I missing something?

• Maybe format these subpoint titles using italics?

AI disclosure

• X, please see my comments in your paper about its MANY aspects that STRONGLY suggest overuse of AI. How are your boss/the executive team likely to feel if they want to learn more about what you've said and so they click through to your linked sources, only to discover that the information you've said has come from a given source actually hasn't? 😭😭😭

  • which is very likely to lead to your losing the trust of your boss/the executive team as well as to hurting your growth as an English communicator 😭 (Curiosity question: How likely is your dream job to require you to speak/write in English?)

• Hmmmm. . . .WHERE does your Deloitte (2024) source say this??? 😭😭😭—X, for many reasons, I am concerned you overused AI when writing this essay. One reason is that nowhere does the Deloitte (2024) source you cite here say what you have "paraphrased" it as saying 😭—please remember that according to our ESL 522 First Day Handout, “Fabrication of sources is violation of academic integrity." If this were your final draft,  I'm afraid I would have no choice but to report this academic integrity violation to FAIR 😭😭😭 (Or did you just accidentally cite the wrong source among your different sources

  • (Or did just you locate this in-text citation in the wrong place? But regardless, how is your boss likely to feel if he finds this info interesting and wants to read more from the original source, only to discover this info doesn't exist in the original source 😭😭😭)

Academic integrity

• X, I'm afraid that although you cited your source for this information, because it is inadequately paraphrased, technically it's still plagiarized 😭— i.e., even if there are no direct synonyms for most of its WORDS (though do change any you can!), definitely you can change this sentence's/phrase's STRUCTURE, right?

Reflection

• X, where is your "75–100 word summary of the top 3 most important things you learned from your peer reviewers (Which peer reviewer(s)?) or from your peer review of your classmates' informational reports (Which classmate(s)?) as well as HOW you think learning these things will increase the chances that your future writing will lead your boss to say "Great work!" 🤩, NOT "You expected I'd be okay with us sharing THIS with clients/my boss/the executive team/etc.? 😳" 

Email Templates

Subject line: Where are you?

Dear X,

Where are you? I'm in my office waiting for you so we can discuss your ESL 522 informational report during our individual conference appointment scheduled for today from 1:30–2:00 pm. I really do want to help you to improve your report before you submit your final draft, so if you can't meet now, please do reschedule this appointment—thanks!

Monica

• X, why did you not apply my feedback about this on your 2nd draft? 😭 (i.e., " ") 

• X, why did you not apply my feedback on your second draft as follows? 😭 (i.e., " AND ") 

• Why does your 2nd draft cover letter—but not your final draft 😭—follow standard business letter block format XXX?

• 😉😉😉 Just FYI: If you are REALLY applying for this (or any other!) job, ALWAYS take your draft cover letter(s) to the University of Illinois Career Center to get feedback from job application experts who have experience helping University of Illinois students SUCCESSFULLY land jobs 😍: https://www.careercenter.illinois.edu/services/onlinereviews 😉😉😉

Salutation

• Are you VERY sure you cannot locate the name of this hiring manager? 🤔

  • Should this be "Recruiter" or "Hiring Manager"? Also, are you VERY sure you cannot locate this person's name? 🤔

• Make sure you use the hiring manager’s last name here—you can use presence or absence of a comma to make sure you get the order right 😉:

  • Comma: Sheffield, Matt = Lastname, Firstname 

  • No Comma: Matt Sheffield = Firstname Lastname

• (For examples, see https://www.careercenter.illinois.edu/sites/default/files/2023-03/Sample%20Cover%20Letter-Handout.pdf and https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_i28yYnpbyU7lVK1j0bWHI32EvbexOyG/view?usp=sharing)

• Technically, for proper block structure, you’re expected to use a colon ( : ) rather than a comma here

Opening

• Please see my opening paragraph comments 😉

• Just FYI, the first part of this sentence made me wonder why you thought your background in "internal affairs and data analytics" fit the CBS-Finance-Account Payable Associate position position you're applying for—to avoid similarly confusing a hiring manager, how could you communicate your finance/accounting background earlier in this sentence?

• Make sure your opening is accurately previewing the main points of your body paragraphs, so the reader can see your structure. (When I see a list of ideas like this at the end of a first paragraph, common structural patterns make me then expect body paragraphs that align with these 'preview points' directly (in this case, [three] body paragraphs, on those topics, in that order. When the paragraphs don't align with this summary/preview statement, it can cause confusion for your reader!)

• I can see a ‘summary/preview statement’ in here - but this opening paragraph feels long, with too many details. I’d recommend making it more concise (especially separating out the email vs. cover letter pieces), so a skimming reader can more readily find your previewed points.

• I can see a ‘summary/preview statement’ in here - but it feels long, with too many details. I’d recommend making it more concise, so a skimming reader can more readily find your previewed points.

• Your introduction is not ending on a ‘summary’ or ‘preview’ statement that previews the main points of each body paragraph. Cover letters are often read very quickly, so making it effortless for a reader to find your main takeaways is important.

Paragraph structure & development

• Hmmmmm. . . .is this information important enough to include in your cover letter?

• Hiring managers value concise writing because they are BUSY!!! (I think this general section could be condensed/made more concise without losing much 😉)

  • Cut all unnecessary details—hiring managers are busy people 😉

  • Cut all redundant phrasing—hiring managers are busy people 😉

• How do these two ideas connect to each other? How does this sentence match what this paragraph's topic sentence promises this paragraph will discuss?

• How does this relate to what your opening paragraph's summary statement/preview points and this paragraph's topic sentence promised this paragraph would discuss?

• Does this summary/preview point match any qualification specified by Deloitte as required/preferred for this position? 🤔

• Does this summary/preview point match the main point of any of your cover letter body paragraphs? 🤔

• These are relevant facts, but can you tell a 2–3 sentence STORY that includes all these facts to make your this paragraph more impressive/impactful? If possible, SHOW vs. TELL what characteristics you will bring to the company. Make sense? 😉

• This might be true, but does it connect to the MAIN point you want the hiring manager to take away from reading this paragraph? (If not, cut it, so it doesn't distract from your main point 😉)

• What is the main point from the job ad (required/preferred qualification(s), day-to-day responsibility, etc.) that you’re highlighting in this paragraph? Make that clear right away with a strong topic sentence! 

  • I’m having a hard time telling what the ‘main idea’ of this paragraph is intended to be. What is the main point from the job ad (required/preferred qualification(s), day-to-day responsibility, etc.) that you’re highlighting in this paragraph? Make that clear right away with a strong topic sentence! If you wait until the end of the paragraph to arrive at your point, you risk the hiring manager not reading that far, and thus missing your point.

  • Does this paragraph's main point/topic sentence match any qualification specified by Deloitte as required/preferred for this position? 🤔

  • Which opening paragraph summary statement preview point does this body paragraph provide more details about? (I expected to read more info about your skills in combining data and auditing, but if that's what this paragraph is discussing, you need to make this more explicit—make sense?)

• HOW huge? Provide specific numbers

• You have clear ‘TE’ paragraph structure - make it ‘TEA’! Take the strength in your topic sentence and your evidence/supporting details and connect them to this particular role. How will this applying this strength make you successful in the responsibilities of the position? Providing this ‘Analysis’ makes it very easy for the reader to picture you bringing value to their team!

  • Develop this body paragraph a little more in terms of how your experience applies to being successful in the role (the 'Analysis' portion of the paragraph)

• Make sure your order of points matches the order of your opening paragraph's summary statement/preview points—make sense?

  • Does this order of information match how a hiring manager would prioritize each characteristic's importance? 🤔

  • I recommend reorganizing this sentence to put what PwC would gain by hiring you FIRST (because this is what a hiring manager REALLY cares about) and then HOW you gained this experience—make sense?

• This is a nice paragraph in terms of presenting an idea, providing good supporting details, and then wrapping it up with how those experiences will make you better at this role!

• You have good evidence and detail here! I think this paragraph could be even stronger with a clearer takeaway for the reader in the topic sentence. Think of it from the perspective of a busy, skimming reader: if you wait until the end of the paragraph to arrive at your point, but a skimming reader doesn’t get that far, your paragraph becomes less persuasive.

• You have good evidence and detail here! I think this paragraph could be even stronger with a clearer takeaway for the reader - potentially in the topic sentence. Right now, it seems like the main focus of this paragraph is ‘[eleven years of experience],’ which is a good thing to highlight. But looking at your following evidence and examples, is there a particular ‘theme’ or skill(s) that you think you’re emphasizing more heavily as you elaborate? If so, I’d recommend integrating that into your topic sentence. (e.g., some variation on ‘[Experience] has allowed me to excel at [skill]’, or ‘I bring [strength] based on [experience]’) Naming that strength/takeaway means you aren’t relying on the reader to infer the takeaways from the paragraph - which they might not bother to do if they’re busy and skimming!

• The body of your cover letter isn't showing good 'TEA' structure yet taught in Lesson: Paragraph Structure - it's a single 'mega paragraph' rather than focused body paragraphs with one main idea (-2)

• Your first body paragraph is missing the 'T' of 'TEA' structure - make sure each paragraph is clearly previewing and presenting one main idea (-1)

• Your first paragraph, while generally focused, could be stronger with a more precise topic sentence to preview the main point of the paragraph - it feels a little 'list-like' right now.

• Your evidence and supporting details for your topic sentences are a little technical/jargon heavy - can they be revised to be more accessible to a non-expert reader?

• This paragraph doesn’t have a clear focus just yet. Based on the topic sentence, I expect to see evidence about how you [collaborate with diverse teams], and that I might learn more about you and what you value in terms of [communication style and company culture]. Instead, you’re [repeating some ideas from the previous paragraph], so the paragraph feels disorganized. What do you think is most important to highlight and illustrate here?

• As a topic sentence, this could be stronger and demonstrate more you-attitude. I personally recommend avoiding starting a paragraph by just summarizing an experience - provide a clear strength or outcome as a takeaway for the reader! Take these two sample topic sentences:

1. “Last year, I had the opportunity to intern at Company X.”

2. “A major strength I bring to teams is my ability to explain complicated topics to diverse audiences, thanks to my internship experience last year at Company X.”

#2 is much easier to skim, the reader knows where your paragraph is going, and it’s easy for them to picture how you’ll bring value to the team!

• I see good things in this paragraph - I see specific experiences being highlighted, and I see you trying to connect those experiences to being successful in the role. That said, I don’t think this paragraph works just yet. Having one ‘mega-paragraph’ that touches on three or four different skills, but doesn’t deeply develop or illustrate them, ultimately feels more disorganized than persuasive. How can this be split into 2-3 TEA body paragraphs that each develop one main idea, as described in Lesson: Paragraph Structure? What specific points are most important to highlight for this position?

• You’re spending this paragraph “telling” the reader that you’re good at things, not “showing” that you’re good at things with examples and elaboration. “Showing” is much more persuasive than generic claims that anyone can make! What support can you provide?

• It’s good to see specific examples to support your main point - but these examples have a lot of technical jargon, with limited explanation or analysis to show me what it all means, or why it will benefit you in this role. General HR employees often review cover letters first - any ideas for making your supporting details more accessible to a non-expert audience? I have ideas, but I’d rather hear yours!

• Question for you: Is it possible to get any more specific here without getting confusingly technical? This evidence sounds a little general, but does work as-is if adding more detail is too challenging.

• I like these examples to help sell your strengths! I might recommend rephrasing them a little, though. Simply stating that you [prioritize tasks and use calendars] sounds a little basic when you’re just describing the action. I would recommend highlighting an outcome first, then providing the action as support. (i.e., an outcome might be that you’re effective at conveying complex topics to large groups - the action might be that you create clear, concise PowerPoints with carefully selected visuals.) A question to ask yourself: What might these skills/good habits allow you to do for the company? That will help you get to the ‘outcome’.

Knowledge about the company/position

• I think this cover letter could demonstrate company knowledge a little bit more. The question to ask yourself is: if you swapped another company’s name into your letter without changing anything else, would the letter still work? If the answer is ‘yes’, it’s a good sign that more company tailoring is a good idea. Are there some details you could include that show you’ve researched the company’s culture or initiatives? Or anything else that gives the impression that you’re genuinely interested in this particular job? Where in your cover letter could you integrate these details?

• How can you avoid this phrase suggesting to a hiring manager that you are using this same closing paragraph to apply to MULTIPLE jobs (so actually you're NOT specifically interested in EY—so why should they be specifically interested in YOU?)

  • Consider if you can strengthen the company tailoring even further to demonstrate company knowledge and convey interest in this specific position.

  • Include more demonstration of company knowledge/tailoring to convey specific interest

• Is there a job ID code associated with this opening? 🤔

• I recommend avoiding the phrase "your company/firm" as it might lead hiring managers to believe that instead of having tailored your cover letter specifically to their company (showing you are specifically interested in THEM and therefore increasing the chance that they will be specifically interested in YOU), you are only minimally modifying your cover letter for all companies you're applying to and just changing the name of their company, depending on whose hiring manager you're writing to 😭—make sense?

• How does this accounting firm compare to PwC? (maybe add "one of China's most respected "Big 8" accounting firms")

• Check if this name matches this company's  OFFICIAL English name  😉 

You-attitude

• Hmmmm. . . .check your "you-attitude" here. Do you really want to start your cover letter putting focus on YOUR wants/needs (vs. the company's wants/needs for someone who will bring value to their team)? 🤔

  • Mostly great, but check your "you-attitude" in your first sentence. Do you really want to start your cover letter putting focus on YOUR wants/needs (vs. the company's wants/needs for someone who will bring value to their team)? 🤔 

• Make sure you're including good 'you attitude' in all portions of your letter - structure your content based on what you think the reader wants and needs

• I wouldn’t recommend including this phrase, since it puts the focus on meeting YOUR goals, rather than showing how you fulfill the reader’s needs!

• Are you 100% certain the hiring manager will understand this abbreviation? If not, write out its full name 😉

• I generally caution against including too much about how you will benefit from the position in a cover letter, since that doesn’t align with the reader’s wants and needs (finding someone who will bring value to their team). A brief mention of why you find the position appealing can be part of demonstrating company knowledge, but keep the focus on conveying that you’re well-informed about the role, rather than expressing your wants.

Positive emphasis

• Be careful to avoid negative phrasing (e.g., "most of" = "some, but not all"—just don't mention at all preferred qualifications you don't meet 😉 )

• Be careful to avoid negative phrasing (e.g., "hope" = "I hope so, but I'm really not sure"—jwhat about just deleting the "I hope" part of this sentence 😉 )

• While there can be a fine line between sounding confident and arrogant, I think this phrasing is a little too soft. Phrases like "I think this is a good match", "I'd like to..." "I hope I can contribute..." makes it sound like you're not totally sure yourself - and if you’re not sure, why should the hiring manager be? :)

Closing

• Many busy readers value concision - I think this general section could be condensed/made more concise without losing much. :)

Clarity of language

• X, your ideas are clear, but please use Grammarly or ChatGPT to edit your writing sentence-by-sentence for grammar/phrasing/punctuation/spelling/capitalization using the ChatGPT prompt "Proofread this sentence:"—also, to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, please use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google/Google Scholar first to verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions truly ARE more standard English phrasing and do not change your meaning [which CAN be problem😳] and (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?) 

• Don't exaggerate in cover letters 😉

• I like the ideas and preview points here, but I think this phrasing is a little awkward. I’d recommend rephrasing - either checking Google for common expressions, or asking GenAI to provide 5-6 options for revision without changing much vocabulary, then picking what sounds most natural to you. (Avoid strong adjectives and overly fancy word choice that you’re not familiar with to avoid sounding like you have ‘AI’ writing style)

• Some small spots seem slightly repetitive/redundant/not concise (busy hiring managers love concision!)

• Right now your language is clear - but there are some grammar errors or phrasings that aren't 'idiomatic', which is particularly important for a cover letter. Once you have all of your ideas in order, some sentence-level revision would help how this letter is perceived. Google, Grammarly, Generative AI, or even a friend are good tools for this! I'm happy to discuss this point further in conferences.

Formatting

• Check your formatting here 😉

• X, where is your cover letter's return address (or letterhead address), date, or inside address? 🤔

• You’re missing the formal block structure! See the first example at the bottom of this page: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/subject_specific_writing/professional_technical_writing/basic_business_letters/index.html

• Monica, need to locate better cover letter/block format examples to link!!!! 

• X, where is your cover letter's return address? 🤔

• Outstanding professional letterhead 😍 (Am I right in assuming you're using this same letterhead for your resume so your job application documents appear organized and professional as well as remain easy to identify as yours even if their printed pages become accidentally separated? 🤔)

  • Good return address formatting 😍—but just FYI: Cover letter templates often provide return address info in a letterhead header across the top of the page.  This is perfectly fine and may in fact be preferred for the following reasons: 

    • This allows you to use the same header style for BOTH your cover letter and resume, so your job application documents appear organized and professional (as well as remain easy to identify as yours even if their printed pages become accidentally separated! 🤗) 

    • Moving this info into the page header gives you more space on just ONE page for the content of your cover letter 😉

  • Just FYI: To include your return address as part of your cover letter/resume's professional letterhead, make sure this info is (1) centered at the top of the page and (2) uses a different font (often in terms of both font type and color 😉) from the font used elsewhere in your cover letter/resume

• Hmmmm. . . .is this your FULL name? 🤔

  • In the US, full names written without a comma are understood as "Firstname Lastname" (so capitalizing your last name is redundant and could even confuse Americans who are unfamiliar with international norms of marking last names via all capital letters)

• Curiosity question: Why did you decide to NOT include your US mailing address in your cover letter's return address? 🤔

• Is this your COMPLETE mailing address? 🤔

  • Does this follow standard US mailing address format? 🤔

    • Where is your US mailing address zip code? 😉

    • Does standard US mailing address format require this comma/ALL these commas? 😉

    • Check this address line's comma placement

    • This address line is missing a comma—can you figure out where? 🤔

• Curiosity question: Why did you decide to NOT include your phone number/email address in your cover letter's return address? 🤔

  • Does this follow standard US-context phone number formatting? 🤔

• Hmmmm. . . .does this URL lead to YOUR professional website/profile? 🤔

• X, where is your cover letter's date? 🤔

• For true block structure, move the date BETWEEN your two address blocks 😉

• Standard business letter formatting's block structure requires a blank line between the return address and date 😉

• Standard business letter formatting's block structure requires a blank line between the date and inside address 😉

• Just FYI: Because cover letters are formal business letters, they are characteristically formatted using an unabbreviated, NOT abbreviated, date—make sense? 😉

  • Just FYI: For formal writing such as cover letters, English spells out the name of the month (i.e., does not indicate the month numerically) 😉

  • Just FYI: Because cover letters are formal business letters (not casual-style writing), the day of the month component of their date is characteristically NOT followed by "th" 😉

  • Is this date missing a comma? 😉

• X, where is your cover letter's inside address? 🤔

• Should this be YOUR name or the hiring manager's name? 😉

• Technically, a business letter recipient's name should be followed, not preceded, by his/her title 😉 (For examples, see https://www.careercenter.illinois.edu/sites/default/files/2023-03/Sample%20Cover%20Letter-Handout.pdf and https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_i28yYnpbyU7lVK1j0bWHI32EvbexOyG/view?usp=sharing)

• Doesn't the inside address in US business letters (such as cover letters) include the recipient's name, title, and company name, not just the recipient's name, company name and company mailing address? 🤔 (For examples, see https://www.careercenter.illinois.edu/sites/default/files/2023-03/Sample%20Cover%20Letter-Handout.pdf and https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_i28yYnpbyU7lVK1j0bWHI32EvbexOyG/view?usp=sharing)

• Standard business letter formatting places the recipient's title and company on DIFFERENT lines (probably to avoid suggesting the company name is unimportant 🤭)

• Does this match how your target company prefers to capitalize its abbreviation? 😳

• Is this the recipient's COMPLETE mailing address? 😉

  • Does this follow standard US mailing address format? 🤔

    • Where is the company's mailing address zip code? 😉

    • Does standard US mailing address format require ALL these commas? 😉

    • Check this address line's comma placement 😉

    • This address line is missing a comma—can you figure out where? 😉

    • Is this YOUR TARGET COMPANY'S mailing address? 😳

• Does this follow standard US-context phone number formatting? 🤔 (Also, does standard US business letter format require phone numbers for the inside address AND the return address? 😉)

• What's your FULL name? 😉

• Although handwritten signatures are not necessarily required when submitting a job application, they can add a nice touch —I recommend discussing with University of Illinois Career Center staff the pros/cons/methods for including in your cover letter a digital version of your handwritten signature: https://careercenter.illinois.edu/ (Monica, need to check this advice for PDF cover letters)

  • Standard US business letter format includes your handwritten signature (which may or may not be legible 😂) followed by your typed signature 😉

    • Standard US business letter format places your handwritten signature AFTER your typed signature 😉

    • Hmmmm. . . .to avoid confusing the hiring manager, I recommend even for your handwritten signature in English that you follow the English ordering of first/given name followed by last/family name 🤔

  • X, your cover letter will look more attractive/carefully prepared if you CENTER your handwritten signature so that it's located halfway between your "Sincerely," and the typed version of your signature—make sense? 😉

• X, the length of your cover letter should NOT exceed 1 page, not only per our cover letter assignment guidelines but even more importantly, per cover letter norms generally (as you'll see if you Google "Can business cover letters exceed 1 page?") Busy hiring managers love concision!

• How is a hiring manager likely to respond to your apparent lack of attention to detail shown via your cover letter's inconsistent font? 😭

  • Hmmmm. . . .why did you choose to bold this information? 

  • To make your text easy to read, always use a proportional (not monospaced) font when writing in English 😉 (See https://inforiver.com/blog/general/best-fonts-financial-reporting/)

• Does your cover letter's paragraph spacing following standard business letter block format? (See https://rasmussen.libanswers.com/faq/33178)

  • Why doesn't the spacing between your inside address /last paragraph and salutation/complimentary closing match the spacing between other elements of your cover letter?  🤔

  • Per standard business letter block format, why doesn't the line spacing of your cover letter's return address match the line spacing elsewhere in your cover letter? 🤔  (See https://rasmussen.libanswers.com/faq/33178)

• Check this paragraph's indentation 🤔

Script

• X, based on this elevator pitch, why should a recruiter believe you are specifically interested in THEIR company? (If you fail to convince them of this, why should they be specifically interested in YOU vs. other applicants enough to pass on your application materials to the relevant hiring manager???)

  • I recommend avoiding the phrase "your company/firm" as it might lead recruiters to believe that instead of having tailored your elevator pitch specifically to their company (showing you are specifically interested in THEM and therefore increasing the chance that they will be specifically interested in YOU), you are giving the same elevator pitch to all companies whose recruiters you're approaching and just changing the name of their company, depending on whose recruiter you're talking to 😭—make sense?

  • WHICH position? 😉 (Won’t failing to specify indicate to a recruiter that you haven’t in fact researched current openings at their company and therefore actually aren’t particularly interested in THEM—if so, why should they be particularly interested in YOU? 😉)

  • WHICH needs? Why should a recruiter believe that you're not saying this to EVERY recruiter you approach at the career fair? What specific piece of information clearly from THEIR website has convinced you their teams are dynamic? Reference that info, so they know you're talking to THEM. Make sense? 😉

  • How do you know? 😉 (This is a great opportunity to demonstrate you are specifically interested in THEIR company by showing you've researched what they do/value/etc. Or, if will be obvious to the recruiter that this experience aligns closely with the work their company does, maybe start this sentence with "Obviously"—which also shows you have done your research and know this is a MAJOR aspect of what this company does. Make sense?)

• Are you 100% certain the Deloitte recruiter will understand this abbreviation/the abbreviated company name "CICC"? If not, why not provide CICC's full name and/or a brief description of the company in terms of its similarities to Deloitte? 😉

  • Just FYI: Based on your target company, you can probably safely assume the recruiter will understand this abbreviation. However, are there any companies you plan to approach at the career fair whose recruiters might NOT know this abbreviation? (If so, what about providing CICC's full name and/or a brief description of CICC in terms of its similarities to each of these target companies? 🤔)

  • Would the recruiter likely recognize or be particularly interested/impressed if you mention the specific name of this company/one of these suppliers or customers? Which one and why? (Or, if you can’t due to your field's privacy norms, what about providing a general description of the company’s size/how much variety there is in the patents it registers yearly, etc.?) 

  • Even if you think giving the name of the firm wouldn't be helpful (e.g., because its name is in Chinese or the firm isn't well-known), why not provide a brief description of the firm in terms of its similarities to Deloitte? (e.g., "the tax department of one of the largest CPA firms in [major city/province/region of the country]" or "the tax department of a CPA firm specializing in X")

  • BEFORE hearing your elevator pitch, will the PwC recruiter already know about your Grant Thornton internship? Therefore, wouldn't your elevator pitch be clearer if you said "During my INTERNSHIP at Grant Thornton," not "During my TIME at Grant Thornton"? (=13)

  • Just FYI: Xiamen University may be such a “big name” school in Asia that everyone there recognizes its name. However, are there any companies you’re interested in whose recruiters may NOT recognize its name? If so, what information can you add about Xiamen University’s reputation—especially if it’s well-known for a strong accounting program—to help less knowledgeable recruiters recognize the value of your Xiamen University degree? 🤔

• Because recruiters often do not give even 30 seconds before they interrupt students who approach them at the career fair, how can you communicate this information more concisely while still maintaining your conversational style—make sense?/cut ALL words not needed for a conversational-style elevator pitch—make sense? (so maybe rephrase as "INCLUDING four years of relevant experience"😉/I recommend NOT saying "if you are interested." After all, the recruiter is not going to reply, "No, I'm not interested," so for the elevator pitch context when time is so short, these are wasted words—make sense?)(Can you locate any other words that aren't truly NECESSARY that you should also cut? 😉)

  • Be careful not to waste the recruiter's time by including details unlikely to contribute to their choosing YOU as a strong candidate for helping meet their company's needs—make sense? 😉

  • Hmmmm. . . .is it NECESSARY for you to mention this? (If at all possible, you should not include negative information in your elevator pitch because you want your pitch to ENCOURAGE the recruiter to take a look at your resume not DISCOURAGE them from taking a look, right? 🤔)

    • X, if you include negative information during your 30- to 45-second elevator pitch, couldn't that suggest to the recruiter that you're a negative person? In that case, how likely are they to want to pass on your application to the relevant hiring manager? 😳  (How can you express your main points here more positively? 🤔)

  • Don't TELL a recruiter you're genuinely excited—SHOW this in your 1–2 sentences about WHY this company/role is a compelling opportunity. Make sense? 😉

    • Don't TELL a recruiter this “truly” resonates with you—it’s enough to SHOW this by explaining you believe this reflects the grandest goal an auditor can strive for. Make sense? 😉 

• What's your name?/What should the recruiter call you? 😉

• These are relevant facts, but what 2–3 sentence STORY can you tell (that includes all these facts) to make your elevator pitch more interesting/memorable to the recruiter and therefore more likely to pass on your resume to the appropriate hiring manager? 🤔

  • WHAT valuable professional experience? What 1–2 sentence story (or stories) can you tell demonstrating SPECIFIC skills you gained from this experience that match the skills Deloitte/PwC are looking for?

    • Hmmmm. . . .wouldn't this be stronger as "Based on this as well as other aspects of my background, I believe. . . ."? 😉

• Hmmmm. . . .do companies hire applicants in order to (1) move their company forward or (2) help applicants "improve [their] knowledge and capabilities throughout [their] career journey"? If #1, how can you rephrase this from focusing on how YOU will benefit if Deloitte hires you to focusing on how DELOITTE will benefit if they hire YOU? 🤔/how YOUR dream will be fulfilled if Deloitte hires you to focusing on how Deloitte hiring YOU will help the company fulfill ITS vision/mission/purpose? 🤔

  • Remember companies hire applicants in order to (2) move THEIR company forward, NOT to fulfill applicants' dreams of working at their company 😉—therefore, how can you rephrase your last few sentences from focusing on how YOUR dream will be fulfilled if Deloitte hires you to focusing on how Deloitte hiring YOU will help the company fulfill ITS vision/mission/purpose? 🤔 (=14 if value to target company IS communicated IMPLICITLY, even though not EXPLICITLY)

  • How would your having this experience benefit DELOITTE if they hired you? (If it won't, delete this info because isn't sharing it a waste of the recruiter's time? If it will, you need to explain how. Make sense?)

  • How does PwC'S reputation for audit excellence and innovation connect to why they should hire YOU? (Work on more CLEARLY communicating in the last few sentences of your elevator pitch a "you-attitude," not a "me-attitude"—make sense?) (=13)

• Hmmmm. . . .how can you say you think you're the best candidate for this position when you don't know who else is applying? This sounds presumptuous 😳 (What about instead saying something like "I therefore think I would be a good candidate for Deloitte's [currently advertised position you think the best match to your background]. Would you like to take a look at my resume?" 🤔) 

  • Hmmmm. . . .this ASSUMES they will hire you, which is very bold. What about instead saying something like "I think I would be a good candidate for Deloitte's [currently advertised position you think the best match to your background]. Would you like to take a look at my resume?" 🤔

• Generally good, but to help the recruiter classify your resume among the many other internship resumes he/she will collect during the career fair, I recommend including WHEN you hope to do a PwC internship (e.g., in summer 2025) 😉

• X, the volume of your video was low, which I'm afraid made it difficult for me to understand what you were saying. Only after I played your video at a VERY high volume could I hear your elevator pitch clearly—but this also caused me to hear quite a bit of background noise/echoing 😭 (=7)

• A little slow in pace, but okay (≈ pace near the slow end of normal range) 

• X, the quick pace as well as tone of your elevator pitch make it sound like you were reading your script vs. communicating its info naturally and conversationally 😭 (If YOU were the recruiter, how would this video's pace/tone impact your interest in interviewing/hiring this applicant???) (=7)

• Your good eye contact and smile make you look confident and friendly, both of which are VERY attractive characteristics in a potential hire—great job! 😍

  • Perhaps there is a cultural difference in expectations regarding this, but for the American context, I recommend smiling as a way of showing (1) confidence and (2) friendliness (both of which are attractive characteristics in a potential hire)—make sense? 

  • Remember that smiling not only helps you look and feel confident/relaxed, but also friendly, which are both attractive characteristics in a potential hire 😉

• X, generally good eye contact (even though making eye contact via video is unnatural and therefore hard to do!), but DON'T just stare at the camera—it's natural to blink occasionally, right? Thus, as long as it's only occasional vs. overly frequent, blinking will NOT make you look nervous 🤗

  • (Just FYI: It's okay to blink occasionally in your elevator pitch video—after all, blinking is natural and sometimes it's necessary, right?)

• X, you were OBVIOUSLY reading your elevator pitch script vs. talking conversationally—watch your video to see your eyes UNMISTAKABLY moving back and forth across the screen as you read 😭 (If YOU were the recruiter, how would this impact your interest in interviewing/hiring this applicant???) (=7)

• X, you basically never made eye contact with your camera in this video, strongly suggesting you were reading your script vs. communicating its info naturally and conversationally 😭 (If YOU were the recruiter, how would this lack of eye contact impact your interest in interviewing/hiring this applicant???) (=7)

• Just FYI, in the US it is unusual, especially in the case of professional communication, to begin a "talking head" video or Zoom call by waving both hands (or even just one) 🤔 (=9)

• I'm afraid your face/voice/gestures didn’t communicate interest in your topic—which can make your audience bored over time: “If YOU don’t think your topic is interesting, why should we?”😝 (What gestures/facial expressions could you add to support and/or emphasize your points? 🤔) 

• OUTSTANDING!!! (including your natural chuckle about how difficult it is for auditors to collect data from their clients at year-end because it not only shows you understand FROM EXPERIENCE the real challenges auditors face but also you have a positive attitude about facing these challenges, which obviously an attractive characteristic in a potential hire 😍) 

• Hmmmm. . . .how do you think wearing a Super Mario T-shirt when recording your elevator pitch might impact how likely you are to be invited to interview? 😉

• OUTSTANDING analysis/reflection—WOW!!! 😍 

• Your reflection talks about the importance of maintaining eye contact, but this doesn't match your video's lack of eye contact—why? 🤔

• X, where are your responses to our elevator pitch reflection questions? 

• OUTSTANDING analysis/reflection, except that you forgot to include timestamps where they would be appropriate 😭 (=22)

  • X, why doesn't your reflection include video timestamps where appropriate, as required by our elevator pitch assignment guidelines? 😭 (=22)

• You do not clearly answer our 4th reflective question: Do you THINK changes you made from the draft to the recorded version have enhanced your pitch's impact in terms of improving its flow of information, emphasis on key points, or (likelihood of) engagement of the listener? (Your answer to this question is SO vague, it STRONGLY suggests you overused generative AI ☹️😭☹️ ) (=19)

  • Regarding the second reflective question, your reflective response would have been clearer if it had mentioned "Deloitte's broader mission and values," so that readers could SEE how this matches your belief that "tax will help reshape society"—make sense? 

• Why do several of your reflection responses look like they were copied/pasted from our assignment prompt (in that they use "you/your" where they should use "I/me/my")? 🤔 (=22)

• At the University of Illinois career fair, won't this be obvious? 😉 

• X, your ideas are clear, but I've highlighted in pink a few remaining minor grammar/phrasing/punctuation/spelling/capitalization errors you may still want to check using ChatGPT (via the prompt "Proofread this sentence:") 😉. (Just remember that to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google first to verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions truly ARE more standard English phrasing (as well as accurately express YOUR meaning!); (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned; and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?) (=5)

  • X, mostly your ideas/language and logic are clear (=3) /X, I'm afraid that your English phrasing is currently sometimes hard to understand, but you CAN grow in this (=2)—unless you're writing about personal/company/research secrets that might be shared with others 😳, please use Grammarly/ChatGPT to edit your writing sentence-by-sentence for grammar/phrasing/punctuation/spelling/capitalization, including the errors I've highlighted in pink. Also, to build your brain’s capacity in the future to automatically produce more standard English phrasing, please use exact phrase search [= within quotation marks] in Google first to verify Grammarly-/ChatGPT-proposed revisions truly ARE more standard English phrasing and do not change your meaning [which occasionally CAN be problem 😳] and (2) read aloud to yourself MULTIPLE Google search results containing the more standard English phrasing you just learned and (3) practice creating a few sentences using this phrasing that realistically you might say/write in the future—make sense?) 

• Hmmmm. . . .what does the pronoun "it" here refer back to? (LOGICALLY, I can guess, but GRAMMATICALLY, this isn't clear—make sense?)

  • clients = auditing and accounting consultant roles? (LOGICALLY, I can guess your meaning, but GRAMMATICALLY, it's not clear—make sense?)

  • Hmmmm. . . .as WHAT TYPE of professional? 😉

  • Hmmmm. . . .would "next May" or "this coming May" be clearer (so recruiters don't need to calculate from the current year to May 2025 to realize that's what you mean ) 🤔

  • Hmmmm. . . .do you really mean "heard" or "saw from your website"? 🤔

• Have you correctly spelled the name of this company? 😳

• X, overall your pronunciation is clear, but practice accurately pronouncing the following first individually and then within 5 new YouGlish phrasal contexts (e.g., https://youglish.com/pronounce/illinois/english/us?) every day until their standard pronunciation becomes automatic for you: Illinois (Notice the "s" is silent so should NOT be pronounced); "analysis" (Notice that related words in English are sometimes stressed differently from one another by comparing https://youglish.com/pronounce/analysis/english/us? to https://youglish.com/pronounce/analyze/english/us? to https://youglish.com/pronounce/analytics/english/us?/https://youglish.com/pronounce/analytical/english/us? 😭); resume (= the job doc) vs. "resume" (= "to continue"); "experience" ("x" once pronounced correctly as "ks" but another time mispronounced as /s/) (=4 if just  a few errors; =3 if many/important errors)

  • (If you want to work on improving your pronunciation of individual English sounds, please let me know. I can share resources and guidance to help you with this! 🤗)

• X, generally your pronunciation is clear, but I recommend using the 4/3/2 technique (https://www.excelinenglish.org/speaking/fluency/432) to increase your English speaking fluency by avoiding choppy/broken speech. 

  • I also recommend fluency practice using the 4/3/2 technique (https://www.excelinenglish.org/speaking/fluency/432) to minimize pausing in the MIDDLE of a grammatical phrases (vs. BETWEEN phrases), since this can damage listeners’ ability to build cumulative understanding of your ideas 😭 

  • X, one challenge I faced in understanding your spoken English when listening to your elevator speech is that often your speech was choppy/broken vs. smooth/fluent because you paused in the MIDDLE of a grammatical phrase instead of BETWEEN phrases, damaging listeners’ ability to build cumulative understanding of your ideas! (cf. “since. . I graduated”). Remember fluency is NEARLY ALWAYS more helpful than perfect grammar for facilitating listener understanding 😉. If you are interested in working on this, I recommend the following: (=3)

    • Day 1ff: Watch San Diego Voice and Accent’s "3 rules to using thought groups in English" at https://youtu.be/PgSOC3XrwXg, practicing each of its recommended techniques for building fluency.

    • Day 4ff: Check out the activities Fluency Buildup at https://www.excelinenglish.org/speaking/fluency/fluency-buildup and/or Shadowing at https://www.excelinenglish.org/speaking/fluency/shadowing for additional focused practice on breaking up phrases ONLY at thought group boundaries.)

    • Day 7ff: To help yourself grow in fluency by lengthening your thought groups/increasing how long you talk before pausing, practice the 4/3/2 activity at https://www.excelinenglish.org/speaking/fluency/432 (This activity can be VERY powerful for building fluency as you'll see if you regularly record your first 4-minute talk on a topic and compare it to your 2-minute version or if you compare your first 2-minute talk to another 2-minute talk a week or two later! 😉)

  • With specific phrases: Practice breaking up phrases ONLY at thought group boundaries within 5 new YouGlish phrasal contexts per day until standard English thought grouping becomes automatic for you (e.g., https://youglish.com/pronounce/since%20I%20graduated/english/us?).

    • “since. . I graduated” (= broken prepositional phrase)

    • “is widely used. . . .internationally” (= broken verb phrase)

• X, overall your pronunciation is clear, but I'm afraid you're not clearly pronouncing the distinction between the two English vowels "a" (as in "tax") vs. "e" (as in "text"). What about adding some contextual information to support listeners in easily understanding your intended meaning (e.g., "FEDERAL tax" or "STATE tax" or "CORPORATE tax," etc.)? (For the long-term, I recommend working on distinguishing these two English sounds by first creating a free account at https://www.englishaccentcoach.com/ to train yourself to HEAR their difference the same way native English listeners do. After you are able to consistently distinguish these two sounds when LISTENING, it will be easier for you to accurately judge whether you are clearly PRONOUNCING their difference—make sense? (If not, let's talk about this during my office hours! 🤗)

• X, I'm afraid I couldn't figure out what words you were saying in "when I worked on ____ project and handled work through ____" (maybe "IQ" and "tasks" or "tests"?)/If you think I failed to understand the words you said before "insurance company" because it's a Chinese name, what about NOT mentioning the full name of this company, but instead providing a brief DESCRIPTION of the company in terms of its similarities to PwC? 😉)/currently your pronunciation of your degree "an MSA student" is a little hard to understand (in part because you said "a" not "an"). To make sure recruiters clearly understand you, I recommend you instead say the full name of your degree 😉 (Or practice the standard word stress/pronunciation of your degree by following multiple YouGlish pronunciations of it: https://youglish.com/pronounce/MSA/english/us)/when you expressed how you value EY's motto of "Make a better world," I couldn't hear the unstressed "a," so it sounded like the grammatically incorrect "Make better world"—probably you don't want to sound like you're making a grammatical mistake with such a key EY phrase, right? 🤔

• Check the following phrasing in Grammarly/ChatGPT  😉

  • To find out which is preferred phrasing for expressing your intended idea, use Google Scholar (https://scholar.google.com/) to search (in quotation marks) "Can you have a look ABOUT it?" vs "Can you have a look AT it?" 😉

  • Also, your phrasing should be "master of science IN accountancy" (not just "master of science accountancy") 😉 and "have data intuition combined with accounting principles" should be "have data intuition combined with APPLYING accounting principles"—make sense?

• A minor grammar/word order point is probably you mean Xiamen University-Malaysia is "well-known IN ASIA for its strong accounting program," NOT "well-known for its strong accounting program IN ASIA." (Can you figure out their difference in meaning? If not, please ask me 🤗)

• Try to minimize or avoid use of the emotional word "truly" (3 times in 46 seconds is SO frequent that it negatively impacts your apparent professionalism—make sense? 🤔) 

• X, the word "improved" suggests at first you had POOR analytical skills, which is a negative message you probably don't want your elevator pitch to give 😉 Why not ask Grammarly/ChatGPT to suggest more positive-sounding verbs that mean basically the same thing that you can use instead? 🤔 

  • Hmmmm. . . .it sounds like you are suggesting that Cushman & Wakefield, which you indicated are the top real estate appraisal company in the US, aren't currently using efficient evaluation methods 😳 Is that really what you mean? If not, maybe rephrase as something like "continue to achieve" and "given my strong background in efficient valuation"?

  • Hmmmm. . . .will this suggest to the recruiter that, if they hire you, you will not, in fact, be dedicated to DELOITTE, but instead might do the minimum work necessary so you can also continue your education or work a second job? 😳 

• X, after listening to your elevator pitch, what do you want the recruiter to DO? 🤔 (What about closing with something like "Would you like to take a look at my resume?")

  • Just an idea: When giving a CONVERSATIONAL elevator pitch, what about rephrasing this as "and ask you a few questions about the position/about how I can best shape my application materials to show how they match your need?"

• "Tax positionS" = "it" or "them"? 😉 (You said BOTH "tax positions" and "it," which confused me about whether you're interested in ONE vs. MULTIPLE Deloitte tax positions and I'm afraid might confuse the Deloitte recruiter in the same way 🤔)

• Is the noun "research" countable or uncountable? Therefore, should you say “did A research about” or “did research about" or "did a research PROJECT about"? 🤔 

• X, according to our elevator pitch script draft assignment guidelines, "At the top of your script draft, [you should have indicated] which specific company you plan to deliver this pitch to" 😭 Also, I have tested the length of each of my ESL 522 students' scripts by reading them aloud myself and I'm afraid yours exceeds our elevator pitch assignment's (already generous!) length guideline of a maximum of 45 seconds 😉 (=2)

  • X, according to our elevator pitch script draft assignment guidelines, "At the top of your script draft, [you should have indicated] which specific company you plan to deliver this pitch to" 😭 (=3)

  • X, I have tested the length of each of my ESL 522 students' scripts by reading them aloud myself and I'm afraid yours exceeds our elevator pitch assignment's (already generous!) length guideline of a maximum of 45 seconds—in your case, as demonstrated by your 59-second video that you technically were not required to submit yet 😉 (=3)

• X, your elevator pitch exceeds our assignment's (already generous!) length guideline of a maximum of 45 seconds. Because recruiters often do not give even 30 seconds before they interrupt students who approach them at the career fair, can you think of any way you can communicate your elevator pitch more concisely?" Even more importantly especially for an in-person career fair, what questions could you ask the recruiter to create opportunity for you to share this important information in a CONVERSATIONAL style? (=4 if between 50 seconds and 1 minute, =3 if between one and 1.5 minutes)

ESL 522 Prompts

• A 75–100 word summary of the top 3 most important things you learned from your peer reviewers (Which peer reviewer(s)?) or from your peer review of your classmates' cover letters (Which classmate(s)?) as well as HOW you think learning these things will increase the chances that your future cover letters will lead to job interviews 🤩 vs. the trash can 😭

• A 75–100 word summary of the top 3 most important things you learned from my feedback on the 2nd draft of your cover letter and HOW you think learning these things will increase the chances that your future cover letters will lead to job interviews 🤩 vs. the trash can 😭

Feedback

• X, where is your cover letter final draft's reflection summarizing the top 3 most important things you learned from MY feedback on your cover letter's 2nd draft??? 😭

1. What was the most positive writing experience in your academic (school) life, either in your own language or in English? What kinds of events, actions, or help from others, led to such experience? Which steps from our “AWELL Chapter #1: An Effective Writing Process” did you use? Were there any steps you did not use? How does this experience shape your plan for writing in ESL 111 and in your future career?

2. What do you think are some of the biggest differences between writing in the U.S. and writing in your home country? What is the easiest aspect of writing in English for you? What is the most difficult aspect of writing in English for you? Which chapter in our AWELL textbook do you think will help you most this semester and why? In what ways will growing in this difficult aspect of writing help you prepare for your future career?

3. Share a few stories demonstrating your greatest weakness in terms of writing habits during high school. What specific changes do you plan to make this semester to grow in this weak area (especially in terms of AWELL Chapter #1: An Effective Writing Process)? Finally, describe how you think your proposed plan for growth will help maximize your chance of landing your dream job and/or advancing rapidly as a professional in your chosen career field."

1. Your Reaction to "Research" Writing: The focus of this class is on writing a research paper. When you hear the term "research paper," how do you feel?

2. Previous Experience: In your opinion, what is the purpose of a research paper and why do you think it is such a big part of this class? Have you ever written a research paper before? What did you write about? Was it a good experience? Why or why not? Looking back, what would you do differently? Why?

3. Self-Evaluation & Goals: Based on the feedback you received in ESL 111 from your instructor and peers (as well as feedback you have received on your writing in other classes/experiences and your own personal impressions), what is your biggest strength as a writer? Why? How will this strength help you write a research paper? Also, what is the biggest area you'd like to improve as a writer? Please organize and describe an honest and detailed account of how you have tackled and completed writing assignments in the past with examples (e.g., What steps do you generally go through when planning and writing an academic paper? How do you plan your time/avoid procrastination? What are your strategies for maintaining academic integrity, i.e., avoiding plagiarism and overuse of AI?) Explain how your writing process could be better in the future and what will you do during this class to continue growing in this area.

• Outstanding!!!

• Generally good, but according to our assignment instructions, you should only have discussed ONE of our three possible topic options 😉 (=9)

• Mostly good, but how has this positive writing experience shaped your plan for writing in ESL 111 and your future career? (=9)

• Mostly good, but “Were there any steps from our “AWELL Chapter #1: An Effective Writing Process” you did not use?” Also, how does your extended essay experience shape your plan for writing in your future career? (=7)

• X, according to our Reflection Video #1 instructions, you should also have described which steps from our “AWELL Chapter #1: An Effective Writing Process” you used/didn’t use and how this positive writing experience has shaped your plan for writing in ESL 111 and your future career 😭 (=4)

• X, EXCELLENT description of how in China directly stating your point of view in the beginning is thought of as indicating weak vs. strong writing whereas in the U.S. if your main point isn’t stated right away, your writing is viewed as off topic or otherwise missing a main point!

• X, thanks SO much for your very clear description of differences between writing expectations in India vs. the US—I very much appreciate your helping me better understand the challenges faced by Indian students in my U.S. writing classes! 🤩

• X, I’m really glad you chose this topic because I learned a LOT even in this short video from your insights into common Indian vs. American topics for writing. (I’m especially impressed by the accuracy of your analysis regarding American writing topics, which makes me assume your insight into common topics for writing in India as your home country is not only accurate but equally insightful! 😉)

• X, why didn’t you address the second half of your chosen prompt at all? 😭 (i.e., “Which chapter in our AWELL textbook do you think will help you most this semester and why? In what ways will growing in this difficult aspect of writing help you prepare for your future career?”) (=5) 

• Almost perfect, but according to the prompt you chose, you should have told a FEW stories demonstrating your greatest weakness in writing, not just one 😊 (=9)

• Outstanding!!! (And I agree with your analysis that developing your outlining skills will be VERY important for your dream job of being a lawyer)

• Excellent! 😊

• X, definitely the self-reflection in your video is the best I’ve seen so far—wow!!!

• Hmmmm. . . .WHY was this writing experience so positive for you? (=8)

• X, thanks so much for describing so clearly how timed essay tests in China have impacted your writing process—I’m certain you are not the only student whose writing habits have been negatively impacted in the way you describe and I think the information you shared in this video will help me better help my Chinese students in the future. Thank you!

•  X, how do the differences between writing in the US vs. China impact YOUR writing? How do all aspects of English writing being difficult for international students impact YOUR writing? Etc. (=5)

• Hmmmm. . . .Chinese grammar includes almost zero inflection. Where did you learn that “English grammar is comparatively straightforward with fewer inflections”? Also, how does English “verb tenses and voice have limited changes” compared to Chinese? (Why is your description of English vs. Chinese inaccurate?) (=5)

•  Excellent insightful self-analysis regarding WHY you struggle with cohesion (= getting ideas when you start writing and then deviating to a new topic without properly connecting them to the previous sentences/paragraphs) and which AWELL chapters are therefore most likely to help you!

• P.S. Just so you know that you’re not alone—almost everyone gets ideas when they start writing. . . .one of my favorite quotes from grad school is “Writing IS thinking” 😉

• OUTSTANDING analysis regarding how developing your outlining skills will be VERY important for your dream job of being a mechanical engineer (not only for the WRITING your dream job will almost certainly require, but also for formal and informal presentations—e.g., including even to demonstrate your thinking/planning skills during informal office meetings with your boss that show you work hard to prepare well for meeting so as not to waste his/her time) 🤗

• It's possible as an engineer that you will have to write research papers for your job, but will an engineering job really require you to write essays? (=9) 

• Well done 😊

• Generally good (except I think you could have come up with a stronger introduction and it would have been better if you had provided a summary comment as a conclusion at the end vs. just suddenly stopping talking 😉

• X, your video would have been stronger if it had provided listeners context by including a clear introduction vs. starting directly with your answer to the assignment prompt—make sense? Similarly, it would have been better if you had provided a summary comment as a conclusion at the end vs. just suddenly stopping talking—make sense 😉) (=9) 

• Generally well done, though your video would have been stronger if it had provided listeners context for the rest of your video by including a clear introduction vs. starting directly with your answer to the assignment prompt—make sense? 😊

• Excellent! (except that it would have been better if you had provided a summary comment as a conclusion at the end vs. just suddenly stopping talking 😉) 

• Generally well done (though I think you could have come up with a stronger conclusion 😉) 

• X, why didn’t you provide specific, concrete examples of how the biggest differences between writing in the US and writing in your home country have impacted you? Or specific, concrete examples of how all aspects of English writing being difficult for international students impacts YOU as a writer? (I’m giving you full points here only because I don’t think it’s fair to reduce your grade under both this and the “self-reflection” category for one mistake, but please be aware that if I did, your score here would have been “6”)

• X, first you said English “grammar is comparatively straightforward,” but later you said “English grammar rules are relatively complex and nonnative speakers are prone to make mistakes and we need to spend a lot of time to study grammar”—which do you really believe? Your logic regarding this is unclear. (=0) 

• Generally very good, but how might you have better connected your description of the differences between writing tasks in India vs. the US to what you find to be the most difficult aspect of writing in English? 😉 (=9)

• Mostly well done, except you could have expressed how growing in outlining is likely to help you obtain your dream job more concisely vs. repeatedly saying the same thing about this multiple times in different words—make sense? (=9)

• Overall, you were VERY clear! (except that you accidentally said “interviewee” when you meant “interviewer 😉) 

• Overall, you were VERY clear! (though if you ask ChatGPT to edit these phrases, I think you’ll see that “in UIUC” should be phrased as “at UIUC” (or “at Illinois” 😉); “have wrote” should be “have written”; and “master degree” should be “master’s degree” 😉)

• Finally, if you ask ChatGPT to edit “it gonna,” I think you’ll see that standard English phrasing is actually “it’s gonna” 😉) 

• Also, I know it’s weird, but check ChatGPT—does ChatGPT editing indicate that “slang” is countable or uncountable? (That is, do English speakers characteristically say only “slang” or also “slangs”?) 😉 

• Overall, you were VERY clear! (But check on YouTube: Do people usually introduce VIDEOS by saying “This is X” or “I am X”? (Notice this is different than when answering the phone when you don’t know the caller 😉)

• Hmmmm. . . .you used “I think” and “while” (meaning “although”) more often than is common for such a short presentation. Can you think of any alternatives?/you use the words/phrases “As a result,” “easy” and “happy” a LOT—maybe work on adding to your everyday vocabulary other words/phrases that mean the same thing? 😉

• Generally good, but check your pronunciation of “rough” (in “rough draft”) 

• Generally good, but/Also, check your pronunciation of the following words: “theme” (sounded like “seem”), and “l” at the end of “all,” “will,” and “skills” (Just FYI: You will likely find it helpful to watch this video on how to pronounce the challenging /l/ used at the end of words and syllables and then practice pronouncing at least 10 new words ending in /ɫ/ per day, first individually and then within 5 new YouGlish phrasal contexts per day until their standard pronunciation becomes automatic for you.), and “stiff” (I had to listen several times to figure out you were saying “stiff,” not “Steve”) (=4) 

• Generally good, but I’m afraid your video includes a few words whose pronunciation I couldn’t figure out even after I’d watched it twice. Also, check your pronunciation of the following accidentally mispronounced words I DID successfully identify: “préwriting” (accidentally misstressed like “prewríting”), “essay” (sounded like as “ice-say”), “essential” (sounded like “issitial”), and “advantage” (=4/3) 

• X, I think the greatest weakness in your video is actually your pronunciation that I suspect people not used to Chinese-accented English might often find hard to figure out (which could make them shy to interact with you because they don’t want to embarrass themselves or you by not understanding you!!! Make sense?) I therefore recommend especially working on your pronunciation of the words XXX (=3) 

• X, overall your pronunciation is clear, but practice accurately pronouncing the following first individually and then within 5 new YouGlish phrasal contexts (e.g., https://youglish.com/pronounce/reliable/english/us?) every day until their standard pronunciation becomes automatic for you: and words containing "l" vs. "r," e.g., "reliable" (mispronounced incorrectly at first but later accurately), "develop," "complex," "difficulties," and"clear/clearer" 

  • X, overall your pronunciation is clear, but practice accurately pronouncing the "o" in "focus" first individually and then within 5 new YouGlish phrasal contexts (e.g., https://youglish.com/pronounce/focus/english/us?) every day until its standard pronunciation becomes automatic for you 😉

• X, I’m afraid your video includes a few words whose pronunciation I couldn’t figure out. Is this because you were reading from a (ChatGPT-written?) script that included words you don't know how to pronounce? (Also, why did you say "ESL 101," not "ESL 112"?) (=3/1)

• X, although clearly you carefully THOUGHT about you wanted to say before recording your video, it sounds like you did not practice SPEAKING your ideas aloud at all before recording— so your videorecorded speaking is not really smooth or fluent/video includes LOTS of hesitations and restarts. For future videos I therefore recommend using a technique such as 4/3/2 to practice what you want to say BEFORE videorecording (and, if necessary, record your video a couple times to make sure your recording is as clear and impactful as possible!)—make sense?

• Although your English pronunciation in this video sounds natural/standard in many ways, you spoke often in VERY short phrases. To help yourself grow in fluency by lengthening your thought groups/increasing the amount of time between your pauses, practice the 4/3/2 activity. (This activity can be powerful for building fluency as you'll see if you regularly record your first 4-minute talk on a topic and compare it to your 2-minute version or if you compare your first 2-minute talk to another 2-minute talk a week or two later)—please ask me to explain further if these instructions don’t make sense!

• Very good eye contact, even though making eye contact via video is unnatural and therefore hard to do! (And mostly good gestures, but be careful about distracting motions like playing with your hair 😉)

• Jennie, I can see you were trying to maintain good eye contact, but often you didn’t really look at your camera (which admittedly is an unnatural so very hard task!). I can also see you were trying to use good gestures, but in the future, check your videorecording that you’re not wringing your hands or using other body language communicating to your audience that you lack confidence (since they won’t know from that if you’re just nervous about PRESENTING or not confident about your IDEAS). This is important because colleagues/clients/customers can interpret lack of eye contact/nervous gestures as indicating lack of confidence—and then possibly wonder if you lack CONFIDENCE because, in fact, you lack COMPETENCE?!? Make sense?

• Very good eye contact (even though making eye contact via video is unnatural and therefore hard to do!)/Good eye contact and gestures (e.g., pointing to your heart when talking about yourself)! 😊—but why didn’t you follow our assignment guidelines to shoot your video horizontally vs. vertically and that the video should be only 2–3 minutes in length? (How will your boss or clients feel if you ignore clear guidelines for what you should or should not submit? 😉)

• X, your eye contact in this video is AMAZING!!! Often, eye contact in the video format is much harder than in F2F/live speaking because it’s not natural to make eye contact with a videocamera—I’m SO impressed!!! 

• Very good eye contact, even though making eye contact via video is unnatural and therefore hard to do! 

• X, I can see you were trying to maintain good eye contact, but often you didn’t really look at your camera (which admittedly is an unnatural so very hard task!). Be sure to work on this because colleagues/clients/customers can interpret lack of eye contact as indicating lack of confidence—and then possibly wonder if you lack CONFIDENCE because, in fact, you lack COMPETENCE—make sense?

• Often good eye contact, though/X, you did MUCH better at making eye contact with the camera (which admittedly is an unnatural so very hard task!) at the beginning of your video than at the end. (Toward the end of your video, it looked very much like you were reading a script vs. speaking naturally, as directed by our rubric 😉) (=4)

• X, you did MUCH better at making eye contact with the camera (which admittedly is an unnatural so very hard task!) at the end of your video than at the beginning, but at the beginning you made VERY little/basically ZERO eye contact with the camera. Be sure to work on this in your future presentations/videos because colleagues/clients/customers can interpret lack of eye contact as indicating lack of confidence—and then possibly wonder if you lack CONFIDENCE because, in fact, you lack COMPETENCE?!? 😬 I therefore recommend in your future presentations/videos that you prioritize working on your eye contact as well as possibly the use of appropriate gestures that visually support your point—make sense? (=5/3)

• X, very good gestures, but you made basically zero eye contact with your camera/you mostly looked ABOVE vs. AT your camera—in fact, for the first half/throughout much of your video, it looked very much like you were reading a script vs. speaking naturally, as directed by our rubric. If you had recorded a video to train your colleagues or clients/customers on a new tool developed by your company, would your boss be satisfied with this level of eye contact?/presentation on X, with this level of eye contact, would an audience have been willing to watch all the way through your presentation? Why or why not? (=4/3/2/0)

• X, throughout much of your video, it looked very much like you were reading a script vs. speaking naturally, as directed by our rubric. If you had recorded a video to train your colleagues or clients/customers on a new tool developed by your company, would your boss be satisfied with this level of eye contact? Why or why not? (P.S. It's okay to use generative AI to brainstorm ideas, but by the time you record your video, they should have become your own ideas—you should be speaking naturally. Make sense?)

• X, you made basically ZERO eye contact with your camera—in fact, it looked very much like you were reading a script vs. speaking naturally, as directed by our rubric. If you had recorded a video to train your colleagues or clients/customers on a new tool developed by your company, would your boss be satisfied with this level of eye contact? Why or why not? (P.S. It's okay to use generative AI to brainstorm ideas, but by the time you record your video, they should have become your own ideas—you should be speaking naturally. Make sense? 🤔) (=1/0)

• Also, good gestures (e.g., motioning backward to match your description starting with “originally”) 😊 

• I can also see you were trying to use good gestures, but in the future, check your videorecording that you’re not wringing your hands/moving your chair from side to side/rubbing your nose/overuse of clapping or using other body language communicating to your audience that you lack confidence (since they won’t know from that if you’re just nervous about PRESENTING or not confident about your IDEAS). 

• X, I can see you were trying to use good gestures, but you may want to sit/stand a little further away from the videocamera to help your gestures SUPPORT what you’re saying—and also try to avoid nervous gestures that could distract viewers from your message (e.g.,). Make sense? 😉­­ 

• Also, what gestures/facial expressions could you add to support and/or emphasize your points? 😉

• However, you should also know that you tend to speak much more softly than is common in the US context. If you hope to work in the US at all after graduation, you may want to work on this because Americans tend to associate soft speech with lack of confidence—and to assume lack of CONFIDENCE is due to lack of COMPETENCE. This could hurt your chances of getting a job offer and, even after you get a job, how likely you are to get promoted—make sense?

• Good eye contact and gestures (e.g., pointing to your heart when talking about yourself)! 😊—but why didn’t you follow our assignment guidelines to shoot your video horizontally vs. vertically and that the video should be only 2–3 minutes in length? (How will judges or your clients feel if you ignore clear guidelines for what you should or should not submit? Could that hurt your ability to win your clients’ cases? 😉) (=3)

• One final recommendation for future videos: Be sure to set your videocamera parallel to your body vs. at an angle because angled recording makes the lower part of your body appear unnaturally bigger than your face or vice versa. You may also want to sit/stand a little further away from the videocamera to help your gestures support what you’re saying without being distracting—make sense? 😉) 

• I realize I told you this video does not need to look professional, but as a viewer, I found myself VERY distracted by its shakiness (probably due to you holding your phone in your hand while recording?). I recommend for your future videos is that you stabilize your videocamera by setting it against a pile of books, etc.—make sense? 

• OUTSTANDING job editing your video to include image/text overlays so it is easy for viewers to follow your outline/points 🤩 (Just be sure you display text long enough that viewers have time actually to read it, as I had to rewind the initial part of your video to be able to finish reading the text on your first overlay screen 😉)

• Outstanding video editing—wow!!! 🤩

  • Good job editing your video to include a highly appropriate image overlay to support your message 😊

  • Impressive job editing your video to include appropriate sound effects (that are appropriately timed AND play at an appropriate volume!)—wow!!!

  • (Just FYI: If you’re going to include subtitles in your video, make sure they’re spelled correctly—once “argumentative” was accidentally misspelled once as “augmentive” and once as “argumentive” 😉)

• X, I'm afraid your video got uploaded to MediaSpace in portrait vs. landscape mode 😉 

• X, why didn’t you follow our Reflective Video assignment guidelines to shoot your video horizontally vs. vertically? 😭