MBA TOEFL: Sebastien (Reading task) 23.7.9

ATTENDEES
        ✓        Sebastien

AIMS

• To practice techniques for TOEFL Reading
• To refresh the techniques for Speaking: 4,5,6

MATERIALS
✓        Introduction Reading p.2
        ✓        Lesson 1: Factual & Negative Factual p.27
        ❑        Lesson 2: Vocabulary p.48
        ✓        Lesson 3: Inference p.65
        ❑        Lesson 4: Purpose / Method / Opinion p.83
        ❑        Lesson 5: Restatement p.104
        ❑        Lesson 6: Reference p.117
        ✓        Lesson 7: Sentence Addition p.133
        ✓        Lesson 8: Summary / Chart p.149
        •        summary:
P1 -0
P2 -B
P3 -B
P4 -B
P5 -C
P6 -A,C
P7 -C
P8 -E

• category

NOTES


VOCABULARY

MBA IELTS: Marilyn (Writing task 2 Listening) 21.7.09

ATTENDEES
        ✓        Marilyn

AIMS

• To practice techniques for Task 2 Writing
• To practice listening skills

MATERIALS
        ✓        Essay writing V2
                ✓        Essay planning
                ✓        Practice Planning essays and outlining Answers.
        ✓        Insight into IELTS
                ✓        Listening
                ❑        - we stopped at p.17 (track 12)

HOMEWORK
        
        
NOTES
subject - verb - object
active: the teacher - closed -the door
passive: the door - was closed -by the teacher

ESSAY STRUCTURE
-Introduction
some people think...
I think that...because

VOCABULARY
Outweigh: the advantages outweigh the disadvantages

CORRECTIONS

MBA IELTS: Hadar (Speaking+Reading+writing task1) 22.7.9

ATTENDEES
        ✓        Hadar

AIMS

• multiple

MATERIALS
        ✓        Speaking Practice
        ✓        Insight into IELTS
                ✓        Reading 3 p.50
        ❑Writing task 1 practice        
        
NOTES

This diagram shows the processes involved in a house’s central heating system.
Firstly, cold water comes into the house filling the water storage tank. Excess water is stored in the water tank above. The water is transported into different pipes. Some of it is transferred to the taps, while some of it is transferred to the boiler, which heats the water before moving it to the pump. The pump increases the water pressure and pushes the hot water to the radiators. Here the small tubes feed the water into radiator.

The diagram shows how products are being manufactured from raw materials and other components. The diagram also shows how these products are assessed back in the factory and finally how feedback is given.

VOCABULARY

CORRECTIONS

MBA TOEFL: Sebastien (writing task 1/2) 21.7.9

ATTENDEES
        ✓        Sebastien

AIMS

• To practice techniques for Task 1 & 2 Writing

MATERIALS
        ✓        Bruce Rogers IBT2007
                ✓        Introduction Writing (Integrated) p.7 1
                ✓        Lesson 21: Notes & Planning p.24
                ✓        Lesson 22: Paraphrasing p.47        
        ❑        Essay writing V2
                ❑        Essay planning
        
ESSAY (GMAT)
The passage describes how the free gourmet lunch programm [program, programme] not only encourages employee[s] to stay in the building during the lunch time but also succeeds to prompt to increase the average number of hours worked, which results in a profit increase.

Even<>though the lunch programm can spark employees to stay in the manufactury [factory //verb:manufacture] during lunch time, some of them can decide to stay over the midday break because the company installed a swimming pool for them. Thus this assumption is flawed.

Furthermore, the survey showed that some wage earners spend more time because of the lunch program, but it also could be a consequence of an increase of the wages. Likewise, the sample of the survey is not described in the passage. There might be only 10 out of 1000 employees concerned by the study and the increase in time working could also be explained by a stronger demand of the market.

Besides, the number of hours worked by most company Z employee[s] not necessarly lead to a profit increase. For instance, if employees work 110 % but are paid three times their previous wages, the profit of the company will decrease significantly.

It is true that providing free gourmet lunches to its employees can encourage employees to remain in the building during lunch-hour and motivate employees to work harder throughout the day. However, when we consider the above examples the argument is definitely not persuasive.


In an ever facter[faster] paced economy, everything becomes more and more violent, in particular regarding the media programs. Children can often be shocked with something thez[they] watch on TV, even with entertainment program[s]. Although certain persons believe that parents are responsible for the upbringing of their children, and their entertaining[ment], I clearly advocate that media should ensure that their content is suitable for young consumers.

My first and foremost reason is that a children can be severely hurt by tv programs. TV has never been so violent as today, and regardless of the channel, many harsh images are depicted in news, movies, and Manga cartoons. In addition, more and more parents both work, and can't spend all their time with their children. Therefore, Media should monitor further the quality of their programm[e] in order to avoid to hurthurting their children's sensibility.

Moreover many people who work in entertainment companies have children. Thus they are concerned by this issue, and they must be more selective regarding the programmation scheduling [//design] of the differents entretainments which are proposed.

Besides, if media don't regulate programs for children, our society will encounter further violence, in particular at school. As we have unfortunately already observed in the last decade, three or four times a year, a children arrives at school with a gun and generally kills some of his classmates before being arrested by the police. The media corporations have a part of the responsa[i]bility in this dire situation. Even if they can't ban all the violent programs, they must pay more attention to this issue.

For the above reasons, I clearly argue [believe] that media should ensure that their content is suitable for young customers.



NOTES
review grammar in p.52

Essays


In the introduction use “to a certain extent” to show a thesis that will support both sides of the debate.


examples:
If...
I’ve read that....
such as (gerund)


communiciation - email, internet phone,
information / research/ news
online booking - eurostar
entertainment - itunes, music video -youtube
social networking -facebook

fraud
porno - children
virus
content control -nazis


drug testing
dogs for the blind
food: cow, sheep, pig //swine flu?
entertainment: horse, sports, gambling, zoo (education),
violent entertainment: bullfights, dogfights


HOMEWORK
write 2 task 1 passage p.30-32
write task 2 essay from the sample essay section.
VOCABULARY
In the event of an accident



CORRECTIONS
plural s on the end of plural nouns.
verbs s when 3rd person
spelling of: programme or program
factory
conclusion: use I believe or think not argue

MBA IELTS: Tamara (writing task 1) 20.7.9

ATTENDEES
        ✓Tamara

OBJECTIVE

• To learn the structure of Task 1 responses
• To practice responses to several Task 1 responses

MATERIALS


        
NOTES
Dear Sir or Madam,

Re: An Abandoned Car

I’m writing about a vehicle that was left in our block of flats a couple of weeks ago. The car I’m referring to is an old red Ford Focus, now with severely damaged trunk that has been standing there for weeks.
Namely, although the Council was already informed about this issue by telephone, so far nothing has been done about it.
I would like to draw your attention to the fact that it is standing in a rather busy street and is already causing problems to several drivers which have been forced to take extensive detours because they couldn’t turn in a small alley obstructed by the mentioned vehicle.
I hope that you find this as worrying as the residents of the Block and that this problem will be addressed soon, hopefully by sending appropriate services to remove the obstructing car from our neighborhood.

Yours faithfully,
Tamara



Dear Steve

Re: recommendation letter

How are you? Are the students as worrying as me and my contemporaries?

Hopefully you have forgotten about the fire in the dorm episode, but your memory still serves you well enough to remember the good times.

Speaking about selective memory, I would like to share the details of my new -potential- job: I’ve applied for a position as a scientist at Queen Mary’s London, which deals mostly with selective memory of T-cells.

The reason I’m I really interested in the role stems from your intriguing series of lecturers on the immune system. I hope you will share my enthusiasm for this post by writing me a recommendation letter in which you will mention our uni-biology curriculum, as well as your personal character reference.

best wishes
Tamara

MBA IELTS: Hadar (writing task 1) 20.7.9

ATTENDEES
        ✓Hadar

OBJECTIVE

• To learn the structure of Task 1 responses
• To practice responses to several Task 1 responses

MATERIALS
        ❑        Information for Candidates March 2009
        ❑        New Insight into IELTS
                ❑        Writing Unit 1 p.95
                ❑        Writing Unit 2
                ❑        Writing Unit 3
                ❑        Writing Unit 4

        
NOTES

15 out of 30 students found the movie to be less than okay.



The most popular view is that the movie wasn’t very good.
The Least “ ” “ ”was actually good

The PC shows the percentage sales of various products in Bob’s music store.
The most popular product is DVD’s with sixty per cent of the total sales.
The least popular product is posters: it has only 5%.
The percentage of CD’s sold is the 2nd least popular.

The table gives information about the way students travel to school in 3 countries -Britain, Australia & signapore.
The table shows the different means students travel to school in 3 different countries: B, A, S.

The most obvious figure is that both in B & A the most commonly used means of transport is a car, with 65%, while in Singapore, only 10% of students chose to use a car. Another important figure that stands out is the number of students using public transport in Singapore: sixty-five per cent.




The graph give figures about people who own cars beteem 1960 to 2000.
The graph shows the dramatic increase of people owning cars between...
The major trend is a fifteen-fold increase in the number of car owners during the period.



The diagram shows the way CO2 is produced and damages sea life. The diagram predicts that acid level in the sea will be highly dangerous by the year 2100.
Firstly, fossil fuels, are burnt in factories. They release billions of tones of C02 into the air every year. This poisonous gas is dissolved into the sea making it acidic....

The graph shows the significant rise in the number of tourists visiting Brazil between 1995 and 2000 (inclusive).In this period the number of tourists increases by over 150%.


The table shows the fluctuation in the number of Japanese tourists traveling abroad.
The table shows the fluctuating figures in the ....
One can clearly see that August and September are the most popular months, this is probably due to the summer vacation during this period.



nation
creation
international


---
A sharp increase
To increase sharply
-------
becomes steeper


The graph shows the dramatic fall in the percentage of new employees hired between 1997 to the present [till now]. The major trend is the decline in this number by a factor of three over the period.

The graph gives figures about the average office hours worked from the year 2000 till now
The graph shows the steady increase of office working hours from....
The main trend is a slight increase of twenty per cent over the years.








The graph shows the gentle increase of overweight women and men, during the last 14 years. The major trend in the division of gender is that the percentage of men who were obese was smaller than the obese women before 2004, whereas more men were obese than women after that.

To sum up, more men are obese now then women, while the situation was the opposite previously.


VOCABULARY
least ant. most
per cent
trend
respectively: Isreal and America have the largest numbers of Jewish citizens, with X and y per cent respectively.
x-fold = 1960: 10 1980: 100 = A ten-fold increase
carbon-dioxide
process
annual - yearly
anniversary
inclusive
abroad
prevalence - the frequency

MBA TOEFL: Sebastian (READING 1) 20.7.9

ATTENDEES
        ✓        Sebastian

OBJECTIVES

• to acquire key techniques for the speaking part of the TOEFL exam

MATERIAL
        ✓        TOEFL tips (reading)
        ✓        Bruce Rogers IBT2007
                ✓        Introduction SPK (Indpendent) p.6
                ✓        Lesson 15: Personal Preference [task 1] p.16
                ✓        Lesson 16: Paired Choice [task 2] p.24
                ❑        Introduction SPK (Integrated) p.36
                ❑        Preview Test SPK (integrated) p.46
                ✓        Lesson 17: Announcement [task 3] p.51
                ✓        Lesson 18: Passage/Lecture [task 4] p.72
                ✓        Lesson 19: Problem / Solution [task 5] p.90
                ✓        Lesson 20: Summary [task 6] p.106
                ❑        Review Test SPK p.121        

NOTES
personalize 1,2, 5

TASK 2
“If given the choice between A and B, I prefer...”
-state preference
-reason 1
-reason 2 (+/-) -critique
-don’t choose a 3rd alternative
-

TASK 3
-Use the announcement to contextualize and anticipate the subject
-Directly answer the question
-summarize the main reaction
-Outline (paraphrase don’t repeat)
        ❑        -use tickboxes in your notes with crosses and ticks to show consent and disagreement

TASK 4
-Topic of the passage
-Topic/argument of the listening and the relationship with the passage
-summary of reading passage
-summary of listening
-connection between the two


TASK 5
-problem
- 2 solutions
-your choice
-reason 1 (+)
-reason 2 (+/-)

VOCABULARY
analogue

errors
experiment = experience(d)
feel = felt
a countryside = the countryside
enjoy an announcement = he thinks it’s a good idea
books who = books which
homerkop = (when talking about a species in the singular) the homerkop -but you’re applying as a rule to all animals of that species.