Tips for Reading Posted by Terri

Here are six tips for reading.

1. Read and never lose your wonder in seeking meaning.
2. Read with a purpose, follow the argument/s or story plot/s not the details.
3. Have fun in reading, time your reading if you have a timer around. By reading faster, one can make the reading process more challenging. Reading fast can also keep you awake because you must concentrate more.
4. Use a pencil tip to help your eyes scan the text in phrases, and always move forward as fast as as possible.
5. Speed up your reading by practise reading, reading, and reading. Progressively learn to see and comprehend more and more words ( i.e. from 3 to 10 words) at a time.
6. Target yourself to read at an average speed of 200 words per minute to a more advanced speed of 800 wpm.
   

My dairy - To cherish what you have

We always have dinner with my mother-in-law every Saturday.


Tonight, she showed us a photo which included some of her old classmates. In fact, they're also the old classmates of my father-in-law who past away last year. She told us that they had already lost three members in the photo upto now. She was upset to think that the remaining members will past away one by one in the near future.

I feel upset too because that's really ture and this couldn't be changed by anyone. So we can only comfort her. She can arrange more gatherings, possibily as many as they can, so to cherish what they still have.

My diary - Independence day of my child

I'll say today is the 'Independence day' of my boy. To be honest, it's exaggerate to say like this. And of course it's not anything about the Independence Day in US. It's just because my boy went to visit the Hong Kong Observatory under the guidance of a youth centre.

He hadn't gone anywhere under the guidance of a strange organizer before. He did go for similar visits with his parents of course. It is his first visit to somewhere under the organizer by his school as well. That's why the visit today would be a new experience for him to go with strange leaders & members.


In my opinion, it's my responsibility to build up my boy to be a brave and self-dependent child. Besides, he need to learn how to communicate with new friends. So I hope the visit tour today would be his first step to go outside without his parents.

My diary - My son's China tour

Today, I was very happy to have my son back from his China tour.

He went to Fushan for four days with his grandma & grandpa. He really liked to go there because he could play with two of my cousins who live there. Although they were almost ten years older then my son, they still enjoy having fun together. They went swimming, played football, and talked about everything which they were interested in.

Although my son crid when he was about to leave. He looked very happy today when I was back home. I think he has a wonderful tour.

Story Plots

I am trying to work out the how eight types of plot you told me last week. After adopting and analysing the plot to read the novel , I think I can understant how they happened in a novel now.

In the story of Air Babylon, the Duty manager was informed that a snake was found in one of the plane which was just landed. It was found by a hostess when the plane was about to take off. After she saw its head in one of the locker, she had to control herself not to scream. She told other passengers there's a slight leak in the aircon. Then she took away the baggages very slowly and sealed the locker. Until all passengers disembarked, she informed the airline duty manager and the Customs officers. At last, it was taken by the staff of the Animal Reception Centre. In fact, it was brought on broad by a Thai passenger. However, no one could communicate with him because he didn't speak well in english. He brought it abroad with right paper work, but he didn't want to put it on hold. So he just put it in his rucksack and it went away.....

In this part, this story goes from Problem to Solution that the hostess found the snake then informed the right persons to catch it.

It also goes from Mystery to Solution that the hostess finally found the snake was brought in by a Thai passenger.

Moreover, the story goes from Conflict to Peace and from Danger to Safety that after the hostess saw the snake, she was so scared but she tried to calm herself down and not to scream. She had to keep everything as normal until all passengers disembarked. At last, she informed the duty manager and the snake was caught by the staff from the Animal Reception Centre.

After reading the above part in the novel, I understand that the writers always develop their stories by the 8 types of plot.

I have my study on fabric cotton. I know cotton is a kind of natural fibre from the cotton plant. One of the materials from the cotton plant called cellulose can usually be used to produce fabric. I get some information from the internet, it says, "cellulose is arranged in a way that gives cotton fibers a high degree of strength, durability, and absorbency." I also learnt that these substance can be made into cotton thread. The thread can made into different kinds of fabric by different ways of weaving.

I found it really interesting to make a primary observation on several kinds of fabric products. These products were made by different cottons using different ways of weaving. The outcomes of the weaving are very different kinds of fabric materials with unique appearances. Or I should say, the different ways of weaving make the cotton fibre produce their unique appearances. So that designers or factories owners can make many many different products for their customers. Now I'd like to introduce some common kinds of cotton fabric:
Plain
Satin
Houndstooth
Crinkle
Canvas
Voile
Swiss Dot
Burn Out
Seersucker
Foil Print
Twill
Dobby/Texture
Ottoman
Herringbone
Moleskin
Double wear

I'm going to find more information for each the above fabric & I'll also make a simple report later.

English Prosody and Sounds

Today, I learnt how English prosody works in speaking. I think it is important to start learning to speak by complying with the English prosody, or the natural intonation. In other words, I need to think and speak at the same time. The concept of thought groups is a helpful way to speak naturally. Units of English meaning usually comes in group of words, not in a single word.

I need to listen to or watch the videos or TV news to appreciate how native speakers express themselves in thought groups. To identify the key words in long sentences, I need to listen to the syllable that sounds longer, louder, and higher. When I am stressing the sound, I am giving myself time to think and express myself.

I also learnt that there are 44 phoneme sounds in English that come from the 26 alphabet letters. There are two main groups of sounds: 20 vowels and 24 consonants. I can practise and learn to sound them. This will help me to deal with the unknown words that I've never seen before.

The link that contains fashion terms can be found at http://elc.polyu.edu.hk/ITC/ .