Hey guys! Welcome back to my channel!
I'm Cana
So this week has been very encouraging for me
I see my channel growing and I want to thank you guys
and
A lot of people have been asking about
how I use TOEFL writing templates
I have not had the time in June and July
to construct an original template to share with you all
but I do want to help you guys
I know that a lot of you are taking the test
in June, July, and August
and you need some reference on this topic
So I went online yesterday
and I went online and found quite a few templates
The links are include down in the description box
What I want to share with you today is
exactly how I utilize my templates
and how you should construct your essays
Now let's begin
So there's five things that I would like to share with you today.
The first thing is
When you go "template shopping" online (LOL)
Just choose two first
One for the Integrative Essay
and the other for Independent essay
so you need two in total
Two templates.
Once you've chosen one for each type of essay
I recommend that you memorize the whole thing
One way of determining whether you have fully memorized your templates
(By the way, this tip is what I tell my own students as well)
is to test yourself if you can type out a template in five minutes
and it needs to be EXACTLY the same
Now don't freak out
I'm not asking you to just memorize the template
and use it as is in the test
NO.
Memorizing template is more like
a more efficient way for you to type a the structure of an essay
but keep in mind this is just the first step.
So, again. Please make sure you can type out the two templates you've chosen within 10 min.
If you find it hard to do so,
it probably means you're not familiar enough with the templates.
Let's make sure theses templates are IMPRINTED in your brain!
However, if you feel like you're quite familiar with the templates
but you're having a hard time typing quickly,
please know that the TOEFL ibt is a computer based test.
so please make you sure spend time practice typing in English
I have included the link to my favorite typing practice website in the description box
I'm not a very fast typer
but I did find the practice on this site to be very helpful
What I do is practice typing 10 to 15 min per day
If you continue to practice for about a month or two
your typing speed WILL improve
That was how I improved my typing speed.
so I recommend that to you guys
The second thing is
When you're utilizing your template
and trying to insert your content into the blank areas of the template
avoid extending sentences with words like
"which is" or "in which"
because you'll have a higher chance of making a grammatical mistake
This is why I recommend constructing shorter sentences for beginners
You may be wondering "What? Really?"
"Can we really get high scores with simple sentence structures?
"Don't we need advance content to achieve high scores?"
Well, actually, no.
In my experience
Constructing simpler sentences will decrease the possibilities of grammatical error.
Additionally,
simpler sentences are easier to comprehend
The ideas you're trying to convey will be easily understood.
so that's what I recommend for you guys
Of course, if you are an advance English learner
you certainly don't need to do so.
However, if you are a beginner or an intermediate learner
definitely try to write simpler sentences
If you want to make your sentences look more advanced
you can add phrases like
Transitional phrases like these will
will make your simple sentences
look more advanced.
Hey guys! Sorry for the interruption of the video.
Let me show you a few examples.
This video was made very last minute
I didn't expect so many of you
to be interested in how I use my templates
Let me demonstrate how I use my templates
to give you guys a clearer idea of
what I mean by writing in simpler sentence structures.
but if you already know what I mean,
feel free to skip this section
but for those that are not so sure of what I mean by
"writing simple/ short sentences"
Let's take a look at the first sentence.
So
This is what I mean by...
These are all sentences that my student wrote btw
As you can see
The student is trying to use a more advance sentence structure
but he hasn't mastered this peticular grammar rule yet
He has therefore, unfortunately, made a grammatical mistake.
In cases like this, I would recommend you guys
to simplify your sentence into two shorter sentences
so
If you take a look at the second sentence
period.
Can you tell what I mean?
constructing shorter sentences like this
will lower the possibility of a grammatical error
and the vocabulary required to construct this sentence
is still exactly the same
You will be able to use the vocabulary your're most comfortable with
Now let's take a look at the second sentence
This is another example of
writing in simple sentence stucture
So the first sentence says
So, again, there are some grammatical error in this sentence
but I'm not going to delve into grammar correction today
Please note that there are some grammatical mistakes in this sentence.
If you find yourself making mistakes like this
what I would suggest is
since we're working on speed and fluidity
just shorten your sentences.
So the second sentence is the revised version
See how the vocabulary is still the same
and the sentence structure is simplified
but it doesn't really make the sentence ...
how should I put this...
it doesn't make the sentence look too basic.
Now let's take a look at a third example
So the first thing is
You can definitely tell the student is trying to express a lot of ideas
but if you look closely
You'd probably notice that the sentence is too long
Now, when you're constructing your essay
and you notice your writing looks a bit like this example
Of course
you'll need to work on your punctuation.
but most importantly
the length of your sentences (if you're a beginner)
should be about half of that example sentence
If you take a look at the example
I've divided the lengthy sentence in half
So, basically, your sentence shouldn't be longer than this
If you do write sentence longer than this
what you can do is revise it
Don't worry if your sentence look too lengthy
just take a few seconds to think about
how you can shorten them
Usually when you chunk your lengthy sentences
you can avoid making certain grammatical errors
Now the third thing that I'd like to share is
whether you need to use advance vocabulary
to ace the TOEFL test.
I think the answer is
Meh... not really.
A lot of the students who scored well
don't apply much advance vocab in their essays
Like for instance,
I don't really use a lot of vocabulary
However, I've prepared a few...
examples to illustrate my point.
so for instance
Take the word "suitable" for example
Beginners would probably come up with the word "good"
intermediate may think of "suitable"
and advance learners may employ the word"adequate"
If, as a learner,
you have not learned the word "adequate" yet
you'll still be able to get a decent score
with the word "suitable"
So remember. When you're practicing TOEFL essays
but you're not familiar with the templates yet
or
if you aren't able to come up with ideas quickly
don't waste time trying to find the most advanced words
Don't bother yourself with concerns like
"I know the intermediate word ,but what the more advance version?"
because then you'll just get stuck again.
Just go with the middle level vocabulary
and then gradually work your way up.
So step two is to
find that middle ground
Don't beat yourself up on vocab usage
Another thing that I would like to share with you is
ways to come up with thoughts and ideas efficiently
when writing TOEFL essays.
I shared a bit of how I practiced this in my
"How I got 119 on TOEFL" video
You really need to practice reasoning.
When it comes to reasoning
at least for TOEFL essays
there are certain step you can take
Whenever you're faced with an essay topic
okay, take this for example
Which is better? E-books or paperback books?
When you see a topic like this
I would recommend giving yourself ten seconds
to come up with two simple reasons for your stance
and please remember
it should be only one sentence long
So, let me demonstrate.
Which one is better?
electronic books or paperback books?
For me,
I think I would prefer paperback books
Now, I'm going to give you two reasons
and yours should look like this.
The first reason is because
This is my first reason
The second reason that I can think of is
Period.
As you can see, I kept my reasons succinct.
Another thing to remember is
not to give too much background info
before you state your reasons for your stance
I see this a lot with my students
If you go down that path and be like
"When we students start to use these kind of books..."
"The lights would be very bright blah blah..."
Readers end up not getting your point at all
and you'll drown in your own essay
You might not even remember what your point is.
So I recommend that you guys practice
quickly coming up with two reasons for your stance
during every TOEFL writing practice
Jot down your reasons FIRST
before providing your supporting details.
No matter if it's a personal experience
or any other supporting evidence
Although you won't be constructing an essay
with the most advance structure,
you might still be able to reach the intermediate level
Okay.
The last step that I would like to share with you guys is
when A, you have memorized your two templates
B, you are now confident with constructing clear sentences
C, you have good command of your vocab
and lastly, you have practiced your reasoning
to a point where
you can quickly come up with many
clear, persuasive, and succinct reasons.
What is the last step
to preparing your TOEFL writing test?
Now
let's go back to the first point
where I told you guys that
you need to memorize your templates
and be able to type them out in five minutes
Now the last step is
to start analyzing your templates
Try to customize your templates.
For instance,
I talked about this in my last TOEFL video
Words like
"suggest"
You can probably change it to "states"
"claims"
"argues"
and for sentences that start with "Even though"
You could change it to "While it is argued that..."
By modifying the words and sentence structure
of your essay
Try to make changes here and there
add a bit of your personal flavor to your template
Allow your charisma to shine through your essay
For the long run, this can be beneficial
because once you study abroad
you're still going to need that ability
to construct good essays ,right?
As for short term benefits
there's another crucial reason to modifying your template
This will ensure you don't come up with the same exact essay
as the other students that have also memorized templates.
If everyone memorizes and uses the same template.
It's going to very obvious
because everyone is typing out the same thing
So remember to change it(template) up a bit
Make it your own essay
Now I'm going to show you
what I mean by adding flavor
or changing your template
to make it your own writing.
Lets take a look at an excerpt
of a template from the New Oriental website
We're going to use same topic
"Whether ebooks will replace paperback books"
The original template provides the first blank for students
to fill in the topic of the essay
so all you have to do is state the topic
Then the following sentence says
So what you'll need to do is
fill in your stance in the second blank
and then it says "however...
Again, if you're a beginner with using templates
and you happen to like this template
then find time to memorize it
and make sure you can quickly utilize it in your essay
When you do reach the last phase of preparing your TOEFL writing with templates
it should look like the following paragraph
I have revised the template according to my preference
If you take a look at my revised version
the red words
This is a phrase I mentioned in my other TOEFL video
"There has been constant drumbeat over..."
This is a sentence I came across while reading
and I'm sure you'll also find sentences you like
during your preparation for the TOEFL test
Once you've incorporated you favorite phrases
or sentences into your template
simply state your stance
so essentially, the structure is pretty much the same
All I did was incorporate my sentences that appealed to me
Now if you take a look at the second sentence from New Oriental template
you can see it contains the word "I"
I personally prefer not to use I in my essays
because I somehow feel like
making claims with "I" just doesn't seem convincing.
So I avoid using the word "I" as much as I can.
If you take a look at the example on the bottom
I revised the original template and omitted the word "I "
So now my version says
Even though my sentence no longer includes the word "I"
I've still managed to convey my opinion
stating that I believe many benefit
come with using paperback books.
Same going with the following sentences
The New Oriental template says " For this point..."
What I've done is make it into an independent sentence.
So, see?
My revised version doesn't really look like the original template
but the structure is actually very similar
If you didn't memorize a template
before attempting to construct essays
it would probably more challenging.
However, if you do memorize templates
and later modify them
it would not only be less stressful
but also more efficient.
So I hope this kind of shows you guys
what I mean by
adding a bit of your own style
what you like
into your template
and I'm so happy, again
to be able to meet all you friends
here
and I hope that you found the
information that I shared with you
sufficient enough for you to kinda
start prepare your test
Now, if you have any other questions
Feel free to comment down below
I'm so happy to see you guys leave me comments
and discuss about
you know
what you guys want to learn
English wise