New Ideas for English Writing (High School)

Author: Chen Jinzhi Chen Jue
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-07-01
Features: The purpose of the college entrance examination English writing test is to assess candidates' comprehensive written expression skills. Although different high schools adopt different textbooks during the senior high school stage (such as unified textbooks, Oxford English, and New Century English), and the writing test formats are diverse (including letters, notices, narrative essays, argumentative essays, picture description, and chart-based essays), their basic requirements remain consistent: candidates should fully utilize the English knowledge they have learned to write short essays of more than 120 words with clear viewpoints, sufficient reasoning, rich content, correct language, fluent expression, and slight variations. Due to various reasons, senior high school students, especially those in their final year, have done a lot of simulated test exercises during their review before the college entrance examination. However, many students only focus on the grammar and vocabulary sections of the test papers. As for the reading comprehension, cloze test, Chinese-to-English translation, and English writing sections, they are often "ignored." Among these four ignored sections, writing is the most neglected. Frequently, in the answer key, one can see the word "ignored." If the setters themselves "ignore" the reference answers for writing, which student would have the time and motivation to "seek self-torture"? What is the purpose of learning English in senior high school? Is it to be satisfied with doing various objective questions, or to truly learn to use English for both spoken and written expression? Nowadays, English tests both domestically and internationally have strengthened the assessment of expression skills, especially writing skills. Therefore, students who hope to score more on objective questions but do not put in effort for subjective writing tasks must seriously consider how to improve their English writing skills. However, improving English writing skills cannot be achieved through short-term cramming or intensive training—it does not help to solve the problem in the long run. Senior high school students should start focusing on writing skills training from the foundation stage in their first year of senior high school, guided by their teachers, and prioritize improving writing skills as a key agenda. In the past, people said, "The seven characters 'zhī, hū, zhě, yě, yān, ěr, zāi' can arrange a scholar's elegance." Today, we say, "The seven letters 'A, B, C, D, E, F, G' can arrange literary talent." We sincerely hope that this book can serve as a guide, help, and inspiration for improving senior high school students' English writing skills. Any inaccuracies in this book are kindly requested to be pointed out by experts, scholars, and teachers.