What’s wrong with these phrases?

As per Ms. Santos’s instruction…

This is in acknowledgment of the receipt of your letter dated…
Please do not hesitate to contact our office…
It is a necessary requirement to…
This report is for documentation purposes.
We will be making an ocular inspection of your office….
The reason why is that
It’s for free.
For further clarifications with our request
Irregardless of the situation
Noted. / Duly noted.
Failure to comply will be met with sanctions.
Flush the toilet. Clean up your own mess. Your mom isn’t here.
 Common Errors/Tendencies

1. Overly formal
This is to acknowledge receipt of your letter dated…
Please do not hesitate to contact our office… Result?
Writing that is
2. Wordiness (cliches, jargons, big/official words) • Unclear/Vague
It is a necessary requirement to… • Boring/Tiresome
This report is for documentation purposes. • Unprofessional
It’s for free.
We will be making an ocular inspection of your office…. Leads to:
As per… • Misunderstanding
• Conflict
4. Nonstandard/Substandard grammar/vocabulary • Failure

5. Irrelevant details

6. Indirectness
 Most business
writing is
persuasive
writing
-in business writing, you write to persuade
to create an effect/impact in the way someone thinks
or acts regarding your or their work/company
Why are these forms of business writing
persuasive?

Resume/CV
Request letter
Complaint letter
Solicitation letter
Recommendation letter
Bill Notice
Memorandum
Accomplishment Report
Annual Report
A casual ‘how are you’ letter to a client
Because business writing
is persuasive writing,
it is essential to use…

The Standard
Writing Process grammar

4 Cs:
Clear Appropriate
Concise language
Confident
Courteous
Building
Grammatical Competence
in Writing
 Articles

I have horse of my own. I call her Pretty Girl. She is

intelligent animal, but she is not thoroughbred horse.
I could never enter her in race, even if I wanted to.
But I do not want to. She is companion, for my own
pleasure. I took her swimming day or two ago.

Exercise:
1. Get a hard copy of the articles exercise.
2. Insert a, an, the whenever needed.
 Adjective or Adverb ?

1. Speak (soft, softly) or don’t speak at all.

2. You must send payments (regular, regularly).
3. He can speak (good, well).
4. Dennis plays tennis as (good, well) as Bruce.
5. We deal with clients on a (strict, strictly) cash basis.

6. You can see the mountains _____ with these binoculars. (clear)
7. When you’re a parent, you’ll think _____ about children. (different)
8. I feel ____ enough to go out at night. (safe)
9. Her perfume smells _____. (terrible)
10. I felt ____ (bad) about not having done _____ (good) in the exams.
 Subject + Verb Agreement

1. Everyone (is, are) here.

2. A few people (is, are) late.
3. The information you sent (is, are) very useful.
4. My pants (is, are) too tight.
4. None of the customers (is, are) willing to wait.
5. None of the work he did (is, are) acceptable.
6. One of the boxes (is, are) labelled “fragile”.
7. Lisa, along with her friends, (has, have) dinner here often.
8. The team (deal, deals) with failure calmly.
9. The team (tend, tends) to fight among themselves.
10. Susan is a woman who (think, thinks) like a leader.
11. Susan is one of the women who (think, thinks) like a leader.
 Count and NonCount Nouns
1. I have a lot of (paperwork, paperworks) to process.
2. We only use recycled (paper, papers) at the office.
3. I left some important (paper, papers) at the office.
4. Can I have some (water, waters), please?
5. Foreign ships can’t enter the country’s territorial (water, waters).
6. We get little (information, informations) from the government.
7. Her house has some fine (furniture, furnitures).
8. The workers loaded the (equipment, equipments) in the truck.
9. The manager is excellent at giving (advice, advices) to her staff.
10. The (staff, staffs) here at AmericanEnglish are nice and friendly.
 Quantifiers

A few employees signed the petition for a four-day work week.

Few employees signed the petition for a four-day work week.

(emphasizing only a small number)
Quite a few employees signed the petition for a four-day work week.
(a large number)

1. He studied hard for the test so he made (few, a few) errors.

2. He didn’t know the route so he made (few, a few) wrong turns.
Dear Mr. Lim,
Good day sir, We sincerely apologized to the error that had
been occured on your credit card bill. Our company is willing
to give you a VIP privilege card for detecting the error on our
system.
As we recieved your complaint, We quickly check our system
to find if there is any more errors. As of this moment our
accounting department is improving our system to avoid
further inconvenience of our clients.
If you have any question please call me at 522-0000 loc 222
Sincerely,
Emerson G. Manuel
Manager, ABC Express
Writing Good Sentences
 Simple and Compound Sentences
Clause = noun phrase + verb phrase

The children + are playing.

I + will go.

Simple Sentence = 1 clause

The loan was approved.

All the participants are learning English.
Lito and Jenna will review your financial statements tomorrow.
I enjoyed the movie.
The company’s stock price rose in the stock market yesterday.

Compound Sentence = 2 clauses or more (joined by and, or, nor, but, so, then, yet)
I shouted and everybody waved.

Turn these simple sentences into one compound sentence.

We arrived early. We had breakfast downstairs.
We arrived late. We tried to take the elevator up. The elevator didn’t work.
 Turning Simple to Compound Sentences

I enjoyed the movie. It was very interesting. Using only simple

We looked everywhere. We didn’t find him.
sentences makes your
writing look amateurish
They are coming by car. They should be here soon. and tedious.

He left the house early. He got to work late. Use a combination of

We ordered 30 boxes. They delivered 25 boxes.
simple and compound
sentences

Use compound
sentences
 Complex Sentences
Complex sentence = 2 clauses (or more)
= 1 main clause + 1 or more adverbial clause
ADVERBIAL CLAUSES COMMON CONJUNCTIONS
Contrast clauses although; though; even though; while;
Reason clauses because; since; as
Place clauses where; wherever; everywhere
Purpose clauses so that; so; because + want
Result clauses so that; so … that; such … that
when; before; after; since; while; as; as
Time clauses
soon as; by the time; until
Conditional clauses if; unless; provided (that); as long as

Examples:
Her father died when she was very young.
She had a difficult childhood because her father died when she was very young.
Although she has always lived in France, she speaks fluent English because her
mother was American and her father was Canadian.
 Put the right conjunctions in the blanks.
By the time wherever provided that so
Since so that While the way

1. ________________ I am, I always think of you.

2. I’ll go _____________ I can sit in front.
3. I like _____________ she sings.
4. She never leaves home without her phone, ______ she can be
reached anytime.
5. ______________ I get to New York, he’ll be gone.
6. ______________ I have nothing to say, I’ll remain silent.
7. It rained ____________ much ____________ the streets were
soon flooded.
8. ___________ pandas may look cute, they don’t make very
good pets.
 Parallel Structure

My degree, my work experience and ability to work

under pressure make me a suitable candidate for the
job.

I can do the following:

1. Prepare proposals
2. Material purchasing
3. Filing of records
4. Processed applications
The Writing Process

5 Format,
Proofread

4
5 Revise

3 Draft

2
2. Purpose
1 1. Audience
Five-Step Writing Process
• Know your audience
– Above or below in rank?
– One or many? (primary and secondary audiences)
– What is my relationship with the audience?
– What is the most likely reaction? (effect, expectations)
– Cultural norms/etiquette

• Understand your purpose

– What do I want to achieve?
– What do I need to say to achieve it (content)?
– How do I convey this content best? (form, style, tone)?

• Drafting (inc. making an outline)

• Revising (can include feedback gathering)
• Formatting and Proofreading
The Writing Process
Steps 1 and 2 very
1. Analyze your audience important to decide on
- internal/external? rank? one or many? a. content and emphasis
knowledge? relationship? likely reaction?
b. style
cultural norms?
• approach
2. Understand your purpose • tone
- inform, request, persuade, command, • formality
express feeling/opinion, socialize?
3. Draft –
• outline if needed 4. Revise – go back to 1 and 2; revise
• write easy parts first for content, style, 4 Cs

• don’t edit much 5. Format, Proofread

- Font styles, pagination,
• avoid perfectionist eye heading/subheadings,
What do I need to say to achieve my numbering/bulleting, alignment
- Spelling, punctuation, grammar and so
purpose?
on
How do I say it best for my audience?
Exercise:

1. Divide into small groups

2. Identify the audience/s you mostly write to:
What do you know about them as a group/in general?
3. Identify your top 3-5 reasons/purposes for writing:
- request? what?
- Inform? what?
4. What effect/impact do you want to make when you write?
 1.Clear
2. Concrete
8 Cs of 3. Concise
Good 4. Complete
Writing 5. Correct
6. C
7. CONFIDENT
8.Courteous