More Great ELL Resources From Kenneth Beare

Writing Compound and Complex Sentences This week's newsletter includes a review of compound and complex sentences for writing compound complex sentences. There's also some helpful tips on using DVDs creatively to improve your English. There are also resources for Halloween at the end of the month, and an exercise on using word stress to improve your pronunciation skills.  Kenneth Beare English as 2nd Language Expert

Halloween Resources Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. I love the playful nature of the holiday with all its ghosts and goblins, parties, fun traditions and the smell of fall in the air. These Halloween exercises will help you improve your vocabulary and understand this holiday. Advanced students will find the classic frightening tale "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe challenging. The reading includes vocabulary reference help for the more difficult words explained following each section of the poem.

Using DVDs to Learn English Watching DVDs provides a unique opportunity for English learners to improve comprehension and vocabulary skills. Most DVDs provide original English language sound tracks, as well as sound tracks in different foreign languages. Most of these DVDs also provide English subtitles. However, just watching a film or sitcom in English or with subtitles doesn't take full advantage of the learning opportunity. Use these tips to get the most out of your DVDs to improve English.

Using Intonation and Stress to Improve Pronunciation Correct intonation and stress are the key to speaking English fluently with good pronunciation. Intonation and stress refers to the music of the English language. Words that are stressed are key to understanding and using the correct intonation brings out the meaning. After students have learned basic consonant and vowel sounds, they should move on to learning to differentiate between individual sounds by using minimal pairs.

Practice Writing Compound Complex Sentences There are three types of sentences in English: Simple, compound and complex sentences. This worksheet focuses on writing compound complex sentences and is ideal for advanced level classes. Compound sentences use coordinating conjunctions also known as FANBOYS (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so) to connect two simple sentences. Remember to place a comma before the coordinating conjunction. Complex sentences combine one dependent and one independent clause through the use of subordinating conjunctions such as because, though, as, while, if, etc these are also known as dependent adverb clauses.