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So what we're going to be talking about in these next three lectures are the three C's cohesion, coherence

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and concise.

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These are the big three C's that you need to know how to do well in order to score at a high mark on

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the writing section.

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Cohesive, cohesive writing is is something that graders really, really appreciate.

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Coherence is something that's expected in writing concisely is a high level English skill that is extremely

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impressive.

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So if you can really work on mastering these three general English skills is going to definitely help

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your exam score.

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So let's take a look at it.

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So first up, we're going to talk about what is cohesive writing and then after cohesive writing will

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move into coherence.

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And after that, we'll talk about concise writing.

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So cohesion.

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When you talk about cohesion, we're talking about the grammatical aspects of writing is extremely,

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extremely important because cohesion affects the tone of your writing, right?

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It deals with the connection of your ideas at the sentence and paragraph level.

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So when you have really, really good cohesion, that's something that brings everything together.

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So your ideas are linked together and you're using language that's helping you to be able to answer

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the question directly and clearly throughout the entire essay.

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So cohesion is a very important, very important writing skill that students need to know how to do

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well.

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A text will have cohesion.

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F is clearly organized, right?

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So sometimes I can spot an essay that's going to lack cohesion when I see a bad thesis statement.

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When I see a bad thesis statement or I see like a general thesis statement, there's not that doesn't

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have any specificity at all.

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I know there's about to be a cohesion problem when I see a student that can't write topic sentences.

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I know there's going to be a cohesion problem.

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Right.

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So cohesion is dealing with words and phrases that like signpost.

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Signpost is like the stop sign.

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Or it's like a yield sign.

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It gives you direction of where to go.

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Cohesive writing, as I said earlier, is the glue.

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It keeps it all together.

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It makes your essay.

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Easy to read.

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Easy to read.

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You know, when you see an essay that's easy to read.

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That means that it has a high level of cohesion.

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These are my three big tips for cohesion and coherence.

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Very often I talk about these two together because they go hand in hand.

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Okay.

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So write a proper thesis statement.

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Right.

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If you write a proper thesis statement, you increase your ability to have cohesion.

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Writing a great outline and making sure each section of the essay is connected.

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These are different cohesion devices.

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OC conjunctions.

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Great cohesive devices.

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Very often students write sentences and they're missing conjunctions.

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When you're missing conjunctions, you're damaging your cohesion.

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Punctuation.

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Proper punctuation, since it's sentence connective sentence frames.

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Right.

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So these are all cohesive devices.

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Conjunctions are great again because they show.

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The links between your ideas.

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Punctuation is important because it helps you know where you stop and go and where do you pause your

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sentence, connect lives, help you to be able to transition from idea to idea, and your sentence frames

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act like signposting.

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So if you want to have really good cohesion, these are the devices that you need to be able to use

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very well.

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Repetition.

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Right.

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So some people say, well, it's not good to be repetitive.

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Sometimes repetition is great for cohesion, but you can't be you can't be overly repetitive, right?

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Sometimes when you're overly repetitive, especially on an English test, it shows you have a lack of

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ability.

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But here we're being repetitive with a very specific word combination modern art.

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Right.

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So by me repeating this in the first sentence and the second sentence, I'm using repetition in a way

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that is cohesive.

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Synonyms.

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Synonyms and paraphrasing.

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Right.

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Synonyms are words that have the same meaning and provide provide variety in your word, choices.

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Right.

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You see, it says they're avoiding repetition.

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Because really repetition is something that should be used very, very specifically with very, very

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specific language that doesn't really have synonyms.

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Now here's an example below.

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You see, in the first sentence, we have the word myths, and then in the second sentence, we use

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the words traditional narratives.

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That's an example of using synonym language.

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That type of synonym language builds cohesion.

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Pronouns, right?

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Effective use of pronouns is so, so important.

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So important because it's an English skill, everybody.

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Right.

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And remember, this is an English test.

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So look at what I have here at the bottom.

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When psychological and psychological counseling devices do not work out as expected, they are often

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considered a failure until the right doctor is located to try again.

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Those that work better, those that work out better the second time often lead to positive results.

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That is what cohesive that that that is what cohesive writing looks like.

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That is what cohesive writing looks like.

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Everyone repeated parallel structure, really, really important.

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Right.

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Really, really important.

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When editing your writing, notice what you have repeated, what you have omitted, and what you have

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not expressed clearly.

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That is called repeated parallel structure.

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Repeated parallel structure is evidence of cohesion.

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Transitions.

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Most of you know, transitions.

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I'm not going to read this paragraph here, but most students, when they think about the word cohesion,

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they think about transitions.

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And they overly used transitions.

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Now, this example here.

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Is.

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I wouldn't use this many examples, this many transitions.

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I'm just using these transitions here to give you an example of transitional language.

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But the big problem.

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Is that most students only think about cohesion.

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And the only thing about transitions when it comes to cohesion and there are transitions, there's repeated

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parallel structure.

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They're pronouns, they're synonyms, and there's repetition of specific language.

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All of these combined together really build cohesion.

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It's not just about transitions.

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It's not just about transitions.

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Everybody.

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I'm not going to read this, but this is an example of transitional language.

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You can look at these two paragraphs and look at how the paragraph at the bottom uses transition language

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and how it's easier to understand because of that transition.

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So take a look at that and get a good idea of how transitions are.

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Okay, everybody.

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And here we have an example of low or basic level cohesion.

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And I know a lot of you are going to look at this and say, well, the sentences are well written.

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Why is this a low score?

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Right.

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Something can be well written and written correctly, but the level of English demonstrated is a low

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level.

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Right.

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So this doesn't have any cohesive, cohesive device.

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This is just a series of short, simple sentences.

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Is a series of short, simple sentences.

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And also it has fragments.

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Here's that same paragraph.

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That has a good or intermediate level of cohesion.

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Here's that same paragraph with a high score advanced level of cohesion.

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Now I know some of you are saying, well, I want to see them all together.

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I can't really see them separated like this.

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Don't worry about that.

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Here it is.

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Right.

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Look at example one.

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Example two.

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An example three.

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Look at it.

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Look at the difference between between a low score of cohesion, a good score of cohesion, and a high

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score of cohesion.

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When we talk about cohesion, this is what we're talking about.

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So thank you very much for joining me in this discussion on cohesion and I hope that it was beneficial

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for you.

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Thanks a lot and talk to you soon.

