UNIT 1:

PRELIMINARIES OF English for

READING AND WRITING Academic and
FOR ACADEMIC AND Professional
PROFESSIONAL Purposes
PURPOSES

Prepared by:
Kristine Ritchel M. Torres, LPT
According to Fisher and Frey
(2008)

➢Students of the 21st Century must

be able to locate, understand,
evaluate, and use written
information in their personal and
academic lives.
P
U
R ➢To inform - share information with
P their audience
O ➢To persuade - build goodwill with
S or enlist the help of their audience
E
A W
C R
A I
➢It is any writing done to fulfill a requirement of a
D T college or university. It also includes any writing
E I assignment given in an academic setting.

M N ➢It is used in most cases to teach someone how to

write or to teach them how to expand their
I G writing
C
List of documents where
academic writing is used:

1. Books and Book 5. Academic journal

Reports 6. Research Paper
2. Translations 7. Thesis
3. Essays 8. Dissertation
4. Conference paper
 PROFESSIONAL
WRITING
➢It is writing done in a workplace context to
enable and support the work of a company
➢(i.e, buying, selling, and making profits)
➢Professional Writing already taking you have
learned and applying it to real life scenarios.
List of documents where
professional writing is used:

1. Business Proposals
2. Market Analysis
3. Contracts
4. Inventory Reports
5. Business Reports
Writing is a form of communication
that is shaped by the following factors:

1. Topic – what is the text about?

2. Role – who am I as a writer? A sibling? A
student? A son/daughter? A customer?
3. Purpose – why am I writing this in the first
place?
4. Audience – who is reading this piece? What
knowledge does he/she need to understand in
my writing?
Topic, Role, Audience, and Purpose
influence the use of language.

➢There are four important features of language

use:
1. Formality
2. Objectivity
3. Explicitness
4. Caution
 Written Work #1:
A. Write the colloquial word/expression you found
on the sentence.

1. With the growing number of health-conscious articles, a lot of young

professionals are becoming serious about maintaining a healthy life-
style.
2. It is a bit improper to assume that the plan does not work.
3. Experts determined that a lot of health ingredients come from China.
4. Teachers say that a lot of incoming freshman students are interested in
sports activities.
5. Lucas got together with Castro in conducting an experiment on
effectively enhancing muscle buildup.
Written Work #1:
C. Substitute the single-word verb for the two-word
verb in the ff. sentences.
6. Oil price has gone up.
7. Major oil players put off oil price hike.
8. Employees did not put up with the company’s
expectations.
9. Parents could not put away money for their
children’s education.
10. The school get rid off tuition hike.
Formality …
➢Formality reflects your dignified stance in your
writing as a member of the academic
community.
➢Audience are fellow members of academic
community.
➢Language requires precision to make it a
“legitimate” piece of academic writing.
Formality can be achieved
through the following ways:

1. Choosing expanded modal forms over

contracted forms. (cannot instead of
can’t)
2. Choosing one verb form over two-word
verbs. (damage instead of mess up)
Formality can be achieved
through the following ways:

3. Choosing expanded terms over their

abbreviated equivalents. (as soon as
possible instead of ASAP)
4. Avoiding colloquial/trite/idiomatic
expressions.
Written Work #1:
1. Rewrite the following sentences to observe a more
formal tone.

1. Writing can’t be done effectively if you don’t

burn the midnight oil.
2. Parenting is a 24/7 job.
3. Watching that romcom gave the audience the
feels.
4. The class is cooking up something big.
5. Adventure may mean doing something epic.
Written Work #1:
C. Substitute the single-word verb for the two-word
verb in the ff. sentences.

1. Senate set up the Meralco committee.

2. Mothers cut down spending on rice.
3. Parents turned down the proposal.
4. The chemical gives off a foul odor.
5. The class carried out a research on the
frequency of using SMS.
Objectivity …
➢Academic writing requires special
knowledge and use of more complex
language and objectivity.
➢Writing must be impersonal and maintain a
certain level of social distance.
Objectivity can be achieved by:

1. Avoiding the use of personal pronouns

such as I, you and we.
➢You need to conduct the experiment.
➢The researchers need to conduct the
experiment.
Objectivity can be achieved by:

2. Avoiding rhetorical questions as it marks

“closeness” with the reader, and
constantly seeks his/her attention.
➢How can these problems be solved?
➢Certain measures must be discovered to
solve the problems.
Objectivity can be achieved by:

3. Avoiding emotive language that shows

biases and lessens objectivity.
➢The investigators were very shocked to see
the outcome of the tests.
➢The investigators did not expect the results.
 Written Work #2:
Improve the text below by rewriting it into a more
objective, impersonal version.

I believe that incidence of drug overdose has indeed become

prevalent nowadays. When people are faced with difficult
problems, I think that they can no longer bear the problem and
that is why they get into drugs. That’s why if you are a
psychologist, you should treat your patients in a way that helps
them to understand their problems and ways to deal with them.
Yeah I know it can be very difficult but hey, that’s what you
specialized in, right?
Explicitness …
➢Academic writing demands the use of
signposts that allow readers to trace
the relationships in the parts of a study.
However …
if you intend to show a change in your line of
argument.

➢It is apparent that the government

hopes to provide assistance to the poor.
However, giving dole outs to the
“poorest of the poor” does not work in
the long term.
The following phrases may be
useful in making ideas explicit:
1. This is due to the…
A number of MERALCO consumers trooped to
the City Hall to claim a PHP 500 cash incentive.
This is due to the Supreme Court ruling that
overcharges must be returned to the end users
whose electric consumption for the April-May
period was below 100kw/hr.
The following phrases may be
useful in making ideas explicit:
2. This resulted in…
With the Supreme Court ordering MERALCO to
return overcharges to the end users,
government offices have been trapped to
operate as claim centers. This resulted in a
number of MERALCO consumers trooping to the
City Hall to claim the PHP 500.00 cash incentives.
Similarly…
When two ideas seem the same, express
each one clearly.

The study showed that eighty percent of the 200

participants involved in the study were
dissatisfied with the operations of MERALCO.
Similarly, the data revealed that majority of the
participants were not aware of the charges
imposed on them by MERALCO.
In addition…
If you intend to give extra information in
your sentence.

MERALCO has been operating as a

business conglomerate involving foreign
stakeholders and independent power
producers or IPP. In addition, MERALCO
owns major IPPs operating in the region.
For example …
if you are giving examples

The MERALCO issue has led to disputes between

opposition and administration senators. For
example, those who have been labeled as
against the president considered the issue as the
administration’s way of avoiding the NBN-ZTE
scandal. National Broadband Network
Performance Task #2:
Write a caption to a personal picture using the
following signposts. Present it to the class.

1. However _______________________
2. This is due to the ________________
3. Similarly _______________________
4. In addition _____________________
5. For example ____________________
Caution …
➢Academic writing requires care since
knowledge is built from proven theories
and concepts.
➢Caution is needed to avoid sweeping
generalizations.
“Government officials are
corrupt.”

➢The statement is not completely true

and the rhetorical impact of the
statement may be misleading.
Improved versions:

➢Some government officials may be

corrupt. (modal verb)
➢Corruption is commonly linked to some key
government officials. (adv. of freq.)
➢A number of government officials tend to
be linked with cases of corruption (verb)
Below are some forms that you may use
in observing caution in writing.

➢Verbs – tends, suggests, appear to be,

think, believe, doubt, indicate.
➢Modal verbs – will, must, would, may, can,
might, could.
➢Adverbs of frequency – often, sometimes,
usually.
Performance Task #3: Group Work
Examine the following expressions and think of ways to
reduce the impact of the utterance.
DIRECT EXPRESSION STATEMENT USING HEDGING
He has halitosis
You need to eat this to be
healthy

The different steps taken led to

their future
Structure …
➢Aside from language, sentences need
to be constructed in such a way that
they show a level of complexity that
reflects the sophistication of an
academic writer.
Avoid redundancy and ideas are
packed effectively.

➢The earthquake caused loss of life.

➢The earthquake caused massive
property damage.
➢The earthquake changed the landscape
of the village.
Complex construction

➢The earthquake was a disaster that

caused loss of life, property damage,
and permanent changes in the
landscape.
Written Work #3:
Combine the sentences to make their structure complex and
better for academic writing.

– The government’s deal with the public transport

company was not successful.
– The government’s deal with the public transport
company will cause delays in projects.
– The government’s deal with the public transport
company will result in unsatisfied citizens.