Opaque writing and the curse of knowledge. From the talk by Steven Pinker. Watch until the end!

Adults often assume that if they know something, then everybody else should know it. It's not true. Students who take my writing courses learn that what is obvious to them might be foreign to others ONLY when they start receiving feedback from other people. We don't see what we don't see. It might be obvious to others that our writing lacks structure, but we don't see it.

To help yourself write in English with clarity, ask yourself these two questions: What do my readers know? What don't they know?
Don't assume that people know. Instead, ask them to read your text and give you feedback. Come back to your own text a week or a month after you have written it and give yourself honest feedback. Does it make sense? Is it clear enough? Can I SEE the message? Don't ask yourself - "Can they read my message?". Any 12-year-old can read words. We're practicing to SHOW people the story, to help them SEE the meaning in our writing.
Practice.

If you do something occasionally, it's not practice. You need to do it consistently. Consider joining the Creative Writing Sprint to practice writing better in English and to get better at taking feedback.

Self-correction and self-reflection are the prerequisite skills that must be mastered to successfully self-regulate the learning process.
Practice daily. You speak every day. But do you listen to how you speak to yourself and others (in any language)?

Did you know that there are rules that tell you how to stress long words in English?

These 5 suffixes will shift the stress of a root word. The primary stress is always on the syllable BEFORE the suffix:

1. -ical (hisTOrical)
2. -ity (availaBIlity)
3. - tion (celebRAtion)
4. -ic (systeMAtic)
5. -ify (soLIdify)

Watch the video to listen to examples and practice. Video creator: Julie Cunningham (watch her Youtube channel "San Diego Voice and Accent")

Can you find a mistake? Interactive Exercises to self-test your grammar

New resource to self-test your grammar and a complete algorithm of how to improve your grammar.
What to study? How to practice? How to test yourself?https://community.nataliatokar.me/c/grammar/can-you-find-a-mistake-interactive-exercises-to-self-test-your-grammar

The examples in this audio message include:

- excuse
- increase
- close
- abuse
- house
- use

Don’t take my word, go and check every example 😉

More confusing words and how to pronounce them correctly. Listen to the primary stress!

P.S. I pronounced advoCAte the first time for the purpose of demonstrating the vowel sound. The primary stress is on the first syllable.

The examples in this audio include:

Advocate
Estimate
Approximate
Deliberate
Associate
Articulate
Elaborate
Graduate
Moderate
Separate

And one more set of words that people see often, but forget to consider the context. The pronunciation will change depending on the context, i.e. depending on what the word means.

Polish
Live
Wind
Wound
Bass
Tear

On Aug 30, we're doing another workshop on English articles. The last meeting didn't get recorded, unfortunately. So we will do it one more time! FREE for active community members. If you're not a community member, a fee applies.


I do 3 exercises.
I ask myself 5 questions. I'm gonna show you how you can include these exercises in your own practice routine.

If you seem to know a lot about articles, but you're still confused, join us and make it all clear for yourself.

Learn more in the event description https://community.nataliatokar.me/c/calendar/community-live-call-understanding-english-articles-practice-56e7b6

Test yourself

See more options (EASY and ADVANCED) here https://community.nataliatokar.me/c/updates/english-articles-an-example-exercise-easy-intermediate-and-advanced-options

From the exercise that I did today (I transcribed au adio):

"This process of continuously sorting through the contrast so as to transform the unwanted into what is wanted, means that we are constantly in the process of appreciating what is, while also continuing to create improvement. We let go of the idea that the goal is to get to a place in life where there is an ended-ness; because everything is perfect and there is nothing more to improve upon. We enjoy this game of exploration and change around consistent improvement. We begin living with the attitude of the better it gets, the better it can get."

My practice routine is an infinite process of consistent improvenement.

I appreciate what is, and at the same time, I create improvement every day.