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Writing & Publishing > Grammar Refresher (prior approval form required for PLUs)
 Whatever your goals, a grasp of English grammar is important if you want to improve your speaking and writing skills. This course will help you gain confidence in your ability to produce clean, grammatically correct work. You'll explore the basics of English grammar—like sentence structure and punctuation—as well as more sophisticated concepts—like logic and clarity. A patient instructor, memorable lessons, vivid examples, and interactive exercises will give you ample opportunity to put what you learn into practice. Reacquaint yourself with old, forgotten rules, meet some new ones, and discover your own grammatical strengths.
This course includes a knowledgeable and caring instructor who will guide you through your lessons, facilitate discussions, and answer your questions. The instructor for this course will be Ellen Feld.
 Ellen Feld holds a Master of Arts degree in Writing from The Johns Hopkins University and has been teaching college writing courses during the past 20 years. She has taught developmental and creative writing, as well as composition, in the classroom and online. Ellen has also worked as a newspaper reporter and copy chief, personal essayist, Web site reviewer, and writer of computer-based training courseware.
To purchase this course, click the Enroll Now button below:
Requirements:
Internet access, e-mail, and the Microsoft Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox Web browser. Please note: this course teaches American English grammar. Also, this course is not designed for ESL students. If you are an ESL student, please consider enrolling in Grammar for ESL Students with Sabri Bebawi.
Syllabus:
All courses run for six weeks, with a two-week grace period at the end. Two lessons are released each week for the six-week duration of the course. You do not have to be present when the lesson is released, but you must complete each lesson within two weeks of its release.
A new section of each course starts on the second or third Wednesday of each month. If enrolling in a series of two or more courses, please be sure to space the start date for each course at least two months apart.
| Week One |
| Wednesday - Lesson 01 |
Which Is Which? - In this first lesson, you'll start by meeting your instructor and getting comfortable in your new online classroom. Then you'll learn about some tricky words that sound alike yet often get confused in writing. You'll begin to spot mix-ups such as have/of, lie/lay, and there/their. This will pave the way to learning which is the right word for the sentence you want to write.
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| Friday - Lesson 02 |
Its or It's? - In this lesson, you'll master the mighty apostrophe, a tiny punctuation mark that has a big job to do. We'll look at how it's used to combine words and express ownership. Building on what you know about mix-ups, you'll find out when and where the apostrophe belongs and why it sometimes doesn't.
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| Week Two |
| Wednesday - Lesson 03 |
I Am and You Are - You might have heard that every sentence needs a subject and a predicate, but do you have any idea what those two things are? In this lesson, you'll reacquaint yourself with parts of speech. (What is an adverb, anyway?) Then you'll learn what's required to organize a bunch of words into a complete sentence.
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| Friday - Lesson 04 |
As You Were Saying - In this lesson, you'll see how bits and pieces can masquerade as a whole. You'll learn to recognize when a collection of words doesn't quite measure up to a real sentence. Then you'll be able to attach those words to their missing part or find a way to rewrite them so they can stand up on their own.
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| Week Three |
| Wednesday - Lesson 05 |
On and On and On - Some of us just like to keep going and going and going. In this lesson, you'll learn how to stop. You'll learn a variety of ways to keep one sentence from running into another and give your readers or listeners a chance to catch their breath.
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| Friday - Lesson 06 |
They Write, Not Writes, Right? - It's time to make sure you're the boss of your verbs. You'll see how the concepts of yesterday, today, and tomorrow can change a verb. Once you know your past, present, and future, you'll take a look at some other things that shape verbs, like voice and mood.
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| Week Four |
| Wednesday - Lesson 07 |
You Are You - They're small in size but large in number. Get ready to put you and me and he and she and this and that (and lots more) under a microscope. You'll learn about the different kinds of pronouns and how some of them change depending on what they're doing in a sentence.
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| Friday - Lesson 08 |
Let's Agree - It's time to take the argument out of your grammar. In this lesson, you'll apply what you've learned about subjects, verbs, and pronouns and find out how to make them all agree with one another. Only then can you create grammatical harmony.
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| Week Five |
| Wednesday - Lesson 09 |
Along the Same Lines - In this lesson, you'll learn how to stay on the straight and narrow grammatical path. You'll begin to recognize inconsistencies. You'll learn how to create a steady narrative system by choosing a person, time, and method to organize your words.
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| Friday - Lesson 10 |
Say What You Mean - Everything you've learned in this course has been leading to this lesson. Now you're going to ensure that your writing comes out the way you want it to. You'll learn how to express yourself in the appropriate language, with no wasted words. You'll use logical thinking to inspire your own good grammar.
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| Week Six |
| Wednesday - Lesson 11 |
Why Stop at a Period? - Every work, great or small, needs its i's dotted. At last, the colon will be distinguished from the semicolon, parentheses from dashes, and the often-misnamed backslash from the forward slash. You'll also spend some time refreshing your memory on those long-forgotten rules of capitalization.
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| Friday - Lesson 12 |
To Err Is Human - We won't say goodbye until we've done a sweeping review of the previous lessons. Then, we'll go over a checklist and do some editing practices. You'll take one more step toward grammatical empowerment by learning independent proofreading and self-checking methods.
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To purchase this course, click the Enroll Now button below:
Student Reviews:
"Finally a class was offered online to meet my personal needs! Grammar is a course that people should take periodically to improve their writing skills."
"I appreciate all your effort and expertise in presenting this course in a clear and interesting manner. I will try hard to apply what I have learned. Again, thank you."
"It was a very useful course that I wouldn't mind brushing up on periodically. Thanks for everything."
"Thanks for a great course. It was just what I needed to gain more confidence in my writing. The language used in the lessons was clear and a joy to read. I liked the style of the lessons and the examples. Thanks very much. I shall miss it now that I have finished it."
"Thank you for a great course. My grammar skills needed great improvement and this course really helped me."
"The Grammar Refresher class exceeded my expectations. The lessons were well written and explored the material in more depth than had I expected. As a result, I was able to pinpoint problem areas in my writing. Making the corrections will be an ongoing learning process for me, and will require breaking some long established habits, but thanks to this class I now know where to start. The best part of the course was the discussion section. The teacher responded immediately to discussion questions with thoughtful, detailed answers. She was incredible! It was extremely helpful to be able to ask her to clarify troubling areas, or explain style differences."
"This course was an excellent refresher! It helped me in getting rid of some bad grammatical habits. Thanks, Ellen!"
"This was my first on-line course. I felt it was worthwhile and will certainly continue to take writing courses. Thank you for a professional introduction to on-line learning."
To purchase this course, click the Enroll Now button below:
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