Level I

Chapter 5
Writing

IC3 Section

IC3 | IT | TOEFL | Best Answer

Vietnamese translation of IC3
Persian translation of IC3

Language Lessons
Assessment

Poverty Reduction/ Xoá đói giảm nghèo/فقر زدایی

Guiding Question: How is it possible for people to move out of poverty in your culture?		Câu hỏi hướng dẫn: Có cách nào để giải thoát người dân khỏi cảnh đói nghèo?
	سوال راهنما: چگونه در فرهنگ شما برای مردم این امکان وجود دارد که از فقر فاصله بگیرند؟

 

Skills:

In this chapter you will do these things:

English Language Skills:

Contemplating Poverty: What do you want to be when you grow up?

Constructing a paragraph

Understanding Cause and Effect

Cause and Effect Conjunctions

Writing Assignment: Causes and Effects of Poverty in Your Country

Vocabulary: Signal Words—Commonly Used Words and Phrases for Paragraph Construction

English Passages: Defining Poverty

Vietnamese Language Skills:

Vocabulary for Poverty

Grammar Point: “Hết”

Writing an Essay

IC3 Skills: Causes of Poverty—Greed or Ignorance?

IT: Spell and Grammar Check

TOEFL

Appendix: Poverty Words and Phrases

Intercultural Communicative Competence

The author of the following article has his own website called InnerNet and a project called CharityFocus with the following explanation: Who Are We? CharityFocus is an experiment in the joy of giving. Our services enable inspired people to contribute in meaningful ways to the world around them. Together, we hope to "be the change we wish to see in the world."

Read the following article and contemplate/discuss the following questions:

1. What is your definition of poverty?

2. Is it within the power of human beings to eradicate poverty?

3. What do you think is more responsible for poverty, greed or ignorance? Or is there something else?

Cause of Poverty: Greed or Ignorance?

by Nipun Mehta
Posted on June 16, 2006 in thoughts.
http://nipun.charityfocus.org/blog/ar/thoughts/000977.html

One of my friends recently asked me:

What do you think is more responsible for poverty, greed or ignorance? And no cheating and saying greed is a form of ignorance. :)

If the question is, what causes poverty, we first have to start by defining what poverty actually is. Broadly speaking, there's material poverty, emotional poverty, and spiritual poverty.

Material poverty: Per Maslow's hierarchy of needs, most people work with the assumption that without a certain threshold of material prosperity, rest of the questions are immaterial. So, let's consider hunger. As Amartya Sen's Nobel work shows, famines are overtly related to the governance; people go hungry not because of lack of food but because of lack of distribution mechanisms. In the West, you have the flip issue: people are obese, not because of access to food but because of policy that makes resources like corn cheaply accessible which in turn, allows for Double Big Macs to be 99 cents and Double Big Gulps to be 79 cents. Likewise, the case can be made for other material quality-of-life metrics. So, I would say that material poverty is a result of policy based on greed (not just for money, but for power/security).

Emotional poverty: Everyone realizes the importance of positive emotions in their life, although it's hard to quantify it. Something like 80% of all donations in the US come from small amounts (not Bill Gates!) given on impulse, women vote for Clinton because he "looks" trustworthy; anti-depressants are a mega billion industry because people don't "feel" good. Feeling good is important to people, yet it's shocking that so little of humanity's "research" is curing this rampant dis-ease. I think it's because we haven't figured out the root cause of emotional poverty -- isolation. Before making decisions, Native Americans would traditionally assess how their decision would affect the seventh generation down the road; now-a-days, we aren't even worried about our how our late-night music will affect our neighbors. Losing the link of inter-connection with people, nature and all life is, I would say, the main culprit behind emotional poverty.

Spiritual poverty: History shows that mankind makes dumb -- ie. Self-destructive -- decisions. Again and again. Why? Because we don't see the consequences of our actions. We all know that smoking is bad for us and happy thoughts are good for us, but that doesn't stop the smokers or the anger tantrums. If people got punished -- not in heaven or hell but here and now -- for each thought of anger, or ego, or ill-will, we would never have any wars, disparity between rich and poor would cease, and we would respect nature. So, then, how do we experience the results of our ignorance, how do we deepen our awareness so we can reduce the gap between the cause and effect, how do we listen to the truth of each moment so we function in harmony with that nature? These are fundamentally spiritual questions. Not having experiential answers to these questions is spiritual poverty. And it is caused by, I would say, ignorance.

Back to our original question -- what is responsible for poverty? Material poverty is created by greed-based policies, emotional poverty is caused by man-made machinery (institutions, technology, drugs, etc.) that isolate us from life, and spiritual poverty is due to ignorance of the consequences to our actions. Furthermore, I think that spiritual poverty is the subtlest and hence the most potent; i.e. solving that question will naturally solve the others.

Practically speaking, how do you become-the-change if you want to eradicate poverty? Make decisions based on love instead of fear, build systems and technologies that connect us with all forms of life instead of isolating us, and act consciously to deepen our awareness of every interaction we have.

I spent yesterday afternoon standing at the intersection of Van-Ness and Lombard, holding up a sign saying, "Spare a Smile?" I'm hoping that eradicated at least some poverty in the world. :)

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Taking it Further

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Taking It Further Explanation

 

Information Technology

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IT Exercises and Activities for Developing Ideas: Use “Spell and Grammar Check” to edit your writing.

Using the Internet for Reference

The internet may serve as a quick way to look up information on language. Instead of leafing through the pages of a dictionary or a book on grammar to search for answers, you can find information and answers online. As you familiarize yourself with what is available online, you should keep record of those sites that are most suited to your personal style of finding information.

Dictionaries

1. Open the Internet.

2. In the web-address bar at the top of the page enter www.google.com . This should bring up Google, one of the world’s most used search engines.

Search engines are websites that allow you to search the entire World Wide Web quickly by entering a few key words or phrases.

3. In the search box enter the words “English Dictionary” and click on the “Google Search” button below the box.

4. A page full of links to other websites should appear on the screen. The first websites listed (above the line) are Sponsored Links, which means they advertise things you can buy that is related to your keyword. (In “English Dictionary” sponsored links you usually find ways of buying computer software or books) Below the line, you will find links to websites containing your keywords.

5. As you skim the descriptions of these websites, look for words like “free on-line dictionary” that would indicate that you can freely look up information. Most likely, some of the English online dictionaries that appear are Mirriam-Webster Online (www.m-w.com ), Cambridge (www.dictionary.cambridge.org ), and Oxford English Dictionary (www.oed.com ). For example, the Mirriam-Webster Online Dictionary’s descriptions says: “A free, searchable on-line dictionary and thesaurus. . .” where as Oxford English Dictionary says: “Oxford University Press's dictionary described with ordering information.” This indicates that it may not be free and you would have to subscribe—some subscriptions are free and others are not.

6. Click on the Mirriam-Webster Online link. When the website opens, you will see in the center box “Mirriam-Webster Online dictionary” with a box in which to write a word to look up in the dictionary and a button with “Go” on it. Below is the “Mirriam-Webster Online Thesaurus, also with a box and “Go” button.

7. Write “cyberspace” in the dictionary box and click the “Go” button. You will then see a dictionary entry for the word and other features such as syllables and pronunciation. You may also click the sound key to hear the word pronounced.

8. Also featured on this definition page are ways to link to Britannica.com – an encyclopedia link that also lists articles on the word—located underneath the definition. Click the link if you want more information. To the right on the sidebar, you see where you can write another word for a definition or go to the Thesaurus. The thesaurus will give synonyms of the word typed in the space provided.

9. Go back to the Google listing of Dictionary links, and this time click the “Cambridge” link. This online dictionary features a clear simple page in which you type the word you want a definition for in the box. Notice that you may also explore the definitions found in other dictionaries by clicking the “Select Another Dictionary” which produces a list of dictionaries you can choose from by clicking on the dictionary name of your choice.

10. This time, type the word “cybrary” in the box. This is a relatively new word in the English language created by computer technology terminology. Does Cambridge have this new word? If not, you may want to check other dictionaries by going to the “Select Another Dictionary” box.

11. Go back to the Google listing of Dictionary links, and this time click the “Oxford English Dictionary” link. On this site, you will find that you cannot search for a word’s definition without subscribing.

Vietnamese-English Dictionaries can also be found on the internet. Use keywords such as “Vietnamese-English Dictionary” to get a list of links. The “Từ điển tiếng Việt” sponsored by VietNet is a good resource. This site can be found at: http://www.saigon.com/~vietdict/ . Another site is the KSVN English-Vietnamese Dictionary found at www.dsvn.com .

English Usage/Grammar

You may also look up English usage, grammar and writing skill information on the internet. Typing “Grammar Usage” or “English Usage” or “Writing Skills” as keywords into the search engine will results in hundreds of links because most university and college websites include these areas in “Help Center” sections available to all of their students. Some good websites are: The American Heritage Book of English Usage found at: www.bartleby.com/64/

and the Online Writing Lab at Purdue University called OWL: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/grammar/index.html .

At Rutgers University, the website, http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/writing/ is helpful. Other helpful websites are specifically for English Language Learners such as the TESL website:

http://iteslj.org/links/ESL/Grammar_and_English_Usage/ .

Go into these website and explore how you are able to get the information you need.

Computer Terminology Glossaries

As we explain information technology in this curriculum, you may find it helpful, also, to have ways of quickly looking up computer terminology to further understand some explanations. Computer technology terminology is continually changing the English language. New words are entering the English vocabulary to describe new technology and equipment, new processes, and new ideas. And as certain things become obsolete, the terminology also disappears. Often, dictionaries cannot keep pace with such changes or are waiting to assess if and when terms become a part of the English language. Therefore, computer glossaries online can be helpful. Because computer terminology is rapidly changing, keeping up with these terms is easier and less expensive than buying a book that becomes out-dated very quickly.

There are a number of good websites that provide glossaries for computer terms. http://www.sharpened.net/glossary/ as one example.

1. Open the Internet.

2. In the web-address bar at the top of the page enter www.google.com . This should bring up Google, one of the world’s most used search engines.

3. In the search box enter the words “Computer Glossary” and click on the “Google Search” button below the box.

4. A page full of links to other websites should appear on the screen. The first websites listed (above the line) are Sponsored Links, which means they advertise things you can buy that is related to your keyword. (In “Computer Glossary” sponsored links you usually find ways of buying computer software or books) Below the line, you will find links to websites containing your keywords.

5. As you skim the descriptions of these websites, look for words like “free on-line.”

6. One good example of a Computer Glossary website is: “Glossary of Computer and Internet Terms -- A glossary of computer and Internet terms with definitions that are easy to understand. http://www.sharpened.net/glossary/ . If you see this link, click on it. If not, type this website by typing the address in the box that is labeled “Address” at the top of the search engine page. In this website, you will find an alphabetical listing of the computer words. Click on the word for a definition.

TOEFL Exercises

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These exercises draw from “Poverty and the Environment: Reversing the Downward Spiral” by Alan D. Durning, “Worldwatch Paper 92”, November 1989 (40-43)

Questions 1-10 are incomplete sentences. Beneath each sentence are four words or phrases marked A, B, C, and D. Choose the one word or phrase that best completes the sentence. Look at the following example.

Example:

Neither hired workers, nor hired managers, nor tenant farmers care for land ___________ .

1. as well than owners
2. as well as owners
3. as well as owner
4. as owners does

The correct answer is B. If you are ready to respond to the following questions, note the time and begin.

1. For the have-nots, food comes ________ the soil, water from the stream and fuel from the woods.

1. by
2. with
3. from
4. to

2. Traction comes from the ox, fodder from the pasture, reeds to make mats from the stream bank, and fruit from the trees ________ the hut.

1. around
2. within
3. before
4. without

3. Poor people know that to endanger any of these things is to imperil___________, and the lives of their offspring.

1. theirselves
2. yourselves
3. himself
4. themselves

4. The economy of the rural poor is measured in the fertility and productivity of _______environment.

1. his
2. their
3. your
4. her

5. Most villagers have a reverence for nature and __________ habitat and ancestral ways.

1. within
2. before
3. after
4. toward

6. Poor farmers ______ secure rights to a piece of land tend to care for it meticulously.

1. with
2. before
3. between
4. among

7. They ______ a long-term view and forgo current benefits for dependable future gains..

1. takes
2. took
3. take
4. taking

8. The poor knowingly harm their environment mainly _______ under duress.

1. why
2. when
3. where
4. how

9. Pushed to the brink of starvation , they lack access to sufficient quantities of land, water, or capital to provide themselves _______ a sustainable livelihood.

1. for
2. with
3. by
4. between

10.______, the central pole around which the downward spiral turns is the lack of resources – the first element of the local poverty trap.

1. if
2. because
3. for
4. thus

"Best Answer"

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After you have completed the Reading, Listening/Speaking, and Writing chapters 5, how would you answer the following question?  

Guiding Question: How is it possible for people to move out of poverty in your culture?		Câu hỏi hướng dẫn: Có cách nào để giải thoát người dân khỏi cảnh đói nghèo?
	سوال راهنما: چگونه در فرهنگ شما برای مردم این امکان وجود دارد که از فقر فاصله بگیرند؟

FORUM

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