Reported speech

I am hereby providing some documents on reported speech as well as object and subject questions with the key for the exercises from English Grammar in Use: Intermediate by Raymond Murphy.  More  exercises on reported speech along with the key are also made available.

Here you can also find more information on subject, object, verb, tense, time and location modifications in reported speech and indirect speech. (Business Grammar Builder by Paul Emmerson)

Sample report

Here you can find the BBC piece, followed by the report on it below.

What is the European Union?

In this BBC news piece, Mark Mardell gives us a brief introduction on the history, purpose and main Institutions of the European Union (EU).

Robert Schuman, a former French Minister of Foreign Affairs, was the promoter of a united Europe. His monument, which symbolises the European Union, is at the entrance of one of the buildings called the Berlaymont.

After the Second World War, the belligerent countries decided to create a Community, in which they had common control over  war materials. This Community grew from its six founding members to the current European Union with its 27 Member States (MS).

Nowadays, the EU legislates on a large number of issues concerning everyday lives of  citizens of MS, from preventing pollution to containing bird flu. In general the Union is based on the idea that the richest countries help the poorest ones.

The Berlaymont is the headquarters of the European Commission, which is one of the main Institutions of the EU led by 27 Commissioners, each one of whom is from a different Member State. At their regular meetings every Wednesday, they take decisions on new legislative proposals. The Commission is the guardian of the soul of Europe, and thus, a unique experiment in the world as a body representing the common interests of MS.

We can compare the Commission to a medieval monarch protecting these common interests and looking for necessary agreements among MS, which in turn, act like the barons of the Middle Ages. These barons are at the Council. This is the Institution representing the individual interests of each country. At the Council, there are various compositions of ministers depending on the policy area, and at least three times per year, heads of government and/or state of all MS meet at summits.

The third big player is the Parliament. The European Parliament (EP) is the most democratic Institution because its members are directly elected by EU citizens. The Members of the European Parliament are grouped according to their political affiliations, rather than national interests. The powers of the EP have been increased in the recent years, with its current right to amend laws and even the possibility to chuck out the whole Commission and budget.

Finally, concerning the legislative procedure, MS always have the last word. However, during these long decision-making processes based on the proposals of the Commission, the Parliament has been increasing its influence.

Minutes

Here is a document on writing minutes. 

 

Here you can find an example for minutes.  Source: Market Leader Upper Intermediate Business English Course Book by David Cotton, et al.

Gender neutrality

"English Style Guide" released by the Commission is hereby available.  On pages 48 - 49 you can find the section on gender neutrality. 

Tenses and key words

Here you can find many exercises on tenses.  I am also hereby making a list of all the tenses and key words available

State vs. action verbs

Here is  a document where you can find information and exercises on state vs. action verbs, along with key for the  exercises. (Source: English Grammar in Use: Intermediate by Raymond Murphy)

Here is a link for a webpage where you can find some  exercises on the same topic.   

Here you can find the list of verbs we have looked at. (Source: LONGMAN Advanced Learners’ Grammar by Mark Foley &  Diane Hall )

EU Enlargement

Here is the official Commission website on enlargement.

Here is an article from The New York Times on the same topic.

Subject-Verb agreement

You can find a document on subject-verb agreement with exercises here.  The key for the exercises is available here.

A longer document entitled "Grammar and Punctuation for Business Communication"  is hereby available.  Please refer to pages 11 - 14 for subject-verb agreement. 

More tips on PowerPoint presentations

Here you can find list of do's and dont's for PowerPoint presentations.

The dont's for PowerPoint

Here you can find Don McMillan's standup on the dont's of a PowerPoint presentation.

The 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint

Here you can find Guy Kawasaki's recommendations on the length (10 slides), duration (20 minutes) and font size (30 points) in a PowerPoint presentation.

Here you can find a stream of his pitch. ('Bozo' means 'fool'.)

Lists of three and the rule of 3s: two speeches

Here you can find the first part of Steve Jobs's iPhone product launch speech.

Here you can find Barack Obama's inauguration speech.

In both of them, please pay attention to the usage of the lists of three and the rule of 3s.

Here is a stream where the rule of 3s is explained among other useful tips on making presentations.

Second sample summary

Global Population Growth Box by Box: Hans Rosling's TED Talk

This is a presentation on the future of global population growth given by Hans Rosling with the aid of Ikea boxes.

In 1960 the global population was 3 billion, one third of which was in the developed world. These people were rich, healthy and well-educated with small families. Their dream was to save for a car. The rest from developing countries, on the other hand, were struggling to have enough food and to save for a pair of shoes.

In 2010 there were 7 billion people in the world. Their situation can be summarised as follows:

-The 2 billion poor were still as poor as they had been in 1960.

- Four billion people lived in the new emerging economies, dreaming of buying a bicycle, and later on, a car.

- The 1 billion rich were even richer, saving to fly to exotic destinations.

Thus, the gap between the rich and the poor became wider, while most people were somewhere in the middle.

The  forecast for 2015 is that the level of welfare in places such as Shanghai will reach that of the western societies. At the same time, there will still be 3 billion people in emerging economies dreaming of an electric car if climate change is under control and energy is still cheap.   Moreover, the number of the poor looking for food  will increase by 50 to 100 per cent. Based on available data, these poor people tend to have large families and low child survival rates.

The solution that Mr Rosling proposes for a sustainable global population growth is to continue to improve child survival upto 90 % and to reduce family size by vaccination and family planning respectively. This is a way to ensure the well-being of the whole global population.

Along these lines, he considers himself to be a "possibilist".

In this process, he sees developed countries as the foundation of the modern world.

Food safety and traceability

Here you can find an article on food safety from The Economist.

Here you can find an article on food traceability from The New York Times.

Here you can find another text submitted by C.  Thank you C!

First sample summary

The U-bend of Life

Summary

The main idea the article conveys to the reader is as follows: ‘Life is not a long slow decline from sunlit uplands towards the valley of death. It is, rather, a U-bend.’ This statement is based on evidence that behavioral scientists and psychiatrists gathered in the studies carried out all over the world within the last few decades. The U-bend trend shows the changes in global and emotional (hedonic) well-being.

When people start out on adult life, they are, on average, pretty cheerful. Things go downhill from youth to middle age until they reach a nadir commonly known as the mid-life crisis. As people age, they lose their treasured qualities – vitality, mental sharpness and looks.  However, they also gain in what most people spend their lives pursuing, namely happiness.

Some scientists have decided to measure happiness itself. Along this line, Great Britain and France have started collecting data on well-being. Figures are mainly collected using surveys which ask two main questions. One of them concerns people’s assessment of their own lives to measure their global well-being, and the other, how they feel at any particular time to measure hedonic or emotional well-being. Following these studies, the analyses based on the perennial question of what makes people happy identified the following four key factors:

1. Gender: women are slightly happier than men, even though the former are more susceptible to depression.
2. Personality: neurotic people – those who are prone to guilt, anger and anxiety – tend to be unhappy, as they are mainly prone to having negative feelings, while extroverts tend to be the opposite.
3. External circumstances: This includes all sorts of variables in people’s lives, such as relationships, education, income and health, which shape the way they feel; happiness increases as these circumstances improve. Concerning income, conventional economics uses money as a proxy for utility – the dismal way in which the discipline talks about happiness. Nonetheless, one study examining data from around the world revealed the ‘Easterlin paradox’ – well-being depends not on absolute, but on relative, income: people feel miserable not because they are poor, but because they are at the bottom of the particular pile in which they find themselves. While the evidence for a correlation between income and happiness over time remains weak possibly due to the lack of data, the one for a correlation between counties is strong. Richer countries are clearly happier, but presumably cultural factors are at work, as well. E.g., Asians tend to be somewhat less happy than their income would suggest, and Scandinavians a little more so. Latin Americans are cheerful, while the republics of the former-Soviet Union are spectacularly miserable. Last but not least, Bulgaria is the saddest place in the world relative to its income.
4. Age: Both 30-year-olds and 70-year-olds generally think that the former are likely to be happier, but if you ask them to rate their own well-being, it seems that the 70-year-olds are the happier ones. Studies have shown that the global average at which people are the most unhappy is 46, i.e., the lowest point of the U-bend. Studies refute that the U-bend is merely an expression of the effect of external circumstances, such as employment status or children. Indeed,  this trend is most likely due to internal changes in one’s personality towards maturity: older people have fewer rows, come up with better solutions for conflicts, are better at controlling their emotions and misfortunes, and are less prone to anger. They come to focus on things that matter now, such as feelings, and less on long-term goals. They also come to accept their strengths and weaknesses, and perhaps, acceptance of aging itself is a source of relief that brings happiness. Moreover, happiness makes people healthier and more productive, and this applies to all age groups.

Second summary exercise

Here you can find a presentation by Hans Rosling.  Please watch it one or two times while taking notes, and then write a summary, which should be one double-spaced page. You can send your summaries to me before our session on Tuesday, 22nd of April.

Articles

Here you can find the document on articles along with the key for the exercises.

Living in Belgium

For our next session, we will be talking about living in Belgium.  In this context we can table some of the best kept secrets of this country for day and/or weekend trips.  We can also talk about the cultural activities on the offer in Brussels.  Finally, we can exchange some unique experiences we have had living in this country.

You can hereby have access to Agenda, the weekly magazine for the cultural events in Brussels. The website seems to be only in Dutch and French, but the paper version is in three languages, i.e., English, Dutch and French.  If you live in Brussels, you can get a free subscription for home delivery.

Economic crisis in Europe

Here you can find an article from The Economist's The World in 2013. 

Summary task

Here you can find two articles which you can synthesize in a summary report.Your summary should not be longer than one double-spaced page.  Please send it to me before our session on Tuesday, 9th of April.

Linkers

The first and second parts of the documents on linkers are hereby available.  You can also find the key for the exercises here.  As you do the exercises, please remember the following three types of linkers we have identified:

• Linking words that connect two parts of the same sentence as in the following example: We only have one week off for Easter, so we will be staying in Brussels.
• Linking words that connect two separate sentences as in the following four examples, which are different ways of saying the same thing:

1. We only have one week off for Easter.  Therefore, we will be staying in Brussels.
2. We only have one week off for Easter; therefore, we will be staying in Brussels.
3. We only have one week off for Easter.  We will, therefore, be staying in Brussels.
4. We only have one week off for Easter; we will, therefore, be staying in Brussels.

• Linking words that are covered under both the first and second types as in the four following examples:

1. Besides giving his friend a lift after work, he helped her with her grocery shopping.
2. He helped his friend with her grocery shopping, besides giving her a lift after work.
3. I am afraid I am not allowed to help you with that question.  Besides, I do not know the answer myself.
4. I am afraid I am not allowed to help you with that question; besides, I do not know the answer myself.

Note that the meaning of the word 'besides'  in the first two examples is different from its meaning in the last two examples.

In all these examples, please pay special attention to the punctuation.

Relative, -ed and -ing clauses

Here you can find some exercises on relative, -ed and -ing clauses along with the key.

Living in a city/town vs. the countryside

Here you can find a webpage with pros and cons of living in a city and the countryside.

Subjunctive

A webpage on the use of subjunctive is hereby made available. 

Here you can find more information with exercises on the subjunctive and unreal uses past forms.  Here is the key for the exercises.

US compared with Europe

Here you can find some information about the cultural differences between the US and Europe.  As we talk about this topic, we have to remember that both the US and Europe are very big, with significant differences among the states and counties within them. Therefore, we can also focus the discussion on various countries and/or states, e.g., the ones you and I are from, during our session.

Journalistic titles

Here you can find a brief explanation on journalistic titles used in, e.g., newspaper headlines.  We, however, should not use this style for our titles in administrative writing.  How would you change the headlines provided as examples in the hot-linked document into administrative style titles?

Composite nouns and possessives

Here you can find some information on composite nouns and possessives with exercises, as well as the key for the exercises. I am hereby also making another document on the same topics with exercises, as well as the key for the exercises.

Future tenses

Here you can find many exercises on tenses.  I am also hereby making a list of all the tenses and key words available. You can do exercises 18 - 28, which deal with future tenses.

Travelling

Here is a link with a piece on the pros and cons of travelling alone. 

For our next session, please think about what you consider to be the best and the worst travelling experience(s) of your life, and why.

Signposting and survival tactics

Here you can find a four-page document with exercises on signposting and some survival tactics, which could come in handy during a negotiation. (Source: Presenting in English by Mark Powell)

Basic negotiation skills

Here you can find the handouts with some basic negotiation skills.

Opinions, agreeing and disagreeing

Here you can find some phrases which can be used to express your opinions, agreements and disagreements along with some exercises.

BBC on meetings and negotiations

Here you can have access to the BBC website on meetings, where they have useful expressions and/or phrases contextualized in short dialogues available as audio streams with transcripts.

Here you can have access to the BBC website on negotiations, where they have useful expressions and/or phrases contextualized in short dialogues available as audio streams with transcripts.

Style guides

Here you can find the Interinstitutional style guide. 

"English Style Guide" released by the Commission can be accessed  here.

Sample email

Dear Ms Smith,
 
Knowing that your entry into service at the European Commission is approaching, I would like to hereby extend you a warm welcome to our Unit, and provide you with some practical information.
 
As agreed during your job interview, you will be in charge of the follow-up of inter-service consultations. This position involves regular interaction and coordination with the other services of our DG as well as with other DGs. You will be working closely with Ms Black in our Unit, as inter-service consultation follow-up is a shared responsibility. Under my supervision, Ms Black will be explaining to you the various procedures, so that you can become acquainted with our working methods as soon as possible. As an attachment, I am resending your job description, in case you need it for a quick reference.
 
You should have been already informed that you will be attending a two-day training course organised by DG HR, i.e., the Directorate-General for Human Resources and Security, before taking up your duties at our Unit. This very useful course should provide you with additional information regarding the functioning of the European Commission, its working environment, and the rights and duties of its employees. During the training, you will have the opportunity to get your badge ready; all the relevant information will be provided by the trainers.
 
As a newcomer in Brussels, you might also be interested in receiving information on matters such as accommodation and public transportation. Please note that the orientation leaders at DG HR will be handing out an information package during the training, and that a legal advisor will be at your disposal to check the leases you might be considering before you sign a contract. If you need to search for an apartment, the best place to start is the immoweb website (http://www.immoweb.be/). There is also plenty of short-term accommodation available in Brussels, especially in the Schuman area close to the European Institutions. You can find all the necessary information about public transportation in Brussels at http://www.stib.be/.
 
I would also like to hereby invite you take up your duties in our Unit on Wednesday, 16th of March, i.e., after the completion of the training mentioned above.  I propose starting the day with a meeting in my office at 9.30 am.  Afterwards, I will introduce you to the members of the team you will be working in. Moreover, you will need to make an appointment to see Mr Miller (tel: +32(0)2/291 7811) in the afternoon of the same day.  I suggest making the appointment at least three days in advance, since he is usually very busy.  He is the HR focal point in our DG, and thus he will be your interlocutor for all contract related issues .
 
As you probably remember from your interview, our offices are located at Rue de la Science, 15, close to Rue Belliard. With your badge, you can come up directly to our Unit, which is located on the 7th floor; I am in office 123.
 
Looking forward to meeting you in person,
 
With kind regards,

 Iris Wellington

Greetings and closers

Here is a list of greetings you can use in your formal emails depending on the recipient:

• Anonymous singular:

1. Dear Sir/Madam
2. Dear Madam/Sir
3. Dear Sir or Madam
4. Dear Madam or Sir

• Anonymous plural:

1. Dear Sirs/Ladies
2. Dear Ladies/Sirs
3. Dear Sirs and/or Ladies
4. Dear Ladies and/or Sirs

• With a given male name: Dear Mr Smith

• With a given female name:

1.  Dear Ms Smith (civil status irrelevant or unknown)
2.  Dear Mrs Smith (married)
3.  Dear Miss Smith (single and younger than fifty)

• With given names to a group of less than three people (male):  Dear Messrs Smith and Jones

• With given names to a group of less than three people (female):

1. Dear Mses Smith and Jones (civil statuses unknown, irrelevant or different)
2. Dear Mesdames Smith and Jones (both of them married)
3. Dear Misses Smith and Jones (both of them single and younger than fifty)

• With given names to a group of less than three people (mixed gender and not related to each other by marriage or blood): 

1. Dear Messrs Smith and Jones, and Ms Presley 
2. Dear Ms Presley, and Messrs Smith and Jones

• With a given name to a couple who use the same last name:

1. Dear Mr and Mrs Smith 
2. Dear Mrs and Mr Smith 

• With given names to a group of more than three people (mixed gender):

1. Dear Sirs/Ladies
2. Dear Ladies/Sirs
3. Dear Sirs and Ladies
4. Dear Ladies and Sirs

• With given names to a group of more than three people (all male): Dear Sirs

• With given names to a group of more than three people (all female): Dear Ladies 

• With a given first and last name and the gender is not clear:  Dear Alex Smith

Here is a list of closers which apply to all formal emails regardless of their content:

• With kind regards
• Kind regards
• Regards

You can hereby find a document on how to address various VIPs in different contexts.