Intensive Academic Preparation 1

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Program Overview (Program does not require approval from PTIB)

This course is designed to develop basic academic reading skills, express thoughts and convey information in an academically appropriate written form, prepare students for the listening needs they will have in college, and develop speaking skills essential for academic success.

Emphasis is placed on developing a comfort in the classroom environment by applying the four language skills in an interactive form, integrating the functions of grammar, mechanics, and punctuation, complemented by practicing the English language in community settings.

Intensive Academic Preparation 1 is designed for students to determine their skills and knowledge in preparation of their college studies, as well as for college students who desire more reinforcement in their English language skills as they apply to their education.  Successful completion of this intensive course will establish a high-intermediate level of English language fluency similar to an IELTS score of 5.5.

The schedule and program end date are subject to change due to the student’s academic performance, course availability, academic breaks, additional electives, and study permit status.

Admission Requirements

  • Minimum score of 45% on the college’s entrance test, an IELTS score above or equal to 4.5 (general), or other equivalents.

For more information on language requirements where internationally-recognized tests and other equivalencies are accepted, see the specific appendix at the end of this program outline.

Learning Objectives

  • Use a variety of pre-reading strategies before reading assigned texts.
  • Check one’s understanding while reading using visualization, explaining the main ideas in one’s own words, using the five W questions to check, ask questions, and make predictions.
  • Understand the main ideas, sequence, and details of a text.
  • Annotate and take notes while reading.
  • Explore the ways the text affects the reader.
  • Reflect on what one has read and on one’s reading practices.
  • Explore the structure of a text.
  • Apply dialectic note-taking.
  • Analyze content and rhetoric.
  • Analyze sentence levels.
  • Determine first, second, and third person point of view.
  • Analyze the word choice of the writer.
  • Analyze paragraphs.
  • Figure out unknown words while you read.
  • Use a dictionary and thesaurus
  • Describe the tone of a text
  • Make inferences
  • Draw conclusions about characters’ emotions
  • Set a purpose for reading

  • Understand the TOWER method of writing.
  • Organize a paragraph.
  • Write / compose:
    • An opinion paragraph
    • A how-to paragraph
    • Compound sentences
    • A descriptive paragraph
    • A narrative paragraph
    • A personal letter
    • Complex sentences
  • Interpret meaning through inferencing, summarizing, or re-stating, and scanning word choices for indications of register and tone; of context clues, symbols, and formatting in official documents
  • Critique a text.
  • Draw conclusions, synthesize and reflect on one’s reading.
  • Define plagiarism and describe how to avoid it
  • Write sentences with an understanding of sentence components and sentence structure (including fragments)
  • Summarize and paraphrase texts
  • Develop a topic sentence, use supporting ideas and transitions
  • Understand what you are writing / what is an essay, the structure of an essay, consider your audience, and how in various forms of essays: expository, narration, illustration, description, classification, process analysis, definition, comparison and contrast, and cause and effect
  • Build paragraph writing skills for different purposes: summary, analysis, synthesis, evaluation paragraphs; identify your audience; select an appropriate tone; choose appropriate and interesting content
  • Effectively determine your audience and purpose, enhance your appeal to your audience: pathos, logos, and ethos, use appropriate points of view
  • Use graphic organizers to plan your writing
  • Review and revise your writing with assessment checklists

  • Recognize how people change their tone and word choice to be formal or informal; change their word choices to speak directly or indirectly; and the differences between personal and public conversations
  • Look for patterns of formality and directness in greetings, directness or indirectness in suggestions, requests, and instructions
  • Compare how people apologize; identify personal and cultural expectations around apologies; and look for patterns of formality and directness when people apologize and respond to familiar and unfamiliar people apologizing to them
  • Compare how people share or filter the same information with different people in different ways

  • Pronounce stressed words; contracted and non-contracted words; and verb endings
  • Adjust which words we choose and how much detail we give to be appropriate in personal or public conversations
  • Use the techniques learned for researching, organizing topics, and prepare an oral presentation to your classmates

  • Build skills in vocabulary through synonyms, word families, cognates, phrasal verbs, idioms, texting abbreviations, homonyms and homophones, paraphrasing, and context clues
  • Gain accuracy through grammar practice with stative verbs and tag questions; gerunds, infinitives, and modal verbs; imperative verbs; modal verbs of advice and regret; adjectives and adverbs
  • Build one’s vocabulary through the introduction of various texts.
  • Spell words with various suffixes, silent consonants, common homonyms, common prefixes, and using the ‘i before e’ rule
  • Utilize common spelling rules, practice proper homonyms, and recognize commonly misspelled words
  • Use punctuation correctly, including periods, question marks, exclamation marks, colons, and apostrophes
  • Use commas in a series, after transition words, in place names and dates, and with appositives
  • Use punctuation marks in direct quotations
  • Identify the subject and verb in a simple sentence.
  • Identify and correct sentence fragments and run-on sentences
  • Recognize commonly confused words and use strategies to avoid their use.
  • Use proper connotations
  • Avoid the use of slang
  • Add suffixes to words that end in a silent ‘e’
  • Add suffixes to 1-1-1 words
  • Edit text for a subject-verb agreement, shifting verb tense

  • Compare how and why different generations of people talk and write to each other; how close or distant relationships show up in talking or writing; how speakers communicate personal or impersonal obligations in talking and writing
  • Identify reasons strangers and/or familiar people talk or write to each other.
  • Adjust how we speak or write for different listeners or readers.
  • Grow fluency through writing and speaking tasks related to receiving communication and engaging respectfully in community relationships.
  • Build fluency through writing and speaking tasks related to making and responding to requests; permission, prohibition, and obligation.
  • Recognize how obligations affect formality and directness.
  • Identify rules (formal obligations) and social conventions that are personal or impersonal.
  • Look for patterns in communication when speakers or writers try to obligate others to follow rules.
  • Adjust how we speak and write to announce, discuss, or enforce rules.
  • Describe why information literacy is important
  • Learn to find high-quality texts, use the CRAP strategy, and find good material on the World Wide Web
  • Recognize when and/or why people feel an apology is appropriate
  • Adjust verbal and non-verbal communication in giving and responding to apologies
  • Build fluency through writing and speaking tasks related to making and responding to apologies and explaining actions to members of our communities
  • Identify social conventions around sharing, filtering, or withholding information
  • Look for patterns among what people think, what they say, and what they withhold
  • Build fluency through writing and speaking tasks related to description and comparisons

Program Details

APEN 101- Intensive Academic Preparation 1   | 80 hours