Discussion Groups / ESL Teaching / April 2005

Is this correct?
She was a student teacher at this school. She visited classes and made
classroom observations.
Or

I teach techies tech. English report writing. They are German natives.
The Spell Checker in MSWord is idiosyncratic, is not claimed by MS
(see MS website) to be much good and is ineffective in catching
punctuation errors, eg the German-based comma in "I told him, that I

Is the definite article neccessary before winter in the sentence
below?
I learned that the definite article was optional in you meant winter
in general but I was told by a native-speaker friend that it had to

I'm planning on taking the GRE some time next year, and so I'll soon
start preparing for it. I'll take a Princeton online course, because I
know I will do poorly (esp in the verbal section) without properly
preparing for it. Now, the question is, should I learn those 5000 words

Somebody using the name 'amos' is posting in several newsgroups using
the Big5 Chinese character set. Can anybody read that? Is it SPAM or
what?

Wherever human exists, language exists and there are no "primitive"
languages, because ALL LANGUAGES ARE EQUALLY COMPLEX AND EQUALLY CAPABLE OF
EXPRESSING ANY IDEA IN THE UNIVERSE.
STOP LINGUISTIC RACISM (like any other form of racism).

(e. g. if an employer prefers handsome people)
"Does your decision always depends on how someone looks like?"
TIA
Hartmut

Hey there,
In the sentence "Move the house to the left", what part of speech is
"left"?  The "left" strikes me as being a noun, but it's not used like
one there...

What does it mean?
Thanks in advance for any help.
Regards, Wiktor Sz.

I saw 'slicing tomatos' on a supermarket circular today, but I think it
should be 'sliced tomatos'.
Shall I say two overlapping books or two overlapped books?
Thanks

... or "my car's door".
According to my grammar book, "my car's door" is not
correct. The "'s" construct is to be used with
persons, groups...

Atheists are ones that believe there's no god(s), but may believe there's a
life after death, reincarnation, cosmic existence, or such.
Agnostics are ones that don't know if there is or isn't a life after death,
that it is unobtainable information, and are not taking a stand either ...

What is the correct pronounciation of the word 'proboscis'? The letter
c is pronounced as c or as k.
Thanks in advance.
Khalid

This is a hot topic now in Taiwan, a non-English country.
Everyone wants to know how to say it in English when your boy/girl
friend has a secret lover(s).
One of English learning book authors says it should be "has the third

what is the difference in meaning at the sentences below?
can you explain the emphasis in each sentence?
a) we can only say general idea on subject.
b) we can  say only general idea on subject.