INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH

SAMPLE MID-TERM TEST

Writing AE2
Task 1: Identify 6 cases of non-academic language in the text below and edit them to make an
academic text. In the box below, write the original words/phrases in the left hand column and
your editions in the right-hand column. You have an example. (30 pts)
CAN MEDICATION CURE OBESITY IN CHILDREN?
A Review of the Literature
In March 2004, U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona called attention to a health problem in the United
States that, until recently, we have overlooked: childhood obesity. Carmona highlighted that the
astounding 15% child obesity rate constitutes an epidemic. Since the early 80s, that rate has doubled
in children and tripled in adolescents. Now more than nine million children are classified as obese. While
the traditional response to a medical epidemic is to hunt for a vaccine or a cure-all pill, childhood obesity
has proven more elusive. Lacking success of recent initiatives suggests that medication mightnt be the
answer for the escalating problem. In this literature review, I will consider whether the use of medication is a
promising approach for solving the childhood obesity problem by responding to the following questions:

1. What are the implications of childhood obesity?

2. Is medication effective at treating childhood obesity?
3. Is medication safe for children?
4. Is medication the best solution?
Understanding the limitations of medical treatments for children highlights the complexity of the childhood
obesity problem in the United States and underscores the need for physicians, advocacy groups, and
policymakers to search for other solutions.
What Are the Implications of Childhood Obesity?
Obesity can be a devastating problem from both an individual and a societal perspective. Children are put
at risk by obesity for a number of medical complications, including type 2 diabetes, hypertension, sleep
apnea, and orthopedic problems (Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, 2004, p. 1). In the Table 4 below,

researchers Hoppin and Taveras (2004) have said that obesity is often associated with psychological
issues such as depression, anxiety, and binge eating.
Obesity also poses serious problems for a society struggling to cope with rising health care costs. The cost
of treating obesity currently totals $117 billion per yeara price, according to the Surgeon General, is
second only to the cost of [treating] tobacco use (Carmona, 2004). Of course, as the number of children
who suffer from obesity grows, long-term costs will increase.

Source: Diana Hacker (Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2006).

Write your answer here.
No.
0
1
2
3
4
5
6

Original word/phrase

Possible edited word/phrase

80s

1980s

Task 2: Read the text below and create a graphic display or an outline that categorizes the points
made in the text in the next page. (20 pts)

SOLVING SCHOOL CHEATING

In my years of teaching, no student has ever admitted to a plagiary, even when questioned. The
closest admission which I get is that someone "read it over for me," or "I used my dictionary." It is a hard
truth: even when they are caught, cheaters continue to cheat. However, there is no harder task for a
teacher than to give a "0"! There are some common factors of cheating which need to be actively
challenged.
Students cheat primarily to make their lives easier. Young people, under heavy parental pressure, find
cheating a way to meet their parents' expectations. It is better to cheat than to have parents scold them
again and again. Recently in schools, the question which is often heard is, "What did you get?" Peer
pressure is another reason for student cheating. It is undesirable to say "I got a 'C'", especially in today's
competitive schools. It is possible that the most important reason for cheating is what Katie Hafner
referred to as "mental softness." It is the Internet that bears responsibility in this case. On the Internet,
ideas and words used to express ideas can be accessed easily. Why do students have to think hard if
the information is substantially provided? An easy life is available to the student cheater: a life without
parental nagging, ridicule at school, or the need to work hard.
With such "softness" evident in our students, the solutions to cheating must be hard ones. Parents

need to accept their children's abilities, and to celebrate their accomplishments, no matter how small
they are. Heavy pressure, by itself, cannot make a child smarter. Students must be encouraged to make
comparisons on how much a peer has improved and on how hard that person had to work in order to
obtain a grade. For some students, a "C" is a major achievement. The hardest challenge will be to
reshape the Internet as a tool for creating higher order thinking, not one for avoiding difficult work.
Teachers, instead of trying to keep students away from Internet resources, must make themselves aware
of the Internet's potential for teaching. Research-based assignments (properly cited) that use the Internet
should be assigned in every classroom. In these ways, we can work on the soft attitudes and remake
them into a passion for disciplined work.
Cheating is a danger to student achievements, one that needs to be challenged vigorously. Parents,
who always want to see geniuses in their family and put frequent pressure on their children, should learn
to ease up to some extent. Students can learn to admire each other's accomplishments without resorting
to comparisons that offer little in judging a person's true worth. Furthermore, teachers can learn from
their mistakes and begin to bring the Internet into their secluded classroom worlds. If we work on this
together, our success will be assured.
The graphic display or outline:
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Task 3: Write a compare/contrast essay (about 300 words) about life in Vietnam now and a
decade ago. Pay attention to the use of academic language and a clear text structure (50 pts)
Today,

April 30, red flags are festooning the streets of Hanoi, the
Vietnamese capital, to mark the fourth decade since the U.S.-backed South
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Vietnamese government surrendered to communist North Vietnamese

troops and ended the Vietnam War. But most Vietnamese are too young to
remember the day in 1975 when Saigon fell, celebrated in Hanoi as
Reunification Day. For the nearly 70 percent of the population under age
40, April 30 is just a day off from work or school.
No one our age talks about it, Hien, a recent university graduate from
Hanoi who gave only her first name, told me. Most young people
nowadays dont really care about what happened. They just want to have
fun.
Forty years after millions of Vietnamese were killed in the war, in which
more than 58,000 Americans also died, locals Ive spoken with bear little
animosity toward the United States. During the three years I spent in
Hanoi, I never witnessed hostility toward Americans. When I told
Vietnamese I came from the U.S., they would smile and talk about
American celebrities, like the pre-teen who told me she loved Beyonc or
the parking-lot attendant who shook my hand enthusiastically: Ah,
Obama!
And unlike me, my Vietnamese contemporaries grew up in the communist
country that the war created. That country has changed dramatically over
the course of their lives. When Nguyen and Hien were children, Vietnam
had just begun to integrate into the global economy following a postwar
decade of scarcity and stagnation. Since then, Vietnam has become one of
East Asias fastest-growing economies, and the government's staunch
communism has given way to a new pragmatism as it privatizes stateowned companies and seeks foreign investment. A recent Pew survey
found that 95 percent of the Vietnamese people support free-market
capitalisma higher percentage than in any other country surveyed,
including the United States. As a Hanoi secretary in her 30s told me: The
war is the past already. ... We care only about money. We dont care about
politics or history.
***
Students in Hanoi learn about the American War for the first time in
elementary school, taking class trips to the capitals Ho Chi Minh
Mausoleumwhich houses the embalmed remains of the communist
leader who led the war for independence against the Frenchand Military
History Museum. In the following years, they study the conflict in the
context of the countrys history of fighting colonial powers, from its 10thcentury rebellion against China to its war against France beginning in the
1940s. Each year, we learn the same thing in more detail. America
started the war to help France get Vietnam back, university student
Luong Tuan Bach, 19, told me from a bench beside Hanois Hoan Kiem
Lake, where he sells Coca-Cola and iced tea to passing tourists to earn
spending money.
4

Luong said he felt these lessons were important, and cited a well-known
Ho Chi Minh poem: Our people have to know our history. But other young
people I spoke with complained that history classes are too dry and
tedious to make a lasting impression. We started learning about the war
in sixth grade, but I don't remember much. History is too boring, just texts
after texts, Nguyen Thi Huong, the university student, said.
Those texts, which, as Hien recalled, depict a hard but glorious struggle
to defeat the American invaders, present the official Vietnamese view. We
learned that even though the U.S. army was really mighty and their
weapons were really modern, the Vietnamese country united and stood up
for our freedom, Thuy, a university student in Hanoi, told me.
This attitude separates millennials from their parents and grandparents.
Older people might put communism on a pedestal, but for us it means
very little. Young people care more about their own dreams, their own
careers, Nguyen, the university student, said.
Luong, the soda vendor by the lake, hopes to become a successful
businessman in the construction industry. Had he started his career 20
years ago, he might have strived to work for a government-run company.
But state-owned businessesonce the cornerstone of Vietnams economy
have declined in recent years, weighed down by bad debt. Between
2000 and 2013, the number of state-run enterprises halved. Many have
been privatized as part of the governments ongoing economicrestructuring efforts, although officials still often refer to this process as
equitization rather than privatization.
Government agencies are also drawing fewer young employees. Privatesector jobs pay a lot more than government jobs, Trang, 28, explained to
me. An event organizer for an international company, Trang never
considered following in the footsteps of her parents, former government
employees and Communist Party members who gave up both their jobs
and political memberships when she was young. My mom has her own
grocery shop at home, so she doesnt care about policy or the party, she
said.
Like Trangs mother, many Vietnamese have taken advantage of 1980s-era
reforms that allowed them to open their own businesses. Today, Hanoi
teems with entrepreneurial ambition. Vendors fill the sidewalks, selling
everything from pedicures to pet goldfish. Families have converted parts of
their houses to cafes, hair salons, and PC gaming parlors, imparting this
same enterprising mindset in their children. Ray Greiner, an American war
veteran who returned to Vietnam in 2011 to teach English, said most of his
students wanted to own their own businesses. That's a huge difference
from the young people I know in the U.S.and a huge difference from my
generation as well, Greiner told me.
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As the growing middle class flocks to new malls like the palatial Vincom
Royal City, a few Vietnamese entrepreneurs have reaped enormous profits.
They include Pham Nhat Vuong, the countrys first billionaire and CEO of
the company behind Royal City, and Dang Le Nguyen Vu, who founded
Trung Nguyen Coffee and whose wealth, estimated at $100 million,
inspired the nickname Coffee King. Nearly 400 people have made
millions investing in the stock market, according to a local newspaper,
some of them born after reunification. American fast-food franchises like
McDonalds and Starbucks opened their first branches in Vietnam in the
past couple of years, and have been interpreted by some as a sign of the
triumph of American-style capitalism.
But this blatant embrace of the market economy does not mean that
Vietnamese feel equally strongly about political reform. Unlike in Hong
Kong, support for capitalism has not translated into a visible prodemocracy social movement. Vietnam remains a one-party state. While
government sources report extremely perhaps implausiblyhigh turnout
for National Assembly elections, none of the young people I spoke with
had much faith that voting matters.
The lack of a pro-democracy movement in part reflects the realization that
advocating radical political change would be risky. Few want to share the
fate of the bloggers arrested for criticizing the government, although the
Internet has made it more difficult to repress dissent. In my time, just
speaking out one time could put you in jail, said a Hanoi man who was
imprisoned in the 1970s for starting an organization to protest the
American War. He asked that his name not be used. Now, its easier for
young people to get information and speak out their opinion. ... Maybe one
or two times is OK, they just warn you. But if you do it over and over and
make it seem like youre trying to gather people, they can still put you in
jail.
But more than that, young Vietnamese Ive met see the potential for
producing social change outside the formal political system. We have
activities to raise awareness about the environment and underprivileged
people, Trang told me. But we dont care about the government or any
political stuff. The government controls everything.
While Trangs generation is not rebelling against Communist Party
leadership, its members are finding ways to communicate their views to
the government. Young people have started using social media to express
their concerns about development issues, such as a plan to build a cable
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car through the worlds largest cave. And sometimes the government is
even responsive. A Facebook campaign to stop Hanoi from chopping down
thousands of old trees drew 20,000 supporters in one day, motivating city
authorities to reverse the decision.
We are the new generation, we are the change, blogger Duong Vu Hoang
Anh told me during the campaign to stop the cable car, which seems to
have had some success so far. Vietnamese youth have participated in this
issue like nothing else before. We realize that this decision should be
ours.
.

SAMPLE MID-TERM TEST

AE2 WRITING ANSWER KEY
Task 1: 30 points
a. Question type: Editing a non-academic text (6 cases of non-academic language)
b. Objective: To assess students ability to write proper language for research papers.
c. Scoring rubric:

Indicators of academic language:

Indicators of non-academic language:

Full forms

Short forms

Formal connectors

Informal connectors

Use of nominal groups (verbs made into nouns)

Use of pronouns

Use of the passive voice

Use of the active voice

Concise vocabulary

Informal vocabulary

Objective and impersonal point of view

Subjective and personal point of view

Suggestion: 5 pts for each acceptable edition. 0 is given as an example.

No.
0
1
2
3
4
5
6

Original word/phrase

Possible edited word/phrase

80s
we have
Lacking success
mightnt
In this literature review, I will consider
Said
Of course

1980s
have been
The lack of success
might not
This literature review considers
noted, indicated
Obviously/ It is obvious that

Task 2: 20 points
a. Question type: Identifying text structure
b. Objective: To assess students ability to understand a text and to elicit the organizational structure of
that text.
c. Scoring rubric:
- Category (main idea)
- Sub-categories (which develop the main idea)
- Major details (which support the sub-categories)
Possible text structure:
Category: There are some common factors of cheating which need to be actively challenged.
Sub- category 1: Reasons for cheating
-

Parental pressure

Peer pressure

Availability of the Internet

Sub-category 2: Solutions to cheating

-

Parents accept and motivate their children

Students recognize their peers improvement and effort

Teachers use the Internet properly

Task 3: 50 points
a. Question type: Writing an academic Compare/contrast essay
b. Objective: To assess students ability to write an academic essay with elements of research
language
c. Scoring rubric:
Content

15

All main points relevant to topic

Essay question fully answers
Organization

15

Topic and purpose of the essay discussed in the introduction

Each main point discussed in a paragraph
All main points summarized and rephrased in the conclusion
Coherence

10

Paragraphs ordered in a systematic manner based on, for example,

importance, priority, etc.
Compare/contrast transitions are properly used.
Style and Tone

10

Formal writing with full forms

Polite writing
Academic vocabulary