Please help me to read this English sentence:

[ColinHowell]

Originally Posted by dogsbody70

um what do you mean we often says "seems. there seems to be misunderstandings. in other words there "Appears" to be some misunderstanding.

masaegu is referring to the fact that JamboP26's "corrected" sentence,

There seems to be some reasons for this.

itself contains an error. The original sentence was

There seem to be some reasons.

Adding "for this" was correct, but changing "seem" to "seems" was wrong, because that made the verb singular, even though the noun it refers to, "reasons", is plural. If JamboP26 had changed it to "There seems to be some reason for this", it would have been OK.

I also objected to JamboP26 "correcting" the American-style spelling "rumor" to the British-style spelling "rumour" when there was no obvious need for such a change, but I'm American , and that's a minor point.

[JamboP26]

Originally Posted by ColinHowell

masaegu is referring to the fact that JamboP26's "corrected" sentence,

There seems to be some reasons for this.

itself contains an error. The original sentence was

There seem to be some reasons.

Adding "for this" was correct, but changing "seem" to "seems" was wrong, because that made the verb singular, even though the noun it refers to, "reasons", is plural. If JamboP26 had changed it to "There seems to be some reason for this", it would have been OK.

I also objected to JamboP26 "correcting" the American-style spelling "rumor" to the British-style spelling "rumour" when there was no obvious need for such a change, but I'm American , and that's a minor point.

I was in two minds about changing the American spelling, but its up to Yuri what one she uses. As for the other points, thanks for correcting

[dogsbody70]

goodness me how complicated you make it.



I would consider some american spellings as not being true English.

if someone is learning American English-- then I guess one has to accept that, but every day speaking of English is not the same as this pedantic teaching of the language.

still i'll stay out of it because i honestly cannot comprehend so much of rules.

very complicated.

[ColinHowell]

Originally Posted by dogsbody70

goodness me how complicated you make it.

Sorry, I can be like that sometimes, though it isn't deliberate.

I would consider some american spellings as not being true English.

"Them's fightin' words!"

Yeah, I know, it's an old issue. I like to think of those American spellings as English's way of reshaping borrowed French words into a more Anglo-Saxon (i.e. pre-Norman Conquest) spelling style, but that's just my personal fancy.

if someone is learning American English-- then I guess one has to accept that, but every day speaking of English is not the same as this pedantic teaching of the language.

Agreed. Again, I can be rather pedantic at times, and my "writing voice" tends to be much more exacting and formal than my "speaking voice". But I do believe that writing requires somewhat higher standards, and the incorrect sentence immediately sounded wrong to me. The complicated part was explaining why that is.

[dogsbody70]

ignore me colin, its aeons since i was at school. my friend goes to college here learning english-- and when she shows me her text books i find them complicated.

forgive my lack of capital letters-- my broken arm makes it difficult to do.


the thing with american's is that when you hear them speak it is so unlike uk english. if it was spoken as it reads it would be written quite differently i feel. does that make any sense?

[YuriTokoro]

Hi.
Could someone correct my English?


“16 days after the Massive Earthquakes in Japan.”

I bought a new mobile phone last week.
My old one didn’t receive earthquake early warnings.
The new phone starts alarm every time emergency earthquake alert is issued.
Even if I am fast asleep, my phone will wake me up a little bit before an earthquake is coming.
In addition, my old phone’s battery has been running out so fast.
I decided to buy a new mobile phone every three years at least.
There were some people who made a phone call for help under the rubble after the Earthquakes.
My cell-phone charms are a small flash light and a whistle.
If a massive earthquake occurred and I’m buried under the rubble, I would search an exit in the dark with my flashlight. You might say you would use your cell phone’s backlight, but the battery must be precious under the circumstances. I would use my flashlight.
If there is not an exit, I will use my whistle to tell my place to the rescue team. Nine days after the Earthquake, 16 old boy and his grandmother were found in the broken kitchen. He said he had heard there were rescue workers, but the rescuers didn’t hear his voice for days.
Can you imagine that you cry out for help in the dark and rescue team doesn’t hear you?
I think there might be many people who cried out for help, but usually people cannot cry loud enough.
I’ve had this whistle for years. When I saw the movie “Titanic”, the heroine blow a whistle for help, I thought I should have a whistle with me.
I really recommend you to have one. Really.

Thank you.

[JamboP26]

Originally Posted by YuriTokoro

Hi.
Could someone correct my English?


“16 days after the Massive Earthquakes in Japan.”

I bought a new mobile phone last week.
My old one didn’t receive early earthquake warnings.
The new phone sounds an alarm every time an emergency earthquake alert is issued.
Even if I am fast asleep, my phone will wake me up a little bit before an earthquake is expected.
In addition, my old phone’s battery has been running out so fast.
I decided to buy a new mobile phone every three years at least.
There were some people who made a phone call for help under the rubble after the Earthquakes.
My cell-phone charms are a small flash light and a whistle.
If a massive earthquake occurred and I’m buried under the rubble, I would search for an exit in the dark with my flashlight. You might say you would use your cell phone’s backlight, but the battery must be precious under the circumstances. I would use my flashlight.
If there is not an exit, I will use my whistle to tell my place to the rescue team. Nine days after the Earthquake, a 16 year old boy and his grandmother were found in the remains of the kitchen. He said he had heard there were rescue workers, but the rescuers didn’t hear his voice for days.
Can you imagine that you cry out for help in the dark and rescue team doesn’t hear you?
I think there might be many people who cried out for help, but usually people cannot cry loud enough.
I’ve had this whistle for years. When I saw the movie “Titanic”, the heroine blows a whistle for help, I thought I should have a whistle with me.
I really recommend you to have one. Really.

Thank you.

Corrected. Hope this helps. I would have marked the corrections in red, but I'm doing this on my phone

[Koir]

Originally Posted by YuriTokoro

Hi.
Could someone correct my English?


“16 days after the Massive Earthquakes in Japan.”

I bought a new mobile phone last week.
My old one didn’t receive earthquake early warnings.
The new phone sounds an alarm every time an emergency earthquake alert is issued.
Even if I am fast asleep, my phone will wake me up a little bit before the earthquake occurs.
In addition, my old phone’s battery had been running out too fast.
I decide to buy a new mobile phone every three years at least.
There were some people who phoned for help while under the rubble after the Earthquakes.
My cell-phone charms are a small flash light and a whistle.
If a massive earthquake occurred and I’m buried under the rubble, I would search for an exit in the dark with my flashlight. You might say you would use your cell phone’s backlight, but the battery life is precious under the circumstances. I would use my flashlight.
If there is not an exit, I would use my whistle to alert the rescue team to my position. Nine days after the Earthquake, a 16 year old boy and his grandmother were found in their ruined kitchen. He said he heard the rescue workers, but the rescuers didn’t hear his voice for days.
Can you imagine that you cry out for help in the dark and the rescue team doesn’t hear you?
I think there may have been many people who cried out for help, but usually people cannot cry loud enough.
I’ve had this whistle for years. When I saw the movie “Titanic”, the heroine blew a whistle for help, I thought I should have a whistle with me.
I really recommend you to have one. Really.

Thank you.

Very good advice, Yuri. I had not heard of cellphone charms like a flashlight or even a whistle, but now having them seems to be a good idea. Flashlights especially can be very small, so having one at all times is possible.

Not many revisions were needed in your composition. Most of them were just changing verbs to be more descriptive or changing verb tenses to better reflect the point in time the action did or could occur.Also, some words were changed to communicate the sentence concepts clearer.

One sentence you wrote in the composition greatly impressed me:

"I’ve had this whistle for years."

This shows that you have a growing understanding of verbs and how they can be used to modify others verbs to create a deeper communication of concepts with less words.

Good work, Yuri!

[YuriTokoro]

Originally Posted by JamboP26

Corrected. Hope this helps. I would have marked the corrections in red, but I'm doing this on my phone.

Hi, JamboP26!
Thank you!
It must have been very heavy on your phone.
I truly thank you.

[YuriTokoro]

Originally Posted by Koir

Very good advice, Yuri. I had not heard of cellphone charms like a flashlight or even a whistle, but now having them seems to be a good idea. Flashlights especially can be very small, so having one at all times is possible.

I believe a flashlight would be very helpful if you were trapped under rubble in the dark.
However, You don’t seem to need it because your country doesn’t have a lot of earthquakes.

Not many revisions were needed in your composition. Most of them were just changing verbs to be more descriptive or changing verb tenses to better reflect the point in time the action did or could occur.Also, some words were changed to communicate the sentence concepts clearer.

I see.
My weakness seems to be verbs.
I know you always correct the verbs, but verb tenses is difficult…….

One sentence you wrote in the composition greatly impressed me:

"I’ve had this whistle for years."

This shows that you have a growing understanding of verbs and how they can be used to modify others verbs to create a deeper communication of concepts with less words.

I’ll try my best.

Good work, Yuri!

Thanks.
Your continued support will be greatly appreciated.