Pronunciation

One of the biggest difficult I have in spoken english is the TH sound. As it does not exist in italian language, I have an huge problem to pronunce that sound correctly. As far as I know, it does not exist any italian word containing "th". Therefore, my tongue and palate are not accustomed to utter it. It goes often a T sound from my mounth.
There are many words over this section I would collect, read, learn and teach to someone else as well as I can. Some of those are:

Thesaurus: / θɪˡsɔːrəs / a dictionary of symonyms and antonyms.
Thick: / θɪk / relatively great in extent from a surface to the opposite. Antonyms: thin.
Thievishness: / ˡθiːvɪʃnɪs / characteristic of a thief; stealthy.
Thorough: / ˡθʌrə / executed without negligence or omissions.
Thoughtful: /ˡθɔːtfʊl/ occupied with or given to thought.
Thrift: / θrɪft / wise economy in the management of money and other resources.

Here there is a good website in which is described the way to say "th".
I have chosen just few words which start with this (for me) unpronunceable sound; all of them have the same phonic cadence.
On the other hand, there are some words changing just for the first letter, which are pronunced one differently from the other. For instance:

Cough: /kɒf/ an illness characterized by frequent coughing.
Bough: /baʊ/ a branch of a tree, esp. one of the larger or main branches.
Dough: /dəʊ/ flour or meal combined with water, milk, etc., in a mass for baking into bread, cake, etc.; paste of bread.
Rough: /rʌf/ having a surface marked by irregularities, protuberances, or ridges; not smooth.
Tough: /tʌf/ strong and durable; not easily broken or cut.

I have to be careful to remember these sounds above. The only way to achieve a good TH sound and a great and well pronunciation is speaking. The more you speak, the better is your english.
Reference: the words' meaning has been found out on http://dictionary.reference.com/

Understanding plagiarism and referencing

"Plagiarism: the unauthorized use or close imitation of the language and thoughts of another author and the representation of them as one's own original work".(1)
"Literary theft. Plagiarism occurs when a writer duplicates another writer's language or ideas and then calls the work his or her own. Copyright laws protect weiters' word as their legal property. To avoid the charge of plagiarism, writers take care to credit those from whom they borrow and quote".(2)

As the definition says, plaragiarism must be handled with kid gloves! In an assignment, you can neither use a bit from this article read from this book nor steal another little paragraph from another one and later paste everything together! However, using a correct way to reference your source is helpful both for you - which may prove you done good research - than for your reader, who sees you have done a great job!
You can draw on by a lecture: you should firstly understand the meaning of the staff you are reading and later write back with your own words.
The University strives against every form of plagiarism; it is considered as a very serious offence! Plagiarizing others' work make you sure you will not as good as you want, your final mark could be even zero!
I have found that website from Metranet which is very very useful to understand properly over all the plagiarism field.

(1) plagiarism. Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/plagiarism (accessed: December 03, 2008).
(2) plagiarism. (n.d.). The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. Retrieved December 03, 2008, from Dictionary.com :
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/plagiarism

Analyse your own language abilities and needs

VERY WEAK ------------------------------ > VERY GOOD

Speaking ________________ x _________________________
Pronunciation _____________ x ________________________
Grammar _________________ x _______________________
Vocabulary _________________ x _____________________
Listening ___________________ x _____________________
Writing _____________________ x ______________________
Academic skills _______________ x ____________________
Reading ______________________ x ___________________

The board above describe my weakest and my strongest english skills, from my point of view. I am a good reader: in my spare time, at home, on the tube, I enjoy reading everything I have handy. My vocabulary is not strong enough, but the meaning of a phrase could be helpful to find out the real word meaning.
My widest lack is on the fluency. I speak little in italian, even less in english! Only doing and doing again exercise, that is speaking, I could become more talkactive. Pronuciation may rise with the help of listening and speaking as well. I would like to hide my italian cadence even though it will need lot of time.
Often, it happens that I have to ask the question twice o three time until I understand properly when we are talking. This happens when the person I am speaking with has eighter a strong british accent or a bad pronunciation. Or perhaps because I am thoughtful, thinking back to another used word.
What I have to do is speaking all day long in english and thinking in english!

Subject exam paper search

After the Pre-sessional English Course, I would like to take Polymer Science and Engineering MSc. There are on Metranet an ocean of already given exams: they could made and idea about how might be our nexts assessment works.
I'm trying to answer a question about Polymer Science.
1) Explain what is meant by the term 'isomer'.
Isomers are molecules which have the same atoms but different bonds among them.
2)Discuss three different types of isomeric structures found between repeat units in polymers. Use an appropriate structure as examples.
Polystyrene can have 3 isomeric structures: - atactic, in which the position of the phenyl is oriented randomly along the carbon atoms of the chain; - syndiodactic, where the phenyl groups are regularly alternating onto the carbon atom chain; - Isotactic, where the methyl groups are arranged on the same side.
It had better to have a graphic comparison.
3)Select one of the isomeric structures above and discuss the polymerisation process to ensure that the discussed structure is prepared.
Polymerisations which use Ziegler-Natta catalysts allow formation of the wanted isomer. Dependently by the chosen catalyst system, we could obtain only one isomer among the possible ones.

I chosen the simplest exercise, but there are some very difficult to solve! More or less, the difficulty of the italian exams is the same, perhaps in the italian ones there are much more calculate to do. In order to pass an exam, in Italy you have to cope firstly with the written task and then, if you have pass it, the oral examination.
Some exams are difficult to pass because of the professor: they reject students just for have said or done little mistakes. It happened to me as well.
I reckon I have to start to freshen up all my previous studies...

Reflections about Seminar 2

The second seminar has gone much better than the first one, from my point of view. Everyone have been involved into the discussion, which has been often vibrating. The researches done have been very useful: I have given some examples to support my idea and I have argued them when I was desagreeing with others. I have tried to move the discussion over all the other points, making connections when it has been possible.
I think my vocabulary and my fluency are improving, but I still need a little break sometimes when a word fails. :(
I have to start to build up more simple phrases and later articulate them with the right vocabulary. I should add two or more thinks easier that I do it now.
Perhaps because of the noise in the class and the distance between each other, I have had some problem to hear, I have lost few words but the phrase's mean has been clear.
It is possible to argue about the topic's pros and the cons for a whole life, because of the vastness of the theme, and the conclusions could be ever argued. However, most important aspect pools everyone, such as privacy and personal security.
We are everytime under control!

Approach to Seminar 2

Tomorrow there will be the second seminar in which we will discuss about Crime and Science. I am looking out on lots of websites, most of them on BBC. Here there are some interesting reflections about privacy.
For each of the point it will examine, I am separating the pros and the cons. I am reading news happened in UK there are some unbelievables such as that one! How can money be wasted in that way... I don't know!
All seem going around databases which hold everyone's data! With them it can be possible prevent all crimes! And from the crime of stealing data, who or what protect us? Are those hedge in safe?
There is a fine line between lawful and illecit which very often, flowing into privacy violation.
See you later!