I hume you was the first collaboration between Gordon Reynolds and Catherine Dubois, and by now, countless readers the world over have benefited from its original style, which compromises neither information nor entertainment in its quest to improve English language skills. The exploits of Seb, Charlotte and Tom are described in a journey taking in the landscape of humour, emotional decisions and supernatural experiences that will inevitably end in an accumulation of vocabulary and language skills of the type often glossed over by traditional methods.
Each chapter in the story focuses on a certain aspect of English, the 'missing word' format is used throughout parts one and two. Occasionally you will be able to fill the gaps straight away, sometimes you will need to read the whole sentence or paragraph to grasp the context, and other times you'll simply have to 'cheat' and look up the answer at the back! Whichever route you take, you will be improving your comprehension of English and taking in a spellbinding story.
If I hume you were a simple textbook, you would be denied Gordon Reynolds's intriguing story. If it were just a novel, there would be no missing words linking to Catherine Dubois's intelligent interactive exercises and tips. Of course, if you have already read part one, you'll know exactly what to find inside the covers; the tale continues.
This book has been designed to enable students to learn English by using English. In every chapter of this book you will find practical examples of English in use. Part one of this book consists of twelve chapters, which are complementary, each chapter deals with a specific point in grammar and is designed to give the reader practice and confidence in twelve grammatical structures. At the end of each chapter there is a crossword to help you master new vocabulary by using the cross reference page numbers which enable you to look for the desired word with a definition of it, thus translating English to English. Every clue in the crosswords gives an indication to the number of letters in the word being searched for, (7) means of course, seven letters. Also at the conclusion of every chapter, there are context-related exercises to give practice in several grammatical points which are not practised in the chapters themselves. In addition to the crosswords and exercises each chapter has its own tip; learning these tips will help you to improve the language skills necessary to be fluent in English.
The key section includes not only answers to the gaps but also the word’s grammatical function, other suggested possibilities, comments, examples, tips and why such a form was chosen instead of a different form.
It is clear that the book may be used in many ways according to the circumstances of each case – the important point being that however you work it, you will find, within the key section, at the back of the book all you need to test your work.
If, however, any doubt arises as to a particular word or structure be sure that you write something before you consult the key. For while you must depend ultimately on the key for help, you must see to it that that help is legitimately worked for. You ought to make it an absolute rule never to consult the key until some version of a whole exercise has been attempted. However difficult the exercise you can always, at least write something. The mere fact of facing a problem prepares the mind to understand and enjoy the solution, whereas if every difficulty is removed by at once turning to the key to see how the exercise is done or which word is missing, little impression is made on the mind, and there is little real progress.