Bryn Mawr offers the following opportunities for students for whom English is a second language (ESL) to develop their writing, speaking, and critical reading skills.
Writing Center Tutorials
The Writing Center offers nine hours per week of designated ESL tutoring; check the online schedule for appointments. Non-native speakers may also make appointments with undergraduate peer tutors.
NNS Discussion Group
Led by undergraduate Writing Center tutors, this group offers students an opportunity to practice spoken English in an informal (and fun!) way. Join us once a week and improve your class participation. No preparation is required; email thewritingcenter@BMC to register.
Analytical Reading Group
Learn ways to read more deeply and critically. For more information, email thewritingcenter@BMC.
ENG 126: Writing Workshop for Non-Native Speakers
This half-credit course is offered both semesters. See the Writing Program web page for more information.
Suggested Resources
The first three sites are likely to be the most useful for students at Bryn Mawr, but the others are included as additional resources.
This site offers an explanation of several of the most common ESL errors found in writing, including singular and plural verb agreement, verb tenses and forms, passive voice, conditionals, articles, gerunds and infinitives, and adjective clauses. Each section explains the error in detail and provides three short self-correcting quizzes to give you practice in identifying and correcting these common errors. In addition, the site offers an overview of “The Elements of Academic Argument” and “Seven Strategies to Improve Your Grammar.”
This site offers both diagnostic tests to determine your problem areas and self-correcting practice quizzes to give you the opportunity to work on common errors in writing.
Georgetown University ’s Writing Center Resources for ESL Students
This site starts with an introduction that discusses the challenges often faced by non-native English speakers in learning to write the traditional American academic essay, including differences in ways of presenting and explaining ideas and differences rhetorical patterns used to express those ideas.
The site also includes handouts on “Sentence-level Errors and How to Fix Them,” “Specific Writing Skills” and “Lessons in Grammar.” The “Resources For ESL Students” page offers a list of links to other ESL writing sites students may find helpful.
Parts of Speech Review by Gallaudet University
This site provides a review of nouns, pronouns, verbs, conjunctions, adverbs, prepositions, adjectives and interjections, as well as charts that show correct usage of each.
LEO (Literacy Education Online)
This site allows you to search for further information based on the specific ESL problems you are having.
The following links offer a guide to grammar and writing, as well as over 170 interactive quizzes.