English as a Second Language Program offers a truly dynamic and communicative approach to learning the English language. This program is a complete four-level course that features a unique “natural” approach to language learning. It follows a carefully sequenced, systematic presentation of grammar and a comprehensive coverage of all aspects of English Language. It consists of complete courses for beginning level, intermediate level, and advanced level, and the Student Book, Work Book, and Audio/Video materials for each level/course provide practice in all four communication skills, with a special focus on listening and speaking for beginning level and on reading and writing for intermediate and advanced levels. Student Books in this program develop basic life skills and vocabulary through interesting and realistic character and dialogue. Work books provide numerous written exercises that reinforce the grammar and structures taught in the Student Books, and Audio/Video materials provide stimulating listening, speaking, and pronunciation practice for each level.

This Program has three basic aims:

1. To provide motivating instruction and material that teach students in real-life situations
   
2. To teach only authentic English that stimulates natural conversation both in and outside the classroom
   
3. To give students a feeling of success and achievement as they learn the language

Real communication from the beginning: from the very beginning, students practice language that can be put to immediate use. For example, students learn to ask for information, make suggestions, and apologize. They learn the appropriate language for different situations, such as formal speech with strangers and informal speech with friends. Most importantly, they are encouraged to express their own ideas and feelings, and to give their own opinions.

Intensive Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) Preparation Program is a truly rigorous and exhaustive English Language Program/Test Preparation Program which simultaneously covers Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing, Structure (Grammar), college-level vocabulary, and Idiomatic Expressions/Speech throughout the entire program. This program consists of Intensive English/TOEFL Preparation Program 1 for novice (beginning) and low-intermediate level test takers and Intensive English/TOEFL Preparation Program 2 for high-intermediate level and advanced students who need higher scores required by U.S. colleges/4-year universities and graduate schools. This program is an unquestionably all-inclusive Intensive English Language Program in that it not only deals with the required test skills (Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing), but also it requires rigorous and demanding practice and class participation for several hours a day in and outside the classroom, including some extracurricular activities closely related to the nature of the program. Our instructors truly and readily deal with every aspect of English language, embrace the class as their own, and inculcate the foreign students with the importance of assimilation into the mainstream of American culture.

This complete multimedia Intensive English/TOEFL Preparation Program 1 helps novice (beginning) and low-intermediate level students prepare for TOEFL iBT (internet-Based Test). It is geared to students whose Diagnostic TOEFL scores fall in the 25-56 range (internet-Based Test) or 80-160 range (Computer-Based Test) or 377-483 range (Paper-Based Test). This program is comprised of three separate phases of advancement to the next phase:

This complete multimedia Intensive English/TOEFL Preparation Program 2 helps high-intermediate level and advanced students prepare for TOEFL iBT (internet-Based Test). It is geared to students whose Diagnostic TOEFL scores fall in the 57-80 range (internet-Based Test) or 163-213 range (Computer-Based Test) or 487-550 range (Paper-Based Test). This program is comprised of three separate phases of advancement to the next phase:

Listening for basic comprehension:

• Understand main idea or purpose of a conversation or lecture
• Understand major points and important details of a conversation or lecture

• Recognize the speaker’s attitude
• Recognize the speaker’s degree of certainty
• Recognize the speaker’s purpose or motivation (e.g., apologizing, complaining, suggesting)
• Recognize how stress and intonation help convey the speaker’s intended meaning

• Recognize organization of information presented
• Understand relationships between information presented (e.g., cause-and-effect, compare-and-contrast, steps in process)
• Make connections between or among pieces of information in a conversation or lecture
• Recognize topic changes, exemplifications, digressions, or aside statements in lectures and conversations; recognize introductory and concluding remarks in lectures
• Make inferences, form generalizations, predict an outcome, and draw conclusions based on what is implied

Independent Speaking:

• Describe familiar persons, places, objects
• Express and justify likes, dislikes, values, preferences
• Recount events and actions
• Express an opinion and support it
• Take a position and defend it
• Make a recommendation and justify it

• Take and use notes to organize information before speaking
• Identify and summarize major points and important details from written and spoken sources
• Paraphrase information from written and spoken sources
• Synthesize information from written and spoken sources
• Recognize and convey a speaker’s attitude and intent
• Connect concrete information with abstract concepts
• Express an opinion in relation to what has been read or heard and support it
• Take a position and defend it
• Make a recommendation and justify it

• Use a variety of signal words and phrases
• Use idiomatic speech appropriately
• Use vocabulary (new and previously learned) with precision
• Use a range of grammatical structures with precision
• Produce intelligible speech
• Sustain speech at an even pace for a short time (1 minute)
• Use stress, intonation, and pauses to convey meaning effectively

Reading to find information:

• Find key facts and important information in a reading passage
• Effectively scan textual material for information
• Increase reading fluency and rate

• Understand the main idea of a passage
• Understand key facts and important information in a passage
• Recognize logical sequencing of written material
• Understand vocabulary meaning
• Correctly identify the pronouns and the nouns they refer to in a text
• Make inferences, form generalizations, and draw conclusions based on what is implied in a passage

• Recognize the organization and purpose of a passage
• Recognize cause-and-effect relationships, compare-and –contrast relationships, and arguments
• Create a mental framework, such as a category chart or an outline/summary, for organizing and recalling major points and important details
• Distinguish between major and minor points or information
• Recognize and create accurate paraphrases of information from a text
• Understand why an author explains concepts in a certain way

Independent Writing:

• Articulate and justify an opinion about an important issue or personal preference, supporting one’s own opinions based on one’s own knowledge and experience
• Take the knowledge of the intended audience into account; that is, do not assume the reader is familiar with the topic

• Take notes on major points and important details from written and spoken sources and use these notes to organize information before writing
• Paraphrase and cite information from sources accurately
• Summarize major points and important details from sources
• Select and present in writing the ways that the information form one source (e.g., what is heard in class) relates to the information in another source (e.g., the reading passage)
• Take into account the knowledge of the intended audience; that is, do not assume the reader is familiar with the source material

• Think about and list all ideas related to a topic or task before writing (also called prewriting)
• Identify one main idea and some major points to support that idea, and plan how you want to communicate them (e.g., with an outline)
• Create a focused thesis statement and use it to develop all the ideas presented in the essay
• Develop the essay by using appropriate explanation and detail
• Express information in organized manner, displaying unity of thought and coherence
• Use effective connecting/linking (transitional) devices to help the reader understand the flow of ideas
• Use a range of grammar and vocabulary for effective expression
• Use vocabulary and grammar accurately; use idiomatic words and expressions appropriately
• Follow the conventions of spelling, punctuation, and layout