Blog topics

Recent Posts

• TOEFL Listening: Tricky Function Question 
  
• Student essay evaluation (How to move from 23 to 28)

Introducing "Dr. Byrnes' TOEFL Listening Mastery Course: Score 27+"

TOEFL Courses

• Reading

• Listening

• Writing

• Speaking

English Skills Courses

• Pronunciation: vowels, consonants and connected speech

• Prosody: word stress, sentence stress, focus word stress and intonation

• Vocabulary: Exam words A-Z, Roots and affixes, Synonyms

• Grammar for Writing and Speaking 

The Daily Grind (But Fun!): Blogging Meets YouTube

• TOEFL Speaking Delivery: Mastering English rhythm
• Key technique for TOEFL Reading Information Questions: identifying phrases of the same meaning
• TOEFL Integrated Essay: Avoid This Grammar Mistake - Confusing Facts and Possibilities
• TOEFL Reading: How to guess correctly
• Struggling with TOEFL Reading?
• TOEFL Writing Grammar: Subject-verb agreement in number

Blog Topics 

TOEFL Reading

Solution strategies: megafauna extinction

Student question: sentence insertion question using 2 clues

Student question: Decoding a difficult TOEFL passage correctly

"Most" and "either" as clues for TOEFL sentence insertion questions

"Such" is the clue: sentence insertion

"Other" is the clue: sentence insertion question

Paraphrase questions using semicolons, colons, dashes and appositives

Semicolon, colon and dash in TOEFL passages

Minerals: Hard questions and incorrect answer on Chinese site

TOEFL vocab: A words

TOEFL vocab: B-C words

TOEFL Vocab Meaning inferable from roots and prefixes: exercise review

TOEFL Vocab questions: meaning inerrable from roots and prefixes

TOEFL inference questions needing contrapositive

Summary questions

Summery questions based on clues

Easiest clue: absolute vs qualified

TOEFL loves "Even"

Implicit information questions

Reading between the lines

How to find hidden information

Negative information question: direct vs indirect effect 

Rhetorical purpose question

Synonym question

Elimination method 

Hard TOEFL passage: Comets

Sentence insertion questions

Sentence insertion questions

Sentence insertion: transitional words of readsong

Information question

TOEFL Listening

Note taking and listening comprehension on Rose Frantzen

Answering strategy

Hard TOEFL lecture: Bode's Law

Main idea question

Note-taking strategies

Archaeological site

TOEFL Speaking

Q1 Collection of ETS raters' written evaluations

Q1 Personal preference answering strategy 

Q1 School uniform requirement

Q2 Comments on student response 

Q4 Defense strategies & Baby math 

TOEFL Writing

Academic:feedback on the seniority policy

Academic: Student essay comments: free public transportation

Academic Discussion Lecture 1 (sample lecture)

Academic ETS official sample responses of score 5 

Academic Comments on student essay: mistake in electronic device purchasing  

Academic: Comments on student essay: social media's impact on society  

Academic: Essay comments: train existing employees vs hiring new ones

Academic Children using electronic devices

Academic Electronic voting

Academic Free will vs determinism

Academic: Celebrity charity

Academic: Reverse mentoring

Academic: Business Success

Academic:How to respond to a difficult TOEFL academic discussion question

Integrated Roman Empire

Integrated: Power companies

Vocabulary

A-Z Vocabulary

Ab- words Ab- words
Ac- wordsAc- words
Ad- words:Ad- words
Ae-, Af, Ag- wordsAe-, Af, Ag- words
Al-, Am- words:Al-, Am- words

Roots and affixes

Roots Greek and Latin roots with the same meanings

Roots from QUOD to RUPT

Roots from SE to SON

Prefix from A to CONTRA

Prefix from DE to EX

Prefix from FOR to ISO

prefix from MACRO-OVER

Suffixes for nouns from AC to ER

Suffixes for nouns from ESS to URE

Suffixes for verbs, adjectives or adverbs

Pronunciation

Course syllabus and sample lectures

Prosody

Course syllabus and sample lectures

Grammar

1 minute grammar

1. Use the definite article correctly

2. Five noun types for noun countability: https://youtube.com/shorts/Y0lcoVS17sk?feature=share

3. Use countable nouns correctly: https://youtube.com/shorts/s6XVICbNFwg?feature=share

4. Three types of countable nouns: https://youtube.com/shorts/EENBQxEJTZs?feature=share

5. Three types of uncountable nouns: https://youtube.com/shorts/UuCDCRmMDM4?feature=share

6. How to talk about quantity with uncountable nouns: https://youtube.com/shorts/WpsqHMATes0?feature=share

Long grammar lectures

1. Rule 1: Noun-determiner agreement: https://youtu.be/vlJtsxBUbVc 

2. Distinction of countable and uncountable nouns: https://youtu.be/SesnD3ymTAQ 

3. Use “the” for specific things: https://youtu.be/3yLJssZHb9o 

4. Singular countable indefinite quantifiers:https://youtu.be/GJXgto8e3Do

5. Plural countable indefinite quantifiers: https://youtu.be/VCchH-W1yiM

6. Nationality of a person and people: https://youtu.be/dhVGpGIJS6A

7. Uncountable indefinite quantifiers: https://youtu.be/ripAqfYlK_Y

8. Plural and uncountable indefinite quantifiers: https://youtu.be/x6a9vsf5gQg

9. Types of Determiners: https://youtu.be/86wM27qxxnM

10. Determiner order (pre-main-post):https://youtu.be/D-9oF2MBwzw