怎樣在考試場合寫優秀的argumentative essays？我經常跟學生說，好的開始是成功的一半，要增加拿高分的機率，
下面有幾個argumentative essay introductions。學生版本雖然grammar 無誤，但比較平鋪直敘。我的rewrite因引用了外來元素，
Is impostor syndrome real?
Student
Though successful people may appear confident on the outside, their private perceptions of themselves may be another story. For example, they may attribute their success to luck and timing, and feel they don’t deserve their fame or money. This strange phenomenon is known as imposter syndrome.
My rewrite
We envy successful people because we are aware of the Pareto Principle at work – in many professions, the top 20% earn roughly 80% of the revenue. What we are less aware of is oftentimes, this 20% have difficulty believing their luck: when they see their bank statements, the figures there seem unreal to them.
Should doctors be allowed to genetically modify unborn children at the parents’ request?
Student
Thanks to recent advancements in technology, making changes to a baby’s characteristics through genetic modification looks less and less like a fantasy. The question remains whether parents have the right to fashion a child according to their liking. For giving parents to right to choose means taking away a child’d right to choose. On balance, I do not think the genetic modification of babies is a good idea.
My rewrite
In hindsight, Barbara Streisand was lucky in not submitting her bumpy nose to the surgeon’s knife when she was still at school and all her Jewish female classmates had work done on theirs. When she later decided to be a singer, she had to thank the displaced wall between her nostrils for a singing voice that was distinctive enough to land 11 of her albums on the top spot on the US Billboard 200 chart.
I think Streisand’s nose offer opponents of the genetic modification of babies one of the most powerful weapons to support their stance. Foresight isn’t 20/20. A feature that is a handicap in one context may become an advantage in another. Rather than giving parents the right to create what they think is the perfect baby through genetic modification, why not let nature take its course, and leave it to the child to decide what to make of himself or herself?
Modern technologies distract us instead of helping us
Student
The experience of being distracted by social media is very common. One notification from Instagram is enough to draw our attention away from studying. One click, and we will continue scrolling, till an hour has passed and we realize we’ve lost an hour to studying.
My rewrite
When a marketing whiz coined that famous slogan for Lay’s potato chips – “Betcha can’t eat just one” – unbeknownst to him, he was also coming up with an apt description of the way social media can destroy people’s ability to focus: A single Instagram notification usually leads a person down the rabbit hole of many more posts; when he or she next checks the time, an hour has passed.
Michelle Ng
英國牛津大學畢業，前《蘋果日報》和《眾新聞》專欄作家，現在身在楓葉國，心繫中國大陸和香港。
聯絡方式： michelleng.coach@proton.me
個人網站： https://michellengwritings.com
逢周日英國時間晚上8時 / 周一香港時間凌晨3時刊出
