What is it?
To start us thinking about the issues that are coming up in the next reading, "Risk-takers: Who are they?" Warwick and Rogers (2018) invite us to briefly describe an imagined risk taker.
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Question
- Imagine a typical risk-taker. Choose your topic. Get ideas on her or him. Write a brief description of the person. Your description should cover:
- the person’s age,
- character,
- gender,
- job,
- and social life.
You have 12:00 minutes to plan and write your response to the question. I suggest you divide your time roughly as:
- planning = 4:00 minutes (It's usually a good idea to plan before you start to write.)
- writing = 6:00 minutes, and
- editing = 2:00 minutes.
A helpful strategy
Beginning your introduction by telling us the name of your imagined risk taker forces you to be concrete, which generally makes for stronger, more effective examples.
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Reference
- Warwick, L. & Rogers, L. (2018). Skillful 4: Reading & Writing, Student's Book Pack (2nd. ed.). London: Macmillan Education
Allan seems to me a typical risk taker. Now in his mid-thirties, he continues to show the same impulsive character traits that marked his earlier life. In primary school, if he got offended, he would hit out at the person who he deemed had insulted him, even if they were older and much larger: the risk of being hurt did not seem to deter him. Thankfully, he no longer gets into fights so often, at least not physical fights. But I've seen him engage in similarly impulsive behaviour, for example, one day a customer complained about the quality of a the custom knife that Allan had sent him: flying into a rage, Allan cancelled the order, refunded the charge, and put that customer on his business's banned list. And wrote an angry email whihc he sent before calming down. He is lucky that the risks he took in setting up a business he is passionate about have worked out well; even though his interpersonal skills are combative and aggressive, there is a solid international demand for his handmade products, which typically sell for thousands of dollars.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure how many long term friends Allan keeps before having a fight with them that ends the relationship. Perhaps there are some who tolerate the impulsive, unreasonable anger because he is also loyal, and ready to fight for what he believes in or for people he respects. Unfortunately, his wife could not stand the constant unpredictability in his behaviour, so left him shortly after the birth of their daughter, whom he loves passionately, but with whom he also has a strained relationship.
One of the typical risk takers whom I have personally known is Peter. He is in his forties. He is a bit bulky and kind of muscular. He has been working as an English teacher at AUA in Thailand for more than 20 years. He is a very generous and friendly person I have ever known. Apart from his teaching job, he likes to take on new challenges, especially when it comes to investment. For example, last week he has just invested a large chunk of money (approximately over half of his savings) in Bitcoin regardless of the fact that the bitcoin price is going down. He hopes that one day the price will go up again which can bring him a massive chunk of money enough to be spent for the rest of his life.
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