The Forefront Achieving Academic Success 1

We would like to thank our colleagues at Middle East Technical University, Department of Modern Languages, who are too many to name individually, for sparing their time to read several drafts of the materials in this book and providing feedback, for proofreading, contributing through sharing their resources, and piloting the materials in their classes.We also thank the previous committee members, Didem Ayan, Murat Aydın, Sinem Bür, and Başak Kösereisoğlu, whose valuable work provided the basis for what we have produced. Another thank you is for our colleague, Melek Altun, who provided valuable support for the logical fallacies part.To our dearest friend and colleague at METU Northern Cyprus Campus, Gamze Öncül, we offer genuine appreciation for her sincere and constructive feedback. Her candor gave us a little shake :) but added the perfect kick in shaping the second edition of this book.We would also like to express a heartfelt thank you to the members of the administration, Derem Çanga, Gökçe Sert, and Meriç Gülcü Kurç, for their support, encouragement, and help throughout the process.And, of course, our deep gratitude and love go to our families, especially our children, who tolerated our absence when working on this book during the pandemic, which added an extra layer of difficulty for all. Thank you for showing understanding even when we couldn't share rare and precious times with you. AIM OF THE BOOKThe first book of the series, The Forefront, Achieving Academic Success 1, is designed to cater to the academic needs of first-year students in English-medium universities. The book follows an integrated skills approach aiming to give students practice in the basics of reading, listening, speaking, and writing for academic purposes. Central to the book's methodology are thematic reading and listening materials revolving around the theme of the human journey, which serve as input for the productive skills, speaking and especially writing, which are the two skills th...