Archive by Author
Remembering Shakespeare Posted by Gabriele on Jun 7, 2016
This year marks the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death and the English-speaking world is remembering this amazing author in many ways. Although there is some debate about who the man William Shakespeare actually was, most people know him as one of the greatest English poets, playwrights (a person who writes plays), and actors that ever…
Wedding engagement vocabulary Posted by Gabriele on May 31, 2016
We are approaching “wedding season” in the United States. Wedding season is a term used to describe the time of year, the summer months, in which most weddings in the United States take place. June is the most popular month for American’s to get married (10.2% of wedding happen in June), but July and August…
English interjections Posted by Gabriele on May 24, 2016
Interjections are short words or sounds that are used to express feelings or emotion. What interjection do you think this baby would make if it could? I think he is about to say “Yikes!” Interjections are words that convey emotion. They do not have a grammatical relationship to other parts of a sentence. They stand…
Standard and Imperial measurements Posted by Gabriele on May 17, 2016
Most of the world uses the metric system for measuring, but the British and Americans have their own systems of measurement (just to make things complicated). These systems are called the ‘standard’ or ‘Imperial’ systems. Let’s take a look at the names for measuring things that are used in the United States and Great Britain…
Ape-related expressions in English Posted by Gabriele on May 10, 2016
Apes are our closest animal relatives, so it should come as no surprise to you that expressions with references to apes (i.e. monkeys, gorillas, chimpanzees, orangutans) are frequent in English. These expressions are particularly common when talking about human behaviors. Below is a list of common ape-related English expressions, with examples of how they are…
Using the word ‘may’ in May Posted by Gabriele on May 3, 2016
Since we have just entered the month of May I thought I’d take this opportunity to talk about this month’s homophone the other word ‘may’. The month of May is a proper noun, but the ‘may’ I want to talk about today is a modal verb. The auxiliary modal verb ‘may’ is (generally) used for…
The Most Annoying English Words Online Posted by Gabriele on Apr 26, 2016
The last thing you want to do is offend someone you haven’t even met by being annoying. Unfortunately, this can happen pretty easily in today’s electronic-based world. We often “meet” people online long before we meet them in person and sometimes we never meet them in person! I found this interesting list (by Grammar.net) of…