Archive for 'English Language'
Other Ways to See Posted by carol on Jun 30, 2021
Hi, there, dear readers! How’s it going? The other day I was with a student in his company’s conference room. When the lesson was over, I noticed he was too busy to walk me to the door. So I decided to say, “Don’t worry about it, I’ll see myself out”. His puzzled look made me…
The Many Problems with Tomatoes Posted by Gary Locke on Jun 24, 2021
There are several problems with tomatoes. I don’t mean that growing them is a problem (although they are susceptible to blights, worms, and pests of all kinds.) Rather, pronouncing, spelling, and even defining tomatoes in English are among the most irksome and debatable issues in our language. Songs have been written about this. The Supreme…
Silent Letters in English Posted by Gary Locke on Jun 10, 2021
Ask anyone what makes learning English so difficult, and many will tell you it’s because the words are very hard to spell. Many English words don’t sound anything at all like the way they are pronounced, mainly because English has so many silent letters. There are also many words with combined double consonants, such as…
Silent Letters in English: A History Posted by Gary Locke on Jun 3, 2021
It’s time to take a look at one of the most difficult problems for anyone learning English – silent letters. There are so many of them throughout the language that it’s hard to imagine having a conversation without encountering at least one. In fact, there were two in that last sentence, the G in throughout…
Prepositions of movement Posted by carol on May 31, 2021
All teachers know it: when it comes to prepositions, students cannot help but roll their eyes in frustration. And there is no denying that this grammar topic can be highly confusing even to the most advanced learners. And in some cases we might come across that word that we didn’t even know was a preposition…
Do you want a shot? Posted by carol on Apr 30, 2021
What’s up, guys? If there’s one thing we can’t stop talking about since the beginning of the year, it’s the vaccines. A lot of people must be wondering when they might be getting their first shot and long they should wait in between shots. But since mass vaccination might still be a while, let’s change…
Confusing Paronyms and Homophones Posted by Gary Locke on Apr 23, 2021
As confusing and maddening as English can be sometimes, learners and even native speakers have particular difficulty dealing with paronyms. In fact, to make matters worse, we even have trouble figuring out the difference between paronyms and homophones! Homophones are words that sound exactly alike, are even pronounced alike, but have very different spellings and…