Archive for 'Learning'
Listening Comprehension: Dog Psychology Posted by Rachel on Apr 27, 2011
Fántastico is a Sunday news program on TV Globo that includes various lifestyle segments that are really helpful for those learning Portuguese. They have fairly simple language and use some basic vocabulary words. Today, we’ll take a look at a segment on dog psychology. Watch the video and see if you can answer the questions!…
Reading Comprehension: Royal Wedding Posted by Rachel on Apr 24, 2011
The Brazilian media has excellent international coverage, and like in many places around the world, the British royal wedding is in the news in Brazil. Today, we’re going to read a few articles in Portuguese about the wedding to test reading comprehension. It’s not about Brazil, but it’s important to be able to understand international…
Brazil World Cup Cities Posted by Rachel on Apr 19, 2011
Recently, the Brazilian Ministry of Tourism released a bunch of short videos about the World Cup host cities in 2014. They’re available in English, but we’re going to watch them in Portuguese, of course. They’re a short little overview of what each city has to offer visitors, so you can see scenes from around Brazil…
Feel Better in Portuguese Posted by Rachel on Apr 5, 2011
If you want to tell someone who is sick or injured to feel better, here are a few ways to do so. 1. Melhoras This is the simplest way to tell someone to feel better, with just a single word. Você está bem? – Are you ok? Não, estou doente. – No, I’m sick. Melhoras!…
Empurra-Empurra Posted by Rachel on Mar 29, 2011
While this expression literally means “push-push,” it has two uses that are useful to know. Let’s take a look. 1. Pushing and shoving This means the type of confusion you’d find in big, rowdy crowds. Houve muito empurra-empurra durante o show de rock; foi um tumulto de verdade. There was a lot of pushing and…
I Wish! Posted by Rachel on Mar 25, 2011
Today we’re going to learn a helpful expression to say “I wish”: Quem dera. Literally, it doesn’t make much sense to a non-native speaker, since literally it translates as “who gives.” But it really means “I wish”or “If only!” Let’s look at some examples. -Você vai no casamento real? Are you going to the royal…
The Carioca Accent Posted by Rachel on Mar 24, 2011
We’ve talked about regional slang in the past, including vocabulary about how to speak like a Carioca. But after I saw this video, I thought it would be helpful to talk a little bit about regional accents as well, and in this case, the Rio de Janeiro accent. Cariocas da gema (which literally means, people…