English Is Crazy

Peculiarities of English pronunciation, word formation...



I bet many of you agree, English is crazy…

Whether / If

[Infographic provided by Grammar.net]

To The Dance Lovers Out There

The video below, shot on the streets and rooftops in LA, is actually a commercial that advertises a brand name of jeans and cut-offs (definition from Urban Dictionary:"Cut offs" or "cut off jeans" are the names that are given to jeans that have been cut, usually D.I.Y, into shorts. They can be loose or they can be tight,and the length of the cut offs generally does not go past the knee. They can be worn by both guys and girls and typically are made from old pairs of jeans or jeans bought from a second hand clothing store.)

Could you describe one or two types of dances? It is not easy! This vocabulary may come in handy: float like, spin like, wobble like, step, walk …

These are the types of dances shown:

A - Arabesque, Morgan Quinn 
B - B-girl, Bgirl Terra 
C - Chicken Noodle Soup, Terence Dickson 
D - Death Drop, Nick Lanzisera 
E - East Coast Swing, Yani Marin, Nathan Kim 
F - Finger Tut, John P-Nut Hunt 
G - Grand Jeté, Julia Cinquemani 
H - Harlem Shake, Amanda Meade-Tatum 
I - Indian Bhangra, Reshma Gajjar 
J - Jump Style, Høps 
K - Krump, Jigsaw 
L - Liquid Dance, Phillip 'Pacman' Chbeeb 
M - Memphis Jookin, Lil Buck 
N - Northern Soul, Levanna McLean 
O - OMG, Anthony 'Lil' Bob' Cabaero 
P - Pole, Nicole 'The Pole' Williams 
Q - Questionable, Reid Shapiro 
R - Rumba, Junior and Emily Alabi 
S - Step, Soul Steps: Dionne Norton, Heather DeLeon, Maxine Lyle
T - Twerk, Twerk Team: Lady Luscious, Mizz Twerksum 
U - Ultimate, Shofu Tha Beatdown 
V - Vogue Hands, Javier Madrid of Legendary House of Ninja 
W - Whine, Colleen Craig 
X - X-press Yourself, Ryan Heffington 
Y - YMCA, Allison Chu at Next Models LA 
Z - TurF FeinZ: Byron Vincent Sanders Jr aka T7, Donald Brooks aka Torch, Eric Bossett aka Kidd Strobe, Gary Morgan aka Noh-justice, Leon M Williams aka Mann, Rayshawn Thompson aka Looney2smooth

Linking words

I hope this video lesson  - together with our classwork - will improve your knowledge about the use of connectors

Visual Vocabulary: Empathy & Sympathy

Brené Brown is a research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work. She studies concepts such as shame, empathy, vulnerability, courage, shame… Hers is the voice in this  video, which explains the difference between sympathy and empathy.

If you are interested in watching and listening to Brené Brown´s TED Talks, click here.

Make and Do

When to use Do and Make is one of those things you will learn naturally if you  frequently read or listen to English but you will have to study the collocations with either one or the other, if you do not. These videos will help you to remember them, I hope

Video number 1 is an Expresso English video: it explains the general difference between Do and Make  and shows 60 collocations

Video number 2 is a video made by an English teacher called Vicki Hollett; she uses different expressions in a context to make them easy for you to remember. Click here to read the transcript:

Video number 3: common expressions with Do  and  Make. Click here to read the transcript

Vocabulary Learning

Learn some vocabulary (things invented in the USA) while you revise some geography (states in the US) to improve your general knowledge 

Demonstratives

[Infographic provided by Grammar.net]

Do you need any practice on demonstratives? Click here

Pronunciation of Food Terms

Read these food terms; they are all names of foreign origin but used in English. Do you know what they are? how do you pronounce them? 

• pho
• paella
• gyro
• prosciutto
• bruschetta
• gnocchi
• hors d´oeuvre
• flambé
• quinoa
• pommes frites
• Worcestershire
• phyllo dough
• petit four
• foie gras
• gruyère

Now watch the video: read the definition of what each one of them is and check their pronunciation in English; the video is called "15 Common Food Terms That You Are Probably Pronouncing Wrong".

    

100 Ways to Say "Great"

“A synonym is a word you use when you can't spell the other one,” said Baltasar Gracián

Improve Your Vocabulary: 100 Ways to Say "Bad"

How many of these words do you know? How many do you use?

For more information about "Write At Home", click here

This Book is the Milk!

This Book is the Milk! is a book written by Damián Mollá and Alberto Alonso; they explain the meaning of the English words we see in our everyday lives. It is aimed at the Spanish market so I am sure you will recognize most of the examples they give.

Leave a note for Santa Claus or for The Three Wise Men asking them for this book; you´ll have fun while you learn a lot of vocabulary in English. Click here to read a sample chapter

This is the presentation of the book: 

Friday, 13th

Do you know what "triskaidekaphobia"is ? For the record, it is fear of the number 13. Number 13 is an unlucky number for many people; would you like to read about the origin of this superstition? Click here

In this video, they ask people what it is and whether they can spell it - now, close your eyes, can you spell it?

Are you a superstitious person? Can you give us an example of the things you do or don´t do because of superstition?

Peculiarities of English: Plural Words

A brief history of plural words in English, by American linguist John McWhorter: click on the captions to both hear and read  the lesson

Now, do some listening practice:

To do a multiple choice listening exercise, click here

Word of the Year 2013: Selfie

"Selfie" (plural "selfies") has been named word of the year by Oxford Dictionaries: read about it here.

It was first used in 2002 in an Australian online forum; the suffix "-ie" is a characteristic one in Australian words, for example, "barbie"( for "barbecue") and "Aussie" (for "Australian")

How would you define what a "selfie" is, in your words? Have you ever taken a selfie? Have you ever posted any on the internet?

One more piece of news about "selfies" ( copied from Brandflakes for Breakfast):

As part of a new ad campaign, South African newspaper Cape Times has transformed some of the most famous photos in history into selfies. Utilizing the tagline “You can’t get any closer to the news,” the ad campaign gives us a different perspective on photos of historical figures such as Jacqueline Kennedy, Winston Churchill, and the royal couple. The “Kissing the War Goodbye” selfie is actually so realistic, we could have sworn we saw a similar photo on Instagram just this weekend!:  

Learning Vocabulary: Silent "E"

Here is a funny way to learn vocabulary while you practise pronunciation: write the names of the items you see in the video; the only change in each pair of words is their spelling and the letter "e" has a lot to do with it.

Write a list of the nouns you hear (based on the images you see) and check your answers by a click here

Tom Lehrer, the writer and singer of this song, is a singer-songwriter, mathematician, satirist…, well-known for his humorous songs

As for the letter "e", can you imagine a song without it? Here is one: read its lyrics and then listen to it in the video

Lyrics:

yo, without a topic i rock it
you just can't knock it or box it
i will not quit or stop and lock lips
this is a rap song in which no lyrics contain that fifth capital
brains and wits magical
i strain to rip madrigals plain to bits
any occasion, i flip scripts
birthdays and kids' trips
violin gigs, absurd paid shindigs and thursdays
i win big with wordplay
i could bring sounds that ring loud
just sing out anything that i think about
how i spray flows
your main bro claims dough from days old
on pink fluffy unicorns dancing on rainbows
but i'm on top of it, always
with or without that non-consonant
i still bring it
fans or not, my mom's fond of it
and you ought to know i just brought this jazz to its limit
that's right, your total abc's without that fifth glyph is in it

i'm not using it
do you kids miss this fifth stiff glyph?
i'm not using it, ooh

so what do you want to do?
look at my lyrics - right in front of you
truthfully, with so much scrutiny
you think I'd goofily put any old symbol in?
mad lunacy, you must not watch my stuff usually
no miscalculations, i rap brutally at any opportunity
wow, actually did it!
post this track to your pals
got a knack for blowing your brains out blaow
dictionary nation, vocab's amazing
difficulty: asian, and i'm just playing
shining bright any night, hit it right, kill a mici'm a mad man with a plan and i spit it tight
vividly spilling a million lilting rhythms and synonyms with a divinity in him
just winning at anything you might go giving him
finishing with only a possibility of pinnacling at infinity

i'm not using it
do you kids miss this fifth stiff glyph?
i'm not using it, ooh

Formation of Plurals In English

Sometimes we (teachers) take things for granted. For example, we think our students know how to form the plural of any word in English and, suddenly, when we are correcting essays, we see the same mistake over and over again and we realize it is time to review the basics...

[Infographic provided by Grammar.net]

Strike Against the Education Reform

Students, parents and teachers from all levels of the Spanish public education system are on strike today to protest against the massive cuts and the education reform passed by the government. 

Last May we lived another strike like this. The video below is about the situation then (the education reform had not been passed yet). Watch it and pay attention to the vocabulary about education you can hear or read there; you know the topic so it shouldn´t be difficult to follow. If you read the captions, try to follow the general idea but remember they are not man-made so you will see quite a few mistakes there.Make sure you know what the following words and expressions mean before watching the video:

• pre-school
• participation rate
• austerity measures
• budget cuts
• reduce spending on education
• tuition
• non-obligatory secondary education
• labour unions
• protester
• to demonstrate
• the public sector
• student-teacher ratio
• charter schools

The Use of English

Harris Academy  in London  has introduced new rules on the use of slang: they have banned the use of some slang words frequently used by their students in order to improve standards of English. Have a look at the banned words:

In case you are wondering what these words mean, here´s an explanation for some of them:

'BASICALLY, IT'S BARE EXTRA, INNIT?' WHAT DO THE BANNED WORDS MEAN?

Coz - short for 'because'. As in 'Care is required in handling elemental sodium coz it generates flammable hydrogen and caustic sodium hydroxide upon contact with water'.

Like - Often used erroneously in sentences. American in origin. For example: 'School dinner was, like, lasagna'.

Bare - Very, a lot of. For example: 'Shakespeare had bare influence on the English language'.

Extra - pointless, stupid, weird or just plain dumb. 'Kafka's novella The Metamorphosis is extra'.

Innit - Isn't it? As in: 'The Mariana Trench is the deepest part of the world's oceans, innit

Read more about this here

Are you interested in learning a little bit more about British slang? Click here

Note: meaning of "academy" according to the Wikipedia:  In the English state education system, an academy is a school directly funded by central government (specifically, the Department for Education) and independent of direct control by local government in England 

Idea for the post taken from The English Blog

British English vs. American English

English is not an easy language; sometimes not even speakers from different countries, but with English as their mother tongue, can fully understand each other. This may be due to their pronunciation (or "mispronunciation", from the other speaker´s point of view) or to the vocabulary itself - slang, for instance.

Here is a good example of all those things mentioned before: British actor Hugh Laurie is interviewed by American television host Ellen DeGeneres. In this excerpt of the interview, they question each other about different slang words. If you find the interview difficult to understand (their sense of humour may complicate things a little bit as well), click here and you will be able to watch the interview subtitled in Spanish - the part embedded below starts around minute 6:30.

Start the weekend with a smile!