Although I rabbit on a lot about writing, social media and my dog, I don’t mention my day job very often on my blog. So for those of you who may not know, I fill my days being an adult EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teacher. That is, teaching adults how to use English for professional …
When Does an Immigrant Feel Part of Their New Country? Some of the most intriguing questions which have come up in recent years are to do with immigration and the assimilation of immigrants into new countries and new cultures. Now that it is relatively easy to live in other countries we have Australians living in …
For those readers who may not know, I actually do something other than ramble on about things that annoy me and scribble out books and poetry. In fact my principal activity is as an English teacher. Not your Shakespeare and Keats English Lit teacher, but a teacher of ESOL. That translates to English as a Second Operating …
For some, playing with the English language may not be your cup of tea, but I love it. One of my favourite parts of speech is the difference of meaning between gerunds and infinitive verb forms. While some verbs change meaning completely, others remain more or less the same. But knowing which ones change and …
It may come as a surprise to learn that the English language contains some complexity. We are always told that it is a rather simple language as it has no masculine, feminine or neuter to worry about. Neither does it have special grammatical structures such as the subjunctive in French or the accusative and dative …
After a relatively long period of navel gazing, procrastinating, idle daydreaming and just plain laziness, I have decided to return to my designated profession as a ‘chalkie’. For those who haven’t heard this label before, it means teacher. And worse still, an English teacher. One could say that I have been afflicted with the absence …
One of my favourite Cambridge examination components was key word transformation . It truly was a test of a student’s knowledge of English at both First Certificate and Advanced levels. However it is also a great exercise for accomplished writers. I still love doing them as it fine tunes my writing skills by having to …
When teaching English writing, one of the most common mistakes I came across was the use of the comma. On asking my students why they had placed a comma in a certain position, they often justified it by saying that it was for a pause for breath. Well when we read we don’t need to …
It’s fun learning a new language. But sometimes trying to use direct word for word translation can result in some very funny expressions! Private school: NO TRESPASSING WITHOUT PERMISSION. Hotel bedroom, Japan: GUESTS ARE REQUESTED NOT TO SMOKE OR DO OTHER DISGUSTING BEHAVIOURS IN BED. Doctor’s surgery, Rome: SPECIALIST IN WOMEN AND OTHER DISEASES. …
The most common sound when we make in English is called the Schwa. It represents up to 15% of our utterances. However, so few people have heard of it. It’s the sound we make when we say ‘cup of tea’, and really say ‘cuppa tea’. It’s this little ‘uh’ sound we use in this example …
One of the most common word forms in English is ‘ing’. Sometimes referred to as the gerund, present participle or progressive form. It has such a multitude of uses that a single label just cannot be affixed to these amazing three letters. So broad is their use that Michael Swan prefers the simple label of …
The grammatical term of the present in English is a bit of trap. Yes it is a tense, but when combined with the four basic aspects of simple, progressive (or continuous), perfect and perfect progressive the concept of the present being the now type present goes out the window. The confusion starts with the present …
