False Friends Between English and Spanish


Stage 6 Stage 7 Stage 8 Spanish and English have a lot of words that are either the same or at the very least close enough to be understood without having ever learned the language. These include a multitude of words that end in either –tion in English or –cion in Spanish. For example, “Education” …

Prepositions Related to Time


Stage 5 Stage 6 Stage 7 Prepositions, the great struggle for students of English everywhere! Although there exist some rules related to the use of prepositions, they must be learned, for the most part, by practice and trial and error. One useful way to learn them is by separating them into basic general categories, which …

A few, few, a little, little


Stage 6 Stage 7 Stage 8 This week’s blog post concerns two words that students often get mixed up – few and little.   Download Exercise   Few is the opposite of many (and “a lot of”) and little is the opposite of much (and “a lot of”). For example: – There are few people …

CONFUSED AND MISUSED WORDS IN ENGLISH


Stage 7 Stage 8 Stage 9 There are many words in English which have similar meanings but are often used in very different ways. Also, there are words that are often confused for each other because of similar pronunciation or spelling. It can be difficult to figure out if you are using the right word. …

So would I – Neither can he


Stage 7 Stage 8 Stage 9 There are times when somebody says something, and we want to reply that the same situation is true for us. Imagine that your friend says to you, “I would love to visit China some day.” And you have the same desire to visit China!   Download Exercise   Of …

Conjunctions


Stage 7 Stage 8 Conjunctions are words that we use to join two clauses together to make longer sentences. There are many words that we use for this purpose. However, the three most common are ‘and’, or ‘and’ but.   Download Exercise   We use the word ‘and’ to link two ideas together. These can …

The Structure Not…either


Stage 7 Stage 8 Remember that the words “also”, “as well” and “too” mean the same thing. The only difference is how we use them in a sentence: “as well” and “too” go at the end, and “also” goes after the first auxiliary verb, or before the main verb. But an important feature of these …

“Christmas Idioms”


Stage 7 Stage 8 Stage 9 As we are in Christmas mode at the moment, I thought it would be a great time to look at some Christmas and Christmas inspired idioms that are in common use. Not all of these are only for use around Christmas time, but some of them can be used …

“Dependent Clauses”


Stage 7 Stage 8 This week we are going to look at two very common types of dependent clauses. But first, let´s just revise what a clause is. A clause is any group of words with a subject and a main verb. We have two types of clauses – Main clauses and Dependent clauses. A …

“The use of the present simple”


Stage 5 Stage 6 Stage 7 Stage 8 The present simple is most commonly used for regular actions – habits; things we do often. For example: ~ I drink coffee every day. ~ Mark plays football at weekends. ~ We study English on Mondays and Wednesdays. It isn’t necessary to state the frequency of the …