The latest Doceri video is up - What's the difference between SAY and TELL?
I should mention that this video covers the basic, general differences. I'll make a more detailed video to go with the First Certificate/Escuela Oficial class work.
Showing posts with label problem verbs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label problem verbs. Show all posts
12.15.2010
STOP SPANGLISH: The Seminar!
New Year! New English! New confidence! New abilities! Ladies and gentelmen (and everyone in between....) I proudly present to you....the FIVE THINGS YOU CAN DO TO STOP SPANGLISH seminar, which will start on Friday, January 14th, 2011.
Instead of babbling on about what an amazing course it is, I've put all of the important information in a downloadable document that you can print out and refer to:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/45323270/Stop-Spanglish-Seminar-1
And, as always, if you have any questions, comments, doubts or requests, don't hesitate to send an e-mail.
Instead of babbling on about what an amazing course it is, I've put all of the important information in a downloadable document that you can print out and refer to:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/45323270/Stop-Spanglish-Seminar-1
And, as always, if you have any questions, comments, doubts or requests, don't hesitate to send an e-mail.
11.02.2010
Cool discovery!
I just discovered something really cool over the weekend. iTunes is now selling the audiobook edition of "Fry's English Delight", the BBC Radio 4 documentary series on the English language.
For years, Stephen Fry was best known for his work with the comedy team "Fry and Laurie" (yes, that Laurie...Hugh Laurie, who you may also know as Dr. Gregory House.) Fry has a wonderful speaking voice and a good sense of humour; most importantly, the documentary provides some interesting information about why certain things exist in English.
You can find "Fry's English Delight" on iTunes. There's also information about the program on the BBC's Radio 4 website.
For years, Stephen Fry was best known for his work with the comedy team "Fry and Laurie" (yes, that Laurie...Hugh Laurie, who you may also know as Dr. Gregory House.) Fry has a wonderful speaking voice and a good sense of humour; most importantly, the documentary provides some interesting information about why certain things exist in English.
You can find "Fry's English Delight" on iTunes. There's also information about the program on the BBC's Radio 4 website.
10.03.2010
Ladies and Gentlemen...presenting...The Grammar Grater!
Years ago, Penguin Books (I think it was) published an extremely useful book called "Right Word, Wrong Word" that analyzed words that were similar, but used in different ways or had completely different meanings.
Unfortunately, that book is no longer in print, but the lovely people at Minnesota Public Radio, in the United States, have something that's just as good, if not better: The Grammar Grater...
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/radio/podcasts/grammar_grater/
Seriously, guys.... bookmark this link. You can download the podcasts onto your personal stereos and listen to them when you've got some quiet time; and be sure to check back regularly to give yourself as much practice as possible.
Unfortunately, that book is no longer in print, but the lovely people at Minnesota Public Radio, in the United States, have something that's just as good, if not better: The Grammar Grater...
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/radio/podcasts/grammar_grater/
Seriously, guys.... bookmark this link. You can download the podcasts onto your personal stereos and listen to them when you've got some quiet time; and be sure to check back regularly to give yourself as much practice as possible.
8.23.2010
NEW! STOP SPANGLISH - The Intensive Course
- Have you been studying English for years, but still feel like you're not getting better?
- Do you want to study for a Cambridge Exam, but are afraid that you can't use your English enough to pass?
- Are you unsure why you still keep making the same mistakes, over and over again?
- Do you find that you're unable to develop your "English brain" and stop translating when you speak in English?
- Do you think you'll never really understand how to speak correctly?
You may be surprised to learn that most Spanish students of English find it extremely difficult to get beyond an intermediate level. But many students are also very surprised to find that English is actually a very simple language because of its lack of flexibility.
In many ways, English can't do the same things that Spanish does - and when you learn how limited English really is, you can make great progress in learning how to eliminate mistakes and reduce the amount of translation you need.
Over eight hours, you will learn:
- How rigid English syntax is - and why that is an advantage for you
- The seven ways to organize verbs
- How to train yourself to stop speaking and writing in Spanglish
- The important connections between grammar and pronunciation
- Valuable English-only dictionary skills - get rid of that old dictionary and find the one that works best for you!
...all this and more for only €129! (that's a 35% discount!)
WHEN: September 10, 17, 24 and October 1st (Friday afternoons), 15:00 - 17:00
WHERE: Hexagone Idiomas, c/ López de Hoyos (Metro Avenida de América)
FOR MORE INFORMATION... Write us at stop (dot) spanglish (arroba) yahoo (punto) es!
6.11.2010
Subject: Subjunctive (Part 1 of 3)
One of the biggest advantages to learning English is the fact that, in English, you have a maximum of FIVE words to express any verb idea:
º the infinitive - TO BE ... TO EAT....TO PAINT
º the present simple - AM/ARE/IS....EAT(S)...PAINT(S)
º the past simple - WAS/WERE...ATE...PAINTED
º the present participle - BEING...EATING...PAINTING... and...
º the past participle - BEEN...EATEN...PAINTED
For people who are learning English, this is either a blessing or a curse. It's a blessing (what's the third person past preterit subjunctive of TO PAINT? Who cares!!), but it can cause difficulties for Spanish speakers of English for two reasons.
The first is obvious: If you're used to using a whole bunch of different words to express very specific ideas, it may feel strange, at first, to limit yourself to only a couple of words.
The second reason is the most difficult and it's the kind of problem that causes people to fail oral exams - it's EXACTLY the kind of mistake the examiner listens for, to check if you're translating or you're really using English.
Let's take idea as an example.
Imagine that you're at a party, and a drunk, obnoxious person comes up to you and starts bugging you. You ask him nicely to leave you alone, but he won't go. Then he tries to hit you! You go to the host of the party, and, in Spanish, you say....
¡QUIERO QUE SE VAYA!
This is a perfect example of when you use subjunctive in Spanish:
a) the two verbs have different subjects: (yo) quiero // (él) se vaya.
b) you can't control the result: quiero doesn't guarantee that the second action (irse) is going to happen.
But in English, you cannot say: *I want that he leaves.
Why not?
Look at the first verb: want. In English, WANT is always transitive: you always want something, or you want someone to do another action. Since you're the speaker and your want is the most important verb in the sentence, you have to complete that verb first.
I want (direct object)...
The direct object of want in this case is HIM, because a verb cannot be a direct object.
I want him (third person singular object pronoun)
So what happens with the second verb? Ah. Since HIM is already the direct object of WANT, it can't ALSO be the subject of LEAVE. It can't do both jobs. As a result, WANT doesn't have a subject, which means it must be infinitive:
I want him to leave.
This is correct English: Two verbs, but only ONE possible subject, so the second verb has to be put into the infinitive. Spanish looks at this situation and sees a philosophical problem; English looks at the situation and sees structural problems with the verbs.
It's worth remembering tthis is the kind of mistake that examiners listen for, especially in First Certificate speaking exams. Remember, it's called the First because it's the first Cambridge exam where you must show that you can communicate without translating. And it's especially important to use common verbs like WANT, HOPE, LIKE properly.
If you're not sure how to organize the information after the verb, a quality English-only dictionary like the Oxford University Press series of dictionaries will describe what verb patterns to use, depending on how you use the verb. (In the Oxford dictionaries, verbs that need infinitives after have the V+[TO- inf] code after them.)
º the infinitive - TO BE ... TO EAT....TO PAINT
º the present simple - AM/ARE/IS....EAT(S)...PAINT(S)
º the past simple - WAS/WERE...ATE...PAINTED
º the present participle - BEING...EATING...PAINTING... and...
º the past participle - BEEN...EATEN...PAINTED
For people who are learning English, this is either a blessing or a curse. It's a blessing (what's the third person past preterit subjunctive of TO PAINT? Who cares!!), but it can cause difficulties for Spanish speakers of English for two reasons.
The first is obvious: If you're used to using a whole bunch of different words to express very specific ideas, it may feel strange, at first, to limit yourself to only a couple of words.
The second reason is the most difficult and it's the kind of problem that causes people to fail oral exams - it's EXACTLY the kind of mistake the examiner listens for, to check if you're translating or you're really using English.
Let's take idea as an example.
Imagine that you're at a party, and a drunk, obnoxious person comes up to you and starts bugging you. You ask him nicely to leave you alone, but he won't go. Then he tries to hit you! You go to the host of the party, and, in Spanish, you say....
¡QUIERO QUE SE VAYA!
This is a perfect example of when you use subjunctive in Spanish:
a) the two verbs have different subjects: (yo) quiero // (él) se vaya.
b) you can't control the result: quiero doesn't guarantee that the second action (irse) is going to happen.
But in English, you cannot say: *I want that he leaves.
Why not?
Look at the first verb: want. In English, WANT is always transitive: you always want something, or you want someone to do another action. Since you're the speaker and your want is the most important verb in the sentence, you have to complete that verb first.
I want (direct object)...
The direct object of want in this case is HIM, because a verb cannot be a direct object.
I want him (third person singular object pronoun)
So what happens with the second verb? Ah. Since HIM is already the direct object of WANT, it can't ALSO be the subject of LEAVE. It can't do both jobs. As a result, WANT doesn't have a subject, which means it must be infinitive:
I want him to leave.
This is correct English: Two verbs, but only ONE possible subject, so the second verb has to be put into the infinitive. Spanish looks at this situation and sees a philosophical problem; English looks at the situation and sees structural problems with the verbs.
It's worth remembering tthis is the kind of mistake that examiners listen for, especially in First Certificate speaking exams. Remember, it's called the First because it's the first Cambridge exam where you must show that you can communicate without translating. And it's especially important to use common verbs like WANT, HOPE, LIKE properly.
If you're not sure how to organize the information after the verb, a quality English-only dictionary like the Oxford University Press series of dictionaries will describe what verb patterns to use, depending on how you use the verb. (In the Oxford dictionaries, verbs that need infinitives after have the V+[TO- inf] code after them.)
4.30.2010
And THAT is THAT!
Arancha sent me a great question last night:
Cual de las siguiente frases es la correcta en inglés:
1ª/ I THINK THAT TO BUY IN THE SUPERMARKET........
2ª/ I THINK THAT BUYING IN THE SUPERMARKET.........
3ª/ I THINK THAT BUY IN THE SUPERMARKET.........
Do you know the answer? It's #2, and here's the reason why.
If you look at the way the verbs are organized, you would probably have a sentence like this:
PART ONE: >>I think that<<
PART TWO: >>buying beer in the supermarket is less expensive than buying beer in the corner store.<<
The sentence has TWO verbs -- THINK and IS. Both of them have different subjects: I think and buying in the supermarket is. What happens is that the information that comes after "that" has to be a noun - you always think of something that needs a verb, and that verb always needs another subject. Here are some more examples:
I think that McDonald's is delicious. (Me: "I think that McDonald's is delicious!")
He thinks that his mother is going crazy. (Jim: "I think that my mother is going crazy.")
We think that we will probably go to France this summer. (Alberto and I: "We will probably go to France this summer.")
They think that Barcelona is a very expensive city. (Jon and Ann: "Barcelona is a very expensive city!")
Why? In all of the examples, "I think that" almost works like reported speech (estilo indirecto):
º I think that McDonald's is delicious.
º He told his mother that McDonald's is delicious.
º The advertisements say that McDonald's is delicious.
º It has been reported in EL PAÍS that McDonald's is delicious.
In Spanish, you would need the infinitive, but in English, we treat it like a noun idea, so we use the gerund form of the verb (since it's usually the easiest noun form.)
This is one really excellent reason why an English-only dictionary is a much better idea than a translating dictionary: most of them will tell you when you use words like THAT to connect secondary ideas with verbs like say, think, know, expect, tell and explain.
Cual de las siguiente frases es la correcta en inglés:
1ª/ I THINK THAT TO BUY IN THE SUPERMARKET........
2ª/ I THINK THAT BUYING IN THE SUPERMARKET.........
3ª/ I THINK THAT BUY IN THE SUPERMARKET.........
Do you know the answer? It's #2, and here's the reason why.
If you look at the way the verbs are organized, you would probably have a sentence like this:
PART ONE: >>I think that<<
PART TWO: >>buying beer in the supermarket is less expensive than buying beer in the corner store.<<
The sentence has TWO verbs -- THINK and IS. Both of them have different subjects: I think and buying in the supermarket is. What happens is that the information that comes after "that" has to be a noun - you always think of something that needs a verb, and that verb always needs another subject. Here are some more examples:
I think that McDonald's is delicious. (Me: "I think that McDonald's is delicious!")
He thinks that his mother is going crazy. (Jim: "I think that my mother is going crazy.")
We think that we will probably go to France this summer. (Alberto and I: "We will probably go to France this summer.")
They think that Barcelona is a very expensive city. (Jon and Ann: "Barcelona is a very expensive city!")
Why? In all of the examples, "I think that" almost works like reported speech (estilo indirecto):
º I think that McDonald's is delicious.
º He told his mother that McDonald's is delicious.
º The advertisements say that McDonald's is delicious.
º It has been reported in EL PAÍS that McDonald's is delicious.
In Spanish, you would need the infinitive, but in English, we treat it like a noun idea, so we use the gerund form of the verb (since it's usually the easiest noun form.)
This is one really excellent reason why an English-only dictionary is a much better idea than a translating dictionary: most of them will tell you when you use words like THAT to connect secondary ideas with verbs like say, think, know, expect, tell and explain.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)