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The Future

November 18, 2009 in blog | No comments

In English there is not a single future tense, there are many ways to talk about the future

  • present continuous – future plan
    • Jim’s coming in an hour for my class
    • I’m flying at 1800 on 24th November

    • I’m having dinner at a Chinese restaurant this evening (I have booked a table)

  • be going to + inf – intention

    • I’m going to play table tennis at the weekend

    • I’m going to have dinner at a Chinese restaurant this evening (I haven’t booked a table)

  • will (shall) + inf – predicition & making a decision at the time of speaking

    • “What are you doing at the weekend?” “Oh, I don’t know, I think I’ll go shopping.”

    • I think I’ll come back to the UK on 10th January

  • present simple – timetable

    • The plane leaves at 1800

    • The film starts at 2040

  • may / should / might / could + inf – modal future

    • We should leave in an hour

    • We might go shopping at the weekend

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Present Simple

November 17, 2009 in blog | No comments

  • The present simple is rarely used to describe the present, instead it has three major uses:
    • Habit – I take the underground to work
    • State – The earth goes around the sun
    • Future timetabled events – On Sunday my flight leaves at 1810
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Hello Again

November 16, 2009 in blog | No comments

Hi

Many apologies for not posting for such a long time, but I now have a child, a baby girl born on 20th September. I figure that the more practical approach to keeping up with posting here is to post a more polished version of the notes I prepare for my clients when a particular question pops up.

Any comments gratefully received.

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Can you see the mistakes 03/07/09

July 3, 2009 in blog | No comments

Each class I have with a client I document their mistakes as they speak. The following session I print out the mistakes and ask the client to correct them. I thought it would be useful to put together a collection of these on a weekly basis and publish them, so others can try and correct them. I have collected them by first language, because each language group makes it’s own mistakes.

So, the following are all WRONG, if you want to download this as a document, with answers, you can do that here – Can you see the mistakes 03/07/09pdficon_large.

Spanish Speakers

… and coming to a so complicated system …

… just to get adapted to the crisis …

German Speakers

… why you haven’t mentioned it yesterday …

… he worked for Lehman Brothers. So I don’t have to comment this …

… last month I wrote him because …

… I’ll leave it on, I’ll see if he’s reacting …

… if I do such a work …

… it depends on what message you want to transfer …

… after his social year he hasn’t found any job …

Read the rest of this entry »

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If someone says “Couldn’t have gone much better” what does that mean?

June 13, 2009 in blog | No comments

Just thought it might be worth posting this. An old client of mine emailed me this question and here’s what I thought.

QUESTION
If someone says “Couldn’t have gone much better” what does that mean?
Is it , “it was great”?
I understand “Couldn’t be better” but the sentence above is using the third conditional.

MY ANSWER
“Couldn’t have gone much better” means that of all the expectations you had of a particular event, it was the almost the best expectation that happened.

For eg. if you were taking an exam and you had a range of expectations, perhaps scores of 45% 55% 65% 75% 85% and after taking the exam and getting your score back you got 83%, you could say “Couldn’t have gone much better”

We also say this after interviews etc., if the interview went well and in response to the question “How did it go?”

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Can you see the mistakes 11/06/09

June 11, 2009 in blog | 1 comment

Each class I have with a client I document their mistakes as they speak. The following session I print out the mistakes and ask the client to correct them. I thought it would be useful to put together a collection of these on a weekly basis and publish them, so others can try and correct them. I have collected them by first language, because each language group makes it’s own mistakes.

So, the following are all WRONG, if you want to download this as a document, with answers, you can do that here – Can you see the mistakes 11/06/09pdficon_large.

Spanish Speakers

… even though I’m understanding almost everything …

… I am always using the word …

… well, let me explain you one problem …

… or to take every single requirement from customers …

… they want to see how good the service is running …

… first of all you need 24 by 7 people …

… you never know people in the end …

… when I hear people on the call centre …

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Can you see the mistakes 06/05/09

May 8, 2009 in blog | 1 comment

Each class I have with a client I document their mistakes as they speak. The following session I print out the mistakes and ask the client to correct them. I thought it would be useful to put together a collection of these on a weekly basis and publish them, so others can try and correct them. I have collected them by first language, because each language group makes it’s own mistakes.

So, the following are all WRONG, if you want to download this as a document, with answers, you can do that here – Can you see the mistakes 06/05/09pdficon_large.

Telegu Speakers

… something I tried to do it …
… she was not letting him to say anything …

French Speakers

… and I walk on the bridge between the museum …
… and they invite for three or four days …
… it was the tenth economy in the world …
… they had no good food, no good education …
… I make always this mistake …

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Few / A few

March 27, 2009 in blog | No comments

wait-await One of my clients recently said something like “I’ve been to the park few times before.”

I told him he was incorrect, and then asked him the difference between

a. There are a few examples of this behaviour.

and

b. There are few examples of this behaviour.

In a. a few is simply describing the amount, the quantity, in this case it means not many or some. In b. few suggests that there are not enough, that the speaker was or is expecting more.

The MDO says that few is

used for emphasizing that a number of people or things is very small, especially when the number is smaller than you would like or expect

while a few is defined as

some, but not many

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New improved and free online dictionary!

March 9, 2009 in blog | No comments

I’ve just discovered that my favourite paper advanced users dictionary, the Macmillan dictionary, now has a free online version. It used to be password protected and slow, but now there is a beta version of a much better dictionary, and you don’t need to register.

Try it out here:

waves http://www.macmillandictionary.com/

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Saturday February 28th 2009

February 28, 2009 in blog | No comments

I’ve added two new feeds from the BBC

Articles

I’ve added an article about a common vocabulary problem, lay, lie or lied? Other than that, the only news is that I’m going to be away for a week, so don’t expect to hear from me for a while!

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