Any time I’m writing and want to show a difference between two things, I find myself pausing. For example:
Reading a language is very different…
…from writing it?
…to writing it?
…than writing it?
They all sound ok, but in the end I usually plump for from, as it sounds more natural, but I’m never quite satisfied, as the other two still sound basically ok too… Continue reading
One of the interesting things about learning to become a language teacher is just how much your vocabulary improves. There’s a lot of jargon related to different aspects of language that one doesn’t ordinarily come across in life. So here’s a fairly random sprinkling of some of the more interesting (to me!) words we language teachers learn to use: Continue reading
First of all, I’d like to thank Spanglish Jill for giving me the idea for this post.
We’ve probably all found ourselves in a situation like this:
Little Timmy: Yesterday, John and me went to the beach and…
Heartless Teacher: No, Timmy, it’s John and I!
Little Timmy: Huh?
Heartless Teacher: You don’t say John and me, you say John and I! John and me is for vulgarians only…
Little Timmy: Oh, ok. John and I went to…
It’s one of those golden rules we have drilled into us repeatedly as children that we never forget, like i before e except before c (more on that in the future): never say (insert name) and me.
But, does this rule always hold? The fact that I’m asking should tell you the answer… Continue reading
Yesterday evening at about 6.30PM I had a moment of panic. I realised that in my rush to leave, I hadn’t read over my post and italicised all the words I should have. I couldn’t go back, and wasn’t in a situation to do it on my phone. It would just have to stay in that condition for a few hours, which aggravated me. Letting something unfinished like that out into the world seemed so sloppy.
What needed to be changed? Not much really, just two or three cases where I was referring to words, and not using them, and wanted to italicise them to make that clear. For example: “I’ve been trying to use the word application…” instead of “I’ve been trying to use the word application…”
A minor change, really, and most of my stress was due to my being a stickler for detail. Because, the post was probably quite comprehensible without my revisions (which of course I still made last night). Putting the word before application made what I wanted to say clear enough. Given also the topic of the blog and the specific context of the post itself, there was probably little ambiguity in the post. And it’s great that language can make things so clear for us, do so much of the heavy lifting of comprehensibility with words alone. But still, I’m drawn to being precise as I can in my use of language, just to be sure… Continue reading
This is a question that always sparks debate, and we probably all know people whose views fall on opposite sides of this debate. Some are sticklers for grammar, pouncing on any tiny error with relish. Others put less thought into how they use language and make errors without regard to how well they’re understood. And most people fall somewhere in between these two extremes. If you’ve ever been concerned about whether you have good grammar or not, then let me reassure you that your grammar is almost definitely much better than you think. Such is usually the case for most people in terms of their native language. But to know exactly what we mean by having good grammar, first we need to look at what grammar is.
What is grammar? Continue reading
Teacher: Yes, that’s correct: We say “In the future, the planet will be warmer.” So when we’re talking about the future, we use will to…
Student: But teacher you can’t!
Teacher: Excuse me?
Student: You can’t say will because you’re not sure! What if things change? You have to use might, because maybe it won’t be warmer in the future! You can’t be certain!!
Teacher: Ok, tell me: what day will it be tomorrow?
Student: Saturday.
Teacher: Ah, but how can you be sure it’ll be Saturday? What if the world ends this evening? Continue reading
The title of this post will either seem completely normal to you, or make you fly into a paroxysm of blind rage, complete with gnashing of teeth and wildly flailing limbs. Why would it make people so angry?
Well, because it’s wrong. It should of course say You’re funny. Some of may have already known that, some of you may not have. Some of you may be aware that you’re is correct in this instance, but didn’t notice that the title is wrong due to being so used to seeing your used instead of you’re.
First off, what’s the difference between your and you’re? Continue reading
English-Language Thoughts 