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hi everybody my name is alicia in this

lesson i’m going to talk about some

differences

between the words almost and barely

let’s get started i want to start this

lesson

with the word almost for this lesson i

want to mention

both almost and barely are

adverbs so they have the same

grammatical function

but they have kind of opposite we can

think of them as kind of having the

opposite meaning

so let’s start by talking about almost

and the meaning of

almost almost can mean

very nearly but not exactly

it can mean not entirely or

not completely so i think this is best

to explain with some example sentences

i’m going to share some

example sentences that use almost in a

couple different ways

let’s look at this first sentence i

almost missed my flight

i almost missed my flight so to miss a

flight means you can’t catch the flight

like you’re not in time

for the flight i almost missed

my flight so we know almost means

very nearly or not entirely or

not completely so if we think about it

which of these

fits nicely into this sentence i feel

very nearly is a great one to substitute

i very nearly missed

my flight i nearly missed my flight

means i caught my flight so i was very

very close i

very nearly did not catch my flight is

another way to say this but we say

i almost missed so that means

this action came very close

to happening but it did not happen

let’s look at another example then she

almost

fell off her bicycle or she almost fell

off of her bicycle

it’s also okay so here the verb is

fell off fell off past tense of fall off

so that means she was riding a bicycle

or in this case

fall off fell off refers to riding in

this case a bicycle

and like losing balance so falling to

the side

becoming separated from the bicycle so

she almost fell off her bicycle

here we can use the same idea let’s

substitute very nearly

for almost here she very nearly

fell off her bicycle this means

she did not fall off her bicycle

but she almost or she very nearly

did it was very very close to happening

so maybe she lost her balance on the

bicycle

but she fixed it she was able to

continue riding her bicycle

so something that very nearly happened

was this

this is the thing that very nearly

happened

but it did not exactly happen she almost

fell off

so this thing did not happen in other

words

okay let’s move on to a different way of

using almost

this next sentence almost everyone

got a raise so here we can think of this

with

very nearly that works well here or

maybe not entirely

that’s another good one or not

completely like all of these

can fit well in this sentence to

substitute

almost everyone very nearly

everyone got a raise

so that means not everyone but very

close to everyone so if there are 100

people

in your company maybe that means 95

people

got a raise so very close to everyone

very close to all people got a raise

so not everyone not everything so

not entirely everyone not completely

everyone

but very nearly everyone gotta raise

all right now let’s look at maybe the

most challenging example sentence here

uh let’s read it first we almost

didn’t make it to the conference we

almost didn’t make it to the conference

so

in this sentence if we if we remove the

word

almost here we didn’t make it to the

conference it means we were not

able to get to the conference we

couldn’t make it in time for the

conference

however if we include almost

that means we very nearly didn’t make it

to the conference

that shows we were able to it was maybe

difficult

but we were able to actually make it to

the conference

okay let’s move along to one more a

common one perhaps

you almost forgot your wallet you almost

forgot your wallet again

you very nearly forgot your wallet

so we can compare the same thing we did

in this sentence removing almost

you forgot your wallet means the wallet

was left

behind like you don’t have your wallet

however

you almost forgot your wallet is imagine

someone is running out the door to go to

work

and their roommate or their spouse

shouts this you almost forgot your

wallet here you very nearly left the

house without your wallet here it is

so this expression almost this word

shows things that were very close to

happening

but they did not happen so we see that a

lot

when we have almost in front of a verb

like in these example sentences here

where we have it in front of a group of

people

for example it shows us not entirely

as the meaning okay so let’s compare

this to barely now i mentioned almost in

barely are kind of like

opposites a little bit so again barely

is an

adverb barely means only just

it can mean scarcely hardly

it can also mean nothing to spare i’ll

show some examples of this

so we can think about barely like

almost not something so let’s compare

some example sentences here first one i

barely made my flight connection i

barely made my flight connection so here

we see barely

before our verb made so to make a flight

to make a flight or to make a flight

connection in this case

means to be on time to be able to go

through the airport

and catch your flight in time so i

barely made my flight connection we can

substitute these words again as we did

with almost i

only just made my flight connection

so i made my flight connection with

nothing to spare

or no time to spare so this

barely shows us something was really

difficult but

i did it so this did happen i barely

made my flight connection the next

example sentence

she barely fit into the truck

so imagine fit into like imagine someone

is moving to a new house

a truck is full of boxes and

all kinds of objects from someone’s

house so

the truck is really really full she

might say or someone might say

she barely fit into like her body barely

fit into the truck because it was so

full

so barely again we can substitute with

only just

she barely or she only just fit into the

truck

means she was able to fit into the truck

she did it it was possible

okay let’s look at another one he was

barely

able to get tickets to the concert he

was barely able to get tickets to the

concert again

he was only just able to get tickets to

the concert

so that means maybe it was difficult to

do this

there were maybe just a few tickets left

and he purchased the tickets

in time like before they were all sold

out

so he was barely able that means this

was possible

he achieved this thing okay let’s look

now at the next example

barely anyone came to the conference

so this one is going to be a little bit

different we can’t substitute

only just in this case in this case in a

sample sentence like this

let’s substitute hardly for this one

hardly anyone came to the conference

that means

almost no people came to the conference

so barely anyone shows us the

turnout or the number of participants

was very

very low for the conference so this does

not mean only just

it means very few or hardly

all right let’s move along to the last

one

we barely had enough time to finish

our project we barely had enough time

this is a common expression we

barely had enough time to do something

so this shows us again we barely had

enough time

shows us that there was nothing to spare

so when we use it with an

expression like time it tends to be

associated it tends to relate to this

nothing to spare idea

meaning no time to spare no time to

waste

everything must be used efficiently so

we barely had enough time to finish our

project

means we finished the project but it was

really really close

so we almost didn’t have enough time to

finish the project

so i’ve done this a couple times

throughout the lesson but actually there

are some cases where we can kind of

swap we can kind of exchange these two

words

and make like the opposite version of a

sentence so the first example sentence

is a great example

i almost missed my flight and

i barely made my flight or i barely made

my flight connection

these mean the same thing they’re just

different ways of saying

it you’ll notice with the verb almost i

almost

missed this is kind of a negative nuance

i almost didn’t catch my flight

it almost didn’t happen here it’s a more

positive sounding verb

i barely made my flight it was very

close

to not happening but i did it so when

you use

barely you can think of this like i said

kind of like the opposite of almost

these are actions when we use it with

verbs that were very close to

not happening but it did happen

over here a reminder almost is used for

things that were very close to happening

but did not happen there’s another

example i want to show you here

um from this one barely anyone

came to the conference i’ve used this

here barely anyone came to the

conference

with this negative remember we use like

some

and any with negatives and positives

here i’ve used barely

anyone came to the conference over here

i used

almost everyone in this one

so you’ll notice that when we’re using

this kind of positive expression

almost everyone will use something like

this

everyone or everybody however this one

will use anyone with or anybody

barely anybody it’s a more negative

expression

so we don’t use barely everybody or

barely everyone

please use barely anyone here

okay so this is a quick introduction i

think

to a few different ways that you can use

barely and almost

and the basic differences between these

two if you have any questions or

comments or want to practice making some

sentences

with this information please feel free

to do so

in the comment section of this video hi

everybody my name is alicia

in this lesson i’m going to talk about

some phrasal verbs that use the word

bring this is a list of verbs that i

think is good for maybe intermediate or

maybe upper intermediate to getting to

advanced students the aim of this lesson

is to help you level up

your use of the verb bring this is not a

complete list

but i’ve chosen a few that i feel are

common and that i hope can help you kind

of improve

how you use this verb so let’s get

started

let’s look at the first phrasal verb the

first phrasal verb

is the expression bring forward to bring

forward has a couple of different

meanings

first we can use bring forward to mean

to introduce an idea so you might hear

this used to talk about

concepts like in meetings or in

presentations when someone wants to

bring something forward

it’s used to talk about introducing an

idea for something

we also use bring forward to talk about

carrying something from the back to the

front of a room this is an expression

that’s used again like in presentations

for example

if i’m presenting at the front of a room

and i have something prepared at the

back of a room

i might ask someone to bring that item

forward so you might hear this for

example in like legal situations if you

like to watch

like police shows for example a lawyer

who has prepared something

might ask for that item to be brought

forward someone to bring that thing

forward to the front of the room

let’s look at another example we brought

forward an idea for a new product

this means we introduced an idea for a

new

product so this might be in a meeting

situation

so there are these two kinds of uses for

the expression

bring forward to bring something forward

okay

let’s take a look at the next phrasal

verb the next phrasal verb is bring home

to bring home to bring something home or

to bring home

means to carry something back to one’s

home so we use this for shopping

and we also use this in sports actually

we use it to talk about

like trophies in sports if you win a

championship or you win some contest

we say they’re going to bring it home or

i’m going to bring it home

where it is like the trophy or the prize

from the contest

so you’ll hear this about shopping or

just items in general you want to carry

home an example of this can you please

bring some milk

home very simple request so bring some

milk home in this case so you can put

the item

between bring and home to use this

expression

okay let’s go along to the next phrasal

verb the next phrasal verb is bring

to light to bring to light to bring

something to light means to cause

something to become clear to cause

something to become

clear so it’s like you can imagine you

are bringing a light

onto something and then because of that

light you can now see

everything very clearly that might be a

helpful way to remember the meaning of

this one

let’s look at an example his lies

were brought to light when important

evidence

was discovered so this is a fairly

typical example of how we use

bring to light so here what became clear

his lies his lies were brought to light

so that means his lies became clear or

the fact that he lied became clear

at this point in time when

important evidence was discovered so

another way to say this is

when important evidence was discovered

or when we found some important

information

we realized or it became clear he lied

multiple times in the past so this is a

common example so

what became clear and why or at what

point in time

okay let’s continue to the next

expression the next expression is

bring to mind to bring to mind

this means to cause to remember to cause

to remember or to cause to think of

something

as well to bring something to mind let’s

look at an example

this song brings to mind i’m sorry this

song brings

my high school dance to mind my high

school dance

so here this song it brings and then

this

is the actual phrase my high school

dance

so this song causes me to remember

my high school dance this song makes me

remember my high school dance or it

brings it

to my mind brings it into my mind so

this is an expression we use for

memories

a lot okay let’s go on to the next one

which is

bring up the rear bring up the rear this

means to be

last to be at the end of something we

use this a lot

for contests especially like sports

um a marathon for example or a horse

race for example where there’s a clear

lineup

of people participating or animals

participating

the person or whoever or whatever animal

is at the last the final position we say

that that person

or that participant whatever is bringing

up

the rear they are last their final an

example

an injured athlete is bringing up the

rear

in the marathon so in this case it’s a

sporting event

a marathon and in this case we’re using

the progressive an

injured athlete is bringing up the rear

so we might use this sentence when we’re

watching a marathon on tv

for example so this is happening now an

injured athlete

is last in the marathon essentially so

saying he or she is last sounds quite

direct

but bringing up the rear it sounds kind

of more like

that person is still continuing like

they’re still working they’re still

making efforts

but they are in the last position the

final position

so here this is in the progressive tense

an injured athlete is bringing up the

rear

all right let’s continue to the next one

the next expression is to bring

something about to bring something about

means to cause something to happen to

cause something to occur

so we use this when we’re talking about

cause and effect

situations let’s look at a very common

example

pollution has brought about climate

change

so in other words pollution has caused

climate change to happen has caused

climate change

to occur so this shows a cause and this

shows an effect

has brought about shows us this

relationship

so pollution caused climate change

though using

brought about i think kind of shows that

over time

um it resulted in something it’s a

little bit more

like time sensitive i think so to bring

something about will help you show

causes and

effects especially over over a period of

time

that could be like months or years in

this case years

over a long period of time so to bring

something

about okay let’s continue to the next

expression the next expression is bring

something

back to bring something back there are

two common uses for this

they are first to cause someone to

remember something i’ll show you an

example of this

and to return an item to a store to

return an item to a store it’s like i

want to

bring this back or i need to bring this

back to a store

with this meaning you might also here to

take something back i need to take this

shirt

back to the store so that’s an example

sentence i need to bring this shirt

back to the store to look at the first

meaning though about causing someone to

remember something

these cookies bring me back to

childhood so this means the cookies here

the cookies have some like nostalgia

factor the cookies

are something the speaker enjoyed in his

or her childhood

so these cookies may be smelling or

eating or making these cookies

causes the speaker to remember the

experience of his or her childhood

these cookies bring me back to childhood

so i feel like i’m

in my childhood again that’s the feeling

of this expression

brings me back to something is a common

way to use this phrasal verb

okay let’s continue to the next

expression next

is bring somebody down to bring somebody

down this means to cause someone to lose

confidence it has a negative meaning so

an example of this

don’t bring your classmates down you

could kind of imagine this as being like

don’t

bully your classmates or don’t be mean

don’t be unkind to your classmates

don’t bring your classmates down another

thing that you might hear

is don’t let someone get you down like

don’t let your boss get you down or

don’t let your grades get you down

so don’t let something cause you to lose

confidence that’s another common way

that we use this

expression so to bring someone down

is this loss of confidence okay let’s

move along to the next expression the

last expression actually

to bring something up please be careful

this is different from to bring

someone up to bring someone up like

bringing up someone’s children

that means to raise i think some of you

probably know that one to bring someone

up

to bring something up however is quite

different

to bring something up means to introduce

or to mention a topic often an

unpleasant one so it’s typically used

for something we don’t

really want to talk about or it’s kind

of an uncomfortable topic or it’s

difficult to talk about for some reason

but someone mentions it in a

conversation

an example management brought up

our project delay in the meeting

so here management a managing team or a

managing person

brought up so mentioned our project

delay our project delay so this is the

topic for discussion

and this is probably something the

speaker feels nervous about or is

uncomfortable about

we know that because this use brought up

that sounds like it’s kind of

uncomfortable we tend to use this for

uncomfortable topics

so in this case a project delay there’s

some

like delay there’s some reason a project

has not finished and the speaker

probably does not want to talk about

it so they feel nervous that might be

why

you could use brought up or to bring

something up

okay so these are a few phrasal verbs

that use

bring there are others there are lots of

others so if you want to know more

about how to use bring in phrasal verbs

like these

i recommend checking out a dictionary hi

everybody my name is alicia welcome back

to know your verbs in this episode we’re

going to talk about the verb

nurse let’s get started

okay so let’s start with the basic

definition of the verb

nurse the basic definition of the verb

nurse is to care for someone

or something it means to care

a lot or to give a lot

of attention and care to someone

examples her family nursed

her to health he nursed his wife

during her illness

okay let’s look at the conjugations of

this verb

present nurse nurses

past nursed past participle

nursed progressive nursing

alright now let’s move on to some

additional meanings for this verb

the first additional meaning is to

provide or

take breast milk as for babies

okay let’s begin with a couple examples

the baby is nursing well how long are

you planning to nurse the baby

so in these situations the example

sentences are relating to either a baby

drinking breast milk or to a mother

giving

breast milk to a baby in the first

example sentence the baby is

nursing well it means the baby is eating

or the baby is drinking

well and that refers to breast milk

specifically so not anything else but

nursing refers specifically to having

mother’s milk

in the second example sentence a

question how long are you going to nurse

the baby it means how long are you going

to provide

breast milk for the baby so this is

probably a question

for mothers or i suppose it could be

fathers also

asking about the baby’s care but nurse

in this way when talking about newborn

children

refers to milk either giving or taking

if you’re talking about the baby okay

let’s move on to the second additional

meaning for this verb

the second additional meaning is to use

something carefully

to avoid pain or to avoid injury

examples he’s been nursing his hand

all day she’s nursing her left foot

isn’t she

so we see nursing used in the

progressive tense in the ing

form in both of these in the first

example sentence

about nursing his hand that means he’s

using his hand

very carefully maybe because it’s

painful to use the hand regularly so for

example if a person breaks their wrist

which i’ve done it might be painful to

move the hand

properly so to avoid pain

people might nurse that that wrist or

might nurse the broken bone or might

nurse their injury

meaning that they’re very careful like

they move it slowly

for example or they don’t move it very

much or they don’t apply much weight

to it we see the same thing in the

second example sentence

she’s nursing her left foot isn’t she

that shows that perhaps she’s not

applying much weight she’s not

stepping or standing a lot on her left

foot or she’s being very careful about

her left

foot so nursing shows that they’re

taking some extra kind of care

with an injured or painful part of the

body

so this is an additional meaning of the

word nurse

the third additional meaning is to

consume

over a long period sometimes an

unusually long period examples

you’re really nursing that beer she

nursed her tea by the window

all right so we commonly see this with

drinks actually so

drinks if you take a very long time

to consume the drink to drink the drink

someone might say you’re

nursing your drink it just means you’re

taking an unusually long

time to drink it if for example as in

the first sentence you’re

really nursing that beer it’s like your

friends or whoever you’re drinking with

they expect you

to drink the beer more quickly than

you’re drinking it now so maybe you’ve

had the same

beer for an hour or two hours maybe but

your friends have had

two drinks for example so that means

maybe you’re taking an unusually long

time

in the second example sentence she

nursed her tea by the window

it’s like she’s just taking a long time

to enjoy her tea

for example maybe she’s holding it and

not drinking it quickly

just means she’s taking her time to

consume the drink

so nurse can have this meaning of taking

a long time

to like drink or eat or consume

something but commonly used with drinks

so the verb nurse doesn’t actually have

any particular phrasal verbs or

idioms that are used along with it but i

hope that you were able to find a few

new meanings from the additional meaning

section of this video

so if you have any questions or comments

or if you would like to try to make

a sentence using the verb nurse please

feel free to do so in the comment

section of this video

hi everybody welcome back to know your

verbs my name is alicia and in this

episode we’re going to talk about the

verb

order let’s begin

let’s start with the basic definition of

the verb order

the basic definition is to request

something to request food at a

restaurant or

cafe to request items from a catalog

or from the internet for example to

order

okay some examples i ordered a pizza

did you order new office supplies

all right now let’s look at the

conjugations of this verb

present order orders

past ordered past participle

ordered progressive ordering

now let’s talk about some additional

meanings for this verb

the first additional meaning is to

command

to command so to command means to

ask someone but very very strongly

could be a military situation could be a

school situation your

parents could be really strict with you

let’s look at some examples

okay the general ordered everyone to

clean

we were ordered to return to our homes

so in both of these example situations

someone

or some entity some group some

organization

is commanding someone else to do

something in the first example sentence

the general ordered

everyone to clean it means the general

in this situation

commanded so strongly asked

everyone in the situation to clean so

this could be

like a military situation everyone

in the group has to clean the cafeteria

for example

so it’s a strong command a strong order

another important point about the idea

of a command

is that if you don’t listen if you don’t

do

the thing you’re ordered to do if you

don’t do the thing

you are requested to do there might be a

bad

outcome a bad results bad consequences

so you should probably

do that thing so the general ordered

everyone to clean

if you don’t clean you could get in

trouble

the second example sentence was we were

ordered

to return to our homes here we’re using

the passive voice we were ordered

by whom we don’t know we don’t know who

gave the order but we were ordered to

return to our homes

so again this is a command if we do not

return to our homes there might be some

bad result

some bad outcome so we should do that so

ordered means command in these cases

okay

let’s go on to the second additional

meaning for this verb

the second additional meaning for this

verb is to arrange

or to organize something examples

i ordered everything according to color

the files are alphabetically ordered

so in the first example sentence i

ordered everything

according to color means i

arranged or i organized everything for

example

clothes or maybe pens or supplies

according to color which means probably

things of the same color are grouped

together or are organized are arranged

together

so but i used the verb ordered i ordered

everything according to color means i

arranged or i prepared everything

according to color

we just use ordered instead here the

second example sentence uses a very

common expression

alphabetically ordered alphabetically

ordered

means according to the letters of the

alphabet

the material is arranged so this could

be for example

a list of names or a list of books or a

list of movies

but they are alphabetically ordered

meaning

the top of the list begins with a or the

letter

closest to a maybe b and then

the bottom of the list is z so

everything follows the order so the

sequence of letters in the alphabet

everything is alphabetically ordered

alphabetically arranged

okay so now let’s talk about some

variations on this verb

the first variation is the expression

out of order

out of order so out of order means

broken or

suspended from use we cannot use that

thing

it’s somehow not safe to use or it’s not

working

not functioning correctly examples

the vending machine is out of order

the company printer is out of order so

both of these mean

that the machine in the subject of the

sentence is broken

or there’s some other reason why we

cannot

use that thing so the company printer is

out of order

maybe it’s broken maybe it’s missing a

piece maybe there’s no ink

maybe there’s some other problem related

to it out of order is kind of a vague

open reason it can mean

a few different things but in general it

just means

this thing cannot be used right now

it is out of order

the second variation is a pair actually

of phrasal verbs which can mean the same

thing

it is order in and order out depending

on who you talk to

these can actually mean the same thing

but it’s just personal preference

order in and order out just to mean uh

getting takeout or delivery food

so you might hear say oh i’ll just read

the example sentences

do you want to order in tonight let’s

order out for lunch

so you might hear diff i don’t know

depending on the person

people might choose order in or order

out i know i definitely say order in

when i mean delivery because it sounds

like i order

something i request something as in the

basic definition of the verb

and the food comes into my house that’s

my logical thinking order out is also

used

but it means like to get take out or to

get delivery

in other words not to cook but not to go

sit down at a restaurant either

there’s some kind of delivery or pickup

happening to order in or to order out

just depends on the situation let’s talk

about one more variation

the variation is to order around to

order someone around

so to order someone around means to

command

them unnecessarily so it’s like you ask

someone to do small tasks lots and lots

and lots of things

you could do them yourself but you make

the other person you

force the other person to do these small

things for you it’s like just because

you want some power over that person

it’s typically not a good thing to order

someone around

i’m tired of my boss ordering me around

he kept being ordered around by his

friends

so in the first example sentence i’m

tired of my boss

ordering me around it means the

speaker’s boss asks them to do

lots of small things that really aren’t

that necessary

or they’re time consuming very tedious

so like lots of small details to take

care of

so the speaker is frustrated the speaker

is unhappy

that the boss figure is asking so much

and

maybe for no reason so they use the

expression

order around i’m tired of my boss

ordering me around

in the second example sentence he kept

being ordered around by his

friends ordered around here refers to

the behavior

his friends are are using so

we’ve included friends in quotation

marks there

because uh the idea is that

friends true friends do not

unnecessarily

you know ask people to do things for

them like

true friends aren’t going to force tasks

on their other friends that’s not

very nice so to order a friend around

is probably pretty rude or it’s like

there’s like a power

thing a power situation happening there

so

to be ordered around by your friends is

probably not a good thing and not a good

sign

okay so that’s one more variation so i

hope that you got a few new ways of

using the verb order and you learned a

few variations that include this verb

so if you have any questions or comments

or if you want to try to use this word

in a sentence please feel free to do so

in the comment section of this video

hi everybody welcome back to know your

verbs my name is alicia and in this

episode we’re going to talk about the

verb

pat so let’s get started

let’s start with the basic definition of

this verb the basic definition of the

verb pat

is to lightly touch to show affection

usually so it’s this motion to lightly

touch something usually to show

affection

or like that you’re happy or there’s

something good that happened

so this is to pat basic definition

examples

the little boy patted the dog’s head

she patted her mother on the shoulder

let’s look at the conjugations for this

verb present

pat pats past

padded past participle padded

progressive padding

now let’s talk about some additional

meanings for this verb

the first additional meaning for the

verb pat is to smooth something with

light

touches so the idea is that there’s some

kind of wrinkled

fabric or there’s some kind of wrinkled

material it’s bumpy or rough

not smooth and we use this motion

somehow

to make it smooth so examples

pat the dough into a rectangle she’s

patting out the wrinkles in the cloth

so both of these example sentences refer

to this kind of

light touching motion to create a smooth

surface or to create like a smooth

shape so in the first example sentence

it’s about patting the dough

to become a rectangle shape so that

means the dough

originally is like a ball shape perhaps

and we use this motion a padding motion

to create a rectangle

from that dough in the second example

sentence it’s about a wrinkled fabric or

a wrinkled cloth of some kind so kind of

bumpy it’s not smooth

we use this motion again to create a

smoother fabric so the fabric eventually

becomes a smooth

surface okay let’s move on to the second

additional meaning for this verb

the second additional meaning is to hit

gently with a tool

so it’s not a hard strike it’s not a

really really rough

motion it’s something very very gentle

like maybe for

a fragile item or something kind of soft

so examples we padded the dirt in the

flower bed with our shovels

pat the drum during this song so in both

of these examples we see there’s some

kind of

tool used along with something else

so in the first example sentence it’s we

pat

the flower bed with our shovels so maybe

after

planting flowers in soil in dirt

we pat the ground around those like to

smooth the ground around it so we use a

shovel

this is the tool in this case to pat the

soil or to pat

the flower bed the place where the

flowers are resting

we use this motion with the tool the

shovel

in the second example sentence there’s a

mallet or some kind of

hammer-like object we use to lightly

hit a drum during a song we can use pat

to describe that so pat the drum during

this song

i would probably imagine in most cases

we say like beat the drum or like strike

the dru i don’t know

okay so now let’s talk about some

variations for this verb

the first variation for this verb is to

pat down to pat down so we use the

expression

pat down here because this sort of thing

happens usually from the top of the body

like starting with the

shoulders maybe and it makes this

padding motion across the body checking

for items

under the clothing and then it moves

down the body this padding motion moves

down the body

of course i suppose in some cases maybe

it starts at the feet and moves up

but we still use the expression to pat

down to pat down

to check for things under people’s

clothing examples

i hate getting pat down at the airport

excuse me

we need to pat you down the second

variation is to pat

someone on the back to pat someone on

the back this means to

tell someone they did a good job so

this can actually mean physically

patting someone on the back it can mean

actually touching

someone on the back and saying good job

well done

or it can just mean using your words

to express your appreciation to express

approval

you could say like a pat on the back you

could actually say that

or just good job nice work great

something like that

so this could be physical or this could

just be with words

examples my boss gave me a pat on the

back for all my hard work the last few

weeks

pat yourself on the back great work

so that second example sentence pat

yourself on the back

great work refers to another person

telling the listener you did a great job

you should be happy

for yourself like you should be proud of

yourself so pat yourself

on the back you should be happy with

yourself pat yourself on the back

so those are a few different ways that

you can use the verb pat

i hope that you found something new from

this lesson of course if you have any

questions or comments or want to

practice making a sentence

please feel free to do so in the

comments section of this video

hi everybody welcome back to ask alicia

the weekly series where you

ask me questions and i answer them maybe

okay let’s get to your first question

this week first question this week comes

from noha hi again noha

noha says hello alicia i have a question

what’s the difference between pick up

and

pick out um it depends on the situation

let’s start by talking about pick out so

pick out has two meanings

the first meaning of pick out is to

choose

or to select you can kind of imagine

that pick out is like saying to choose

or select

something from a group or to choose one

thing

out of many items so it’s like you’re

removing something from a group or from

multiple items so for example please

pick out a sweater or would you please

pick out your favorite color

so this means to choose or to select

something

the perhaps less common meaning of pick

out

is to try to play something like to play

music

using just your ear or using just like

your memory of a song

so this means you don’t have music to

read but you’re just trying to find the

correct notes on an instrument

using your mind that’s it so for example

he

slowly picked out the song on his guitar

or i can’t quite pick out this song

so that kind of refers to playing music

but just using your mind to do it to try

to guess

the notes of something so let’s compare

this then to

pick up to pick up has quite a few

different meanings

the first one i want to talk about is

choosing something that’s on the floor

or finding something that’s on the floor

and moving it

from the floor to a higher location or

putting it in its proper

place so we use this word a lot when

we’re cleaning

so for example pick up your sweater or i

picked up a fork from my bathroom

floor so we associate this word with

cleaning a lot we find something on the

floor usually that does not belong there

and we put it in the correct

place we use this also when we’re

talking about

answering the phone so we can say to

answer the phone

which means like to do this motion with

the phone when someone calls

we also use pickup for example please

pick up the phone

or i usually pick up the phone after two

rings

so we use pickup to talk about this so

the opposite in this case would be to

put down we do not say to pick down but

to put

down so these are the two kind of

similar meanings of pickup that refer to

moving something from a lower place to

like a higher place

in the case of the phone to this

position but pickup can also be used to

talk about people

so when we need to collect someone from

a location

usually a meeting location we can use

pickup to describe that

we usually use it at like a bus stop or

train station or the airport or

something

and we go to collect a person usually

with a car

or some other kind of transportation so

for example

i need to pick up my mom at the airport

or

please pick me up at 3 p.m that means

please like collect me

from a location so i need to go

somewhere

i need your help to do that so to pick

someone up

refers to that interestingly this

can also be used with people to talk

about trying to ask someone on a date so

like to pick up a guy or to pick up a

girl

means trying to ask someone on a date we

can use it in this way too

for example some guy tried to pick me up

at a bar

or do you think we can pick up some

girls tonight so you might hear it in

this way but this does not mean like

collecting them it means like asking

them on a date or trying

to find like romantic partners or

something so

the last expression or the last use of

pickup that i want to talk about

is the expression or the use that means

to improve

or to increase something so we use this

when we’re talking maybe like about

data or we’re talking about a mood so

for example

the mood in the office picked up after i

brought donuts

or the bus’s speed picked up

as it entered the highway so it’s

referring to something

increasing or going up in some way we

can also use pickup in this way

so these are the differences between

pick out and pick up

i hope that it was helpful for you all

right let’s move on to your next

question thanks very much for this one

the next question for this week is from

luna hi luna

luna says hello i’m a girl from iraq and

i have an

online lesson in the diphthong lesson

the teacher

said the spelling i e is pronounced as

i for example die lie

and pie but in the fanims lesson

we learned it can be pronounced e for

example

in words spelled with something i e

something e

y or words ending in eek

if i e is pronounced as i

and e then how do i know which

pronunciation

to choose yeah great question super good

question

so in the examples that you’ve given

like die

and lie and pie where the last letters

are i and e these are these short three

letter words you’ll

always pronounce it with that i sound

this is true

if you are conjugating one of these

words if it’s a noun

uh into the plural form or if you’re

conjugating it into

uh like the simple present form with

like die for example

die becomes dies so there’s no change to

the pronunciation if you add an

s is my point here so die dies

lie lies pie pies and so on for

words that are a bit longer though and

where ie

is in the middle of the word it can be a

little bit more challenging

but memorizing a couple of common

patterns can be really helpful

so for example if you see consonant plus

ie plus consonant e it’s going to have

that

e sound to it so for example like peace

or nice so a couple of other words that

follow a similar rule

like the spelling is not exactly the

same but they follow something similar

are words like priest or fierce

so they’re not like perfect guides for

the spelling example rule that i just

gave

but they have kind of the same sound to

them or kind of the same number of

syllables

for very long words a helpful guide

might be to

think of the i e s ending of a word

as having the e sound so for example

remedies berries treaties

these all end in ies and they all take

that e

pronunciation so if a word ends in

ied though it’s probably going to take

the

i pronunciation so for example

classified

specified or satisfied so this is not a

perfect rule but it can help in a lot of

cases

in kind of these in between words that

are maybe like four

five six letters or so it’s probably

best just to try to

practice and memorize those and with

enough time and enough repetition

you’ll kind of get the idea for which

words take the

e sound and which words take the i sound

but i hope these couple of spelling

guides help you a little bit so thanks

very much for this interesting question

and good luck with your continued

pronunciation studies

okay let’s move on to your next question

next question

comes from sithi hello sippy cythi says

hi alicia

how do we correctly use the verbs save

buy and pay in common expressions for

example we save money but we buy some

time or we pay attention

sure these are idioms so a couple more

examples that use

save are expressions like save your

breath

and save the day so to save your breath

is an expression we use which means like

you don’t need to talk or

it’s a waste of your time to talk so for

example

i want to hold a meeting with management

and someone might respond

save your breath they don’t listen to us

anyway so that means you don’t need to

talk

or it’s a waste of your time the

expression to save the day

means to rescue someone you help someone

in need

so for example my graphic designer saved

the day when he caught my mistakes

so those are a couple common expressions

with save

with the verb buy we have an episode of

know your verbs

on the channel which looks at some of

these expressions with bi

a couple of common idioms are to buy

time

and to buy silence i talked about that

in this episode

to buy silence means to give someone

money not

to talk so this is kind of an illegal

thing usually to buy silence you might

also hear the expression to buy

into something which means to believe

something usually that is

not true so for more details you can

check out the know your verbs episode

about the verb vi if you want to know

more about the verb pay you can also

have a look at the know your verbs

episode of this

a couple of examples a couple of idioms

are to pay

through the nose and to pay top dollar

for something they both mean to pay a

lot of money for something

the expression to pay through the nose

sounds like you pay like a ridiculous or

a crazy amount of money for something

so if you want to know a little bit more

about these verbs i recommend checking

out the know your

verbs series and these episodes have a

lot of example sentences you can check

out

so i hope that that helps you thanks for

the question okay

let’s move on to your next question next

question comes from

maya from mongolia hi maya maya says

what is the difference between

consumption and usage yeah nice question

we use consumption to talk about things

that

go away as we use them so this comes

from the verb to

consume so we use consume like to eat

things

so for things that go away as we use

them we can use the word

consumption so this can be like food or

electricity

natural resources money so consumption

refers to things going away getting

smaller

so for example electricity consumption

is down in our city this year

or vegetable consumption is part of a

healthy diet

so that refers to things that decrease

as we use them

usage on the other hand can be applied

to things that don’t go away

as we use them so this means like

facilities

or services and in some cases we can use

usage and

consumption interchangeably like when

we’re talking about electricity for

example

that’s one case where you might hear

either be used

but it refers to something that doesn’t

really go away so this would mean like

an object

for example so for example bicycle usage

is limited to residents of the building

only or alcohol usage is increasing

among college students

so when you’re talking about something

that doesn’t really go away

it’s always going to be there we’ll use

usage

in my last example that’s a good example

of one that you could substitute

usage for consumption like alcohol

consumption is increasing among college

students

so that is something that goes away over

time but you might hear some of these

things

but you might hear sometimes these words

used interchangeably

if you’re looking at something that

doesn’t go away it’s probably a good

choice to use

usage if you’re looking at something

that does go away you should probably

use

consumption that’s kind of a good

guideline for these two words so i hope

that this helps you thanks for an

interesting question

okay let’s move on to your next question

next question

comes from murugane

says which one is right england beat new

zealand or

england beats new zealand if your answer

is england beat new zealand

why well it depends it depends on what

you want to say

both could be correct england beat new

zealand could be a past tense statement

a simple past tense statement

so if we imagine we’re talking about

sports and we want to use the verb

beat which means someone did better or

had better performance than

someone else or a team had better

performance than someone else

we can use beat in past tense beat

to describe that so beat does not change

from

present tense to past tense like the

past tense form

and the present tense or the infinitive

form are the same

so england beat new zealand means

england had better performance than new

zealand in the match

the sentence england beats new zealand

or rather the phrase

england beats new zealand could be part

of an if sentence for example like

if england beats new zealand who will

england play

in the finals so it could be part of an

if clause

we use beats there because the subject

is england so

england it like the country or the team

beats new zealand so we use an s in that

case

another case where you might hear it is

like when you’re listening to a sports

announcer

sometimes when announcers are like

really excited about the game they’ll

use

present tense to make it sound like

you’re experiencing the game

right now if you use past tense it kind

of sounds like a report

so like if something super exciting

happens right at the end of the game the

announcer might say something like

england beats new zealand and they might

use present tense

like it sounds like it’s happening now

so that’s one situation another

situation

where you might hear beats used instead

of past tense

beat so in sum again it depends on the

situation

both could be correct it depends on what

you want to say i hope that this helps

you

hi everybody welcome back to ask alicia

the weekly series where you ask me

questions and i answer them

maybe okay let’s get to your first

question this week

first question this week comes from boon

kyong hi boon kyung

bung kyung says how do we know when to

use

shall or will when asking questions

okay so very simply shall is used to

make

suggestions we put shall at the

beginning of our question

when we want to make a suggestion and to

make something sound

kind of formal we don’t really use shao

in everyday

english so some examples shall i drop

the mic

shall we leave or shall we get going

or shall i make you a birthday cake

okay so shall is used to make these

formal suggestions

shall i or shall we or shall he

and so on there’s some kind of

suggestion there like shall he make you

a

cocktail or shall we give you a birthday

party or something like that so you can

replace

i with we or he or she in those

sentences

so you’re making suggestions but again

they sound really

formal we don’t say these in everyday

speech at least

in american english it sounds too polite

will

on the other hand is used at the

beginning of questions

when we want to make requests so

again shall is used for suggestions will

is used to make requests

like will you stop doing that or

will you get me a coffee and so on so

we’re using

will to make requests will comes at the

beginning of the sentence when we want

to make a request for something

shall can come at the beginning of a

sentence when you’re

kind of asking if it’s okay to do

something as well

so this is the basic difference between

using shall at the beginning of a

sentence or the beginning of a question

and using will at the beginning of a

question suggestion

or offer and request making some kind of

request

so please keep this in mind i hope that

this helps you thanks for the question

okay let’s move on to your next question

next question

comes from move in hi i’ll move in

al-mubin says hi alicia what is the

difference between

continue and go on okay

so continue is followed with a noun

phrase

so that’s the thing that’s going to move

forward so

go on can be used to mean please

continue

speaking but when you say when someone

is saying something interesting in a

conversation

and they stop the sentence or they stop

speaking but you want them to

continue you can say go on you can say

continue

as well it sounds like a command but you

might hear people say

go on as well so in contrast

to the word continue we cannot follow go

on with a simple noun phrase we can’t

say like go on your discussion or

go on your presentation we cannot do

that we use

go on to talk about going to the next

thing

in a series like the next item in a

presentation or the next topic in a

discussion

like i’m going to go on to the next

slide now or i’m going to go on to the

next question

so we use go on to to express that

we can use continue in this way and just

as with go on

we need to connect continue with two to

the next item

so i want to continue to the next topic

or i want to continue to

the next slide in my presentation so we

can use

both of these to talk about moving to

the next item

in a series of some kind but we can only

use

continue with a noun phrase and we can

use go on

alone to mean please continue in a

conversation

so i’ve noticed in the comments actually

a lot of people

will write like they enjoyed a lesson or

something like that and then

it’ll say go on and it has that feeling

of like go on

like please i know the feeling is like

please continue

to express that a little bit more

naturally like if you see something you

like on the internet

like you should be a little more

specific like if you say

go on or continue generally what native

speakers will say

is i hope you make more videos or please

make more videos like this or please

make more

podcasts or please make more content

like this

so being a little bit more specific with

your comments

at least when you’re writing online

sounds a little bit more

natural than just saying go on or

continue

so i hope that this helps you understand

the differences between

continue and go on thanks very much for

the question okay

on to our next question next question

comes

from luis your name is in all caps luis

hi luis luis says what is the difference

between the words

sleep and asleep in sentences ah

to answer this question just use your

grammar knowledge and your knowledge of

how to use a dictionary as a tool

sleep can be used as a noun and as a

verb

asleep is an adjective so that means

these words take

different positions in sentences for

example he’s sleeping

in that sentence sleeping is used in the

progressive tense he is

sleeping it’s a verb you could also

express the same idea with he’s asleep

he is asleep so he

is adjective asleep so they have the

same meaning he’s sleeping

he is asleep so asleep means in the

state

of sleeping so asleep is just a way to

say it differently so you could say that

you could also use

sleep as a noun as in he went to sleep

on the sofa or i didn’t get enough sleep

last night

so the differences here are in how we

use the words

in the sentence like the sentence

position and we also need to think

especially with the verb

about conjugating the verb changing the

verb to match what we want to say in the

sentence

asleep we use as an adjective so there

are lots of different ways

we can express a similar idea you know

not being awake

but we just need to think about the type

of word

by that i mean verb noun adjective we

need to think about that as we build the

sentence

we can say it negatively too like you’re

not asleep

i can see you i tried to call him but

he was asleep don’t sleep on this chance

that’s something else we mean which

means don’t miss this chance oh that’s

another good expression yeah

don’t i’m gonna sleep on it means i’m

going to go to sleep

and then wake up in the morning and then

have a decision

so after you’re presented with a big

decision

you can say i’m gonna sleep on it which

means please give me one night to think

about this

so i’m going to go to sleep wake up make

my decision

so give me a night to sleep on it so

sleepyhead sleepyhead is a word we use

in the states usually for little kids

like to mean like oh

that’s you’re a child you’re a small

person who is

sleepy that means you’re ready for bed

so sleepy is another word that we

haven’t really talked about here yet

but sleepy is also an adjective i’m

sleepy so that means it takes the same

position in a sentence as

asleep but sleepy means i’m tired

i’m ready to go to sleep i’m ready for

sleep so again that takes the same

position

as asleep in a sentence but it means

something different just a different

adjective

okay so i hope that that helps you

understand the differences between sleep

and asleep in sentences thanks for the

question hi

everybody welcome back to ask alicia the

weekly series where you

ask me questions and i answer them maybe

okay let’s get to your first question

this week first question

this week comes from manjira hi manjira

manjira says hi alicia your lessons are

very useful

i have a question about ever and never

i’m a bit confused about using them

for example i never seen and i

ever seen i’m unable to understand

properly

okay yeah let’s review this point so

first of all never

means not ever you can think of it as

like the negative

of ever so we cannot use ever

alone to talk about life experience we

can however

use never alone to talk about life

experience

for example if you want to talk about

the mona lisa

you could say i have never seen the mona

lisa

you cannot say however i have ever seen

the mona lisa we cannot do that

we can say i have seen the mona lisa

so please keep in mind when we use never

and

ever we typically put it together with

present perfect expression so

i have never for example i have never

seen the mona lisa or i have seen the

mona lisa

so we cannot use ever alone in cases

where we use

ever plus the verb we use it in

questions and we use it in full sentence

responses to things

for example have you ever seen the mona

lisa

or the mona lisa is the most famous

painting i have

ever seen in situations like these we

can use

have ever followed by the verb but we

cannot use

ever like i have ever seen we cannot use

that to express

life experience life experience that we

have we can use

i have never seen though so i hope that

this helps you this is a very very quick

introduction to these points i would

recommend if you want to review this

please take a look at this video on the

channel i made a lesson about using

never and ever and i hope that it can

answer your questions so please have a

look at that

thanks very much for this question all

right let’s move on to your next

question

next question comes from hiro hi hiro

hiro says hi alicia i take many pictures

especially portrait and nature pictures

so i have a question what’s the

difference between photograph

and photography how should i use these

words great question

yeah photograph first of all photograph

is a countable noun so we can

count photographs images pictures we can

say one photograph two photographs three

photographs

a photograph is the individual image

photography then refers to the entire

activity the process of

taking pictures editing pictures all of

those things together as a hobby or as

an activity

that is called photography so you can

say i’m interested in

photography and i take lots of

photographs

so keep in mind photography is the

activity

photograph is the result here so

one point that i want to make though is

that we don’t really use the word

photograph so much in everyday

conversation

unless we’re talking to somebody who

shares our hobby

or they’re also in that field typically

instead we say

picture instead of photograph so instead

of i like taking photographs you could

say

i like taking pictures i would not use

image so much

image is a much more general word we use

image to talk about

like things that you see on the internet

you know so it can be a picture but

maybe it’s a painting

so an image of a painting image is a

more general word

photograph refers specifically to

something that’s captured by a camera

but we use picture as well to talk about

that more commonly

in everyday conversation so in sum

photography

activity photograph one picture i hope

that this helps you thanks very much for

the question

okay let’s move on to your next question

next question comes

from uvani amanda hi uvani uvani says hi

alicia

if you can would you please explain to

me how we can use

take out take off take over and overtake

with examples sure okay let’s begin with

take out to take out to take something

out means to remove something from an

indoor

location and take it to an outdoor

location

so a very common use of this is take out

the garbage please

take out the garbage so to take

something out of

one location and put it outside that

location to take something out

you might also hear take out used to

mean like uh

to kill someone or like to injure

someone

especially in like action movies or

maybe in like sports

like oh no that soccer player took out

our goalie

so that means that soccer player injured

our goalie so the person

in charge of keeping the goal or we need

to take out this person in an action

movie might mean

we need to kill this person or we need

to remove this person from the situation

so that’s probably a less common one in

everyday everyday english we use take

out to mean remove

from a building usually your next one

was

take off to take off has a couple

different meanings as well

to take off can mean remove like with

clothing like i need to take off my

sweater or

please take off your shoes before you

come in the house so to take off

means to remove something as with

clothing or maybe it’s just covering

something else like

take the blanket off the computer so it

means to remove

something usually clothes or other

covering takeoff can also be used to

talk about

aircraft so when a plane goes from

land to flying this process is called

take off as a noun

but when we want to describe it using a

verb we can say the plane is going to

take off to take off means to leave the

ground

as with a plane so take off has these

two meanings

so the next item on your list was take

over to take over

means to gain control of something so

you might hear this

in stories you might also hear this in

business like company a

took over company b in past tense that

means company a

gained control of company b to take over

something or maybe my work is taking

over my life

means my work is gaining control of my

life

so to take over means to gain control

finally

the expression overtake so overtake

means to

pass someone or something else

especially in like a competition

or in a race so for example

i was overtaken in the race by another

runner

so that means somebody else passed me in

a race so that was a passive form

or you could use something like we need

to overtake the competition

next year so that means we need to pass

the competition

in the year ahead so to overtake is not

quite a phrasal verb to overtake is one

word

on its own but it does use take in there

yes so i hope that this helps you thanks

very much for the question

hi everyone i’m gabriella how are your

english listening skills in this video

you’ll have a chance to test them out

with a quiz

first you’ll see an image and hear a

question

next comes a short dialogue listen

carefully and see if you can answer

correctly we’ll show you the answer at

the end are you ready

a teacher is talking to some students

what will the students bring with them

the next day

tomorrow we’re going to a museum bring a

pen

and notebook and something to drink

we’ll have lunch

in the restaurant at the museum so you

don’t need to bring a sandwich

what about an umbrella it might be

raining so please bring one

okay

what will the students bring with them

the next day

a teacher is talking to some students

what will the students bring with them

the next day

tomorrow we’re going to a museum bring a

pen

and notebook and something to drink

we’ll have lunch in the restaurant

at the museum so you don’t need to bring

a sandwich

what about an umbrella it might be

raining so please bring one

okay a man

and a woman are talking when are they

going to get a massage

[Music]

my friend just opened a new massage

place

a massage place i wanna go

do you have time on saturday i’m busy

saturday

what about sunday they’re closed on

sunday

how about friday okay

when are they going to get a massage

a man and a woman are talking

when are they going to get a massage

my friend just opened a new massage

place

a massage place i wanna go

do you have time on saturday i’m busy

saturday

what about sunday they’re closed on

sunday

how about friday okay

a woman is talking with a store employee

which floor is the woman going to

[Music]

excuse me where are the women’s clothes

on the third fourth and fifth floors

which floor has coats the fourth floor

the elevator is right over there the

fourth floor

okay thank you

which floor is the woman going to

a woman is talking with a store employee

which floor is the woman going to

excuse me where are the women’s clothes

on the third fourth and fifth floors

which floor has coats the fourth floor

the elevator is right over there the

fourth floor

okay thank you hey everyone

welcome to the monthly review the

monthly show on language learning

[Music]

where you discover new learning

strategies motivational tips

study tools and resources by the way

all the lessons and bonuses you’re about

to see can be downloaded for free

on our website so click the link in the

description right now to sign up for

your free lifetime account

okay today’s topic is the secret to

speaking more of your target language

if you’re like most language learners

then above all you want to speak and

understand

more of your target language right well

keep watching

you’ll learn how to prepare ahead of

time to speak more

how to put this tactic to use with our

learning program

and how to get free cheat sheets that’ll

get you speaking more

the secret to speaking more of your

target language

if you’re like most language learners

then above all you want to speak

and understand more of your target

language but how do you speak more when

you’re just starting out

when you can’t yet create sentences off

the top of your head

here are some tips let’s jump into part

one

how to prepare ahead of time to speak

more

so what’s the secret to speaking more of

your target language

it’s something called preparation and

believe it or not

you’ve likely used it if you’ve ever had

to give a speech or a presentation so

what do we mean by preparation imagine

that you have to go open a bank account

in the language that you’re learning

how would you do it you can go in there

grunt and use body language

or you can first come up with a list of

words and phrases you need to know

before you go

like debit card bank account i want to

open a bank account

and minimum balance you may want to look

up the grammar rules for how to say

i want to once you know these words and

phrases you translate them into your

target language and you go over to the

bank to open an account

or let’s say you’re meeting a person for

the first time

what are some things you’d say to them

things like what’s your name

my name is where are you from i am from

and so on

so you prepare a list of words and

phrases all the things you’d want to say

in that situation

you translate them ahead of time so that

you can communicate effectively

that’s preparation and preparation works

because most conversations are

predictable to a degree

for example most conversations with

friends start with greetings and

catching up on how you’ve been

and if you know the lines for greetings

catching up and talking about your

weekend

then you can easily handle such a

conversation the point is

the more you prepare the more you learn

to speak without needing a teacher

so how do you prepare part two

how to speak more through preparation

here are some tips

if you’re using our learning program one

take our audio and video lessons

you’ll find these in our lesson library

and just focus on the conversational

lessons

lessons are just three to fifteen

minutes in length and in the first

minute you’ll hear a practical

conversation

for example meeting someone new catching

up with a friend or ordering in a

restaurant

then our teachers break down and explain

every word and grammar rule

so you can learn these lines and

conversations ahead of time

number two download the audio dialogue

track

this gives you just the conversation so

when you finish a lesson

download it for easy review then make a

playlist out of all of them and play the

conversations on repeat

this will make them much easier to

remember number three

save the lesson notes the lesson notes

give you the lesson in writing

so you can read the lesson dialogue the

grammar explanations and cultural

insights for every lesson

download and keep the notes for

conversations you think are useful

for example if you want to talk about

the weather and you took a lesson on

that

then download the lesson notes for that

lesson now if you’re looking to prepare

ahead of time for specific topics then

do this next one

number four use our free pdf

conversation cheat sheets

these conversation cheat sheets teach

you words and phrases for all kinds of

common conversation topics

like weather hobbies family plans and

much more

you can prepare for the most common

conversations with these cheat sheets

if you want to access our free

conversation cheat sheets

leave a comment down below and we’ll

give you the link number five

look up lesson topics in our lesson

library if you want to open a bank

account or eat at a certain restaurant

and you don’t know how to talk about

these topics find a lesson about it in

our lesson library

number six if you’re a premium plus user

simply ask your teacher to point you to

lessons for certain topics

or even better ask them for potential

lines and you can even practice speaking

just record yourself send it in and your

teacher will provide you feedback on

what to say

and how number seven do it the old

school way

sit down think of a topic you want to

talk about make a list of all the words

you think you need

all the phrases you want to say or may

hear in that conversation

then translate those words and phrases

into your target language

so let’s recap most conversations are

predictable

you can prepare ahead of time by

thinking of all the words and lines

you’ll need for various conversations

and you can prepare with one are audio

and video lessons

two conversation tracks three lesson

notes

four free pdf cheat sheets five by

looking up specific topics in the lesson

library

six asking your premium plus teacher and

seven

by manually coming up with a list of the

words and phrases and translating them

starting easy with language learning is

sometimes the best way to get into a new

language

but before you feel guilty about wanting

to learn the easy way

don’t worry it’s fine to start the easy

way you wouldn’t expect to lift 200

pounds on your first day at the gym

right

and language is no different start easy

so you can build up to tackling greater

challenges later

in this video we’ll explore seven easy

ways to learn a language

the reason it’s okay to start easy is

the same as the reason you should start

easy in the gym

you just can’t expect to lift 200 pounds

on day one

you start with 5 pounds then you move up

to 10 15

  1. and language is the same way learn a

few phrases today

a basic conversation tomorrow in a few

weeks you’ll be able to speak for up to

3 minutes in your target language

then you’ll reach 5 then 10 then 20

minutes

success comes step by step little by

little so it’s important to make things

that are easy to do

and easy to continue part of your

routine if you try to study for two

hours a day with nothing but a big

textbook

you may overwhelm yourself get

discouraged and get tired

you might not stick with it because it’s

too hard to do

things that are easy to do are easy to

continue

so here are some resources to help you

learn language the easy way

number one take audio and video lessons

listening to audio and watching video

lessons is an easy way to consume

language

most of our lessons are five minutes on

average so you don’t have to spend too

much time with the computer

you can even learn on our app while

you’re commuting working around the

house or out on a walk

number two take lessons with alexa

if you own an amazon echo dot or show

or are planning to get one you’ll want

to make sure to download some apps to

help you learn your target language

take a look through the amazon skill

store you can listen to lessons and

other audio materials actively or

passively

whenever the time is right for you

number three

download the lesson dialogues and

immerse yourself

with every audio lesson you get a

dialogue track just the lesson

conversation

these are just 5 to 20 seconds long when

you finish a lesson

download the track make a playlist of

all of them

then play them and immerse yourself in

the language

number four the word of the day this

will take you a minute or less

sign up for our free word of the day

email lessons it’ll be a small boost to

your vocabulary every day

number five vocab slideshows

you can access vocabulary slideshows on

any audio lesson or vocab list

just press play and watch the slideshow

that’s it

this is a fast and easy way to review

words from a lesson

you can even put the slideshow on loop

to review as much as you want

number six the daily dose of language

app

this app is for the iphone ipad and

android

with this bonus app you’ll get daily

mini lessons covering phrases

grammar culture holidays slang and more

every day is something new plus these

lessons will take you just a minute or

two to complete

number seven print out our lessons as

physical study material

you might be wondering why you should

bother to print anything if all the

lesson content is already online

but if you have the material sitting

right in front of you it’s a lot easier

to just glance through and start

learning

with our word bank study tool you can

create your own word and phrase lists

and print them out

reviewing takes just a few minutes you

can also print out the lesson notes that

come with every audio and video lesson

you’ll also find our extensive reading

books which will help you to read faster

you’ll find these in the lesson library

are you afraid of making mistakes in

your target language

afraid you’ll never ever be able to have

a conversation or give a presentation

or maybe you’re afraid of something else

in this video we’ll cover

four fears related to language learning

and how to overcome them

the first one is i’m afraid i’m not good

enough to speak

i freeze do you feel like you’re not

good enough to speak yet

a lot of people can relate to this one

probably all language learners have felt

this

at some point it’s a pretty common fear

here are some tips to overcome it

first speak from day one the best way to

get good at speaking is to practice

speaking

if you’re holding yourself back because

you think you’re not good enough you’re

making a mistake

that’s exactly why you’re not improving

you need to open your mouth and start

talking

second if you’re not sure what to say to

start speaking

consider practicing with existing

dialogues in our lessons

you get scripts for introducing yourself

making small talk ordering food

expressing opinions and

much more if you’re looking for some

things to use for speaking practice

the lessons will give you the exact

lines and conversations

our third tip learn with your own

teacher with our premium plus plan

with premium plus you get an actual

native speaker teacher to tell you what

to say and how to say it

you can actually learn to speak with the

help of a real native teacher

fear number two is i’m afraid i’ll never

be fluent

this is a common fear for beginner

learners once you start improving and

seeing progress

this goes away when you’re just starting

out with a new language

fluency can feel like an impossible goal

there are so many new things to learn

and so many methods you can use

it’s easy to get overwhelmed with all

the options but you can’t let yourself

fall into that trap

the longer you keep at it the better

your language skills will become

and slowly you’ll stop worrying about

fluency

what’s important is that you put in time

and continue working on moving forward

so how do you overcome worries about

never becoming fluent

how do you motivate yourself to continue

first

set small specific goals instead of just

saying i want to become fluent

how do you know when you become fluent

fluency is hard to determine

instead of creating a vague hard to

understand goal for yourself

focus on working towards smaller goals

for example

set goals like being able to introduce

yourself or having a five minute

conversation

something you can measure so you’ll know

when you’ve reached it

fluency can be difficult to measure if

you set goals that you can measure

you can track your progress this helps

keep your motivation up over time

the third fear is i’m afraid i’m not

actually learning or making progress

if you’re afraid you’re not making

progress there are a few things you can

do right now

first of all review a lot of people hear

a new phrase once and think they’ll

remember it

but that usually doesn’t happen so when

they forget what they’ve learned they

get worried that they’re not learning

or that the lessons don’t work but the

truth is you have to review again and

again to truly master something

second use the dashboard to track your

progress

if numbers and data are helpful for you

as you track your learning

check out our dashboard it tracks your

progress and gives you dynamic reports

third try a harder lesson on the site

you might not understand it all

at first and that’s okay you’ll be able

to after some study

all lessons come with line by line

translations and our teachers explain

every single word break down these

harder lessons

if you have to work a little more slowly

it’s okay when you finish the lesson you

can be sure of your progress

because you’ll be able to understand

something you didn’t understand a few

minutes earlier

fourth learn one-on-one with a teacher

with our premium plus plan

they will personally review your writing

and your speaking and will fix your

mistakes

getting regular feedback from a native

speaker is a great way to know if you’re

making progress

it’s such a great feeling to hear a

native speaker tell you wow you’re

getting good

the fourth fear is i’m afraid of not

understanding anything i hear

this is very common you hear advanced

grammar and vocabulary and it goes

completely over your head

you have no idea what you’ve just heard

here are some tips for working on this

issue

if you’re taking an advanced lesson read

along with the script

reading along with our line-by-line

dialogue is the best way to improve your

understanding of advanced conversations

if you’re in a real-life situation the

solution is quite simple

learn useful phrases like excuse me can

you say it again slower

or can you say it in simpler words or

even just

i don’t understand there’s nothing wrong

with saying that you didn’t understand

something or asking for help

these are some common fears for most

language learners and we hope these tips

help you is there anything else that

you’re afraid of when it comes to

learning another language

let us know in the comments and maybe we

can share some suggestions for how to

overcome them

great work here’s a reward speed up your

language learning with our pdf lessons

get all of our best pdf cheat sheets and

ebooks for free

just click the link in the description