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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
- 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