How to Talk about Household Tasks in English
my name is alicia and in this week’s
live lesson we are going to talk about
how to talk about your household
activities so in this lesson we are
going to cover chores so that means your
regular household tasks we are going to
talk about sharing space with other
people so that means like how do you
express time alone how do you express
that you want time alone and how do you
express wanting to spend time with other
people and finally we are going to talk
about some everyday use household
expressions so as you join live please
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okay good everyone is here let’s look at
today’s lesson boards then fantastique
okay this is what we’re going to do
today you can take a screenshot if you
like this is our kind of basic we’re
going to talk about basic topics yes but
i want to cover some vocabulary words
that maybe are a little maybe some new
vocabulary words and new expressions so
part one will be chores your household
tasks
part two will be using space like with
together
time alone and time with other people so
how do you how do you express these
desires and finally household
expressions just things that we say
around the house so i hope this is a
good
i hope this is a good lesson just for
everyday practice stuff you can use
right away and so if you have questions
uh or want to practice with some example
sentences send them in the chat and i
will try to check live okay let’s begin
and if you haven’t make sure to like i
know it’s i tell you all the time but it
helps other people to find the lesson
okay let’s get started
first chores let’s begin so our first
vocabulary word for this lesson is
chores what are chores chores always
lists i need to do some chores yeah so a
chore
a chore as a noun a chore is a household
task or perhaps you have office chores
also but chores refers to those everyday
maintenance tasks at your place of
work or the place where you live so
cleaning tasks or organizing tasks those
are all chores those little daily things
you need to do
to make your life clean and tidy right
so let’s talk about some
chore vocabulary and kind of expand on
it a little bit and cover some questions
that and some issues i see sometimes
okay
so
first one is this one do
the laundry to do
laundry so sometimes people say do the
laundry sometimes people say do laundry
both are fine to use
this the refers to the laundry in the
house i guess if you want to be really
specific so to do laundry
we do not use like make laundry we don’t
really say clean laundry sometimes we do
say wash clothes i need to wash my
clothes
one common issue i see a lot in the chat
actually is a lot of uh
speakers and a lot of uh learners
use the word
dress
i think instead of using clothes so we
don’t say
dress to mean all of our clothes we say
clothes uh when we talk about this so we
don’t say i need to wash my dress no
that’s a dress is one specific uh part
of our clothing yeah so please make sure
to say clothes wash my clothes or do the
laundry yeah
so do the laundry includes all of this
wash
dry
hang and fold wash dry hang and fold
these are all included in do the laundry
if you want to be specific you can say i
need to wash my clothes i need to dry my
clothes i need to hang my clothes i need
to fold my clothes but usually we say do
the laundry do the laundry
okay
all right so this is our first one if
you have questions let me know
okay next one is wash the dishes wash
the dishes you may also hear do the
dishes to do the dishes cannot use make
here cannot use make make means to
create something yeah so wash the dishes
or do the dishes we typically do not say
clean the dishes we might use clean for
like one plate like hey can you please
clean this plate it’s dirty you might
hear that but we almost always say this
wash the dishes or do the dishes yeah
okay i’m looking for your questions
there are many people watching hello
everybody watching make sure you like
this okay
let’s go to the next one the next one is
actually three verbs for the same uh the
same chore the same task okay so we have
clean
and pickup
and tidy clean pick up and tidy these
are all verbs yeah so clean
the and then the room i have room in
brackets here so you can put in the room
the living room the kitchen the bedroom
the bathroom i need to clean the
bathroom i need to pick up the bedroom i
need to tidy the bathroom whatever so
what’s the difference in this case not
much clean sounds very thorough so that
means we are going to maybe do
all the cleaning tasks in that room so
i’m going to for example in a bedroom if
i say i need to clean the bedroom maybe
i’m going to wash my sheets and i’m
going to
wash the windows i’m going to do
everything
pick up
the room sounds like maybe there are
some clothes on the floor or maybe many
objects in the room that don’t belong in
the room i’m going to organize it yeah
so i’m going to pick up the room usually
pick up the room means like there’s
stuff in the room on the floor or in the
room that doesn’t belong
finally too tidy to tidy the room too
tidy tidy is used more often in british
english i feel but in american english
we do sometimes use it
to tidy the room is like the light the
mini clean so we’re not going to do deep
cleaning of the room but we just want to
a little a little maintenance to tidy
the room
so like i need to i need to pick up my
room i’ve got some stuff
around i need to put away some laundry
that’s always my task i always leave the
laundry too long
sergio says can we use cleaning to refer
to all of these activities uh yes you
can yes you can like if someone calls
you and you’re like ah i can’t talk i’m
cleaning my house perfect yes all of
these refer to cleaning
awesome sokun and no kalo i hope i said
your names right said i tidy the
bathroom or i need to tidy the bathroom
and i tidy the bathroom every day nice i
tidy make sure the bathroom every day
yeah
jonatha willian says what does folds
mean uh to fold means when you wash
after you wash your clothes your laundry
you fold the clothes
you fold the uh like your shirts or
whatever to put them away somewhere okay
okay let’s go to the next one next is
this group sweep
mop and scrub the floor sweep mop and
scrub the floor what is the difference
so
the difference is the tool so first the
floor
is the bottom of your house yeah the
place where you walk that’s your floor
so we have three verbs here to sweep to
mop and to scrub the floor
sweep
is with a broom yeah this motion so i’m
going to sweep the floor so that’s where
you clean the big stuff like dirt
or i don’t know crumbs like small pieces
of food the big stuff with this motion
yeah we sweep
then
mop to mop so mop is a verb and a noun
mop is the name of the tool we use and
it’s the verb we use so a mop
is a wet
kind of brush on a stick
it’s a mop so we clean the floor with a
wet tool to make it clean yeah
so final one is scrub
scrub to scrub the floor this is the
most intense floor cleaning i scrubbed
my floor a couple days ago
it was good
so to scrub the floor means to use some
like a cloth towel or something and
cleaning supply cleaning water and you
really
on the floor like this with your towel
so
really really intensely cleaning the
floor these are the three verbs we use
to talk about floor cleaning
to sweep the floor to mop the floor and
to scrub the floor
okay
hollis nguyen says i’m learning this
vocab in my el lesson at school oh
that’s so cool oh that’s awesome so i
hope this is good practice for you
thanks for sharing that
okay
all right
gennaro herreria says uh scrub is like
deep cleaning yes we use scrub for like
floors we also use scrub for like skin
care
yeah like it means a deep cleaning you
have some like a product that you scrub
in your face or you scrub on your skin
it’s like deep cleaning that’s the feel
with scrub you can use it for your car
too like scrubbing your car clean
okay
cool
uh
awesome cesar says i must wash the
dishes every day yes we must but
sometimes we get lazy
okay let’s go on let’s go on to the next
one the next one is dust dust this is a
verb and a noun to dust and dust so
first let’s look at the noun form dust
is the
really really really small
pieces of like dirt fuzz
it gathers on
like a table or a shelf so
when we i don’t know i have no dust here
i was cleaning i guess recently but when
we have
dust it’s usually on the top of a table
some place we did we have not touched
recently so there’s little dirt or fuzz
or something here so to describe that
when we find oh there’s this
dirt there’s dust here
we would say there’s a lot of dust on
the shelf there’s a lot of dust on the
shelf here it’s used as a noun there’s a
lot of dust on the shell so maybe
there’s some dust on my shelf somewhere
i should check this lesson makes me want
to clean my house okay
and
we use dust as a verb to mean to clean
dust yeah for example i dusted the shelf
i dusted the shell so to dust as a verb
means to remove
dust yeah with like usually a wet towel
or some other cleaning towel we usually
do this motion we use dust to mean to
remove dust i dusted the top of my tv
yeah or i dusted the shelf yeah this
means to remove dust
someone on facebook i can’t read your
name i’m very sorry he says there are
there are a lot of dust on my book close
dust we use there is there is it’s a
singular or yeah it’s we use this as a
singular noun there’s a lot of dust so
like a mass noun
yeah uncountable uncountable
there is a lot of dust on my book okay
nick nick says can i say the room is so
dusty yes yes you can say that
absolutely my house is so dusty my room
is so dusty
uh gabriel says when i need to use an
iron on my clothes how do i say ah to
express that yeah nice one i think
there’s a little space down here i’ll
add that there’s a little space left so
uh
to
iron
clothes we use the verb iron to iron
clothes yeah
i’ll talk about that last okay
cool then let’s go to the last two we
have to take out the trash
or to take out the garbage both are fine
we use trash and garbage in american
english if you’re studying british
english you might know rubbish to take
out the rubbish yeah so to take out the
trash so we usually say the trash to
mean the trash in my house right now
take out the trash okay
nando says do you use the word debri in
american english yes we use debris for
american english but we use that to mean
the small pieces of um
like machine or maybe dirt and stuff
like that usually like after an accident
or after some kind of maybe like um like
a fight like in war
so we typically don’t use debris in our
house unless maybe unless maybe there’s
been a huge accident in the house like i
don’t know maybe i made a big like
explosion in my kitchen
then i might say oh there’s debris
everywhere it sounds really serious
debris
uh
jonathan says can i say there is a
plethora of dust on the table we would
not say plethora plethora is usually
used in more formal situations for like
a huge amount of stuff like i think my
favorite example is like a plethora of
treasure in uh the egyptian king’s tomb
so we don’t really use plethora very
much in everyday speech but you can say
um
uh there’s a lot of dust plenty of
sounds kind of positive and
dust is generally
not a good thing okay oh my gosh
um
lee and
anita hi says how about telling the kid
to put the trash in the bin ah yeah good
one so bin is another one we don’t use
bin in american english it’s used in
australian and i think in british
english as well
so you can yeah tell your kid put the
trash in the bin yeah for sure or put
the trash in american english we would
say put your trash in the garbage can we
use garbage can or trash can we don’t
say bin in american english
okay
phew great questions everyone let’s go
to the last one we just added to iron
clothes to iron clothes so that’s when
you want to make your clothes smooth i
have like a wrinkle in my shirt i didn’t
see it i started so
we have this if we want to make this
smooth we would say i need to iron my
shirt so that’s with the hot iron
obviously on a surface to iron your
clothes
and if you have a steamer you say to
steam your clothes that’s when you have
the hot iron and water inside to steam
that’s your
sound effect okay phew that was a lot oh
my gosh that’s only part one we need to
continue so let’s go on to part two okay
if you missed it i will show a
screenshot uh and you can watch this
live back later okay
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need to go to part two so let’s go to
part two using your space alone or with
other people right so if you live alone
or if you want some alone space
alone time what do you do
let’s continue and if you haven’t please
please please make sure to hit like yeah
and share the video so other people can
join thanks for your great questions too
it’s super super awesome
okay
gabby says we are celebrating our
independence in mexico oh it’s today
mexican independence day oh
congratulations that’s cool okay um
other questions
oh my gosh there’s so my gosh the chat
is going so fast today uh
i so i lost the name i’m very sorry
someone says what’s the difference
between wash and clean clean is more
general like we use clean for a room
yeah we use wash for like an object so
like wash a window wash a dish uh wash
clothes yeah um so
there is some overlap between those two
yeah
but
clean sounds more like a general thing
we use for like a room
okay
uh all right we need to continue oh my
gosh so let’s talk about using your
space with other people so uh part two
is yeah communicating with the other
people in your space like your roommates
your family members your partner
whatever so
time alone i have time alone and time
with other people
so first let’s talk about how to express
when you want time alone or when you
plan to take time alone okay
first i’m gonna i’m going to i’m gonna
take some time for myself i’m gonna take
some time for myself so that means i am
going to be alone now goodbye
so i’m going to take some time for
myself so you can use this at home i’m
going to take some time for myself
tonight like have a good evening you
could say that to your roommate yeah
it’s maybe kind of maybe it’s like a
little bit serious sounding maybe you’ve
used this when you feel stressed or
really tired but if you want to express
you need some alone time you can do this
another one this is the key word i
wanted to practice today
i need to unwind i need to unwind i’m
gonna take a bath i need to unwind i’m
gonna take a bath okay what is un oh i’m
gonna sneeze
sorry okay
unwind so this is a key word i wanted to
introduce today u n w i n d to unwind
what does this mean so
on means not right so to wind something
like when we wind something i’ll use my
hair as an example it’s like this we
twist something yeah we cause stress to
that thing so when we unwind we relax
right so unwind is a kind of casual way
to say relax
i need to unwind
yeah i’m gonna take a bath i’m gonna
take a bath
so this is a good keyword yeah so uh
unwind means release stress or relax
chill out i need to unwind
okay
next is
everybody can understand this one i
think i just want to watch netflix i
just want to watch netflix so this is a
great response and the key here is this
just yeah so this sentence is correct i
want to watch netflix perfect sentence
but when you feel tired like the end of
the day you’re stressed out you don’t
want to do anything
really difficult you’re just tired
so you could say
i just want to watch netflix that’s the
only thing i want to do or hulu or hbo
or whatever whatever you like to watch i
just want to watch netflix
i don’t want to think anymore i just
want to watch youtube
okay
cool and then
this one you can express you want just
alone time or you want to just shut off
everything with this i don’t want to
think about work
school or anything right now i don’t
want to think about work school or
anything right now okay so that’s like
saying
no just i just want to be alone yeah i
just want to shut down so shut down we
use for computers we use it for people
too
okay then the other on the other side
time with other people when you want to
talk about spending time with the people
you live with like your roommates your
partner or your family members so
do you want to make dinner together
so
uh an inquiry yeah do you want to make
dinner together or do you want to make
lunch together so this one do you want
to blah blah together is a good way to
make an invitation do you want to make
dinner together that’s how we say it at
native speed do you want to becomes do
you wanna do you wanna do you wanna make
dinner together
or we use these let’s patterns let’s
watch a movie later let’s watch a movie
later or let’s go to the park leader
or let’s play
basketball later whatever you like to do
okay
let’s do this later or let’s do it now i
suppose but later
is nice for a suggestion later in the
day
okay
cool let’s go to the next one why don’t
we this is the pattern why don’t we blah
blah why don’t we get some exercise to
unwind
why don’t we get some exercise to unwind
here’s that unwind again yeah why don’t
we get some exercise in order to relax
that’s what this means why don’t we get
some exercise to unwind
and finally let’s have a relaxing night
in
let’s have a relaxing night in this inn
means at home
yeah so the opposite is going out like
to a restaurant or to a party or to a
bar to a club right an exciting night
out
or a relaxing night in now let’s have a
relaxing night in
maybe you can have an exciting night in
if you have a big party at your house i
guess but usually we say like an
exciting night out and a relaxing night
in
okay
cool
that’s it for part two we’re oh my gosh
i’ve talked so much i talked so much
about part one oh my goodness let’s go
to part three then very very quickly uh
and then we’ll wrap up for this week
okay so we’re going back to we’ve talked
about using your space when you want to
be alone and with others cleaning your
space now i want to talk about just some
general use
household expressions okay so if you
haven’t please please please make sure
to hit the like button yeah it will help
other people to share
shahan says can you show pictures well
please don’t send lots and lots of
messages in the chat yeah like i can i
can read so
let’s have other people have a chance to
to check the chat i i don’t i can’t put
pictures for everything here yeah so
let’s continue on
to the last part okay
the last part here uh household
expressions everybody has uh just kind
of those things they say around the
house yeah so
some very common ones
are related to cleaning yeah this place
is a mess this place is a mess yeah so
this place refers to your house or your
apartment this place is a mess
so when you need to clean something you
can you can say it with this okay
and then
my house is squeaky clean
my house is squeaky clean what is
squeaky clean this is the common
expression that we use squeaky clean
refers to when something is very very
clean oh maybe i can do it
oh maybe i can’t do it it squeaks i
can’t do it oh i can’t do it when we
when we touch like a
car that’s really clean it makes a
squeaking sound oh i can’t make it sound
but
when it’s very very clean it’s squeaky
clean it’s so clean it makes it
sound it’s very very clean
okay
all right
then
uh this next one is one we use when we
feel happy about coming home
it feels so good to be home it feels so
good to be home so at the end of the day
you’re tired from work or from school
you can come home and say it feels so
good to be home or i’m so glad to be
home
okay
cool
all right onward next one
i get a cleaning one i say this a lot
maybe everybody does
i really need to clean plus the object
or the room so the object or like the
item to clean like i really need to
clean the kitchen oh no it’s a mess i
really need to clean the kitchen or i
really need to clean the windows or i
really need to clean the floor
so you are maybe you’re thinking out
loud to yourself oh i really need to
clean the windows look how dirty they
are so you can use this when you talk to
yourself yeah this is a really really
good one you’re thinking out loud yeah
okay on to the next one
uh this next one uh is for
uh when you
need something and you want to ask
someone else to bring it to you this is
a super super useful pattern i think i
wanted to include this
the pattern is
can you bring me
object
it’s
location can you bring me that thing
it’s in the bathroom let’s look at some
examples of this and review some
prepositions
we’ll do this to finish today’s lesson
okay
first example is can you bring me the
tape
it’s in
the office
can you bring me the tape it’s in the
office so a request to like your kid or
your partner or whatever can you bring
me the tape it’s in the office
another one
more complex prepositions can you bring
me my coffee
it’s in the kitchen on the counter
can you bring me my coffee it’s in the
kitchen on the counter
so here’s my object can you bring me my
coffee
it’s in
preposition in the kitchen
on the counter so we have two in that
sentence it’s in the kitchen
on the counter
okay
all right finally
can you bring me my laptop
it’s in the kitchen
it’s in my bag next to the table can you
bring me my laptop it’s in the kitchen
it’s in my bag next to the table
so this is a good chance to practice
your preposition yeah
okay
hhl says can you bring me the vacuum
it’s in the storeroom perfect very nice
very nice okay
uh
all right
others other questions
i’m looking for your questions make a
video on based on kitchen basic objects
i think i have a top words video on
youtube that’s about uh kitchen objects
i think i do
so i do a search for like kitchen or
cooking on the youtube channel i’m
pretty sure it was a few years ago i’m
pretty sure there’s one
okay
uh
nick nick says how about can you pass to
me the sponge oh pass me
something something yes you can use can
so we don’t say pass to me
we use pass when we’re at like a table
yeah someone else can reach the object
so if i say someone’s over here i say
can you pass me the marker they can
reach the marker but i can’t
so pass is used when we’re all together
nobody has to
go somewhere else to get the thing yeah
so pass is used when the other person
can reach across and get something for
us
joe sanchez hey one of our members says
can you bring me my guitar perfect very
nice
others
i need to clean my backyard because it
is full of bushes juran dear bushes
plural there yeah
uh gemeshu says what is i hope i said
that right gimmichu tadesa hi says what
is the difference between bathroom and
washroom oh bathroom is used in american
english british english typically uh
more often uses washroom yeah that’s the
difference you i mean there’s no
communication problem if you use
washroom in america in english but we
use a bathroom
typically okay all right i have to
finish i’m very late today that was a
lot part one was long oh my gosh so
we’ll finish there for today um
i’ll show you today’s lesson board so
you can take a screenshot part one had
lots of key vocabulary for chores i hope
you can use that right away here is
today’s lesson info so take a screenshot
we talked about chores your household
tasks we talked about uh time alone how
to express time alone or wanting time
alone and uh wanting time with other
people and we talked about basic
household expressions so my place is a
mess or my place is squeaky clean my
place i need to i need to tidy my place
that’s what i’ll do
okay uh we’ll end there for today but
i’ll be back next week next week next
week where is next week’s lesson
information here it is okay next week
we’ll be back as always next week’s
lesson will be on september 22nd at 10
p.m eastern standard time that is new
york city time wednesday night if you
don’t know your local time please google
it or use uh youtube’s notification
facebook’s notification or if you follow
me on instagram i always share a link
and a topic reminder in my stories next
week i’m going to talk about how to use
conditionals to talk about your dreams
for the future yeah we haven’t done a
conditional lesson in a while so we’re
going to practice conditionals next week
uh yeah so like
if travel opens up again where do you
want to go those kinds of things
dreaming about the future with
conditionals okay cool so we’ll finish
there for this week that was super
awesome thanks for your great questions
i love it when you guys send all these
awesome questions in example sentences
that was cool i hope you found something
useful so i will say goodbye for this
week i hope that you enjoyed this week’s
lesson uh enjoy the rest of your day uh
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the video all there’s like
i don’t know 25 30 of these for free now
go check it out if you haven’t recently
or if you never tried so check that
stuff out get your free stuff there uh
and if you want to find me on social
media you can also find those links in
the youtube description phew okay uh
check all of that out and enjoy the rest
of your day have a good weekend too and
i will see you