We use the Continuous Verb Forms to talk about things which are happening over a period of time. With continuous forms we highlight the duration of an event. Note that sometimes we use the word Progressive instead of Continuous. Continuous forms usually talk about...
Irregular Verbs are those verbs which do not follow the normal rules of conjugation in English. In English, most verbs follow this pattern and are regular: infinitive past form past participle walk walked walked As you can see, they add an -ed to the end of...
Indefinite Pronouns replace nouns or people or things that are not clearly specified. Some like it hot. Some who? Some what? Some people? Some animals? Some planets? Someone knocked at the door. We don’t know who it is. We just heard a knock and assume it is a person....
This article offers a simple First Lesson for Beginners. It assumes that all instruction will be done in English and the class knows no English at all, i.e. the class are all complete beginners. Background It is generally accepted that using English only in the...
To show degrees of ability, we can use modal verbs. These show: 1. ability or opportunity in the present She can play the piano. She is able to play the piano. 2. ability or opportunity in the past She could play the piano. She was able to play the piano. 3. ability...
In grammar person is used to show the relationship between the speaker and the listener or the writer and the reader. For example, if I talk about myself I use the pronoun I but if someone talks to me, they use the pronoun you. So depending on the person doing the...
The Zero Article does not exist. But it is very useful nonetheless. Talking about the zero article is useful when we're describing how to use articles. But essentially when we talk about the zero article we mean that we do not use any article in front of a noun. In...
An Open-Ended Question is a question which cannot be answered with a simple Yes or No answer and one which requires more thought. It is the opposite of a Closed Question. And like a door, an open question could lead anywhere, a closed question stops everything....
This article looks at major grammatical differences between British English and American English. For a list of vocabulary differences between the two varieties of English, see Varieties of English Vocabulary. Present Perfect vs Past Simple BrE sometimes uses...
An Adverb Phrase (sometimes known as an Adverbial Phrase) is - as you might guess - simply a group of words which act in exactly the same way (grammatically speaking) as a single adverb. For example, here's a sentence with a single adverb: The police arrived quickly....
