In 1953 the General Service List was published. This was a list of about 2,000 most commonly used words in English. For many years this was used as a basis for materials writing. This list was useful in learning because anyone who knew all the words on the list would...
At the ----- School of English, we believe in the principals of accuracy, hard work and having fun. I came across this snippet the other day whilst looking at a school website and it frightened me. If they can't spell properly, how can they believe in the idea of...
Please... whatever else you do... spell GRAMMAR with an A at the end and not an E. GRAMM A R - yes GRAMM E R - no According to Google, a search for 'grammer' brings up over 4 million hits. However, things seem to be getting better. Looking at Google n-grams we can see...
There are several major varieties of English: American, British, Australian and so on. This article looks at differences in spelling between these. It is a general guide which covers the majority of cases, however remember that there are exceptions which will need...
An interesting sideline to the eternal debate about taboo words. The BBC reports that the English term, shitstorm, considered by many to be vulgar and not a word to be used in public as such, has entered the German vocabulary. However, it has entered as a...
A Lexical Chunk is a unit of language which is made up of two or more words. Here are a few examples of lexical chunks: Good morning. Nice to see you! What's the time? Other lexical chunks can include phrasal verbs, idioms, collocations and so on. Lexical chunks...
What is the past form of pay? This often causes problems for students. The verb pay means to give money to someone and it is usually an irregular verb. I pay $15 each month for my internet connection. Last month I paid $15 for my internet connection. I have paid $15...
For both teachers and students a dictionary is one of the most important books (or apps) you can own. This article offers tips for choosing the best possible dictionary for help in the classroom and with preparing lessons. If you're buying a dictionary then the best...
A compound word is a word made up from two or more other words joined together. They are often created to describe a new concept or idea and are thus neologisms. As a simple example, take the words foot and ball. These were brought together to describe the game:...
Using a euphemism is a way of hiding something bad, offensive or tasteless behind a good word or phrase. So, for example, instead of saying that someone died, we say they passed away. Instead of saying that a girl is pregnant we might say the girl is in trouble. Why...
An abbreviation (from the Latin, brevis, meaning short.) is a shortened form of a word or phrase used almost exclusively in print. For example: LOL = laugh out loud mins = minutes abbrv = abbreviation As you can see, abbreviations are often either the full word...
This article details the spelling rules for turning singular nouns in plural nouns. Note, for a look at the general principles of singular and plural nouns, see Singular and Plural Nouns. Most nouns in English are regular. To make them plural we simply add -s to the...
One of most common situations a TEFL teacher will find themself in is Explaining Unknown Words. A typical scenario is when a class is working on a text or watching a video and then a student will simply ask what the meaning of a certain word is. They may well use you...
Non Sequitur is a Latin phrase we use in English which means it does not follow. It is mainly used to describe a statement which has nothing to do with what was said before. For example, this is logical and sensible. Socrates was a man. All men are mortal. Therefore...
A Palindrome is a word or phrase which can be read correctly either right-to-left or left-to-right. These are palindromes: civic deified dewed kayak level madam minim racecar radar redder refer rotator rotavator rotor sagas solos sexes stats If punctuation is ignored,...
Vocabulary Poker is a great game for practicing vocabulary and semantic fields. It's easy to play and great fun for the students. Although it can be played by beginners, it's probably best for intermediate and advanced students. NB in some countries it may be...
Puns are ambiguous; they are words (or phrases) which sound the same but which have two very different meanings used for humorous effect. (A traditional explanation of a pun is a "play on words" but since this defines everything from puns to Spoonerisms to...
What are Anagrams? Anagrams are simply rearrangements of letters from one word or phrase to make another word or phrase. The word itself comes from the Greek, anagrammatismos, ana- (up, again, back, new) + -gram (letter). For example, the following are a few...
Mnemonics (pronounced /nəˈmɒniks/ with a silent 'm' at the beginning) are short devices (sayings, poems, etc) used to remember longer, more complex ideas or lists (also known as aides memoires or memory aides). Think of them as poetic versions of string tied around...
Homographs are words which have the same spelling but different meanings. They may or may not have the same pronunciation. Here the word has the same spelling and pronunciation, but different meanings: bear - beə (a big animal living in Yellowstone park) bear -...
Word Frequency is listing words according to how popular they are in the language. The method of determining the list is by taking a corpus of language and simply counting the words in it and how often each one is used. This usually brings up the following as the...
A root is the very simplest form of a word without any affixes or changes. It cannot be made any smaller and is sometimes known as the base word. For example, take the word important. This consists of 3 parts: im (a prefix) + port (the root) + ant (a suffix]) So the...
Family Tree is an ideal and fun activity for students to practice family relations and working within that semantic field. The basic idea is that you give your students a series of statements about a family such as, "Joe is Mary's brother" and, "Frank is Julie's...
An affix is a morpheme that is attached to a root (or stem) of a word to form another word. For example, take the word reason and add two affixes: un + reason + able Prefixes and suffixes are common types of affixes. A prefix is an affix which is placed before a...
A Synonym is a word which has almost exactly the same meaning as another word. For example: student - pupil old - ancient Note: Compare this with antonyms which are words of opposite meanings. In English, there are no perfect synonyms. Two words may be very similar...
A Word A Day is a simple daily email which anyone can sign up to which sends out a word and definition each day which is useful to help enrich and enlarge vocabulary. For TEFL teachers it is ideal; with students it is perhaps better suited to advanced learners. The...
LEXEME is the term used in Linguistics to refer to a word (a minimal unit of language) with a distinctive meaning (a semantic value) and often a specific cultural concept attached to it. banana, love, animal, run These are all lexemes. Lexemes can be seen as the...
Homophones are words that sound the same but with very different meanings. The words are usually spelt differently or, if they are spelt the same, come from different roots. For example, the words may be spelt the same, such as rose (as in the flower) and rose (as in...
Spelling is the order in which letters are put to make up words. Many languages have phonetic spelling, in other words, each letter represents a certain sound, however in English this is not the case. An English letter can have many different sounds. For example, the...
Hangman is a traditional, simple game which is useful as a five minute filler for practicing vocabulary. Variations of the game and played in many different countries so one advantage is that some students will already know the game in their own language (see...
