Ron's ESL Blogs

Here is tip #2 on how to increase interest, involvement and results when teaching grammar:

Tip #2

Teach for a reason. There is a reason for teaching and knowing each grammar rule, other than passing the test.

Each grammar rule is taught for a reason. If your student knows that reason, they will be more motivated to understand and use what you teach.

For example, why do we teach the English parts of speech?

Because a person who knows the parts of speech understands the building blocks of the language. Moreover, when using the dictionary, they can find the right meaning more easily.

For example, Lisa reads the sentence “They water the plants.”

She’s not sure what “water” means in this case, so she looks it up in a dictionary.

Since the dictionary has the words organized according to their part of speech, she will have an easier time locating the correct definition if she know that “water” is used as a VERB.

So make sure your students actually know why they study each grammar topic in the first place!

Click here for more tips and articles on how to teach English.

Articles are words that we use before a noun to show whether the noun refers to something specific or not.

The English articles are a, an, the.

1) If you are talking about something specific ==> use the.

Example: “We saw the movie you told us about.”

Meaning: We saw that specific movie you told us about.

2) If you are talking about something general ==> use a/an.

Example: “I would like a drink and an apple.”

Meaning: I would like one of your drinks and one of your apples, but I am not saying which.

So What Is the Zero Article?

Zero article = when we don’t use any article before a noun.

Examples:

Incorrect: “I don’t like the horror movies.”
Correct: “I don’t like horror movies.”

Incorrect: “She is from the Italy.”
Correct: “She is from Italy.”

Incorrect: “Let’s stay at the home.”
Correct: “Let’s stay at home.”

Click here for additional tips if you want to learn to write in English.

Interjections are sounds, words or phrases that express the speaker’s emotion.

Here are some examples:
Ouch! It hurts!
Hmm… That’s an interesting question.
Hey! What are you doing?
Wow, that’s wonderful!
My goodness, what happened?

What is special about interjections is that they remain unaffected by the rest of the sentence. They do not change their form. They do not have singular/plural form, different tenses etc. Also, a single interjection can be considered as an Entire sentence!

Example:
Goodbye!
(That’s the whole sentence…)

Sometimes regular words in the language function as interjections.

Examples:
Yes!
Sorry!
Ok.

How to use interjections?
You can use them to express emotions such as surprise (e.g. oh!), annoyance (e.g. damn!), joy (e.g. Hurray!), etc. They are also used to greet (e.g. hi!), pause your speech (e.g. um…) and so forth.

Writing tip: When combining the interjection with the rest of the sentence you should usually use an exclamation mark (!) or a comma (,) depending on the strength of the statement.

Examples:
Wow, this is awesome!
Ah, that’s nice.

Interjection is a part of speech. Click here for more data on the English parts of speech.

The following is an important thing to keep in mind when learning English verb tenses.

It is known that the Present Progressive tense is used for actions that are taking place now, or for actions that are temporary.

For example:
“We are having dinner at the moment.”
(This happens right now.)

“He is renovating the house these days.”
(This is a temporary action.)

However, the Present Progressive can also be used for planned future actions.

For example:
“We are celebrating tonight.”
“She is starting a new job tomorrow.”

So how can we distinguish between the present and the future? Time expressions are used exactly for this purpose.

Future words, like “tomorrow”, “next week”, etc, indicate future actions.
Words like “now”, “at this moment”, “these days”, etc, indicate actions in the present.

– Ola Zur, www.really-learn-english.com.

Some words are generally considered as uncountable, but you can add “-s” or “-es”. When you do that, you change the meanings of those words. Here are a few examples:

water  - waters

It is clear that “water” is uncountable, but when we talk about the water in the oceans, in the seas, we must add “-s”. So we say “sea waters”. Here is an example from the Bible – God said, “Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water.” God was talking the waters in the ocean. He used its plural form.

wood – woods

“Wood” is material for furniture. It is uncountable. When we add “-s”, the meaning changes. “Woods” refers to trees and plants in a wooded area, a small forest.

glass – glasses

When we talk about window glass, “glass” is uncountable. However, in ” Would you like a glass of water?” “glass” is countable here. You can say: “Three glasses of water!” Here the meaning has already changed. The glass is the container of the drinking water. Another example is “a pair of glasses”. Here you must always use the plural form when you talk about the glasses you are wearing.

There are some other strange words. “Mail” is uncountable, but nowadays, we use “emails” all the time. “change” is countable. We say “many changes”. But when we talk about money: “Do you have some change?” The “change” is uncountable. You don’t say “Do you have some changes? (wrong)” We can “small talk”, but we don’t say “small talks”.

Some words are countable, but you never add “-s” even though you are using them as countable nouns. “Police” is such a word. You say “Police are coming!” Not “Police is coming!” (wrong). “Cattle” and “aircraft” are two other examples: ”Japanese aircraft were strong on maneuverability.” ”Cattle were inclined to remain in the territory.”

“People” is a countable noun, but you don’t need to add “-s”. When you add “-s”, it means peoples from different nations.

– Ron Lee