vocabulary

Have you ever felt that someone is telling you something that is not true? Perhaps they are trying to lie to you. In that case, you smell a rat!

When we feel that something someone or something is not honest, we smell a rat.

"I smell a rat. If John was off from work all week because he was sick, why has he got a suntan?"

We use use much and many in questions and negative sentences. They both show an amount of something.

Use 'Much' with uncountable nouns

We use much with singular nouns.

Question: "How much petrol is in the car?"
Negative clause: "We don't have much time left."

What's wrong with this sentence?

"Boy played in the park."

The problem is that the noun 'boy' (the subjects) cannot be used without an article. We could say, for example, 'The boy', 'A boy' or 'My neighbour's boy'. Generally, the articles a and the are used with nouns.

When to use The

Use the before singular and plural nouns when the noun is specific.

Native speakers usually use contractions especially when speaking. We make contractions by connecting two or more words together. One or more letters are removed from the words when they are connected.

I contractions

I am → I'm →"I'm older than you."

I had →I'd → "I'd better do my homework."

I have → I've → "I've always liked sushi."

Let's take a look at a couple of words that are often confused by English learners, alone and lonely.

If you are sitting in a room and there are no other people in the room, you are alone. Alone simply means without other people.

"I used to live with my parents, now I live alone."

On Wednesday, Google finally _1_ its latest much-talked about product, 'Google Glass'.

A while ago we looked at how to use look, see and watch; today we at two other verbs connected to our senses: hear and listen.

Hear

We use hear for sounds that come to us when we are not expecting to hear them, i.e. we are not trying to hear something. We hear something without trying to.

On Sunday my young daughter asked what afraid means. Good question. I was going to say it means 'scared' until I realised that it has more than one meaning.

Afraid is a useful word for English learners to know because it can be used in a few different ways. Let's take a look.

Afraid as 'scared'

When we are afraid we have a fear of something or are scared.

Are you afraid of dogs?
Yes, I am very afraid of dogs.

Often when we are talking about present situations, we use unless instead of if...not.

Unless means except if or simply it means if...not.

Both of these examples have the same meaning and refer to the present time.