Some words are often confused by language learners – because they are similar to another word or because they look like a word in your own language but have a different meaning. Here are some words that often cause confusion. sensible and sensitive sensible means ‘practical’ or ‘having good judgement’ sensitive means ‘easily affected بیشتر بخوانید...
Wish and ‘If only’ are both used to talk about regrets – things that we would like to change either about the past or the present. Talking about the present If only I didn’t have so much homework I could go to the concert tonight. She has a lot of homework بیشتر بخوانید...
In the present tense we use ‘can’ to talk about a general ability – e.g. I can swim – and also for ability at a particular moment – e.g. I can see you! The rules for talking about past abilities are different. General ability We use could to talk about general abilities in the بیشتر بخوانید...
We use modal verbs to say how sure we are about something. must We use must when we feel sure that something is true because there’s very strong evidence. He must live near here because he comes to work on foot. We don’t know where he lives but we’re sure it’s not far بیشتر بخوانید...
Permission, Prohibition, Obligation, No obligation To express permission, prohibition, obligation and no obligation we usually use modal verbs. Permission Can is often used to ask for and give permission. Can I sit here? You can use my car if you like. Can I make a suggestion? We can also use may and could to ask for and give permission but can is used بیشتر بخوانید...
When one verb is followed by another, the second verb can either be an infinitive or an –ing form. Some verbs can be followed by only an infinitive , others by only an –ing form and some by both but with a change in meaning. To know which structure to بیشتر بخوانید...
To form yes/no questions where there is an auxiliary verb or a modal verb, we invert the word order of a positive sentence. Question forms & subject/object questions Review of question forms Yes/No questions Is he a teacher? Yes he is. Can you swim? No, I can’t. Have they got a car? بیشتر بخوانید...
The future continuous (will be + ‘ing’ form) and the future perfect (will have + past participle) tenses are used to talk about events in the future. Future continuous Don’t ring at 8 o’clock. I’ll be watching Who Wants to be a Millionaire. This time tomorrow we’ll be sitting on the beach. I can’t بیشتر بخوانید...
There are very many multi-word verbs (sometimes called phrasal verbs) in English and it’s very difficult to learn them all. It can sometimes be quite easy to guess the meaning (He picked up the pencil) but other multi-word verbs are less easy to guess (I picked up Italian quite easily بیشتر بخوانید...
Question tags are the short questions that we put on the end of sentences – particularly in spoken English. There are lots of different question tags but the rules are not difficult to learn. Positive/negative If the main part of the sentence is positive, the question tag is negative …. بیشتر بخوانید...