I’ve always loved this bitter-sweet story. It’s about a young man who studies to be rabbi. However, he has a few problems. He’s lonely, poor and naive, and he doesn’t even believe in God. Can a wife save him? The student uses a matchmaker to find him someone who will touch his heart. However, it’s… Continue reading Short Story: The Magic Barrel by Bernard Malamud
In an earlier article we talked about automatic conditionals. They look like this: When I’m hungry, I eat. Catch up here. Now we’ll dissect (= analyse) another kind of conditional, which is Future Conditional. An example of that is: When you are ready, we will go. Bjørn Bulthuis What Is Future Conditionals? Futre conditionals… Continue reading Conditionals in the Future: When You’re Ready, We’ll Go.
A Short Guide and Three Tips to writing an Application Letter that will land you a Job. The letters that you probably need the most are application letters. The following will give you some general tips and a few examples: A formal cover letter for a CV (Americans say “resume”) will be very unexciting. It… Continue reading How to Write an Application Letter (Cover letter) that Gets You a Job
Would and could are both examples of modals. You can use modals to ask things, to say what is possible, or to give someone advice. When do you use would? – When something can be true in the future. – When you want to ask something politely. For example: Irena would fly to… Continue reading Would or Could
For some people, saying b and p is difficult. For instance, if your mother tongue is Arabic, you will have difficulty saying the p. Now, in English there is an additional feature that you need to use when you say words that start with a p. The p is aspirated. Aspirated means there is air… Continue reading Important Pronunciation Tip – Aspiration in English or how to say your Ks, Ps and Ts
1 Don’t expect you can learn correct grammatical English by learning the tenses by heart. It’s better to learn a language by practising “real language:” by reading stories or articles and talking to someone else. In the past students did have to do endless exercises with tenses, and in many schools all over the… Continue reading Three Warnings about Learning Tenses
Go and come depend on your view: If someone or something is leaving you, they are going. If they are moving towards you, they are coming. Here are some examples: Go: Where did you go this afternoon? Did you go to the park? They’re going on a trip to Marrakech. Come: Are you coming… Continue reading Come and Go
After you’ve watched this video, I really hope you won’t (ever!) make any mistakes with its and it’s again. It’s here: There’s also practice for you to do in the video.
So the weekend has started. Well, if you think I’m going to lie on my back with a good book you’re mistaken. Lots of things to do. Things that I either must do or need to do… Such as: Chores When you work around the house, it’s called housework, or chores. Examples of this are:… Continue reading I Must Do This Today: Must, Have To and Need
Recently I received an email that went like this: “Dear Sir, Sorry, but my English is very Bad. Please help.” First of all it made me smile. If you want to be polite, please address me with Dear Madam, because I’m a woman! I get many emails that address me with Dear Sir. But I… Continue reading Many learners of English think their English is “very bad.” What can you do about it?
English with a Smile 