Look at these simple questions: Can you handle the truth? Are you busy? To answer them your students will often give just a Short Answer: Are you rich? No, I’m not! Does he smoke? Yes, he does. Who killed the king? He did. Short Answers & TEFL Sometimes your students […]
Continue ReadingSentences in English Grammar
A sentence is a group of words beginning with a capital letter and ending with a full stop/period, exclamation mark or question mark. It is the written equivalent of an utterance. My name is Conan. We won! Is July going to be hot here? Sentence Types There are a number […]
Continue ReadingSemicolons in English Punctuation
A semicolon sits half way between a period/full stop and a comma. It has little or nothing to do with a colon, however. It is used instead of a period/full stop when we want to avoid too strong a break between phrases and instead of a comma when we need […]
Continue ReadingSecond Conditionals in English Grammar
Very simply put, the Second Conditional is used to talk about possible, but unlikely, situations and wondering what would happen. The little girl in the picture might think… If I had a bike, I would go out and play with my friends. But she doesn’t have a bike so she […]
Continue ReadingReporting Verbs in English Grammar
When we repeat what someone has said before, we usually use say or tell: Jeff said he was never going to eat meat again after that meal! Susan told us the most amusing story about the pigeons in her garden. And with direct speech we almost always use say: “No,” […]
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