Merry early Christmas!

Hello everyone and welcome to Euroschool’s Christmas! 

The Passive Voice (Part 2)

Hello everyone!

Last January we wrote a post about the passive voice (you can check it out here) but we told you that it was part 1! So today we are going to take a look at 2 other types of passives (usually for Intermediate students and above) which can be quite tricky to master.

Let’s take a look at the following active sentence:

Learning English through play

Hi everyone!

How did those question tags go? Check your answers here:

Answers

And as for the extra challenge….

Question tags (Part I)

Hi there everyone!

I can see that our last post (Internet slang) really caught your attention, didn´t it? I wanna say a big thank you for all the visits, pings and trackbacks we’ve been getting for the last couple of weeks. It’s just been amazing!

But I reckon you really want the answers for the Internet Slang challenge, don’t you? Well, here they are: 

Internet slang

Hello eveybody!

HRU? What do you think our renewed website and blog? Judging by your hits on the site it must be pretty cool, eh?

Well, FYI, pretty cool new things are going on at Euroschool! Everybody is B2W and I promise you will soon know about them but, meanwhile, let’s take a look at some internet abbreviations, shall we? 🙂

Improving your Listening skills

Hi there!

As the summer holidays come closer some students frequently ask us how they can improve their listening results. Well, the answer seems straightforward: come to class in summer! The truth is that three months is a really long time and if students stop coming to class, their listening and speaking is affected.

So here is my first tip, whether you choose a summer camp, some weeks in the UK or coming to classes, do not interrupt your learning process for more than four weeks.

Having said this, there are a few things students can do at home to refresh and/or improve their receptive skills (reading and listening):

1. Speak up magazines:I always advise my students, especially the ones who struggle with Listening, to take them home.They are great practice for both Reading and Listening as the magazine includes articles categorised by level that you can either read and listen to before answering some questions.



2. Watch series and videos:Nowadays, the Internet provides a huge number of choices. If you like travelling, we suggest you check out the “BBC Coast” videos, on YouTube’s BBC 1 channel. It’s good practice and great fun!
3. Read the news:But in English, of course. Again, the Internet is our best friend here. Follow newpapers from the UK and the US on Twitter (for example) and you will get your daily practice while being informed. Remember that if you are more traditional and prefer paper format, El País issues a daily international newspaper called “Herald Tribune” (if you live in A Coruña, you can buy it in the kiosk in “Plaza de Mina”)
4. Skype lessons:Last but not least, remember that, even if you don’t feel like coming to the school in summer, or if you don’t live in A Coruña, you can have Skype lessons with us (All levels, all areas covered) so there’s actually no excuse! 😉

So! Have you already chosen? Contact us for more info or more ideas! Happy San Juán and happy summer solstice to all you guys! 😀

Present Perfect vs Past Simple

Hello everyone!

Today we are going to talk about a grammar point that is usually quite a pickle for students up to Upper-Intermediate level: Present Perfect vs Past Simple.

Let’s start thinking about TIME, not about tenses, but about time. There are only 3 times: PAST – PRESENT – FUTURE

In this way, we hardly ever doubt when we need to use Past Simple. We simply use it to talk about an action that started in the past and finished in the past.

E.g: “What did you do last weekend?”

We use the Past Simple because the weekend started and finished in the past time.

So, when do we use the Present Perfect tense?

The present perfect is a tense that connects past time and present time.

E.g: When we ask ‘Have you been to Paris?’ what we mean is ‘Have you been to Paris at any time from the moment you were born until now?’

In this way, we can learn a lot about the time we are talking about if the person we are talking to uses the correct tense. We can use Past Simple or Present Perfect in the same sentence, depending on when we are saying it.

Let’s take a look at these sentences as an example:

a)      ‘Did you see Mary this morning?’

As we can see, part of today is in the past time, so when I say ‘Did you see Mary this morning?’, I am doing it because it’s either the afternoon, evening or night of the same day, so the morning already belongs to the past time. You can see it better in the following timeline:

This is today:

Let’s imagine that it’s 5 o’clock in the afternoon and you will see how part of the day belongs to the past, other part to the future and how the present is just 17’00h:

b)        ‘Have you seen Mary this morning?’

If I use the Present Perfect tense in this sentence is because the morning is not over, so it started in the past but continues in the present.

We could use this sentence if, for example, it was 11.30 in the morning:

To review all past tenses, we recommend you check the following podcast: ‘The mystery story’, it’s great practice and great fun!!!

I hope this post has helped you to clarify the use of these tenses and remember: everything’s about time! 😉

Have a great week! 😀

T                             O                            D                            A                            Y

Now, this is today:

From lost to the river

Hi there everyone!

Happy spring! Even though you might not be able to tell by just looking through the window… yet! Better times are always ahead! 😀

Today we are going to look at some expressions in English! I’m sure you have noticed the title of this post “From lost to the river”, a very common expression in Spanish that we don’t know how to translate.

Students often ask in class about these idioms so, well, let’s make it fun, shall we? Here I have prepared a quiz for you to choose the expression in English that you think belongs to the one in Spanish, but no cheating, eh?

1. “De perdidos al río”

A) From lost to the river

B) In for a penny in for a pound

C) All in

2. “Aprender algo de memoria”

A) To learn something by heart

B) To learn something by brain

C) To learn something by ear

3. “Estar en misa y replicando”

A) To have a finger in every pie

B) To be in the church and sleeping

C) In heaven and in hell

4. “Hablando del rey de Roma”

A) Speaking of Rome

B) Here comes Alexander The Great

C) Speak of the devil

5. “Está lloviendo a cántaros”

A) It’s raining cats and dogs

B) Noah’s calling

C) It’s raining jugs

6. “No es mi tipo”

A) It’s not my piece of cake

B) It’s not my cup of tea

C) It’s not my apple

7. “Me suena a chino”

A) It sounds Chinese to me

B) You’re talking Chinese to me

C) It  all sounds Greek to me

8. “Me estás tomando el pelo”

A) You’re pulling my leg

B) You’re making me bald

C) You’re pulling my hair

9. “Dios los cría y ellos se juntan”

A) Birds of a feather flock together

B) Created by God, joined by fate

C) From the same God, the same style

10. “Es la gota que colma el vaso”

A) It’s the last drop that makes you spill water

B) It’s the last straw that breaks the camel’s back

C) It’s the most ridiculous thing that makes you cringe

11. “Se cosecha lo que se siembra”

A) What goes around, comes around

B) What you grow you eat

C) If you give tomatoes don’t ask for gold

12. “Cuando el río suena, agua lleva”

A) When the river is full, it sounds

B) If people talk, words are they saying

C) Where there’s smoke, there’s fire

Are there any other expressions you would like to know the translation of? Anything that you want to express in English and you don’t know how? Leave us a comment below and we will solve that pickle! 😉

Don’t forget to check the answers in our next post!

😆

Pronunciation (-ed )

Hey guys!

How are you doing? In Euroschool we couldn’t be happier!!! We have been awarded with the Achievement Award 2016!!!

Do you know what that means? Well, in case you missed it last year, this is an award given by Cambridge English to the best Exam Preparation Centres. We are top notch! 🙂 And the best part is that it is not us saying it: it’s Cambridge! So before getting hands on with pronunciation we want to thank YOU: this wouldn’t have been possible without all your effort to pass.

Here’s the award:

PRONUNCIATION:

-ed pronunciation is usually an issue to students of all levels so, today’s post is going to be dedicated to helping you with this matter.

The first thing you need to understand is that the pronunciation of these endings is going to depend on the last sound of the word without the suffix. (If you are not familiar with the phonetic chart, check out this link: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/phonemic-chart )

For example:

“Watch” is pronounced /wɒtʃ/ and its last sound is /ʃ/. This means that when adding the -ed suffix it will sound like this: /wɒtʃt/. You can see that a /t/ sound has been added at the end.

“Love” is pronounced /lov/ and its last sound is /v/. So in the past and past participle forms it will sound like this: /lovd/. Here, a /d/ sound has been added.

“Lift” is pronounced just as it is written: /lift/, with a final /t/ sound,  and in its -ed form is pronounced /liftid/

/t/, /d/ or /id/?

As mentioned above that will depend on the last sound of the word which  we know is sometimes difficult to identify. However, we have made this chart in which we categorise those sounds depending on the pronunciation of the -ed suffix.

(Please note that these are not phonemic symbols but an approximation of how they sound when we pronounce them)

/t/	/d/	/id/
/p/ /k/ /f/ /s/ /sh/ /tch/ /ks/	/b/ /g/ /v/ /z/ /dj/ /m/ /n/ /r/ /l/	/t/ /d/

This chart works not only for verbs but for any other word with -ed ending.

I know that phonetics are not very popular amongst Spanish students but I really encourage you to learn them! Your teacher at Euroschool can help you! Meanwhile, if you want to start digging around on your own, here is a great video to get started:

YouTube – British Council Phonemic Chart

As students, we usually think that our pronunciation has to be spot on and that we should know how to pronounce every word. We tend to put a lot of pressure on ourselves! Well, maybe the following video will help you to be a bit more relaxed about it!

Check it out! It’s just hilarious! 😆

<a href="http://www.slideshare.net/EuroschoolOfEnglish/slideshelf“>http://www.slideshare.net/EuroschoolOfEnglish/slideshelf

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