I always loved the word formation part of the FCE test. This was the part of the test where I always scored really high. However, some of my students don’t. So I sat down and tried to find out why I have been so successful in this part of the test. And the result? I…
For an unknown reason many elementary textbooks teach HAVE GOT at the very beginning. Students find it difficult and they get confused. Moreover, they get even more fed up when they learn that the Americans do not use this form. But I have to teach the grammar, so there is no use crying over spilt…
Conditionals scare students to death. They seem complicated and difficult to understand. But as I explain, they only seem to be like this. In fact, they are quite simple and easy to comprehend. In this post, I will try to keep things as simple as possible. I will deal only with one type of conditional…
Recently I have felt that my lessons are not language rich. And that is something no EFL teacher is happy about. For example, I have been teaching questions to my fourth graders. We learnt all the vocabulary and grammar, but when I asked my students the questions, they were not able to answer. They did…
The past continuous tense is one of the most graphical tenses in English. By “graphical” I mean that it is easy to demonstrate the difference between the past simple and past continuous tense in a video or in a short dramatic sketch. Unfortunately, I could not find a video demonstrating the difference betweent the two…
Present simple and present continuous are easy tenses to learn in English. However, as simple as they are, there are still many students who make mistakes in these English tenses. For this post I have collected the most common mistakes my students make. I believe it is much better to learn from the mistakes others…
When students start to learn English as a second language, there is a set of basic questions in English they need to master. All language courses start with these questions, but many people struggle to learn them. It is necessary to learn these by heart. However, you also need to be able to vary them…
Teaching irregular verbs in context is not only useful, but rewarding too. A short story attracts the attention of students and can be used in many communicative activities. Unfortunately, there are not many short stories which can be easily used for teaching the past tense. Advert: [showmyads] Luckily, my friend Lynne Blackburn sent me a…
I have already created two posts on the difference between the present simple and continuous tenses. There are Present simple or present continuous tense – improved and Present simple and continuous tenses posts. Both of them are good but as I have come up with a new idea, I want to share it with you…
Present simple is one of the most important tenses in English. It is quite easy to teach and learn but it must be done properly. In this post I am going to teach some vocabulary first and then teach the forms using the verbs. ADVERT: [showmyads] In this post you can find a worksheet, a…
Teaching irregular verbs can be fun. The verbs are easy to use to tell stories and stories are interesting for everyone. In the following post I am going to tell a story and you can learn the past tense of ten irregular verbs there. ADVERT: [showmyads] To achieve this there are a video, a worksheet,…
In the following post intermediate students of English can learn to form wish clauses starting with I WISH or IF ONLY. In my opinion wish clauses are quite easy to master. However, if you feel it differently, there are several helpful features to change your mind. There are several interactive quizzes, an explanatory video and…
The difference between LITTLE and FEW, especially when you add A LITTLE and A FEW, causes a lot of problems event to students whose English is really good. In this post I try to teach the difference in a graphical way. Having studied the infographic, you should try the interactive quiz and check whether you…
I have already published a post on possessive case. But when I tried to teach it again, I found out that it was not clear enough for the group I am teaching now. So I created a new infographic and several new interactive exercises in which students can practise the grammar. And my new students…
It is much more memorable to teach or learn irregular verbs in a story. The verbs, especially their meaning, are easier to remember and retrieve from memory. Moreover, teaching verbs in a story is fun. In this post there are several activities: a mind map, a worksheet, an MP3 drill and an interactive quiz. These…
Today I experienced the great teaching moment when one of my not so proficient students said that she can understand the grammar perfectly and that it is really easy. I was exalted. I was teaching present continuous tense and the students really liked it and at the end of the lesson they were able to…
The usage of the words SOME and ANY is really easy. However, some textbooks like to mix this grammar with the concept of countability and thus they confuse the students. These two words have very little to do with countability. In my opinion their usage is dependent on completely different factors. In this post I…
The post on countability has been the seventh most viewed post at our site. More nearly 95,000 people have seen it and hopefully used it. While the post is great for intermediate students of English, it is very theoretical. This post aims to be more practical and for a bit lower level of students. Here…
About half a year ago I published a post where I tried to explain the usage of 5 different tenses. About 71,000 people have viewed this post but several complained that there was not enough practice. That is why I have decided to reintroduce this topic and add three more quizzes to practise the five…
There are many different ways to speak about the future in English. You can find all of them in the previous posts on future tenses at Will or be going to or at Be going to post. In this post I would like to explain and teach the usage of WILL for speaking about the…