Helping English language learners
People in the UK often put Christmas decorations in their homes. These decorations include Christmas trees, lights, ornaments and Christmas cards. Some people put Christmas decorations outside their homes, and sometimes their displays are...
People in the UK usually greet people in a particular way during the Christmas period and many send Christmas greetings to people they know. People often wish each other Merry Christmas. In the days...
The Days of Christmas Welcome to the first of a series of posts about Christmas. This one is about the days of Christmas. Christmas celebrations in the UK can spread over quite a long...
We use relative clauses to add extra information to our sentences. They help us to say more about a noun without starting a new sentence. A clause is a group of words that includes...
Main and subordinate clauses A clause is a group of words that includes a noun and a verb. Examples: We call these clauses “main clauses”. They make complete sense on their own and we...
What is a Sentence? A sentence is a group of words that expresses a complete idea. It always contains a verb. A sentence almost always contains a noun or a pronoun. (The exceptions are...
When I was at school – many years ago – I was taught the spelling rule “i before e except after c”. It was very useful to help me remember to put the i...
Active and passive voice In English, verbs can be used in two “voices”: active and passive. Some people might tell you that you should always use the active voice. But really the active voice...
Which is correct: “learned” or “learnt”? Both! In British English, the verb “to learn” is irregular. The past participle is “learnt”. So, we might say: Similar irregular verbs include: In American English, many irregular...
Gerunds are very useful but can be a bit confusing at first. Two things you need to know about gerunds right from the start: Here are some examples: We can also use the infinitive...