R sounds are a constant challenge to me in the US. I’m British so I speak with a non-rhotic accent, but most people around me speak with a rhotic accent. This means they are expecting strong clear R sounds which, unfortunately, I often fail to provide.
Unless I’m in mission critical circumstances…
Learn more in our video on how to pronounce R sounds in British and American:
We strive to show language in context in the videos we produce, so for some and any, we headed to the kitchen where we knew there would be lots of countable and uncountable nouns around.
In this video we show three important grammar rules in action, and also show you how we make lentil soup. Bon appetit!
We’re back with another eight words that are hard to pronounce in British and American English. Watch some English learners pronounce them and learn how we say them in British and American English.
We look at how we say: fifth, basically, chaos, refrigerator, fridge, Tuesday, photograph, photography, height, weight and eight. We also have some pronunciation tips for how to pronounce long words and shifting words stress.
If you or your students have words that they find hard to pronounce, please tell us. We can make another video about them.
Back in the 1980s computer scientists were creating the world wide web and looking for ways to connect computers that spoke different languages. The Dutch scientist, Jon Postel, came up with a computer protocol that’s helpful and relevant for international and intercultural communication today.
Travel back in time with us and learn about our top tip for communicating internationally.
Our dear friend Kathy came round the other day and helped us make a video. It’s a story for teaching phrasal verbs and other expressions and it has the sort of plot line I love: Jay has something he wants to do. Vicki stops him and gets him into trouble with the boss.
Here are some of the phrasal verbs and expressions you’ll see in action: stop by, stop off, pick someone up, drop someone off, give someone a ride/lift, touch down, check in, set off, hurry up and take off.
I’m always surprised by how much news about the British royal family there is on US television. Are Americans really interested in things like the royal wedding with Meghan and Prince Harry? We decided to hit the streets and find out. In the process we collected lots of fast natural English for listening practice along with some great expressions.
Everyone we interviewed was American and I was suprised by how many differences between British and American English cropped up. Some were just frequency issues like the prefix super. We can say things like super excited and super cute in British English too, but we generally don’t say them as often.
There was a little preposition difference too, with Americans saying “excited for’ and “excited about”. That would be “excited about” in British English. And then there was my favourite: Duh! I love this word, or should I say sound? It’s the perfect thing to say when someone says something stupid and you want to joke around with them.
We had requests for a lesson about the verbs hope and wish. We set out to make one video and realized we couldn’t. We needed to make three videos!
Hope and wish often appear in exams like IELTS, Cambridge First Certificate and TOEFL because the grammar’s tricky. But watch our examples, see them in action and we’ll make it easy.
The first video is about how we use these verbs to say nice things to people and it looks at some other ways to give good wishes too.
The second video looks at seven structures we use with these verbs to talk about possibilities and regrets in the present.
And here’s a video about how we use the verbs to talk about past hopes and wishes.
Here’s hoping and wishing you find these videos useful! If you do, why not share them with a friend?
Our latest video is special!
It was a joint project with ESL students from the New York Film Academy, so students who are studying English as a second language and filmmaking at the same time. The students came up with the concept for a video and we shot it together at the YouTube Space in New York.
They were our cast and crew and they were a joy to work with. They arrived well prepared with props and costumes. The actors had learnt all their lines and prepared all their moves and we had plenty of willing hands to operate cameras, move lights, operate the clapper board and all the other things that need to get done. There are always technical hitches at video shoots and problems to solve, but their energy never flagged. We want to say a special thank you to their teacher, Meghan Killeen for all her hard work on the project. It really was a team effort and we couldn’t have done it with out her.
So here it is: Potato Chips by ESL students at the NYFA. See some slang and informal English expressions in action: stressed out, chill out and screw it.
