czwartek, 5 grudnia 2013

Grammar in Songs: Modal Verbs

Modal Verbs

Most verbs we learn are names of activities. We do things and give them names. Look at this example:

Lots of activities and lots of names of them. There are also verbs that are names of feelings or emotions - love, like, hate etc. Some verbs are names of states, like: live, work, stay, etc. All of the above though are names.
There are also verbs that aren't names of anything, but we need them a lot and use every day. All they do is to modify sentences.
Let's get a sentence:

They talk a lot.

Just a simple information.
Now I will modify this sentence a bit, let's see what happens:

     
         may
         will
         won't  
         must
They should talk  a lot
         mustn't
         can
         can't


     

etc,etc.... can you see how the meaning of your  message changes?
You use just one word and the meaning of all information is completely different. Those mighty verbs that change sentences are called modal verbs .
They aren't too many and they share some characteristic features:

1. They don't have all grammar forms (that's why some people call them "defective verbs")
2. They don't use auxiliary verbs to form questions and negations
3. We never use two modal verbs in a row!! (Forget sentences like: He will can.....)
4. A verb that comes immediately after a modal verb never takes full infinitive form (She can to swim.  say : She can swim.)

Modal verbs are:  cancouldmaymightmustought toshallshouldwillwould and need (need can be a full verb too)

Their grammar is easy and I bet you all like tests on modals^^ a good mark guaranteed.
 However, there are a few issues that may spoil your mood a bit... I mean the number of meanings modal verbs have. Here they are:

can / could

1. ability (zdolność)

    I can swim quite well.
    She can't speak French at all.
    Mona could ride a bike when she was three years old

2. possibility (możliwość)

   I think a tiger can live up to 20 years.
   A mouse can't live up to 10 years.

3. logical deduction (logiczne rozumowanie)

   This man can't be Pete's father, he is too old.

4. probability (prawdopodobieństwo)

    My absent-minded neighbour left her suitcase on the platform unattended. Someone could have stolen it!

5. permission / offer (pozwolenie/ propozycja)

    Can I use your computer?
    Can I help you?
    You can't go out right now.

may/might

1. probability (prawdopodobieństwo)

   My aunt may arrive in Poland in two weeks.

2. possibility (możliwość)

   I am worried my daughter might not like it at the kindergarten.

3. permission (pozwolenie)

   May I turn on the heating? It is rather cool in this room.

must

1. obligation (nakaz)

    I must do my Maths homework for tomorrow.

2. prohibition (zakaz)

   You mustn't light fires in woods.

3. deduction (logiczne rozumowanie)

   It's 10 o'clock, so my mum must be at work.
   (Uwaga: w tym znaczeniu zaprzeczeniem must jest can't, np: It's 20:00, so my mum can't be at work)

shall 

1. can be used in questions to ask for instructions and decisions

    What time shall we come and see you?
    Shall we go out for a meal?

2. can be used to make offers and suggestions

   Shall I open the window?
 
should

1. advice  (rada)

   You shouldn't argue with your boyfriend all the time.
   Should  I write a letter to her?


The above list isn't full of course. There are more shades of modal verbs. But those you will discover later, I don't want to bore you to death.














czwartek, 28 listopada 2013

Jak się uczyć języka angielskiego?

Nadszedł czas użyć języka polskiego w moim poradniku - blogu. Postaram się pomóc wam tak zorganizować waszą naukę języka żebyście mogli po pierwsze opanować stawiane przed wami wymagania szkolne, a po drugie  (i najważniejsze|) żebyście skutecznie nauczyli się podstaw języka angielskiego.
Każdy z was uczy się języka angielskiego przynajmniej trzy godziny w tygodniu. Czy to dużo czy mało? W tygodniu jest 168 godzin. Około 56 z nich poświęcamy na sen. Pozostałe 112 godzin to nasz czas kiedy używamy języka. Cały czas! Nawet jeżeli z nikim nie rozmawiasz ani nic nie czytasz to i tak używasz języka. Cały system twoich pojęć zbudowany jest z języka, w twoim przypadku z języka polskiego. 109 godzin używania języka polskiego w tygodniu! Nic dziwnego, że tak dobrze potrafisz nim się posługiwać. Jak się do tego maja marne trzy godziny szkolnych lekcji?
 Uczyć się języka to nie tylko uczyć się na pamięć słówek i robić ćwiczenia z gramatyki. Jeżeli tylko tyle robisz, nie nauczysz się korzystać z języka angielskiego.  Z drugiej jednak strony musisz mieć pewną "bazę danych" żeby móc samodzielnie wystartować do krainy języka angielskiego. Twoja baza to znajomość szkieletu języka - jego gramatyka i znajomość jego tkanek - słownictwa.  Jeżeli myślisz że wystarczy się nauczyć słówek, bo reszta "sama przyjdzie" to zrób pewien eksperyment: idź do sklepu mięsnego i sprawdź sam czy w leżących na ladzie kawałkach mięsa potrafisz dostrzec świnie, krowy czy nawet kurczaki.. Podobnie jest ze słownictwem - znajomość tylko reguł gramatycznych bez słownictwa - to tak jak dawno wymarły przedpotopowy stwór, którego kości oglądasz w muzeum ale nie potrafisz wyobrazić sobie jak wygląda...
Cóż więc zrobić żeby opanować tę bazę? Oto kilka wskazówek:
1.  Jeżeli uczysz się słownictwa, nie wkuwaj listy wyrazów z końca podręcznika. Nic ci to nie da.. wyrazy bez kontekstu wykute na pamięć wylecą z niej jak tylko odłożysz długopis po napisaniu kartkówki. Zamiast tego - pobaw się ze słowami. Ucz się codziennie 5 - 8 nowych wyrazów. Układaj je tak, żeby tworzyły jakieś ciągi znaczeniowe, np wyrazy należące do tej samej rodziny, opowiadające jakąś znaną ci historię, służące tej samej funkcji językowej, itp. W ten sposób poukładasz sobie w bibliotece swojego mózgu jak książki na półkach różne słowa i będzie ci łatwiej po nie sięgnąć gdy będziesz ich potrzebować.  Zastanów się jak najłatwiej ci jest zapamiętywać - czy widząc napisany wyraz, czy głośno powtarzając go, czy spacerując po pokoju. Jeżeli chcesz zbadać który sposób jest dla ciebie najlepszy spróbuj przeprowadzić poniższy test

http://www.vaknlp.com/nlp-quiz.htm

Bardzo dobrym sposobem na zapamiętywanie nowego słownictwa jest układanie zdań albo tekstów z nowymi wyrazami. Możesz, na przykład robić quizy dla kolegów! Wymyśl zdania do których trzeba będzie wstawić nowe wyrazy (musisz oczywiście sam wiedzieć jakie^^) i przynieś na lekcję - ręczę ci że twój nauczyciel to doceni. Możesz układać krzyżówki, wyszukiwanki i inne zadania z tymi wyrazami.
Niektórym osobom pomaga rysowanie ilustracji danego wyrazu, np.

Squirrel 
Można wymyślić wiele sposobów uczenia się słówek; tak na prawdę nie ma "najlepszego sposobu" dobrego dla wszystkich - każdy z nas jest inny i potrzebuje innego najlepszego sposobu na swoją naukę.

2. Jak się natomiast uczyć gramatyki? Po pierwsze upewnij się czy rozumiesz dane zagadnienie. Jeżeli nie jesteś tego pewien, zawsze lepiej zapytać nauczyciela. Podręcznik także przyjdzie ci z pomocą. Możesz też (i powinieneś) skorzystać z linku Szlifuj Swój Angielski lub innej strony przeznaczonej do uczenia się angielskiego.  Jak już w końcu zrozumiesz na pewno co to jest ten czas Present Simple^^ czy inne zagadnienie, musisz to dokładnie przećwiczyć. Nie wystarczy odrobić zadanie domowe z ćwiczeń na parapecie przed lekcją. Trzeba włożyć nieco wysiłku żeby zmusić swój umysł do czynnego korzystania z nowej struktury gramatycznej.

Pamiętaj!!! W nauce języka obcego najważniejszy jest stały i systematyczny kontakt z tym językiem. Musisz znaleźć czas CODZIENNIE na szlifowanie swojego angielskiego^^ . Inaczej zapomnij że wkrótce będziesz swobodnie operował językiem Szekspira.

3.  Inne formy uczenia się, które mogą ci bardzo pomóc i zarazem sprawić przyjemność  to:
1. Słuchanie piosenek angielskich i tłumaczenie ich tekstów
2. Czytanie książek po angielsku (polecam wszystkie książki o Harrym Potterze, Wheels of Time, Winnie the Pooh i wiele wiele innych)
3. Oglądanie filmów po angielsku z angielskimi napisami lub całkiem bez (warto taki film znać z polskiej wersji, wtedy jest o wiele łatwiej)
4. Oglądanie angielskich telewizji, reklam, programów informacyjnych
5. Na końcu nieco kontrowersyjna zabawa - gry MMO RPG, w które grając na międzynarodowych serwerach musisz czynnie korzystać z języka angielskiego aby móc porozumieć się z innymi graczami. Pamiętaj jednak aby gry te nie pochłaniały ci zbyt dużo czasu.








środa, 27 listopada 2013

English Tenses - forms

Here is a paradigm of the verb “play” which I made to illustrate forms of different tenses in English. “Play” is a very regular verb, so all forms it takes look like rules of a tense formation. I hope  this will help you to defeat the monster called English tenses. There is also a useful link which will lead you to a printable version of my tense table. Wishing you lot of luck with the tensesJ

PLAY
                                                       Simple  (do)                                               
Present            I/you/we/they play                                
                         he/she/it plays                                        
                         I/you/we/they don’t play                      
                         he/she/it doesn’t play                             
                         Do I/you/we/they play?                      
                         Does he/she/it play                                

Past                  I/you/he/she/it/we/they played                
                         I/you/he/she/it/we/they didn’t play           
                         Did I/you/he/she/it/we/they play?            

Future              I/you/he/she/it/we/they will play             
                         I/you/he/she/it/we/they won’t play           
                         Will I/you/he/she/it/we/they play?             

Continuous  (be + verb-ing)
Present            I am playing
                         you/we/they are playing
                         he/she/it is playing
                         I’m not playing
                         you/we/they aren’t playing
                         he/she/it isn’t playing
                        Am I playing?
                        Are you/we/they playing?
                        Is he/she/it playing?

Past                 I/he/she/it was playing 
                        you/we/they were playing
                        I/he/she/it wasn’t playing
                        you/we/they weren’t playing
                        Was I/he/she/it playing?
                        Were you/we/they playing?   

Future             I/you/he/she/it/we/they will be playing
                        I/you/he/she/it/we/they won’t be playing
                        Will I/you/he/she/it/we/they be playing?      

Perfect  (have + Past Participle)
Present               I/you/we/they have played
                            he/she/it has played
                            I/you/we/they haven’t played
                            he/she/it hasn’t played
                            Have I/you/we/they played?
                            Has he/she/it played?

Past                   I/you/he/she/it/we/they had played
                          I/you/he/she/it/we/they hadn’t played
                          Had I/you/he/she/it/we/they played?


Future              I/you/he/she/it/we/they will have played
                         I/you/he/she/it/we/they  won’t have played
                         Will I/you/he/she/it/we/they have played?

Perfect continuous  (have+ been+verb -ing)

Present             I/you/we/they have been playing
                        he/she/it has been playing
                        I/you/we/they haven’t been playing
he/she/it hasn’t been playing
Have I/you/we/they been playing?
Has he/she/it been playing?

Past                 I/you/he/she/it/we/they had been playing
I/you/he/she/it/we/they hadn’t been playing
Had I/you/he/she/it/we/they been playing?

Future              I/you/he/she/it/we/they will have been playing
I/you/he/she/it/we/they won’t have been playing
                       Will I/you/he/she/it/we/they have been playing?






środa, 6 listopada 2013

Those tenses:(

Guess what people answer when asked why they think English is difficult. I bet everyone knew the answer before my not too long sentence ended. Yes, almost everyone says that the worst thing under the Sun to learn is English tenses.
Then they repeat terrifying legends about the number of English tenses. Some people say there are 12 tenses, some that there are 24 of them. I met a student who was trying to convince me that you don't need any tenses to communicate. So what is the truth? And are those horrid tenses really so hard to understand and learn?
In my opinion there are things to be much more afraid of (English-language-wise ofc) than tenses, which are all consistent and once you understand how they work, they aren't difficult anymore. Of course I don't promise you you won't need to learn them. On the contrary - if you want to use tenses correctly, you need a lot of practice. Remember you are Polish so you don't use English for everyday communication, you need a special training for your L2  (second language) skills.
Now, about the exact number of tenses. During my University studies I learned that we can talk about one real tense - the Present Simple. All the others are simply certain verb forms. Well, Present Simple is the most important tense, no doubt about it. You need to be able to operate it without any difficulties. This tense you use to talk about your life, your emotions, likes and dislikes. This tense tells about everyday life, habits and traditions. Sheryl Howard Pociecha in her book "Patchwork which is English" says that if you are able to use the Present Simple, you can talk about everything. Even a sentence like "I eat breakfast yesterday" can be understood. I don't encourage you though to learn only this one. You want to sound natural when you use a language and you want to express precisely your thoughts. For this you certainly need more than just Present Simple.
When I was my students' age, I was taught  that there are 32 English tenses! Dreadful news.... I suddenly felt overwhelmed, unable to even dream about ever knowing English well enough to communicate. But then, gradually I discovered that it isn't that hard, and I'll try to explain to you how I understood English tenses.
Let's think about what we need to communicate with people. We need to talk to them about present, past and future time. We want to tell them about our life, our regular actions, likes and dislikes, our habits and traditions, and, of course about what we are doing at present. All these refer to the present time. Sometimes we need to talk about our plans and intentions. We want to share our predictions or dreams about the future too. It means we need to be able to talk about future time. We often need to tell our friends about our adventures or experiences we had. We want to talk about past actions, things that happened in past time. Here you are three dimensions of our reality:

PRESENT    >>>>     PAST    >>>    FUTURE

I am sure you understand this - in our language we also use tenses referring to present, past and future time.


Now, another concept. We have actions which are in progress, happening at certain time. We say:

I am reading a book.
She is cooking dinner.
They were  watching TV yesterday at eight o'clock.
Mary and John will be arriving in London tomorrow at 5pm.

The above sentences show actions in progress. We don't know when they started or ended. All those tenses are Continuous.

Another group of tenses tell us about actions that happened before the time we are talking about, but they are all connected with that time:

I have read many fantasy books. (I did it in the past, now I know what they are about, and I will read fantasy books again in the future)

She had started cooking dinner before Darren arrived. (we state time in the past = Darren arrived; before he did she had already started cooking )


They will have finished building the bridge by May 2016. (we state time in the future = May 2016; before that time the bridge will be ready)

All those actions happened before the time we were talking about and all of them were connected with that time. All those tenses are Perfect.

Simple tenses are the most general, it means that firstly, they all belong to the time they talk about, secondly they tell about complete activities , feelings, emotions etc.

Uncle Ben likes sitting outside with his pipe.(likes)

Mary visits her Grandma every Friday evening.(action repeated regularly)

Sean met his girlfriend at the summer camp. (stated time in the past)

They never ate mushroom when they were little. (stated time in the past)

Humans will live on Mars in 200 years. (prediction based on what I think)

Sometimes Perfect and Continues tenses join to show duration of an activity.

He's been reading since morning. (it is afternoon now and I can see him reading all the time)

Lucy had been watching TV for 3 hours when her mother came back from work. (naughty Lucy, she wasted 3 hours watching TV before her mum arrived)

Here you are a video that may help you understand a difference between  Simple Past, Simple Present and Present Perfect.


poniedziałek, 4 listopada 2013

Speaking English

We all learn English because we want to chat with friends around the world and we need it for school or for business. English has become a common means of communication in the global village of contemporary world, so everyone needs to be able to use it more or less fluently. In this blog I'll try to help young users/learners of English to improve their skills and develop their language competence.

For starters a nice Youtube video showing that speaking English may be tricky even for native speakers^^



Yeah, speaking English may mean something a bit different for people from different parts of the world, even from different parts of Britain. As long as you understand each other and can successfully communicate with anyone throughout the world, it is OK. You don't have to speak like the British Queen to enjoy chatting with people. Use your English as often as possible, don't worry about making mistakes and you will get fluent sooner than you expect.