The Most Common Words in English: 8 ways to use ‘THAT’

135,922 views ・ 2019-06-29

English Jade


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

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Hi, everyone.
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In this lesson I'm going to tell you everything you need to know about "that".
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"That" is one of the most common words in English.
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Let's have a look at how we can use it in conversation and in writing.
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First use is something close or distant.
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When something is close, we can say...
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"This" is a pointing word; it means close to me.
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"This man", "this room", "this pen".
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"This pen is close to me."
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But when something is further away, I can show that in language by saying: "That woman",
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"that house", "that pencil".
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"This pen; that pencil" - more far away.
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We can also use "that" when we want to reduce the length of a sentence.
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Because "that" is a pointing word, we can take a longer sentence, such as: "The song
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that is playing sounds great", and instead we can just say: "That's a great song."
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In a sentence like this, "that" means the song that's playing now.
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You already know about it, so I don't need to say those extra words.
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I can make it shorter: "That's a great song."
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Another example: "What's that thing in your hand?"
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I can simply say: "What's that?"
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If I'm looking at it, my eyes will show what I'm talking about: "What's that?"
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Another example: "The outfit that you're wearing looks great."
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You're dressed up, you're wearing something nice.
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I don't need to say all those words; I can simply say: "That looks great.
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That looks really great."
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The next use of "that" is to intensify something; make it more strong.
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I can say...
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An example...
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An example situation: "Trust me.
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It's that bad", and I use my tone of voice to add the intensity on "that", and also a
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bit on "bad".
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"Trust me.
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It's that bad."
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Another example: "I'm not joking.
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His cat really is that fat."
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And when we use "that" with our tone, it's something that native speakers would do to
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emphasize something.
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When we're making a joke perhaps or we're exaggerating something in a story, we'll say
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"that" with a lot of emphasis.
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Next use of "that" is the difference between writing and conversation.
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In conversation we don't always say the word "that"; whereas in more formal writing, we
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often will write "that" in a sentence.
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"I thought that it was a mistake."
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That's what I'd write.
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"I thought that it was a mistake", but perhaps I'd just say: "I thought it was a mistake."
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I could...
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I could also say, if I wanted: "I thought that it was a mistake."
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It's not right, it's not wrong; it depends on the speaker.
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But typically, if we do something in writing, that's because it's considered more formal,
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or more standard English, or more proper English.
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Another example: "They said that the package has not arrived."
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Perhaps I would write that sentence: "They said that the package has not arrived", whereas
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I would say: "They said the package has not arrived."
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Another example: "You promised that you would be home by 9."
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A written example, maybe we'd see that in a novel.
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Maybe not actually because this seems like spoken...
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Spoken dialogue.
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We could simply say...
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We could simply say, instead: "You promised you would be home by 9."
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Now let's look at example number five of when to use "that".
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We can use "that" in situations to comment and share our feelings about something that's
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happened.
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First example: "That's insane!"
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If I use that tone, I'm surprised.
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This could be you tell me that you've won 20 million pounds on the lottery - I'm so
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shocked about that, I say: "That's insane!"
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But equally, I can use this expression when I'm really shocked that something happened,
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and I think that it's crazy and insane.
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Let's say you knew about a criminal incident that happened - a crazy guy came and smashed
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up your friend's car.
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Maybe a jealous boyfriend or something like that - he smashed up the car, but when the
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police came, in the end they didn't charge him for anything.
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So, nothing happened to this guy who smashed the car.
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When you hear about it, you can say: "That's insane!" because you think it's a bad thing
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that happened.
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It depends on your tone.
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The next ones: "That's a pity", "That's too bad", and "That's a shame" all mean a similar
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thing, which is that something unfortunate has happened to you, you've been disappointed.
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This could be you had a job, you loved the job, you thought it was going really, really
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well and then two weeks after you've been doing this job the boss suddenly comes to
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you and says: "Sorry, but we can't keep you on", so you lose your job.
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When I hear about that, I say: "That's too bad" or I say: "That's a shame", because I
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knew you really liked it.
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Or I say: "That's a pity."
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I feel for you at the time.
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And the last example I would say: "That's good."
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That's...
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Well, it depends how enthusiastic I say.
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When I say...
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When I say: "That's good", I'm excited for you and I'm happy for you.
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Something good has happened to you today.
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Perhaps you did well in an exam.
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When you come back, I've got more examples for you.
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Now that you're back, I've got some more uses of "that".
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We use "that" when we want to report facts or information.
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"Info" is short for "information".
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Here's an example: "The graph shows that exports have declined."
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When something declines - goes down.
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And "export" is the goods that a country sends out to other countries.
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Effectively, they sell these things to other countries.
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"The graph shows that exports have declined."
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This is a fact or information because I'm looking at the graph and I can see the line
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where the exports are declining.
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Another example: "The paper says that the Glitter Fairy Party will win the election."
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Same thing happening here.
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The newspaper reports the news to us, and we can use the construction: "says that" so
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that we have the information about who's winning the election.
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And another example here is: "This report claims that global warming is a hoax."
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We have the same thing happening in all the examples.
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We have the source of the information or source of the data, a report, newspaper, or graph,
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and we use a verb plus "that".
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"...claims that", "says that", and "shows that".
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And when we use the verb and "that", this is how we show the information.
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The next one is we use "that" to link noun...
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Noun phrases together, and when we do that we show causation; we show that one noun phrase
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is linked to the other one - they're in a relationship.
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Here's an example: "I was so happy that I jumped for joy."
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Here's the first phrase: "I was so happy"; here's the second phrase: "I jumped for joy".
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"I was so happy that I jumped for joy", and "that" is in the middle to sandwich the two
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phrases together.
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Another example: "Tom was so tired that he fell asleep at the wheel."
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Same thing happening here.
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Here's the first phrase: "Tom was so tired"; the second phrase is: "he fell asleep at the
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wheel", and we link them together with "that", and we know that this phrase is in a relationship
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with the second phrase.
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Another time when we use "that" is for statements we make using "suggest", "recommend", or "advise".
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Here's some examples: "I advise that you get a second opinion."
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In this sentence, "that" is optional.
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I can also say: "I advise you get a second opinion."
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Similar to a previous example, in writing, "that" is considered more formal; but often
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in speech people don't say it.
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"May I recommend that you try the salmon?"
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Also we can say it without "that".
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"May I recommend you try the salmon?"
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This is your waiter speaking to you in the nice restaurant.
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One more example: "I suggest that you apologize."
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When we use "suggest" in that way, often we are...
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We pause before we speak.
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We hesitate.
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Perhaps because we...
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We don't want to quickly give that person advice, so we don't say "advise" and we don't
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say "recommend" because we don't want to tell them what to do, so more softly we say "suggest",
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like this: "I suggest that you apologize."
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Sometimes we can hear the pause after "suggest" because people are careful about telling the
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other person what they think they should do.
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Now let's look at some common expressions where we use "that".
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When we're...
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When we've reached the end of what we're saying, very often people will say: "That's about
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it", or they'll say: "That's about it then", and after they've told their story or they've
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explained something, this is an expression that says: "I've finished now; this is the
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end of my point", and then the other person will reply or start speaking about something else.
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Another expression is: "That's a good point."
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When somebody says that to you, they agree with what you're saying.
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"That'll be the day" means you think something is really unlikely; you don't think it's going
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to happen.
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Perhaps your... your... your son has a really, really, really messy bedroom; he never brings
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the cups down to the kitchen, he never keeps it clean and tidy, but one day he says to
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you: "I'm going to keep that room tidy now, Mum, don't worry.
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I don't want you coming in there and cleaning it anymore."
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She might say: "That'll be the day."
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She...
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She doesn't believe what you're saying; it's so unlikely.
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Another one is: "With all that being said..."
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This is a...
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This is an expression we use after we've made a very long point and giving an opinion on
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something - we say: "With all that being said" when we follow it with a contrasting opinion.
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Perhaps this opinion comes to us after we said...
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Said everything before.
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It's the opposite.
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This tends to be a more formal expression.
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Or not necessarily formal; you would only hear it in situations where people are discussing
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and talking for a long time about things; perhaps not in regular, daily conversation.
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More examples, here.
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"And that's that.
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That's that" - that's another way of saying: "I've finished my point.
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You can talk now".
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"That'll do.
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That'll do.
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Let's get out of here" - enough or finished.
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Actually we can also say this one when we want some people to stop making a noise or
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a commotion.
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For example, kids in the classroom, the teacher can come in and say: "Hey, that'll do now",
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and that means: "Stop.
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I'm here."
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Another example is: "That's done it.
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That's really done it now."
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That's what you say when you're angry and when you've come to the final straw.
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The "final straw" is when you've reached that point where after this point you can't ignore
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it anymore, it's too late now, you gave them many chances before, but now: "That's done it."
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You did something too far, too much, and the person reacts.
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Often they're angry with you.
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And last of all we have: "That's all folks."
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This one is a slogan from Looney Tunes, the cartoon.
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And I can't really do the accent for it, but it means: "We're finished now.
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That's all folks."
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That's my best.
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That's my best.
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So, here are all these uses of "that".
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What you can do now is go and do the quiz on this lesson.
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That's all folks.
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Bye.
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