Easy English Conversation: SUGGEST & RECOMMEND

Hello, my name is Emma, and today we will talk about "suggest" and "recommend".

What do these words mean?

Well, "suggest" and "recommend" have the same meaning in English.

Both mean that we use "suggest" or "recommend" when one person wants to tell someone else

what they should do.

We use "suggest" and "recommend" to give advice.

Many learners of English make mistakes with these words.

Let's look at an example of these mistakes.

A common mistake is, "Can you suggest me...?

Can you suggest me a good movie?"

And notice I put an "x" because "eh", it's a mistake.

I will tell you why in a moment.

We can see the same mistake with "recommend".

"Can you recommend me a good English teacher?"

Again, this is a mistake, "eh".

Why is it a mistake?

Well, we do not use "me" after "suggest", we do not use "me" after "recommend".

What do we use after these words?

Well, there's four different possibilities, and in this video, we will look at each possible

ending we can use after "suggest" or "recommend".

So, I have here four sentences to show you what I mean.

The first sentence, "Our teacher recommends that we read books."

I can also say, "Our teacher suggests that we read books."

So, one ending after "suggest" or "recommend" is a "that" clause.

You will often see the word "that" after "suggest" or "recommend", and we will talk about that

in a moment.

Another possible ending is we can say, "Our teacher recommends books to us."

Or, "Our teacher suggests books to us."

So, I wrote the word here, "books", but we can use a noun or a noun phrase after "recommend"

and "suggest".

I will explain this in a moment.

The third example that we can have that follows "suggest" or "recommend" is -ing verbs.

So, we can have the word "recommend" or "suggest", and the very next word is an -ing verb.

So, "Our teacher recommends reading books."

Our teacher suggests reading books.

And the final thing that can follow "suggest" or "recommend", the final end of the sentence

can be a -wh question word.

So that can be "who", "what", "where", "why", "when", and "how".

So, an example of this is, "Our teacher recommends what books to read."

Or we can say, "Our teacher suggests what books to read."

So, you'll notice "recommend" and "suggest" are often interchangeable.

This means they have a similar meaning, and we can use them both in the same way.

So let's look at examples for each of these endings and talk a little bit more about each

one.

All right.

So, let's look at our first example of what can follow "suggest" or "recommend".

So, I have up here the word "that" and a clause.

So, the word "that" often follows "recommend" or "suggest".

You might ask, "What is a clause?"

Well, the main point of a clause is you have a subject and a verb in a clause.

So, you will have the word "that", a subject like "I", "you", "he", "she", "they", "we",

and then a verb after that.

So we'll look at this in a little more detail.

Here is an example sentence, "I suggest that you", so this is our subject, "bring", that's

our verb, "a coat."

I suggest that you bring a coat.

We can also use the same structure with the word "recommend".

I recommend that she study.

So one thing you will notice is we use subject pronouns here, so we use words like "she".

We do not use words like "her" or "him".

We use a subject pronoun which is "he", "she", "I", so that's something to keep in mind.

Here is another example, "I suggest he create a resume", but wait, where is "that"?

Shouldn't there be a "that" there?

Well, that's a great question.

"That" is something we can put in, but it's optional.

So sometimes, especially in informal language, we won't even include the word "that".

It's your choice.

So that's why I have "that" in brackets.

Sometimes we include it, but it's not necessary.

So if we wanted to look at this like a mathematical equation, we could say we have our subject,

in this case "I", we have our word "suggest" or "recommend" here, so I can just write that

in, "suggest" or "recommend", "that", which I mentioned is optional, and then we have

our person word, which is our subject pronoun, "I", "you", "he", "she", "they", "we", and

then a base verb.

So what do I mean by base verb?

Well, a base verb means that there is no conjugation.

For example, "bring", I could say, "I bring", "you bring", "he bring", "she bring".

Notice we don't do anything to the verb, it's just in the base form.

It's the same here.

We have "she study", we don't need to change the verb here.

So let's look at some more examples.

"I suggest that he take our quiz."

I've highlighted this because you'll notice there's no "s".

When we use a base verb form, in this case with "suggest" or "recommend", you do not

need to have an "s" for "he" or "she" pronouns.

Let's look at another example.

"They suggest that", so here we can put a subject word.

In this case, I'm going to put the word "I".

"They suggest that I go."

And again, "go" is in the base form.

So this is one ending we can use when we are talking about the word "suggest" or "recommend".

We can use "that" and a clause afterwards.

All right, time for a quick quiz.

I have here a sentence with "suggest", and I have different possible endings.

So let's choose the correct ending.

"I suggest that", so what comes next?

Do we use "she" or do we use "her" in this case?

So remember, the second part is almost like its own sentence, so we would use the word

"she".

So I'm going to circle that, "she", and remember what I said about the verb?

What verb form do we use when we have "suggest that" or "recommend that"?

Do we say "go", the base form, or "goes", where we conjugate?

In this case, we would use the base form.

We would use "go", so we would say, "I suggest that she go.

I suggest that she go to the mall.

I recommend that she go to the mall."

So the beautiful part about "suggest" and "recommend" is after that, we don't need to

conjugate the verb.

All right, well, so now let's look at the next example of what can follow "recommend"

or "suggest".

So this is an easy example.

After "suggest" or "recommend", we can have an -ing verb.

So let's look at an example of this.

I suggest studying English.

So my verb here is "study", and I add -ing.

Why?

Because after "recommend" or "suggest", we use -ing verbs.

I suggest studying English.

Here's an example with "recommend".

I recommend, so we have our verb "be".

I recommend being careful online.

So again, we have our -ing.

Let's look at an, or actually, before we get to the next example, I should mention that

when we use a verb with -ing, you'll notice that we don't have a person here.

We don't mention the person.

We're only mentioning the action in this case.

You know who the person is based on the context.

So I suggest studying English, the person likely is, I'm suggesting that to you based

off of this context.

So let's look at another example, and this time I want you to try it.

My friend recommends, and I have the verb here "take breaks".

My friend recommends take breaks.

So what do I need to do to this verb?

If you said add -ing, you are correct.

So we can say my friend recommends taking, so take + -ing, breaks.

So I'll just write that in here, taking breaks.

I recommend getting a new marker.

All right, well, let's look at the next example.

She suggests.

She suggests, and then we have here our verb "spend time in nature".

So what do we need to do to the verb?

If you said add -ing, you are correct.

She suggests spending time in nature.

Okay, another quiz.

True or false, we use "me, him, her, and them" after "suggest that" or after "recommend that".

So for example, I suggest that me go to the store.

I suggest that him study English.

I recommend that her learn English.

So is this true or false?

If you said false, you are correct.

We do not use "me, him, her, or them" with "suggest that".

We use "I, she, he, we, they" after "suggest that".

All right, well, so now let's look at the third... the third piece that might follow

"suggest" or "recommend".

"Suggest" and "recommend" can be followed by a noun or a noun phrase.

So a noun is a person, a place, a thing, or an idea, and a noun phrase is where you have

maybe the word "the" plus a noun, "a" plus a noun, or maybe a number, like "to" plus

a noun.

So let's look at some examples of this.

So again, a noun or a noun phrase can come after the word "suggest" or "recommend".

Here's my first example.

Can you suggest a good restaurant?

In this case, we have the word "a good restaurant", that's a noun phrase, and that can come right

after "suggest".

We can also use the same thing with "recommend".

Can you recommend a good hotel?

Can you recommend a place to buy a coat?

Can you recommend a good movie?

So these are all examples of a noun phrase.

So you might be wondering, should I put the word "me" here?

Can you recommend me a nice hotel?

What happens if you want to recommend something to a person?

Where do you put the pronoun or the person word?

Do you put it before the noun, right after "recommend" or "suggest", or do you put it

after?

If you said after, you're correct, but we need to use the word "to" as well.

So nothing goes here, we can say, can you recommend - well, sorry, we should have the

word "a" - can you recommend a nice hotel to me?

So if you wanted to use "me", that's fine, but it has to come at the end with the word

"to".

Can you suggest a good restaurant to me?

Can you suggest a nice place to go to my parents?

So the key here is you need the word "to", and it comes at the end, and then you can

have your object pronoun or your person word.

Alright, what time is it?

It's time for another quiz.

So I have here the sentence, can you recommend a movie?

Now, I want to put the word "me" here.

How can I do this?

Should I say, can you recommend me a movie? or should I say, can you recommend a movie

to me?

Which is correct?

If you said "to me", you are correct.

So we do not have the word "me" here, it does not follow "recommend", it does not follow

"suggest".

If we want the word "me" in this sentence, it comes at the end, after the noun, the noun

is the movie, so it comes after that, and we need the preposition "to".

We can put other words here.

If we are talking about a man, we can say, can you recommend a movie to him?

Can you recommend a movie to her?

Can you recommend a movie to them?

So with the word "to", we can use him, her, me, these are some examples of what we can

use with that.

All right, well, so now, let's look at the final item that can follow "suggest" or "recommend".

So so far, we've covered "that" with a clause, we have covered nouns, and we have covered

the verb "ing".

All of these can follow the word "suggest" or "recommend".

The final item that can follow "suggest" or "recommend" are "wh" question words, and "how".

So we can use "wh" questions, what do these include?

Where, what, when, why, who, and also "how", which is considered a "wh" question word,

even though it does not start with "wh".

So let's look at some examples of this.

So the first one, could you suggest, so we have our word here, "suggest", and notice

the next word is a question word.

Could you suggest where I might buy a coat?

Could you recommend where I might find some tasty cuisine?

So again, "suggest", "recommend", we can use them in the same way, they can be followed

by a question word.

Here's another example.

Can anyone suggest how we should decorate our house?

Can anyone recommend how we should decorate our Christmas tree?

So again, we have our question word "how", and you'll notice that right after "how" or

"where" or these question words, we have a subject pronoun.

So that's like words like "I", "you", "he", "she", "they", "we".

Okay, so those are the four items that follow our words "recommend" and "suggest".

So what are you going to do now?

The best thing to do is to study and to test yourself.

We learn a lot by testing ourselves, so here is my recommendation.

I recommend that you take our quiz.

Where is our quiz?

Well, it's at www.engvid.com.

There you can take a quiz on what you've just learned about "suggest" and "recommend".

I suggest that you subscribe to our YouTube channel.

We have a lot of great grammar lessons, a lot of great information, including tips and

tricks on how to learn English, so I recommend you check that out.

So thank you so much for watching, and until next time, take care.