3 Hour English Masterclass: Pronunciation, Vocabulary, Grammar

Vanessa: Welcome to the Ultimate English MasterClass.

Get ready to level up your English pronunciation skills, so that you can speak clearly and

understandably.

Then you'll level up your vocabulary skills, so that you can express yourself completely.

And finally, we'll focus on leveling up your grammar skills, so that you can speak advanced

natural English.

Hi, I'm Vanessa from SpeakEnglishWithVanessa.com, and like always, I have created a very special

PDF worksheet for you today.

This PDF worksheet includes everything that you will learn in this MasterClass.

It is 24 pages long.

It is completely free, my gift to you.

You can click on the link in the description to download this free PDF worksheet.

Don't miss out, because it will help you to level up your English skills and get the most

out of this Ultimate MasterClass.

Let's get started by focusing on pronunciation so that you can speak clearly.

Let's go.

Today, I'm going to be helping you with some common English phrases and sentences and questions,

how to combine them, how native English speakers make them quick and fast, so that you can

pronounce them like this yourself if you feel like it, but also to help you be able to understand

fast English.

You are going to be pronouncing these eight fast sentences in English in no time.

Let's get started.

Our first five sentences include some kind of reduction with the word you.

Let's take a look at our first sentence.

What do you think?

But do you think that we really say it this slowly?

What do you think?

Absolutely not.

I just bought this new dress.

What do you think?

What is happening in the middle of this question?

Let's break it down, there are a couple different ways that we can reduce this question, so

let's talk about the first one.

What do you think?

What do you think?

Here, the final T on the question word what is cutoff.

We just say "what."

Then, instead of saying do with a nice oo sound, instead it sounds like duh.

What do, and then the next word you is going to have a similar sound.

What do you?

What do you think?

What do you think?

Can you say that with me?

What do you think?

What do you think?

But would you imagine that we can reduce this even more?

Yep.

You will definitely hear in English movies and TV shows.

People say, "I just bought this new dress, what you think?

What you is happening to the verb do?

Listen carefully.

I just bought this new dress, what you think?

What you think?

Do is just gone.

It's completely absent from this sentence.

It's off on vacation somewhere.

So you can say, what you think.

What you think?

What you think?

What you think?

Our second question is, where did you get it?

But do you think we say it like this?

Where did you get it?

No.

If English speakers spoke like this, then you probably wouldn't be here because you'd

already be able to understand fast English because it would just be slow English.

So let's see how this is actually said.

I love that dress.

Where'd did you get it?

Where'd did you get it?

Let's break this down where'd.

Where'd.

This is a contraction of where and did.

Where'd you, this is you.

Where'd you.

And then our final two words we're going to link together.

Get it.

Get.

Where's that D coming from?

Get.

Get it.

Well, in American English, when there is a T between two vowels, we often change that

T to a D sound.

This is going to be extremely common in American English and it's going to help you to pick

up on fast words like sweater, water.

These are common examples of a T changing to a D.

And finally in this question, there's one more thing we need to mention.

Listen to the final sound of the question.

Where'd you get it?

It.

It.

Do you hear it?

Nope.

Listen one more time.

Where'd you get it?

Where'd you get it?

That final T is not really pronounced.

Your tongue is going to be in the same place as if you are going to make a T sound, but

instead of letting that air flow out, your tongue just stops on the top of your mouth.

That's why we call this a stopped T. Can you say those final two words with me?

Get it, get it, get it.

All right, let's put it all together and I want you to say this out loud with me.

Where'd did you get it?

Where'd did you get it?

Now sometimes we reduce this a little bit further and the entire rest of the sentence

sounds the same except for the word you.

Sometimes we say where'd you, where'd you.

Instead of where'd you.

This is the difference between Y and J. Where'd you get it?

Where'd did you get it?

Where'd did you get it?

Oh, I like that dress.

Where'd did you get it?

Where'd.

So that's the one main difference here between these two different reductions and you're

going to hear both of them.

So now I hope that you'll be able to understand them.

Let's go to our next one sentence number three or I guess question number three is are you

doing okay?

This is a very kind question you can ask someone who you feel like might be having a hard time

in life.

It's the year 2020, so a lot of people are in this situation and it's a kind question

you can ask and you will also hear other people asking.

But do they say, are you doing okay?

No.

This is often reduced in the couples different ways within the sentence.

So let's talk about it.

Hey, I haven't seen you in a while.

Are you doing okay?

Are you doing okay?

Here, we have kept the word are, but then you listen carefully.

Are you doing okay?

Does that sound familiar?

We already talked about how sometimes you becomes you, and this is extremely common

as we're speaking quickly and talking with people in a comfortable situation.

Are you.

And then listen to our verb doing okay.

What's happening with the G at the end?

Doing.

It's gone.

It is on vacation.

So make sure that we say are you doing okay?

Are you doing okay?

Are you doing okay?

We can reduce this even further by cutting off our first verb, are.

You doing okay?

You doing okay?

Say that with me.

You doing okay?

I haven't seen you for a while.

You doing okay?

You doing okay?

Fast sentence number four, did you eat yet?

Did you eat yet?

But do you think we say it like this?

Nope.

Instead we're going to reduce this in a couple different ways.

So you might say, when I visit my grandma's house, she always asks me, did you eat yet?

But she doesn't say it like that.

Instead she says, did you eat yet?

Did you eat yet.

Here, the word you is being reduced to you?

Did you eat yet?

And also notice what's happening with the two final words.

Eat.

And yet they both end in T. So think back to another rule about T that we talked about.

Eat yet my tongue is stopped at the top of my mouth and I'm not letting that air pass

through.

Listen to the full sentence.

Did you eat yet?

Did ya eat yet?

Can you say that with me?

Did you eat yet?

We can reduce this another time and say, did you.

Did you eat yet?

Say it with me.

Did you eat yet?

Did you eat yet?

And then we can reduce this one final time.

And this is I think one of my favorites.

Growing up my family sometimes used to laugh about this because it's reduced so much it

doesn't sound like any English word, but in the right context you can totally understand

it.

What if I said to you, did you eat yet?

It sounds so weird.

Did you eat yet?

Did you eat yet?

This means did you eat yet?

But we are reducing this again and again and again.

If you remember we just talked about did you making you into a J sound.

So that's what's happening here, but we're dropping did and we're keeping J and then

eat yet.

Did you eat yet?

Did you eat yet?

Did you eat yet?

Now, if you are uncomfortable using these extremely reduced versions of English sentences

yourself, that's no problem.

One of the biggest benefits to knowing these types of reductions is being able to understand

other people when they use them.

So I want to give you these tools in your figurative English toolbox so that you can

understand people.

If you're watching a movie and they say, did you eat yet before this lesson you would've

thought, what in the world did they say?

But now you know that they're asking did you eat yet?

So you have that tool in your toolbox to know how they're saying this, what they're saying

and how they're reducing it.

Sentence number five is I'll text you later, I'll text you later.

We often use this if we just want to get in touch with a friend later.

Maybe you don't have the information they're asking about.

You don't know if you're free on Saturday to get together.

So you're going to go home, look at your calendar and then you'll text them later.

So let's break down how we can say this sentence.

I'll text you later.

I'll text you later.

Did you notice what we're doing here?

You is becoming, listen again, I'll text you later.

It's becoming you again.

As you can tell, this is a very common reduction of the word you.

I'll text you later.

We have another reduction that's happening here.

What is that first word?

This is simply a contraction of I plus will the future tense in English.

I'll text you later.

Listen to our final word.

Later.

Later.

There's a T, but it sounds like a D. Is this happening again?

Yes.

Here we have a T between two vowels and so the word later doesn't sound like later.

Instead, it's going to sound like later.

Later.

Can you say that full sentence with me?

I'll text you later.

I'll text you later.

We can even reduce this a little bit more, especially in an informal situation and drop

the subject altogether.

You might just say, text you later.

This is kind of like when you say goodbye to someone and you say, see you later, you're

dropping.

I'll see you later.

We just say, see you later.

Talk to you later.

This is the similar idea, but you can say, text you later.

Okay, text you later.

I'll get back in touch with you, text you later.

For our final three fast sentences, we're going to be talking about reducing contractions

even more and sometimes cutting out verbs completely.

Let's go to sentence number six.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

This verb to get means to understand.

And we often use this for jokes.

So if someone tells a joke, you might say, I don't get it.

This means you don't understand why it's funny.

So they might have to explain it to you.

And this is something that's common as you're learning another language.

There's probably a lot of twists of language or jokes and different things that people

will say that you won't understand why it's funny or why it was interesting or why it

was sad.

So you might need to say this, "Hey, I'm sorry I don't get it.

Can you explain it to me?"

That's perfectly fine, but let's break down the pronunciation of how you can reduce.

I don't get it.

Our first way is to say, I don't get it.

I don't.

This is a negative contraction.

Do not.

And that T is just going to be stopped at the top of your mouth.

Don't.

Don't So you're making a slight N sound, but you want to make sure that that T is stopped.

Don't, I don't.

And then we're going to link together.

Get it.

Get it.

Do you notice here a T is between two vowels, even though they're different words.

It's okay.

It's still between two vowels.

We're going to link them together, not get it, but get it.

What's happening with the word it?

Here, that word, it has a stopped T at the end.

So it's just it.

It.

My tongue is stopped at the top of my mouth.

Do you think we can put all of this together?

I know it's a short sentence, but isn't it amazing how so many pronunciation tips can

be packed into one short sentence?

All right, let's say it all together.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

But you might have imagined we can reduce the contraction don't even further.

Listen to this.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

I don't.

Don't.

What's happening to the D here?

I don't, don't.

It's just gone.

Sometimes we just cut it out when we're speaking really fast.

So you might hear I don't.

I don't, I don't.

And that is I don't.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

The final part is the same as before.

We're changing the T to a D, get, and then it is a stopped T. Get it.

But that first part with the vowel, listen again, I don't get it.

I don't, I don't.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

I don't get it.

So you're going to hear people say this in movies and TV shows really fast.

If someone says something funny and the other person doesn't laugh, they might say, sorry,

I don't get it.

I don't.

I don't I don't get it.

Sentence number seven is I have got to go to someplace the store, my friend's house,

work.

But do we say it like that?

Oh, I bet you wish that we did, but unfortunately we reduce this many times.

So let's talk about it from the beginning.

First, we're going to make a contraction with I have, I've.

And then we have got to.

Got to implies a necessity.

I have to do something.

But got to means something very similar.

But we can reduce these words together.

Instead of saying I've got to, we can say got to.

Got to.

We often write this in a text message or in a quick email as G-O-T-T-A.

Got to.

Got to.

Got to.

What's happening with the pronunciation?

That T is changing to a D. Say it with me, I've got to.

I've got to study English every day.

I've got to.

The same thing is going to happen with the next two verbs.

Go to the store.

Instead of go to, we're going to say, I've got to go to.

Go to.

Go to.

I've got to go to the store.

I've got to go to.

That T is changing to a D. Say it with me.

I've got to go to the store.

I've got to go to the store.

Now, just to let you know, sometimes in American English, when there is a present perfect verb

tense like I have got to do something with the word have.

Sometimes we drop, have completely, especially with got to.

We might just say.

I got to.

I got to go to the store.

I got to go to the store.

Where are you going?

Oh, I got to go to work.

I'm sorry I'm late.

I got to go to.

Our final sentence, number eight, is I'm about to plus some kind of verb like I'm about to

pass out I'm so hungry.

Or I'm about to go to work.

I'm about to do something.

Let's reduce the beginning of this sentence.

Our first word is a contraction, I'm, which is I am, I'm.

Our next word about.

Sometimes we cut off the first letter A and just say bout bout.

And then for the word to, sometimes instead of saying to, we say to.

To.

You saw this previously with got to go to the store.

Here it's the same thing.

I am about to.

I am about to.

I'm about to pass out.

I'm so hungry.

I'm about to go to the store.

I'm about to go to work.

I am about to do something.

But we have one more reduction that we can have.

Think about those two Ts at the end of the word about and at the beginning of the word

to.

Those are two ts together.

And on either side of that, what do you see?

Oh, is that a vowel?

That's right.

There are Ts surrounded by vowels.

So what happens?

We can change them to a D sound.

And this is all going to link together in one fast word.

I'm about to.

I'm about to.

I'm about to.

Here this D sound is the T that's been changed into a D. Actually the two Ts that have been

changed into Ds.

Let's try to say this all together.

I'm about to pass out.

I'm so hungry.

I'm about to.

I'm about to pass out.

I'm about to.

I'm about to pass out, I'm so hungry.

Great work practicing all eight of these shortened quick, reduced fast sentences.

I hope that this helped you to be able to understand some principles of English pronunciation

and to level up your listening skills.

Yes.

Well, today I would like to help you with five common American English phrases that

include key American English sounds.

This lesson will help you to level up your vocabulary and also level up your pronunciation

and understanding skills.

So the next time that you hear these phrases and you hear American English speakers, you

will know exactly what they're saying.

And of course, like always, I have created a free PDF worksheet to go with today's lesson.

You can download this worksheet and learn all of the pronunciation points, all of the

sample sentences, all of the ideas, and at the bottom of the worksheet you can answer

Vanessa's challenge question so that you never forget what you've learned.

You can click on the link in the description to download that free PDF worksheet today.

All right, let's get started with our first American English phrase and pronunciation

point.

Have you ever been looking at social media and you thought, huh, the grass is always

greener on the other side.

And then you realized maybe the grass isn't always greener on the other side.

There's probably some hidden costs to all of these wonderful things that you're seeing

online, and that's really the truth.

Social media is not real.

So this common phrase, the grass isn't always greener on the other side means that the other

person's life or something that you're not experiencing always looks better than what

you currently have.

But in reality, that's not really true.

If you get to that other place, if you do that other thing, it's not always the paradise

that you expect.

So let's break down this pronunciation so that you can use this phrase and say it clearly.

The grass isn't always greener on the other side.

Do you hear the sound that I emphasized?

This is the R sound or in American English we often call this the colored R because it's

very strong.

Listen to it.

When I say the word grass, grass.

Does this remind you of an angry dog?

And this is a way to have the American English R sound.

Can you say it with me?

The grass.

The grass.

Let's add the rest of this phrase.

The grass isn't always greener on the other side.

So don't forget that hard R sound in the word greener at the end and also in the word other.

Having that strong colored R sound at the end of the word is essential in American English.

Let's say this full phrase one more time and I want you to try to say it with me.

Are you ready?

The grass isn't always greener on the other side.

All right, let's go on to our second phrase and also our second American English pronunciation

point.

Are you someone who is late?

Well, it might be useful for you to use this phrase better late than never.

Better late than never.

Unfortunately, I have had to use this many times.

I am often late, hopefully just by a few minutes, but it's still nice to apologize and you can

use this lovely phrase.

Sorry I'm a few minutes late, better late than never.

You can say it with a little joke in your voice.

But let's break down this pronunciation.

Better late than never.

Listen to that word better.

Is there a D in this word better?

Are we talking about a bed that you go to sleep in?

Nope.

In American English, a T that is surrounded by vowels or vowel sounds will change to a

D. Better.

This is common in the word water or maybe you're wearing a sweater.

This is typical of American English.

So when you use this phrase, make sure that you pronounce it like this better late than

never.

Our third American English phrase and American English pronunciation is included in this

phrase.

Don't get bent out of shape over it.

Don't get bent out of shape over it.

What's happening here?

Well, there's one concept that we just talked about.

Listen to the middle of this phrase, out of shape.

Here this T is changing to a D. But we've already talked about that.

Don't get bent out of shape.

So what else are we adding here?

Listen carefully for another T sounds.

A lot of these words end in T, but as I say this phrase, I want you to listen to see if

you can hear any of them.

Do you hear when I say this phrase, don't get bent out of shape over it?

The sad news is no.

All of these Ts are what we call stopped Ts.

So it's not wrong to say don't get bent, but when you hear fast American English speakers,

you're going to hear them stop the T in their mouth.

So let's take a look at this common contraction.

Do not becomes don't, but when we pronounce it in a fast sentence, you're more likely

to hear don't.

Don't.

My tongue is at the top of my mouth, like it's going to make that T shape, but I just

don't let the air come out.

Don't get.

My tongue is stopped at the top of my mouth.

I did not say get instead, I said get.

And then the next word bent becomes bent.

Don't get bent.

And our next word is the linking with D sound.

Out of shape over it.

And that final word, it also has a stopped T. So that T is going to be at the top of

my mouth.

It.

It.

This is a lot.

Let me give you the context and what this means and then we'll say it together.

Let's imagine that your friend's boss gives her some, we'll say constructive criticism,

some feedback that maybe didn't feel too great to get.

You might say, "Hey, your boss was just trying to help.

Don't get bent out of shape over it.

She was just trying to give you some advice.

It might not sound kind and it's certainly not something you really wanted to hear, but

don't get bent out of shape over it.

You're not going to get fired.

It's going to be okay."

This means don't take something too seriously.

So can you say this phrase with me?

Yes.

Let's say it together.

Don't get bent out of shape over it.

Don't get bent out of shape over it.

Don't get bent out of shape over it.

It'll be okay.

Our fourth American English phrase and American English pronunciation is included in this

phrase.

What goes around comes around.

Let's talk about this pronunciation really quick.

What goes around comes around here.

We have two instances where the S at the end of goes is followed by a vowel.

So that S is going to sound like a Z in American English.

What goes around comes around.

And this phrase has to do with your behavior if it's good or bad, like karma, will hopefully

happen to you again too.

Usually we use this in a negative sense to make ourselves feel a little bit better.

So for example, if someone is not a nice person, you might say, "Well, what goes around comes

around.

Someday someone is going to be mean to him too."

Or if one of your coworkers gets fired because they're always late, you might say, "Well,

what goes around comes around.

He didn't respect his job and this business, he was always late.

So he got fired.

His own actions ended up affecting him."

You can use this with positive things like, "I'm always nice to my friends and when I

need them, they also care for me."

We could say What goes around comes around because your behavior is coming back to you,

but it's more likely used in a negative situation.

Bad behavior will come back to haunt you someday.

So let's try to say this phrase together with the S changing to a Z so that you can use

it clearly and accurately in conversations.

Are you ready?

What goes around comes around.

What goes around comes around.

Great work.

Our final American English phrase and American English pronunciation point is this phrase.

We'll cross that bridge when we get there.

We'll cross that bridge when we get there.

Does this phrase exist in your language?

I feel like this is kind of an international idea that you're dealing with a problem and

you know that some other problems might come in the future, but you don't want to think

about them now.

We'll cross that bridge when we get there.

Let's focus on our current problems instead.

Well, let's take a look at this pronunciation, especially that first word.

We'll cross that bridge when we get there.

You can say this contraction very clearly.

We'll.

We plus will is we'll.

But in fast American English, we often reduce this in a relaxed way.

And we say we'll.

We'll.

This is similar to these other contractions as well, like you'll.

You'll.

Instead of saying you will we say you'll.

You'll.

And same as we will, we'll.

So could you say this with me?

We'll cross that bridge when we get there.

For my family, we raised seven baby chicks and we knew that having adult chickens would

be a lot of work, but we kind of just said, we'll cross that bridge when we get there.

Let's enjoy these baby chicks while we have them.

We'll cross that bridge when we get there.

Let's say it all together.

We'll cross that bridge when we get there.

We'll cross that bridge when we get there.

Great work.

Vanessa: All right.

Are you ready to get started with the first secret of American English pronunciation?

Let's start.

Have you heard this phrase before?

"The early bird catches the worm."

This means that if you wake up early or you get started now, well, you will succeed.

Only the birds that wake up early in the morning get the best worms.

If you wait, if you procrastinate, well, too bad for you.

You won't be able to succeed.

But this wonderful phrase uses an important American English pronunciation point.

There are three words, early, bird and worm that use a colored R. So in American English,

this R is a strong hard sound, early, bird, worm.

Do you see how that's almost like an angry dog?

Worm, bird, early.

Make sure that when you're using American English pronunciation, this colored R sound

is hard.

Phrase number two that uses a key American English pronunciation is this one.

Have you ever heard someone say, "Your guess is as good as mine?"

Your guess is as good as mine.

This means that the other person has no clue.

Maybe you could say, "I don't know how to get to the beach.

Your guess is as good as mine."

But there is something important happening with the pronunciation of this phrase.

At the end of the word guess, and at the end of the word is, there is an S. But in American

English pronunciation, we often link the S with the vowel next to make a Z sound.

So listen carefully when I say this phrase, "Your guess is as good as mine."

It sounds a lot like this, and that's what's happening here.

We are linking together the S plus a vowel from the next word.

Try to say it with me.

Your guess is as good as mine.

I have no clue.

Your guess is as good as mine.

Key phrase number three that uses American English pronunciation is this fun one, "Don't

bite the hand that feeds you."

Have you ever been trying to help someone and then they complain about how you're helping

them?

You can use this phrase and say, "Hey, don't bite the hand that feeds you.

I'm just trying to help you."

Well, it's the same idea.

If you argue with your boss, if you yell at your boss, ugh, he's the one that gives you

your paycheck.

So don't bite the hand that feeds you.

But there is an important American English pronunciation here that happens three times.

Don't, bite, and then a little later in the sentence is the word that.

What is similar between all three of these words?

It's the letter T. Listen when I say this contraction, "Don't, don't."

Do you hear, "Don't" with that puff of air coming out?

Nope.

In American English, oftentimes a T at the end of words will be cut off.

We call this a stopped T because your mouth is making that shape.

"Don't."

My tongue is at the top of my mouth trying to make that T shape, but there's no puff

of air that comes out.

Listen carefully as I say this, and I want you to hear that stopped T. "Don't bite the

hand that feeds you."

You think you can say that with me?

You can do it.

Let's say this phrase together.

"Don't bite the hand that feeds you."

All right, let's go to our next phrase.

Has this ever happened to you before?

You invite a lot of people over to your house and you think, "It's going to be a fun party.

It's great."

And then it just becomes so many people in your house, so much chaos, and you have to

say this, "Oh, no, I think it's going to get out of hand."

This doesn't mean that anything is really in your hand and it's getting out of your

hand.

Instead, this means it's getting out of control.

But this phrase, "Get out of hand," uses an important American English pronunciation tip,

which is that the T at the end of words, another T tip, that has a vowel next often changes

to a D sound.

So listen, when I say this, "The party will get out of hand."

The word get is surrounded by vowels.

There's a vow on either side, G-E-T, and then the next word starts with an O. So that T

is surrounded by vowels, and that means that it's going to change to a D sound.

"Get out," and then it's going to happen with out and of.

"Out of."

In fact, the word of changes to just a.

Get out of hand.

Can you say it with me?

"The party will get out of hand."

The party will get out of hand if you invite 50 people over to your house.

All right, let's go to our last American English pronunciation tip.

Has it ever happened to you that you travel abroad and then you realize that you are just

meeting people from your own home country?

It's like you're magnetic towards each other.

Well, we could use this phrase, "Birds of a feather flock together," and this means

that common things are attracted to each other for better or for worse.

So there is a key American English pronunciation point we can talk about with this phrase.

We already talked about the word bird and how it uses that colored R, that hard R sound.

Bird.

And there is another R tip in this phrase as well.

Look at the end of the word feather and together.

Here is an E-R, and it's going to be a strong R sound.

Feather, together.

Again, pretend that you are an angry dog and try to make that hard R sound.

Feather, together.

Can you say this wonderful idiom with me?

"Birds of a feather flock together."

Wonderful.

So if you can use all five of these American English pronunciation points, you will sound

more American, and it will also help you to understand American English speakers when

they're talking, which is wonderful when you're watching a movie or TV show.

So I guarantee the next time you hear these wonderful idioms, you will think, "Oh, I learned

that in Vanessa's lesson.

Yes, now I understand it and I know how they're pronouncing it and I can do it too."

Do you have good pronunciation?

How do you know the best way to test your pronunciation is to speak with someone else

and see if they can understand you, because understanding is the purpose of pronunciation

and of speaking.

But unfortunately here on YouTube, I can't listen to you.

Maybe YouTube will create that technology someday in the future.

So for now, I'd like to give you a different type of pronunciation test.

The next best way to test your pronunciation is to shadow or imitate exactly after a native

speaker so that you can see if your pronunciation is similar to mine.

Is it different?

What are the specific areas that are difficult for you?

I'm going to be testing your pronunciation on 16 challenging words.

But the best way to test your pronunciation is not with individual words, but with a whole

sentence.

So this is what we're going to do.

I'm going to show you a challenge sentence that uses four difficult words, and this is

what I want you to do.

I want you to say that sentence out loud before I talk about anything.

This is your original pronunciation.

I want you to hear your original pronunciation and then I'm going to read that sentence,

but I'm going to mispronounce one word.

I want you to guess which word is mispronounced.

There are sometimes multiple ways to pronounce each word, but I want you to be listening

for what is the most natural way to pronounce each word in fast English.

And finally, I'm going to be saying the sentence correctly, and I want you to be able to say

it with me.

So I want you to repeat the correct sentence with me.

Are you ready to get started with sentence number one?

Let's do it.

This is sentence number one.

I want you to say the sentence all by yourself.

Test your original pronunciation.

Go ahead, say it out loud.

Now I'm going to say the sentence and I'm going to mispronounce one word.

Can you guess which word I mispronounce?

"I buy clothes through the internet.

I buy clothes through the internet."

Which word did I say incorrectly?

Did you hear clothes or clothes?

You heard the second one, but really, that's not correct.

Instead, when we speak in fast English, we often pronounce clothes a lot like, "Close

the door."

I buy clothes through the internet.

All right, let's go through each of these challenging words and I want to help you say

them correctly.

That first word, buy, buy.

It sounds exactly like, "Bye.

See you later."

Bye.

And then we have clothes, which I just mentioned sounds a lot like, "Close the door.

Close the door."

When native speakers are speaking a little bit slower, they might add a T-H sound, clothes,

clothes.

You see how my tongue comes out a little bit for that T-H?

Clothes.

But really, when we're speaking quickly, it just sounds like close.

Close.

And then we have the word through.

Oh, this word is lovely.

We have a T-H followed by an R. Let's practice it slowly.

Your tongue is coming out between your teeth and there's some air.

That's a wonderful T-H sound.

Through.

It sounds like I threw the ball.

This is the past tense of throw.

I threw the ball.

So let's try to say this, "Through, through," and then we have our final word, internet.

What's happening to that middle T?

Internet?

You can say internet with a clear T if you're speaking a little bit slower, but when native

speakers are speaking quickly, we're going to cut out that tea completely and just say,

"Inner net, inner net."

Let's go back and try to say this full sentence clearly and naturally together.

Are you ready?

"I buy clothes through the internet.

I buy clothes through the internet."

Were you repeating with me?

I hope so, because we've got three more challenge sentences and I want you to test your pronunciation.

Let's go to number two.

Here's sentence number two.

I'm going to pause and I want you to try to say this sentence all by yourself.

Test your original pronunciation.

Go ahead.

Now I'm going to say it, but I'm going to mispronounce one word.

Can you guess which word is incorrect?

"A little girl took the recept to the bus.

The little girl took the recept to the bus."

Which word is wrong?

Did you hear receipt or recept?

You heard number two, but that's not correct.

Instead, the P is silent.

So you're going to say, "Receipt.

Receipt."

Just completely forget about that P in there.

All right, let's go through each of these challenging words because I want to make sure

that you can pronounce them correctly.

The first one is, "Little, little."

Do you see there's two Ts in the middle of this word, but really in American English,

those Ts are going to become D sounds.

So it's going to sound like, "Liddle," like a lid that you put on a container.

Liddle.

And then we have girl.

A lot of these words, girl, world, early, those words can be a little bit tricky, so

let's break this one down.

When you want to talk about the sound that an angry dog makes, you could say, "Grr, grr,"

and then we're going to add, "ul," at the end, "Girl, girl, girl."

Notice that my mouth isn't really moving here.

It's all inside my mouth and in my throat.

"Girl.

Girl."

And with the L, my tongue is coming beside my teeth.

"Girl."

It's right there, "Girl.

Girl."

All right.

And the next word is, "Receipt, receipt, receipt, receipt."

This is the piece of paper that you get after you make a purchase.

The cashier will give you a receipt, and then our final word is, "Bus."

Sometimes this short U sound can be a little bit tricky, so I want to make sure you're

not saying bus, buss, boss.

Make sure you say, "Uh, bus, bus, bus."

All right, let's go back and say this full sentence together.

"The little girl took the receipt to the bus.

The little girl took the receipt to the bus."

Did you say that with me?

Let's say it one more time.

"The little girl took the receipt to the bus."

Great work.

Let's go on to the next challenge sentence.

All right, here's sentence number three.

I want you to say it all by yourself.

Are you ready?

Test your original pronunciation.

Go ahead.

Now it's my turn.

I'm going to mispronounce one word.

Listen carefully.

"In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather.

In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather.

In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather."

Which one of these challenge words did I mispronounce?

Did you hear warm or warm?

You heard that second one, but that's not correct.

Instead, the word warm has just one syllable.

Not warm.

Instead, warm.

Warm.

Notice how my lips are in an O shape.

Warm.

Warm with a clear R. Warm.

All right.

Let's go through each of these challenge words so that you can say them correctly.

The first one is early.

This is similar to what we talked about with girl.

Early.

Let's break it into two sections.

Err, err, and then lee, lee, early.

Make sure that when you say the L, your tongue is touching the back of your teeth, L, L,

lee.

Early.

Early.

Don't add another sound in there.

I often hear English learners say, "Early, err, uh, lee," but that uh in the middle isn't

natural, so let's make sure you say early, and put it together, "Early."

Next we say, "Winner."

What is happening to the T in the middle of this word.

You might hear native speakers say winter with a clear T if they're enunciating clearly

and maybe speaking a little slowly.

It's fine to do that, but when native speakers speak fast, you're going to hear, "Winner,

winner.

When's the winner Olympics?

Winner" This is the same as a winner and a loser.

It's the same pronunciation, so make sure that the context helps you to know which word

it is.

Does this sound familiar?

"Internet, winner?"

We're cutting out that T, especially when there's an N-T in the middle of a word.

Internet, innernet, winter, winner.

You're going to hear that a lot in fast English.

Next, we have the word, "Didn't," but this is the clear pronunciation.

When native speakers are speaking quickly, we do not say, "Didn't."

With each sound pronounced, instead, you're going to hear, "Didn't.

Didn't."

There's a lot going on here in your throat.

Didn't, didn't.

So that final D is cut short, and the final T as well is cut.

So it's really going to be just your throat.

Can you say that with me?

"Didn't.

Didn't.

Didn't.

Didn't.

Didn't.

Didn't."

If you have trouble pronouncing or hearing or understanding contractions, it's probably

because we cut off a lot of those sounds.

We reduce them.

That's something that's natural in English.

I made a video about how to pronounce 81 different contractions.

You can check it out here because this happens to a lot of different contractions, and I

want to make sure you can pronounce them, but also that you can understand them.

The difference between a positive word, "Did," and, "Didn't," is very important when you're

having a conversation.

All right, let's go to the last word.

"Warm.

Warm.

Warm."

Make sure that this is one syllable.

Warm.

Warm.

Do you think you can put all of these words together?

You got it.

Let's say it together.

In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather.

In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather.

In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather.

In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather.

Great work.

All right, let's go to the final challenge sentence.

Here's our final challenge sentence.

Can you say this all by yourself?

Go ahead.

Now it's my turn.

I'm going to mispronounce one word.

I want you to guess which one it is.

"I definitely sought the water at the beach was salty.

I definitely sought the water at the beach was salty."

Which word is incorrect?

Did you hear, "Thought," or, "Sought"?

You heard the second one, "Sought," but does this word start with an S?

No.

Instead, it starts with a T-H.

So you need to make sure that your tongue is between your teeth and there's that stream

of air coming through through.

Through, we already talked about that word.

Thought.

Thought.

All right, let's go through each of these challenge words so that you can pronounce

them correctly.

What's happening with this word, "Definitely, definitely."

I feel like words like definitely, certainly probably those words can be a little bit tricky.

I talked about some of those in this pronunciation lesson up here, but the word definitely, we

use a lot and you probably would like to use a lot, but you need to pronounce it correctly.

So let's break it down.

Definitely.

Definitely.

Definitely.

Definitely.

Definitely.

Definitely.

Definitely.

It's definitely a beautiful day.

This is definitely a helpful lesson.

I hope so.

The next word is that lovely word we just talked about, "Thought.

Thought."

Make sure that your tongue is between your teeth.

I often hear English learners switching an S and a T-H sound, "Sought," instead of, "Thought."

And in some situations this could be a little bit difficult for other English speakers to

understand you, so make sure that you say this correctly.

"Thought.

Thought."

And then we have the word water.

Water.

What's the sound that you hear in the middle of this word?

Wadder.

Wadder.

Well, it's not a T sound.

Water.

Instead, it's a D. Here we have again the T is changing to a D.

This is typical in American English.

Wadder, wadder.

I want you to say that with me.

Water.

Water.

And finally, we have the word beach.

Beach.

A lot of you are concerned that you might say a rude word instead, so let's practice

that vowel sound.

It needs to be a long E. Beach, beach, beach.

And really, the context here is going to help you a lot.

So when we're talking about the water at the beach is salty, you're most likely talking

about the ocean, the sea.

You're not talking about a rude word, so I think the context is going to help you a lot,

but make sure that when you pronounce it, you say E, beach.

All right, let's go back and say that full sentence.

I definitely thought the water at the beach was salty.

I definitely thought the water at the beach was salty.

I definitely thought the water at the beach was salty.

Great work.

I hope that you had a chance to say that sentence out loud with me and test your pronunciation.

Are you ready for a final challenge?

We're going to go back and say all four of those sentences, and I want you to say them

out loud with me.

I'm going to say them two times so that you can listen and then you can also repeat.

Are you ready?

Let's say them together.

I buy clothes through the internet.

I buy clothes through the internet.

The little girl took the receipt to the bus.

The little girl took the receipt to the bus.

In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather.

In the early winter, I didn't miss the warm weather.

I definitely thought the water at the beach was salty.

I definitely thought the water at the beach was salty.

Congratulations on leveling up your pronunciation skills so that other people can understand

you clearly and easily.

The next thing is to level up your vocabulary skills.

Grow your vocabulary.

In this section we'll be focusing on specific words that you can use to describe other people,

and then specific words that you can use to talk about different body parts, including

important idioms that you can add to your daily conversations.

Let's watch.

The first category are almost 100 personality expressions.

You will take a personality test where you can guess which word you think best describes

you, and you'll meet a couple of my friends when we describe each other where you can

learn even more expressions.

The second vocabulary category is we will be talking about 100 body related words.

I will be going through my body talking about each word that you need to use to talk about

all of the different parts of the body, so it's a great way to level up your daily vocabulary

so that you don't have gaps where you don't know what to say when you're trying to speak.

Let's get started with the personality test and the personality expressions.

Let's go.

Have you ever taken a personality test?

These kind of tests try to tell you something new about your character, or maybe put you

into a category.

You are a comforter.

You are enthusiastic.

You are a pessimist.

Personally, I hate almost every personality test.

Why do I need a test to tell me about my personality?

I already know my personality.

You probably learned a lot about me just from that statement.

I don't need a test.

I don't need someone else to tell me about my personality.

But having said that, sometimes personality tests can be really helpful for expanding

your vocabulary so that you can accurately describe people.

Maybe you just got a new job and you want to tell your husband about your boss.

You want to explain your boss's character or maybe how your boss looks or some things

that your boss does or maybe you're on a first date with someone and you want to tell them

the wonderful things about your personality.

You need to describe yourself.

So in this lesson, I'm going to give you the vocabulary to accurately describe other people

and also yourself.

Today, I want to ask you six questions to learn more about your personality.

The goal is to choose some of these nouns and adjectives and create a sentence or maybe

a couple sentences describing yourself.

If you feel like this is too personal, you can create a list for someone else in your

life.

At the end of this lesson, I have some extra special material.

You're going to see a conversation with five native English speakers where we try to describe

each other.

Hopefully, this will help to also expand your vocabulary, but you'll have to wait until

the end of this lesson.

All right, let's get started with the first question on this personality test.

Personality test question number one, are your travel plans generally organized?

What about your home and office?

Are they pretty tidy?

Tidy means clean.

Things are orderly.

Think about this for a moment.

Organized, tidy.

Does this describe you?

Think about this for three seconds.

Choose yes or no.

Three, two, one.

All right.

Let's say you decided to say, "Yes.

My travel plans are generally organized.

My home and office are pretty tidy."

What are some great adjectives we can use to describe you?

I'm organized.

I'm put together.

I have it together.

Here, we're talking about your life.

You have your life together.

It is organized.

"I'm organized, I'm put together.

I have it together."

Or you might say, "I'm A type."

A type is compared to B type, which we'll talk about in just a moment.

A type means that you are quite orderly.

There is a place for everything in your life.

You might also add a qualifier to some of these expressions.

"I'm somewhat A type.

I'm kind of A type.

I'm pretty A type."

Here, we're lessening it a little bit.

You're not 100% A type.

You're not 100% organized.

I'm somewhat organized.

Okay, that's fine.

Most of us are in the middle of a lot of these categories, so it's good to use these qualifiers.

"I'm somewhat organized."

You might also say if you said yes to this that your travel plans are generally organized,

you might say, "I'm a doer."

Doer.

Here, the root word is do.

You do things.

You don't just think about them and wait for something to happen.

You do things.

You take action.

"I'm a doer."

Or you might say simply, "I'm clean.

Things in my life are clean.

I'm a clean person."

What if you said no to this?

"No, my travel plans are not orderly.

Oh, my home and office, they're a wreck."

Well, what are some adjectives we can use to describe you?

You might be spontaneous or creative.

What if you are not A type?

You are B type.

B type means that you don't always have things orderly.

Maybe you tend to be slower at doing things.

You think about things a lot.

Usually B type people.

Might be a little more of the creative spontaneous type.

That's why you're in this list.

And then we have some negative words that we can use to describe these people as well.

You might be scatterbrained.

Here we can imagine in your head, things are not orderly.

They are scattered.

Scattered means unorganized.

So if you say to someone, "You are scatterbrained," it is not nice.

You could say it about yourself.

That's fine.

"I'm scatterbrained," but you don't want to say that about someone else.

So during today's lesson, for these words that are definitely rude to say to someone

else, I put a little star beside it so that you know, "Ugh, I should probably be careful

saying this to other people because these are always negative," and-

Vanessa: ... for saying this to other people because,

these are always negative.

And the final thing you might say if you said no to this question is, "I'm not clean.

I'm messy.

My life is messy.

My house is messy.

Just things are not organized.

I'm messy."

Did you write down some words that relate to your personality?

All right.

Let's go on to the personality test question number two.

Question number two.

Is it easy to stay relaxed even when you have the pressure?

Do small events not change how you feel about the rest of the day?

Maybe a small negative thing happens and who cares?

It doesn't bother you, you can just easily forget about it.

Think about these questions.

Is it true for you?

"Yes, I can easily stay relaxed even when there's pressure.

Yes, I can easily forget about little annoyances during the day or no, it's hard for me to

feel relaxed even when there's pressure."

Think about this for you and let's talk about some words in three, two, one.

What if you said yes to this?

It's easy for me to feel relaxed even when there's pressure?

And, yeah, if there's small annoying things that happen during the day, it doesn't bother

me.

What are some words we could use to describe you?

You could say, "I'm easygoing.

Nothing phases me.

I'm optimistic.

I'm even-keeled."

We talked about this word in a previous lesson where Dan and I talked about our relationship,

our marriage together.

He said that I'm even-keeled.

This is a great word.

You might say, "I'm confident.

I'm calm.

I'm rational."

These are all things that you might use to describe you, if you said, "Yeah, I can easily

stay relaxed even when there's pressure."

But what about if you said no to this question?

What if you said, "Oh, no, I don't easily feel relaxed.

I'm often not relaxed.

I'm often stressed."

What are some words we can use to describe you?

We might say, "I'm sensitive."

This means that things affect you easily.

It's not always a negative thing.

Of course, it depends on the situation.

If you're applying for a high stress job, you don't want to say, "I'm sensitive."

It probably means you're not a good fit for the position, but this could be just to describe

you personally.

"I'm sensitive."

Or maybe you might say, "I'm emotional."

Your emotions play a big part in your life.

Another way to say emotional is moody.

Moody is always a negative thing.

This means you're in a good mood, you're in a bad mood, and you're swinging between those

moods and there's no rhyme or reason.

That means there's no predictability.

Oh, one day or one moment you feel like this and the next day or the next moment you feel

like this, you are moody.

This is stronger than emotional.

This is much more negative than emotional.

So, don't tell someone you are moody.

Especially if they are moody, it won't go well.

Do you know what the opposite of optimistic is?

You might be pessimistic.

Pessimistic means that the glass is half empty.

The glass is not half full, the glass is half empty.

This is an expression that means you always see maybe the negative side or what if this

happens?

You're always asking, "What if", in kind of that negative way.

Of course it's good to balance, being optimistic and pessimistic, but these are the two extremes.

The next five words mean something very similar and they're all negative.

I don't recommend telling someone else that they are these things.

Of course, you can say them about yourself if you would like.

You might say, "I'm uptight."

Tight.

We can kind of imagine something inside of you is maybe twisted or tight and inside of

you, you don't feel relaxed.

You are uptight or maybe you are anxious.

You can say, "I'm anxious", and that describes your personality, but you might just be anxious

about one thing.

"I'm anxious about my exam tomorrow."

Okay, maybe in general, you're not an anxious person, but you're anxious about that specific

activity.

That's fine.

That's not really describing your personality.

"Every day, I'm often anxious."

No, it's just one specific thing.

Or you might be high-strung.

High-strung has that same feeling of uptight, anxious, high-strung, or you might be a worrier.

A worrier.

"She is a worrier."

That means that she worries a lot.

This defines her personality.

She's a worrier.

Or we might say, neurotic.

"He's neurotic.

She's neurotic.

I'm neurotic."

This is quite strong.

You are uptight and a lot of things bother you.

Let's go on to personality test question number three.

There's actually three questions in one here.

They are, is it difficult to introduce yourself to new people?

Do you feel tired after you spend time with a group of people?

Is a good book or a good movie more interesting than a social event?

Think about those questions for a moment.

Is it difficult to introduce yourself to new people?

How do you feel when you get together with a group of people?

Do you feel tired?

Think about that for a moment.

If the answer is yes or no, three, two, one.

Let's imagine that you said, "Yeah, it's difficult to introduce myself to people.

I think that when I get together with a group of people, I feel so tired.

I would rather read a good book or watch a movie than go to a social event."

If you said yes to this, let's talk about some adjectives that can describe you.

You could say, "I'm reserved.

I'm shy.

I'm timid.

I'm introverted."

Or just simply, "I prefer small groups."

I know some people are like this.

They don't like big groups.

They would rather get together with just one other person or maybe two or three other people,

not a group of 20 people.

"I prefer small groups.

I'm introverted, I'm reserved, I'm shy, I'm timid."

These are all great words.

What about if you said, "No, I feel energetic when I get together with a group of people.

I would rather go to a social outing.

Oh, it's no problem to introduce myself to new people."

What are some words we can use to describe you?

You could say, "I'm outgoing.

I'm the life of the party."

Now for this expression, it's probably better that someone else says this about you, just

because it's maybe not so humble if you say, "I'm the life of the party."

It means that, "Everybody loves me.

People love talking with me."

It's probably better if your friend said, "Oh, yeah, Vanessa, she's the life of the

party."

Instead of me saying it about myself.

But this might be an expression you can use to talk about someone like this.

Or you might be the opposite of introverted, extroverted.

"You are at ease in social situations.

You take initiative.

You are social."

This word initiative is a beautiful word.

We can imagine that when there are two people, maybe in a gathering and they both are kind

of looking at each other, but they don't really want to start a conversation, the person who

starts the conversation, that person takes initiative.

They took that opportunity.

So if you have no problem introducing yourself to other people or maybe asking questions

at a store, you take initiative.

Let's go on to question number four of this personality test.

Do you often get lost in thought and forget your surroundings?

Do you often think about the meaning of life?

Do you get lost in thought?

Things are going on in your head and you're thinking about those things, not the things

around you.

Do you often think about the meaning of life?

What is life?

Think about this question.

Is it true for you?

Is it not true for you?

Three, two, one.

Let's imagine that you said, "Yeah, I do kind of often get lost in thought.

Yeah, I do think about the meaning of life often."

What are some words we can use to describe you?

You might say, "I'm deep."

Now this is an expression, kind of like I'm the life of the party, that it's not so humble.

If someone is deep, this is a compliment.

It means that they have a lot of wisdom.

So it's probably better for you to say it about someone else.

"I really like talking to my cousin.

He's so deep.

He has such interesting thoughts."

Instead of saying it about yourself, you might also say, "I care about finding truth."

This is another way to say deep.

"I care about finding truth."

Or you might be the kind of person who is critical.

"I'm critical of things.

If someone tells me something, I often question it."

Is it true?

Is that real?

On the negative side, you might say, cynical.

Cynical is always a negative word.

And that just means that, "Yes, that person asks questions, but they always doubt."

They're not just asking questions, but they're always doubting.

"Ugh.

Is that true?

Oh, there's no way that that's true."

They're cynical.

They're always doubting.

If you often get lost in thought, you might say, "I'm a dreamer.

I often like to daydream.

I am lost in my own world.

I live in my head."

These are all...

They're not things that you want to say in a job interview, but they're not necessarily

bad, so you can say them to your friends or say them about yourself.

If you want to say this in a negative way, you could say, "I am a million miles away."

Or, "She's a million miles away.

She's not paying attention.

She is a million miles away."

That's pretty negative.

And then if you want to be really negative, you could say, "I'm an airhead."

We can imagine your head is filled with nothing but air.

"I'm often lost in thought and I forget the things around me.

I am an airhead."

This is a similar category as someone who often thinks about things, but it's quite

different from being deep.

If you're deep, your head is filled with a lot of thoughts.

But then on the negative side, you might say, airhead for having no thoughts.

You're often lost in your own world.

You're often in your head, but you're not thinking about anything.

Just an airhead.

What if you said, "No, I'm not often lost in thought.

No, I don't really think about the meaning of life that often.

Life is life.

Whoa.

Why would I care what the meaning of life is?"

What would you say on the other side?

You could say, "I am alert."

You don't often get lost in your thoughts because you're looking around.

You are alert to the things going on around you.

You notice little details.

Maybe people who are lost in thought, they're not thinking about the physical details around

them.

They don't realize, "Oh, there's a cup over there.

Oh, my friend just walked by."

But if you are alert, you're noticing those things.

You might also say, "I'm detail-oriented."

You notice lots of little details or you might say, "I'm astute."

These are great things for a job interview.

"I'm detail-oriented.

I'm alert and astute."

This means that you will not forget little things because you are organized, you are

able to keep track of physical details.

Similar to alert, you might say, aware.

"I'm aware of my surroundings."

You're not lost in your head, you are aware.

Or you might be a realist.

A realist.

This is quite the opposite of somebody who's thinking about the meaning of life.

"Well, if I think about the meaning of life, I'm never going to really find out, so why

would I waste my time?"

A realist would say that.

So if you think that, you might be a realist or you might just be practical.

Practical and a realist are both quite similar.

You are practical.

You're not going to waste your time if you know that something won't be profitable or

won't be helpful.

"I don't think it's really helpful to contemplate the meaning of life.

I'm just practical."

This might be something you can use to describe you.

Let's go on to the next question.

Personality test.

Question number five.

When you want something, do you often not change your mind?

When you want something, do you often not change your mind?

Think about this.

Is that true for you?

You don't change your mind?

Or, "No, I changed my mind.

It's not so serious for me."

Think about this.

Three, two, one.

Let's imagine that you said, "Yes, it is true for me.

When I want something, I don't often change my mind."

What are some words we can use to describe you?

We could say, "You are diligent, you are motivated.

I want to study English.

I'm going to become fluent in English.

I'm going to feel more confident in English, and I will be diligent.

I will study every day.

I'm motivated.

I will study every day."

You want something and you are not going to be distracted.

These are positive expressions.

They're great for job interviews.

They're great general personality traits.

There's some negative ways to describe this as well, though.

You might be stubborn or we have a lovely idiom, stubborn as a mule, or we might say,

"You are headstrong."

Headstrong.

This means stubborn.

When you want something, you often refuse to think about other options.

"I want this.

I want this.

I want this.

I'm not going to think about other things.

I'm stubborn."

Or you might be adamant.

Adamant.

This means that you stick with your opinion.

Let's imagine that you are a teenager and your mom says, "I heard that you were drinking

beer with some friends behind the school."

And you say, "No, mom.

I wasn't doing that.

I don't know who you were talking with, but it wasn't me behind the school doing that."

And she says, "Well, I heard from this person that you were doing it", and you stick with

your opinion.

"No, it wasn't me.

It wasn't me.

There's no way that was me."

You are adamant, that that person was not you.

You are adamant about something.

This means that you refuse to change your story about something.

You are adamant.

You also might be opinionated.

You have opinions and you're not really afraid to share them.

This isn't necessarily a negative thing to be opinionated.

But of course, if you are opinionated, if you have strong opinions, especially if these

are opinions that are not shared with a lot of other people, it's great to be careful

about how you present them, about how you share them with other people, so that they

don't think that you are pushy.

Pushy is always a negative thing.

If you are opinionated, you need to talk about it in a specific way, so that you don't become

pushy.

Pushing your opinions on people.

You might be persistent.

This is similar to adamant, but it's in the negative way.

You are persistent.

"I wasn't drinking behind the school.

That wasn't me."

You are persistently keeping with the same opinion.

Persistent.

Or maybe you have a three-year-old and that three-year-old is asking for candy.

"Oh, I want candy.

Mom, I want candy.

I want candy."

That three-year-old is persistent.

They are wanting it and they're telling you again and again and again.

You might hear the word bossy.

"I'm bossy.

She's bossy.

He's bossy."

This is similar to persistent.

Adamant.

You're telling someone, "You should do this, you should do this.

You do this, you do this."

Like a boss, but usually if you're a good boss, you don't act like that.

You're much kinder, but we use the term bossy for people who have an opinion and they're

not willing to change it in this negative way.

What if you said the opposite thing to this question?

What if you said, "Actually, sometimes I do change my mind.

I don't always stick with exactly what I say I want every single time."

What are some other words we can use?

You could say, "I'm flexible, I'm compliant, I'm reasonable, I'm open-minded, I'm agreeable."

These are all positive things.

But what if we take this to an extreme?

You might say, "I'm submissive."

And this means that you never stand up for yourself.

To stand up for yourself means that you have something you want and you never tell other

people.

You are submissive.

Maybe too submissive or we can use a great expression.

"I often get walked on."

Get walked on.

If you have an opinion and you always change it depending on what other people want, we

can imagine that you are like a doormat.

This is the thing that you walk on to enter a house.

This is you.

People are always walking on you.

"I often get walked on."

Your desires, your needs often get forgotten because you don't stand up for yourself.

"I often get walked on."

You could say that about someone else.

"Yeah, he often gets walked on because he doesn't feel comfortable standing up for what

he wants.

He doesn't feel comfortable pushing what he wants, so he just gets walked on."

Let's go to the next question.

Question number six.

This is our final personality test question.

When people come over to your house, when guests come to your house, do they feel comfortable?

Do you go above and beyond what is necessary to take care of them?

This is a great expression.

Go above and beyond.

Maybe it's necessary to give them a glass of water.

Okay.

When a guest comes to your house, you say, "Sit on the couch.

Here's a glass of water."

But maybe you go above and beyond.

You do more than that, so that your guests feel comfortable.

Is that true for you?

Do your guests feel comfortable?

Do you do more than is necessary?

Think about that for a moment.

Is it true or not true for you?

Three, two, one.

Let's say that this is true for you, that you make your guests feel comfortable and

you do more than is necessary.

Let's talk about a lot of adjectives that we could use to describe you.

"You are hospitable.

Nice, friendly."

But here's a big warning.

If you come from France, Italy, Spain, Brazil, Portugal, these romantic language countries,

do not.

Warning, warning, warning.

Do not say, sympathetic.

You do not say, "He is sympathetic.

She is sympathetic."

This does not mean nice in English.

This is a false friend and I hear a lot of people say this.

Instead, in English, we do have the word sympathetic.

This means that maybe your brother lost his job.

And when you go over to his house, you bring him some flowers and you bring him a meal

and you sit down and talk with him, and you talk about that difficult, hard time in his

life.

Because, you are sympathetic to his difficulty.

We usually have a difficult situation happening and you didn't personally experience that

difficult thing, but you feel his difficulty.

You feel his pain.

You are sympathetic.

So here we're using it in a completely different sense than friendly.

Friendly just means, you're nice.

But if someone has a difficult situation, you are sympathetic to their problem.

You understand.

"Oh, I think my brother's really sad right now.

He's probably worried about the future."

You are understanding his difficult times.

I hope I explained this word as sympathetic, so that you do not use it and say, "Vanessa,

you are so sympathetic."

No, no, no, no, no.

Don't use that.

All right.

What are some other words we can use?

You could say, "I'm compassionate.

I'm considerate.

I'm generous."

This means you give maybe your time or your money to other people.

You could say, "I'm warm.

I'm warm-hearted."

This means that people feel this warm feeling when they're with you.

They feel like you're such a friendly person.

You could say, "I'm helpful.

I'm down to earth."

Down to earth is an expression that we use to mean you are relatable.

People feel like your life is not so different from theirs.

You often hear this word described with celebrities.

Celebrities, movie stars, they have lives that are much different than our own, so they

seem kind of untouchable.

So different.

But maybe there is one celebrity who relates to the problems of normal people.

Someone might say, "Oh yeah, she's really down to earth.

She's down to earth.

Her feet are on the earth.

She's down to earth."

Or you might say, "She's sincere.

She's genuine.

She's really her herself.

She's not faking it.

She's dependable or I am dependable."

Your friends know that they can depend on you.

What if you said no to this?

I imagine that you probably didn't say no to this about yourself, but you probably know

somebody like this, so let's talk about the opposite.

Someone who is maybe not so generous, not so considerate or so friendly.

Let's talk about the opposite.

Maybe you know someone who is unpleasant.

This is a little bit of a nicer way to say, "Ugh, they're so annoying.

They're such a terrible person."

You could just say, "Yeah, he's kind of unpleasant.

I don't really like working with him."

Unpleasant.

Or someone might be selfish.

They're not generous.

They don't like to go above and beyond.

They're kind of selfish.

Or maybe you know someone who is self-centered.

The world revolves around their life.

They are self-centered.

Their self is the center of the universe.

They're self-centered.

So how did you do?

How did you answer all of these six personality test questions?

I hope you wrote down some adjectives that you can use to describe yourself.

Write that sentence down in the comments.

But before we go, I'd like to share some extra material with you today.

You're going to see five native speakers.

They are three friends, plus my husband, plus me.

We're attempting to describe each other.

So I sat down with each of my friends individually and asked, "How would you describe this person?

How would you describe that person?"

I didn't tell them specifically to describe their personality or their character, but

you'll see that a lot of these people, they did describe their physical appearance a little

bit, but most of these descriptions had to do with their personality or character.

You're going to hear some of the words that we just talked about and maybe you'll hear

some new words as well.

Let's start with my friend Liz.

You're going to meet Liz, Heather, Lauren and Dan.

They're going to be describing each other.

Let's see what everyone has to say about Liz.

How do they describe Liz?

Let's watch.

Liz: Hi, I'm Liz.

Heather: Gosh.

Liz is witty and sarcastic to a fault.

Vanessa: I say so.

Heather: She's super inquisitive.

And very...

I'd say literate.

Vanessa: Yeah.

Heather: That is a very good description.

Vanessa: For sure.

That's something that I first recognized about Liz is, she's really inquisitive.

Heather: Yes.

Vanessa: She asks great questions.

Heather: She's curious about life.

Vanessa: Yeah.

Heather: Very much.

I would say she's adventurous for some things.

Like travel or things like that.

Not so much food.

I think that.

And she's very loyal.

Very loyal friend.

Lauren: Liz is very sarcastic and smart.

Quick-witted.

She's funny and she has nice pretty long brown hair.

Vanessa: That's true.

Dan: I would describe Liz as very curious.

Out of many people I know, not many people will ask you questions a lot.

When Liz asks you a question, she'll ask more and more questions, which I'm not hating on.

I think it's great.

She's also very assertive.

So whenever she has an opinion, she usually makes it very clear.

It's not hidden in any way.

She's also very friendly though, so the assertiveness doesn't get in the way of her friendliness.

Her friendliness shines through.

Vanessa: You just heard some amazing adjectives to

describe the wonderful person of Liz.

Let's go on to the second person.

You're going to meet Heather, and let's see how everyone describes Heather.

Heather: Hi, I'm Heather.

Liz: Heather is a short little person and she has

brown hair and amazing freckles.

And she's very creative, and she's an introvert.

She's a good painter.

She's very smart, she's well traveled.

Vanessa: Those are all true things.

Lauren: Heather is short like me.

And she's kind of got some...

She's dry-humored.

So, very subtle.

Also very smart and well traveled.

She's lived in lots of different places.

Dan: Heather.

Heather is very reserved.

Yet, when you get to know her, she's very fun-loving.

She's also very curious.

She's kind of geeky.

She likes Harry Potter and Star Wars and stuff like that.

But yeah, she's very fun.

And if you get together with her at a party, you're going to have a good time.

Vanessa: I hope you enjoyed those adjectives to describe

Heather.

Let's go on to Lauren.

How does everyone describe Lauren?

Lauren: Hi, I'm Lauren.

Liz: Lauren is also a short little person.

She's got blondish brown hair, a darker shade of blonde.

She has glasses.

She, to me is very businesslike.

And she likes to tell stories with a lot of details, which are always interesting.

Heather: Lauren is short with short hair, glasses.

And I think she's a geek.

Vanessa: Could you explain what you mean by geek?

Like about her interests?

Heather: Yes.

A little bit about her interests.

She's, like Liz, curious about different knowledge and stuff.

She loves Star Wars.

Vanessa: Harry Potter.

Heather: Exactly.

Vanessa: That kind of stuff.

Heather: Harry Potter.

Movies.

She's definitely a movie buff, and she can remember almost everything.

All these weird random details.

Vanessa: Her mind is like a steel trap.

Heather: Yes.

Vanessa: She knows everything.

Heather: Yeah.

I think she's also a very loyal friend and very caring.

Vanessa: Yeah.

Yeah.

I've been friends with her for 10 years.

And I feel like she is that kind of person.

Heather: Yes.

She makes an effort.

She makes an effort in her relationships, I think.

Vanessa: Yeah, that's a great quality.

Heather: Yeah, very much.

Yeah.

Dan: Lauren.

Lauren.

Lauren is very loyal, I would say.

When she's your friend, she's your friend for life.

She'll remember you and she's very detail oriented.

She'll remember all the details of your relationship.

I don't mean this in a bad way, I just mean there's always somebody in your life who gives

all those details about your life.

And she also knows a lot about...

From my perspective, a lot about pop culture.

She's always filling me in on the details and maybe I understand something that she

also understands, and we can have a funny conversation about that.

Usually Vanessa doesn't understand.

Vanessa: Yeah, I don't know much about pop culture.

So, Lauren is my window into this world.

She helps me to learn that stuff.

I hope you learned some great words with those explanations.

Let's go on to my husband, Dan, and see what everyone else has to say about Dan.

Dan: Hi, I'm Dan.

Liz: Dan.

Dan is so fun.

Dan is this tall, skinny ginger.

He's got very great, amazing red hair.

He always has a lot of energy.

I feel like he's always like, "I'm Dan."

Vanessa: He does have a lot of energy.

Liz: I feel like has a lot of strong opinions about

things, which I really like.

And he's married to you and has a baby.

Vanessa: That is true.

Those are all true facts.

Liz: I feel like he's very relaxed in some ways,

but also cares about details in other ways.

Which is kind of hard to describe, but it's true.

Vanessa: That is true.

Heather: Dan is a tall, skinny, redhead.

Vanessa: That is the first thing Liz said too.

Heather: I think he is very creative.

And I would probably describe him as adventurous, not afraid to take risks.

Inquisitive, opinionated.

I think he has opinions and he said his way, but I think he's also open for discussion.

Vanessa: Okay.

Lauren: Dan.

Oh, Dan.

Dan.

Vanessa: Other people said that too.

Dan.

Oh, Dan.

Lauren: Dan is thin and he has red hair.

Very red hair...

Lauren: ... thin, and he has red hair, very red hair,

and he can be kind of loud and enthusiastic.

That's a good word for Dan.

Vanessa: Enthusiastic, yeah.

Lauren: He's very intelligent too, and adventurous.

He's been to lots of different things, and learning.

He likes to learn.

Vanessa: Those are some great adjectives to describe

Dan.

Oops, I forgot to say that my friends are also going to describe me.

Here we go.

Liz: You, you're just so delightful.

That was my first word for you.

Vanessa: Oh, continue, continue.

Liz: Not just because you're in the room, but because

you are just delightful.

Vanessa: Oh, that's so nice.

Liz: You have a very effervescent personality.

Vanessa: Oh.

Liz: So I feel like you're very uplifting for other

people.

You bring a lot of joy to people.

I feel like you always seem like you have it together.

That's definitely my most overarching impression of you, is you have it together.

Vanessa: Oh.

Liz: You're also a very good host.

You're excellent with hospitality.

Vanessa: Oh, thank you.

Liz: Obviously, we share a love of reading.

Vanessa: Yes.

Liz: So I know that you're very well-read, and

I like that you get very interested in specific topics.

Vanessa: When I'm in a topic, I'm in.

Liz: Whenever we read a book, she's like, "I went

and did research and I found this out, and this and this, and it was just very interesting."

Vanessa: Uh-huh.

I think that's quite true, that when I'm interested in something, I'm really interested.

Liz: You go all the way.

Vanessa: Yeah, just go into it.

Yeah.

Well, thank you for your kind words.

Liz: Yes.

Heather: Vanessa.

Vanessa: Tell me what you think.

Heather: I think you're probably one of the kindest

people I've ever met.

Vanessa: Aw.

Heather: Yeah, I think you're just very genuinely nice.

Vanessa: Aw, thanks.

That's really sweet.

Heather: You could prove me wrong.

Vanessa: You know when you're not around, Heather,

I'm evil.

Heather: I think you're also very inquisitive and very

literate.

Vanessa: Mm-hmm, I like to read.

Heather: Yeah, I think you're very curious about the

world, and people like Liz.

I think where you and Dan fit well together is he seems super creative, comes up with

ideas, but you're very good at implementing ideas.

I think you're good at keeping people on task.

Vanessa: Okay, like focusing on the point.

Heather: Yes.

Vanessa: Yeah, I ...

Heather: I think yeah.

I think you need that.

You run your own business, so I think that is a good quality.

Vanessa: Yeah, got to be able to focus.

Heather: Yes, exactly.

Vanessa: That's great.

Heather: I think you are very good at having fun, but

also getting the work done.

Vanessa: Being serious when I need to be serious.

Heather: Yes, exactly.

Lauren: Vanessa is kind, and warm, and likes to learn

as well, well-traveled also, and you have pretty brown hair too.

Vanessa: Thank you.

Dan: Vanessa.

Vanessa: No pressure.

I'm your wife.

I'm sitting right-

Dan: Number one adjective is wonderful.

Vanessa: Oh, thank you.

Dan: Vanessa is probably the nicest person on earth.

Vanessa: Oh.

Dan: And by nicest, I mean also just sincere.

She's always very sincere, very caring, very curious, always sincerely interested in most

people's topics, like I'll hear even a boring person say something, and she'll be like,

"Oh, wow, very interesting," and I don't think she's making it up either.

I think she's seriously very interested.

Vanessa: Yeah.

Yeah, life is interesting.

Everyone has something interesting if you listen close enough.

Dan: Yes.

Yeah, she's also very fun, very fun-loving.

You can do a lot with her.

Obviously.

I like Vanessa a lot, because I decided to marry her.

Vanessa: I'm glad you like me a lot.

Dan: We get along very well and I like, hmm, yeah,

about 99% of Vanessa.

Vanessa: Congratulations, you just learned almost 100

words to talk about personality in English.

Next, let's focus on body expressions.

You're going to learn 100 body expressions, level up your English, and be able to express

yourself completely.

Let's watch.

Let's get started by talking about the top of our head and working down to our feet.

Let's start with the head.

There's a lot of words to talk about.

This is my head.

We have a great idiom that goes along with this, which is off the top of my head, I couldn't

tell you how far the Earth is from the moon.

Off the top of my head, this means without doing research, just having the knowledge

in my head.

Off the top of my head, sorry, I couldn't tell you.

I don't know.

Off the top of my head, I have no clue.

What's on my head?

It's hair.

We could say I have brown hair, or I am a brunette.

This is most often used for women.

You could say it for men, but brunette is most often used for women, or we could say

he has blonde hair.

She or he is a blonde, or he has red hair.

He's a redhead, or we sometimes say he's a ginger.

Sometimes people who have red hair don't like this expression.

My husband is a ginger, and he doesn't care.

This expression is fine with him, so maybe just listen out for it, or you could just

say he's a redhead.

He has red hair, or you might have black hair.

Under your hair, we have your scalp.

Your scalp is the skin under your hair.

Then moving down, we have your forehead.

Forehead.

Then we have your eyebrows, your eyebrows, your eyelids, and your eyelashes.

I want to take a quick note for my Asian followers.

In the Asian world, it is somewhat common to talk about some different terms for your

eyelids.

When I lived in South Korea, I heard my Korean coworkers when they were speaking in English,

I heard them use the terms monolid and double eyelid in their English conversations, but

I just want to let you know that this concept is relatively unknown to most of the English-speaking

world.

This is something that's much more common in the Asian part of the world, so if you

were to have a conversation with someone in English and you said, "Yeah, he has a monolid

or a double eyelid," most other people in the Western world are not familiar with this

concept, so we just call this the eyelid.

These are my eyelids.

My eyelids and my eyelashes protect my eyes.

My eyes.

That's a great idiom we sometimes use, don't roll your eyes at me.

Have you ever done that?

Have you ever done that to your parents?

If you have rolled your eyes at your parents, they most likely said to you, "Don't roll

your eyes at me."

This is a common phrase that parents say to their children, don't roll your eyes at me.

That's rolling your eyes.

Under my eyes, I have my cheeks.

My cheeks.

Babies have cute cheeks that we love to pinch, cheeks, and moving over here are my ears.

My ears, so these are my ears, but this is my ear lobe.

Some people have a pierced ear lobe, so I do.

These are pierced ears, and my ear lobe is pierced.

There's another idiom we use, which is I'm all ears.

If you have a suggestion for a YouTube video that you'd like me to make, I'm all ears.

This means I'm willing to listen.

I'm interested in what you have to say.

I'm all ears.

I have no mouth, no nose, no eyes.

I'm all ears.

I'm going to listen very carefully.

Then we have my nose.

This is called the bridge of your nose, and these are my nostrils.

My nostrils.

Under my nose is my mouth.

This is the general word for this area, but there's a lot of specific words to talk about

these parts, so let's talk about it.

My mouth, my lips are on the outside, my lips, and when I open my mouth, there are my gums.

The skin on the inside of my mouth is my gums, and then there's my teeth, and my tongue.

There are some fun idioms we can talk about with the mouth.

Let's say that you tell your friend that you're going to have a surprise birthday party for

your sister.

Your friend might say, "Oh, don't worry, I won't tell her.

My lips are sealed."

That means you can't open your mouth.

My lips are sealed.

The secret is safe with me.

It's a great expression to let the other person know, don't worry, I'm not telling anyone.

My lips are sealed.

What do you do with your mouth?

You eat.

If you love sweet things, maybe you have a sweet tooth.

This doesn't mean just one of your teeth is sweet, but this just means I love sweet foods.

I have a sweet tooth, so I have to keep sweets out of my house, or else I'll just eat them

all the time.

I have a sweet tooth.

Before we move on to the rest of the upper body, let's talk about one more idiom about

your tongue.

This expression is extremely useful for English learners.

What if I said to you, "Oh, what's the name of that movie with the pirate?

Oh, it's on the tip of my tongue"?

Oh, do you get the idea that I know the movie, I just can't think about it right now?

The name of the movie with a pirate is right there.

It's on the tip of my tongue, I just can't get it out.

Oh, I just can't remember.

What's the name of that movie with the pirate?

Oh, it's on the tip of my tongue.

So if there is a word that you don't remember in English, you might say, "Oh yeah, the skin

in your mouth.

Oh, Vanessa talked about that.

Oh, it's on the tip of my tongue.

I forget what that word is."

Oh, well, first of all, you remembered this idiom.

That's great, and just to let you know, it's your gums, your gums.

But this is a great expression to use is when you know you know a word, you just can't remember

it.

Under your mouth, we have your chin.

Your chin.

If I told you, "Keep your chin up, things will get better."

Keep your chin up.

This is an encouraging statement that you can use to say, "You can do it.

Keep going.

I know that it's tough right now, but find some positivity in this tough time.

Keep your chin up.

You can do it."

Great encouragement.

Under your chin, we have your neck.

Your neck.

And another wonderful idiom, what if I said for you, "I stuck my neck out for her because

I felt like she did the right thing, and she needed some support."

I stuck my neck out for her.

You're not literally sticking your neck out for her, but this has to do with the idea

that you are supporting someone, even though you might face some criticism.

Your head is very important to your body, right?

This is a really valuable part of your body, so when you stick your neck out, you are putting

your head in a vulnerable position.

You're sticking your neck out.

You're not keeping it close to you, so that's the idea of this idiom.

When you support someone, even though you might face some criticism, you could say I

stuck my neck out for her.

Sometimes we use this if we regret it later.

Man, I stuck my neck out for her, and she just didn't appreciate it at all.

I stuck my neck out for her.

I tried to support her even though it wasn't the popular thing to do, and now I regret

it.

She didn't care at all, and it wasn't really helpful.

Finally, for your head, we can say your face.

All of this right here is your face.

Have you ever had a pretty rotten morning, things just didn't go well, but when you walked

into the office, you couldn't be grumpy, you couldn't be in a bad mood?

You had to put on a face.

This implies that things are going poorly, but you have to pretend like everything's

fine.

Sometimes we say, "I had to put on a happy face when I walked into the office," or we

could cut out the word happy completely and just say, "I had to put on a face in front

of the clients, even though I had just gotten yelled at by my boss.

I wanted to cry, but I just had to put on a face when I talked with the clients."

This is kind of a tough thing to do, but we all have to do it in lots of situations in

life.

Maybe you have to put on a face.

All right, let's go to the next section, which is not your head, which is your upper body.

Now, let's talk about the upper body.

The upper body.

These are my shoulders.

My shoulders.

If I'm angry at someone, I might give them the cold shoulder.

The cold shoulder is never good.

That means that you ignore someone, you don't talk with them, and you show them that you

are angry by giving them the cold shoulder.

You might not actually turn your body like this, but that's the expression we use.

He gave me the cold shoulder after I told him what was going on.

Below your shoulders is your chest, your chest, and this is the socially acceptable word for

men and for women to talk about this area.

We often use the term I just have to get something off my chest.

If there is a weight on your chest, it's a burden.

It is not a good situation, but when you get something off your chest, you tell someone

something important.

Maybe you've been keeping in a secret and you finally can tell someone that you love

that secret.

I just have to get something off my chest.

I love you.

I've been wanting to tell you this for so long.

I love you.

Oh, it feels good to say it.

I'm free now.

That's the idea of getting something off your chest.

Under your shoulders, we have your armpits.

Your armpits, and they are connected to your arms.

Your arms.

If you have to twist someone's arm to get them to do something, you had to work really

hard to convince them.

I had to twist my husband's arm to get a cat, but he finally said yes, and now he loves

that cat.

That's actually not true.

He wanted to get a cat.

He had to twist my arm to get a cat.

It means I had to convince him to get a cat, and now we have one.

Wonderful.

On your arm there is your elbow.

Your elbow.

Sometimes we say I need some elbow room, some elbow room.

If you're cooking and all your kids are in the kitchen and everyone's moving around,

you might say, "Hey guys, I need some elbow room.

I'm trying to cook here.

Can you guys just give me some space?"

That means I need some room, some elbow room.

Attached to your arm, your elbow, is your wrist.

Your wrist.

This is the joint here, your wrist.

When I was in high school, I broke my wrist.

It was literally and figuratively a pain, and then I have my hand, my hands.

When you give someone a hand, you help them.

Hey, can you give me a hand?

This box is really heavy.

I need some help picking it up.

Hey, can you give me a hand and read over this report?

I want to make sure I said it right.

Give me a hand.

On my hand, I have my palm.

My palm.

That's the bottom of your hand, and I have five fingers.

Each of my fingers has a knuckle.

My thumb has one knuckle.

Notice the K is silent, but my other fingers have two knuckles.

Knuckles.

You might see in a movie, we don't really use this in daily conversation, hopefully

not too much, but you might see in a movie someone say, "Do you want me to give you a

knuckle sandwich," and that means do you want me to punch you, because your knuckles are

like this and it's a knuckle sandwich.

Hopefully you don't use that a lot in daily life, but you might hear it in a movie and

now you'll understand it.

Each of my fingers has a fingerprint and a fingernail.

A fingernail.

We have different names for each of our fingers.

Do you know what they are?

This is my pinky finger.

Sometimes we say my little finger, but almost always do we say my pinky finger.

My ring finger, and that's because we often put our wedding bands on this finger, my ring

finger.

My middle finger.

In the West, maybe in other places as well, it's very rude to show only your middle finger.

That means eff you.

I'm so angry at you.

Here's my middle finger, so be careful not to do that.

Do not point with your middle finger.

Instead, point with your pointer.

That's what this finger is called.

Point with your pointer.

Then we have your thumb.

Your thumb.

All right, so we've talked about the hand, the arm, your chest.

Sometimes we talk about this as your chest area, especially if we're being a little bit

vague with women.

You might say, "Oh, there's something on your chest area."

Maybe there's a stain on your shirt, but you don't want to point.

You don't want to be rude.

You might just say, "Oh, there's something on your chest area."

It's not talking about your skin.

It's just in this general area, so that's a very polite way to talk about this.

We sometimes use the term collarbone for this bone here.

My collarbone.

Oh, yeah, I just slammed into a drawer and I hit my collarbone.

It really hurts.

This is my collarbone.

Sometimes schools will have a dress code that says you need to cover your collarbone, so

that's what they're talking about.

In your chest area, we have your ribs.

Your ribs, that's the bones here.

Sometimes we use the more technical term your rib cage.

Your rib cage.

I bruised a rib.

Oh, that hurts my ribs.

Oh, it hurts my ribs to laugh so much.

This is your ribs.

Below your ribs, you have your belly button.

If you are human, you have a belly button.

This is what connected you with your mother when you were in the womb.

You have a belly button, and this area is usually called your stomach, but sometimes

we call it your belly.

This is especially for children.

Oh, your belly hurts.

Oh, this is my belly.

But we often use an idiom that uses another word, and that is your gut.

Technically, your gut is inside you.

That's like your intestines and your organs inside you.

We're not going to get to that.

That's too detailed right now.

But we sometimes use the phrase, trust your gut.

This doesn't mean that you are using your rational brain.

You're just trusting your instincts.

If you thought, "Should I join Vanessa's course or not?

Well, this is how much money it is.

This is what I saw on the website.

No, I'm just going to trust my gut.

I know Vanessa is a nice teacher, and I think it will be useful.

I'm going to join the course."

Great.

Well, you can join The Fearless Fluency Club here.

Trust your gut.

That means I'm just going to trust my instincts and do it.

All right, let's move on from the head, the upper body, and talk about the lower body.

All right, now let's talk about the lower body.

These are my hips.

My hips, and if you want to talk about this area in a polite daily conversation-type way,

we often just say private parts.

This is something that's common for children to say, and I think this is something that's

common for adults to say as well.

Of course, we don't usually talk about this area in the workplace just in general, but

if you are going to use a polite term, we would say private parts.

We sometimes use the word crotch, but this is a mainly for men, and it's mainly used

to say, "Hey, don't hit me in the crotch."

Of course, talking about this area is not professional, so in the workplace, of course,

none of these words apply, but in daily conversation those are words you'll definitely hear, and

they're not considered rude.

You'll also hear the term groin used, and this specifically has to do with the muscles

on the inside of your legs, like in this picture, and it's most commonly used to talk about

when you hurt your groin.

You might say, "Oh, I pulled my groin when I was doing yoga yesterday."

It's used to talk about maybe some kind of pain.

If you go to the doctor, you can use that term to talk about the muscles on the inside

of your leg.

I know that's a little technical, but you will use this and hear this in daily conversation.

Oh, I pulled my groin and now it hurts to walk.

Next, let's talk about your legs.

This is my leg and my knee.

My leg and my knee, and here is my butt.

This is the most general term that we use, but sometimes we use backside to be a little

more polite.

For my kids, we use the word bum.

Wipe your bum.

Don't put your bum on the table.

We use those terms to be a little more indirect, but the most general term you're going to

hear is butt.

We often also use thigh to talk about the upper part of your leg.

My thigh.

Oh, I bumped my thigh on the table and it really hurts.

Your thigh.

Then below your knee, notice that the K is silent, below your knee is your shin.

Your shin.

This is also a little bit of a technical term, but we often use shin when we're going to

the doctor and saying, "Ah, yeah, I just really have some shooting pains in my shin and I

don't know what it is."

This bone in the front is your shin.

Behind your shin is your calf.

Your calf.

Now strangely enough, this is also the word for a baby cow.

A baby cow is a calf.

Notice the L is silent, but this muscle here, back here, is your calf.

My calves are really sore after going on that hike.

My calves are so sore.

Then we have your foot.

Your foot.

Just like the hand, the foot has a lot of parts as well.

We can talk about your ankle.

Your ankle is the bone here.

Don't twist your ankle.

That hurts a lot.

For your toes, we don't have a name for every individual toe.

Maybe doctors do.

I imagine doctors do, but in daily life we just say your big toe and your little toe.

The other toes are important, but we don't have a specific name for them, so it's your

big toe and your little toe.

Then we have underneath your foot is called the foot arch, and sometimes we say the arch

of my foot.

The arch of my foot hurts after walking for 10 hours yesterday.

My foot arch hurts, or the arch of my foot.

The back of your foot here is called the heel.

The heel.

Notice the spelling is different than to heal, the verb, so this is with two E's.

Heel.

I hurt my heel and I hope it heals soon.

That's your heel.

What would it mean if I said, "I have a new job starting tomorrow and I'm going to put

my best foot forward and be prepared for my job"?

To put your best foot forward doesn't really mean that one of your feet is better than

the other.

It just means I'm going to do my best.

I'm going to do everything I can to make sure that there is success.

I'm going to put my best foot forward.

I'm going to wear professional clothes.

I'm going to be in the right mindset.

I'm going to get a good night's sleep the night before.

I'm going to put my best foot forward.

Excellent expression.

Congratulations on leveling up your vocabulary so that you can express yourself completely.

Next, let's move on to grammar.

You are going to be focusing on five important grammar concepts that will help you be able

to say what you want to say, but also understand other people when they use these advanced

grammatical constructions in their speech.

It's very important for speaking and for understanding.

Let's get started.

Let's get started with the first grammar concept, the difference between get to and have to,

so that you're not rude and you can speak politely in English.

Let's watch.

I'm in beautiful, sunny Costa Rica.

Usually I don't film these videos outside, so I'm sorry if there's some wind.

You're going to hear some birds, some trees rustling.

It's all part of nature, right?

Hopefully it will help you to relax and enjoy today's lesson.

We're going to be talking about how to describe your vacation in English.

Usually vacations have positive parts and sometimes negative parts as well, so I hope

that the expressions we talk about today will help you to naturally describe it, and also

I'm going to show you a little bit around the farm so you'll get some real practice

with these expressions.

The two expressions that we're going to talk about today are to get to do something and

to have to do something.

Today, you're going to get to guess some of the wonderful vegetation that's around me

on this farm.

I'm going to take you on a little tour throughout this lesson, and I want you to guess what

the different plants are.

Let's talk about that first expression, to get to do something.

This expression has a sense of honor, of privilege, kind of a sense of, wow, I get to be in this

beautiful nature.

Wow, I'm so privileged.

I feel honored to be here.

You could just use the simple past or the simple present.

I am in beautiful nature, but if we want to give a sense of honor, privilege, wow, I'm

so lucky to be here, we can use get to.

I get to be in this beautiful nature.

What about that second expression, to have to do something?

Well, in order to get to this farm, we had to drive on some difficult roads.

They weren't always paved.

There were a lot of potholes.

They were really windy.

We had to drive on difficult roads.

When we use had to, which is the past version of have to, this has a sense of something

difficult, something undesirable.

I had to take out the trash.

I had to study for my exam.

It's something that's a little bit of a burden, so here we have a positive expression, I get

to see beautiful nature.

We got to see amazing iguanas on the trail, or something negative, we had to drive on

some difficult roads to get here.

We had to pay $15 to get into the park.

Before I tell you a little story about my experience here in Costa Rica, let's go to

our first question where you get to guess some of the plants around the farm.

All right, first quiz question.

We have this beautiful tree with these interesting things hanging down.

Can you guess what this is?

What kind of plant is this?

You've got three seconds.

Three, two, one.

It is cacao.

This is the outside seed, the outside pod, where you'll find chocolate.

I hope you enjoyed that first little quiz question.

There's going to be three different quiz questions throughout this lesson.

Let me tell you a little story about the first night that we arrived in this city.

When we got to the farm, the farmer helped us to find the house that we were staying

at.

It's a little bungalow, a little cabin on his property, and when he tried to open the

gate, he couldn't open it.

He tried one key, then he tried another, and he ran back to his farm, and we had to wait

for about 15 minutes while he looked for the key.

Then he came back with a key.

He was so excited.

He tried to open the gate, and it didn't work.

Well, he said, "You're probably going to have to wait for another hour while we work out

this problem with the key."

For a moment, I was just a little bit worried, because we have a toddler, and we'd been driving

all day, so we wanted to just open the door and let him run free finally, but then he

said to us, "Well, we have a dinner available at our eating area.

Would you like to be our guest for dinner?"

Yes, of course we would, so we got to have an amazing dinner at the farm.

We had some rice, and beans, and plantains, and chicken, and some guava juice, all produced

on the farm.

It was our luck really, that we got to eat that dinner with them, because we had no plans

for dinner.

We were kind of worried what we were going to eat, because we just arrived here after

a long day of traveling.

Because of this problem with the key, he had to find the key somehow, somewhere, we got

to have a great experience.

Before we talk about the grammatical structure of get to and have to, let's go on to the

second quiz question.

Vanessa: The second quiz question.

Quiz question number two.

We've got these interesting plants here with these little flowers.

What do you think these flowers will do someday when they're not flowers?

What would they become?

What will this plant produce?

Something quite important that probably a lot of you enjoy every day.

Let's take a look at these.

I'll give you three seconds.

Three, two, one.

It's coffee.

This is a coffee plant.

The farm here has a lot of coffee.

As you saw, also cacao, and we'll see a third one in just a moment.

Did you enjoy that second quiz question?

I hope so.

Let's talk about the grammatical structure of using "get" and "have" in the sense of

something positive or something negative happening.

We got to eat dinner on the farm.

He had to look for the key.

Here, we're conjugating that special word, "get" and "have," into the past tense.

And do you see what's happening after that?

We got to eat.

Make sure that you add "to" and then an unconjugated verb.

We got to eat.

He had to look for the key.

Beautiful.

Now that you know how to correctly grammatically construct a sentence using "get to" and "have

to," let's go onto our third quiz question, and then I'll tell you a final story about

our trip using these beautiful expressions.

For our third quiz question, it's quite obvious.

So I want to show you the base of the tree first.

And as we go up the tree, start thinking about what is it.

What is this going to produce?

Here we can see a little flower hanging down.

What is it?

What is it?

Are you ready to guess?

Three, two, one.

It's bananas.

So beautiful.

I didn't know that so many grew in a bunch like that.

It's wonderful.

I hope you enjoyed that third quiz question in this little mini tour of the farm.

It's really nice to see nature in other areas around the world.

Now that you know what "get to" and "have to" mean, and you know the correct grammatical

structure, let me tell you another quick story about something that we did today and something

that we plan to do in the future so that you can see the different verb tenses, "forget"

and "have."

This morning, we got to see an amazing waterfall.

It's one of the famous attractions of this area in Costa Rica.

But to get to the waterfall, you have to walk down 500 steps.

And then to go back to your car, you have to walk up 500 steps.

But it was really cool because we got to see the waterfall, and then we walked a little

bit down the path and we got to really relax and feel refreshed and wade into the water.

It was quite cold.

There were a lot of fish.

It was tons of fun.

And a great part was we didn't have to drive too far from the farm.

It was just about 15 minutes, so not too bad.

Over the next couple days, we hope that we'll get to see some more animals, maybe some sloths,

maybe some more monkeys and more iguanas, maybe an anteater or two, some parrots, maybe

some macaws.

That would be amazing if we get to see those.

So we're going to go to national park, and then we're going to maybe get to go to a hanging

bridge park.

Maybe we'll get to go to the lake.

We'll see.

But you have to drive a little bit of a distance, maybe 30 minutes, an hour, an hour and a half

to get to those locations, but I think it'll be worth it.

We've already gotten to do a lot of cool stuff in Costa Rica, and I hope that we'll get to

do other cool things in the next couple days.

Great work.

I hope you enjoyed my little vacation to Costa Rica during that lesson.

The next grammar lesson is going to be focusing on an advanced grammar sentence construction

that I rarely see English learners use, but native speakers use this all the time.

I want to help you level up your speaking skills.

Let's watch.

Do you remember learning comparisons in your English classroom?

Like this sentence, "His bike is faster than my bike."

The word "faster" is a comparison word.

Or, "Her English is better than it was last year."

"Better" is our comparison word.

That picture is more beautiful than mine.

"More beautiful" are our comparison words.

When we have a short word like fast, hot, easy, green, we're just going to add "-er,"

faster, easier, hotter, greener.

But when you have a longer word like that last sentence, beautiful or intelligent or

annoying, instead of adding "-er," we're just going to add "more" or "less."

More beautiful, more intelligent, more annoying, less beautiful, less intelligent, less annoying.

So these are our two ways that we can make comparisons just as a quick review because

that's going to be essential for taking it to the next level in our advanced sentence

structure.

Let's take a look at this sentence, "The warmer it is, the happier I feel."

Can you pick out the two comparison words here?

Warmer, happier.

We can see that "-er" at the end is kind of a key to this.

The warmer it is, the happier I feel.

Right now, it's the middle of winter where I live, but occasionally, every couple weeks,

there will be one day that feels like spring, and everyone in my city goes outside and jumps

for joy, and all of that sadness from winter just washes away because when it feels warm

outside, you feel great, you feel so happy.

So we could use this sentence, "The warmer it is, the happier I feel."

We're comparing two things, but let's take a look at actually what's happening here.

We have those two comparison words, but what's happening right before that?

It's the word "the."

The warmer it is, the happier I feel.

So that's going to be our key here for structuring these sentences.

At the beginning, we have some kind of cause.

The cause is warm weather.

And what's the effect?

I feel happy.

So we have a cause and effect happening here.

The warmer it is, the happier I feel.

Let's take a look at some other examples.

The richer the person, the more annoying he is.

This is just personal opinion.

So here we have two comparison words, "richer" and "more annoying."

Because the word "annoying" is a longer word, we're going to use "more" in front of it instead

of saying "annoyinger."

We're not going to add "-er" at the end.

And then we have that keyword, "the."

The richer the person is, or the richer the person, the more annoying he is.

What about this one?

The sweeter the dessert, the more delicious it is.

"The sweeter," that's our comparison word, "the more delicious," that's our other comparison

word, "it is."

And we have "the" in front of both of those.

So we have a cause and an effect.

The dessert is sweet.

And what's the effect?

It's more delicious.

We have a cause, someone is rich, and an effect, he's more annoying.

So we have a cause and effect happening here with this wonderful advanced comparison.

Are you ready to take this to the next level?

You probably already know how to make comparison words, but what if we make this advanced concept

more advanced?

Often when we use "the," "the" sentence structure, like we've been talking about, we don't use

that comparison word.

We just use the word "more" or "less," plus a noun afterwards.

Let's take a look at this example.

The more you eat, the more you gain weight.

"The more," that's our comparison.

So we're not actually using a word like "the warmer" or "the more beautiful" or "the more

annoying."

We're not using those words.

Instead, we're just saying, "The more," plus a noun, "you."

The more you eat, the more you gain weight.

Let's look at a couple others.

The less I sleep, the less I can focus on my work.

We can use "more" or "less" in these situations.

"The less I," that's our noun here, "I sleep, the less I can focus on my work."

The more I speak English, the more I feel comfortable.

Do you see in all of these sentences, we're just expanding on what you already know.

You know about comparisons, now you know that we need "the" in front of each of them, and

then we're adding "more" or "less."

The more I speak English, the more I feel comfortable.

We could switch that around and say, "the more comfortable I feel."

There's a couple different ways you can use this, but this is going to be beautifully

advanced to talk about cause and effect, and we use this all the time.

In fact, there are a couple fixed phrases.

They're not exactly proverbs or idioms, but they're just fixed phrases that native speakers

use a lot that include this "the," "the" sentence structure.

Let's take a look at a couple.

Someone might ask you, "How do you like your coffee?"

Well, you could say, "The stronger the better."

This means you don't like cream in it, you don't like sugar in it, you just want a lot

of caffeine.

Black coffee that's really strong with a lot of caffeine.

The stronger the better.

This is often used to talk about drinks.

You could even use it to talk about an alcoholic drink.

Do you want rum or vodka?

You might say, "I want both.

The stronger the better."

So you're talking about the strength of the drink.

The other day, I was having a bonfire in my backyard and I invited a family, and they

said, "Hey, can I invite my other friends?"

And I said, "The more the merrier."

This is a really common "the," "the" type of fixed sentence.

The more people who come, the merrier.

This is kind of a old-fashioned word to mean happy.

The happier we will be.

But in that fixed sentence structure, we do use the word "merrier" in daily conversation.

The more the merrier.

Sure, come on.

Or if you're having a problem at work and you're talking with your coworker, saying,

"Should we tell our boss about this problem?"

Well, your coworker might say, "Well, the less said, the better."

The less said to our boss, the better the outcome or maybe the better for your boss

or the better for the situation.

The less said, the better.

The final common fixed phrase is one that procrastinators probably hear a lot.

Let's imagine that you need to study English or you want to study English, but you've looked

at your phone, you went for a walk, you called your friends, and then your husband says,

"Are you going to study your English lesson today?"

He might also say, "You know, the sooner you start, the sooner you finish."

That phrase, "the sooner," "the sooner," is used a lot.

The sooner you begin exercising, the sooner you'll feel better.

The sooner you do something, if you do something now, you'll see the results quicker.

You'll see them sooner.

So we often use this.

And the sooner you start, the sooner you finish, or the sooner you'll see the results.

Now I'd like to share a quick conversation dialogue with you that uses this advanced

sentence structure a lot.

I challenge you, after this lesson, go back and try to say those sentences with us.

That's going to train your speaking muscles, help with your pronunciation, and also remind

you how to use this because you're using it yourself.

I've been feeling kind of down lately, but I'm not sure why.

Dan: Have you been working too much again?

Vanessa: Well, I go to work at 6:00 AM and finish at

8:00 PM, but that's fine with me.

Dan: Whoa, that's a long time.

Maybe the more you work, the more stressed you feel.

Vanessa: I don't know, I guess I have neglected to

see my friends lately.

Dan: Yeah, the more you see your friends, the more

positive you'll feel.

Vanessa: Yeah.

I do feel kind of lonely.

The less I do outside of work, the less connected I feel to them.

Yeah, maybe I have been working too much.

Dan: I'd say so.

Vanessa: In fact, the more I tell you about my work

life, the more I realize I need balance.

Dan: Yeah.

The more work, the more stress.

Vanessa: Yeah, the more down I feel.

Dan: But the more time with friends, the happier,

the more connected.

Vanessa: The more encouraged, but also the poorer.

Dan: What?

The poorer?

Vanessa: Yeah, because I would be spending money instead

of making money.

Dan: Don't worry about that.

The more money you make, the more you can spend.

Let's go have fun.

Vanessa: Okay, you convinced me.

Let's go.

Great work leveling up your speaking skills.

The next grammar lesson focuses on two tricky words, "do" versus "make."

You will join me in the woods again in nature.

Sometimes this helps make grammar a little more fun, where you're going to learn some

important expressions that can help you learn the difference between "do" and "make" in

your daily conversations.

Let's watch.

We use "do" for specific tasks, some obligations, or repetitive activities.

I need to do some housework.

This is an obligation, a duty, to do some housework.

We use "make" for creating or producing something.

I need to make some soup.

I'm creating the soup.

Today, we're going to be in two different locations, one in the woods and one by the

stream, so that you can visually remember the difference between these two words.

I hope that it will just add to this experience so that you can enjoy the lesson and also

remember these words.

But this can be tricky because cooking meals is kind of an obligation or a duty, right?

I hope that by talking about some specific expressions with both of these words, it'll

help you to remember them, but also it'll help you to keep those words together.

If you hear "make soup," "make soup," "make soup" a lot, your brain will keep these two

words together.

It's kind of like when you were first starting to learn English, you never heard "I were

happy."

You always heard "I was happy."

Because you never heard "I were happy," you probably didn't create that wrong sentence

structure.

So I hope that by hearing this correct sentence structure again and again, you're going to

be able to remember if it's "do" or if it's "make."

Let's start by talking about seven expressions using "do."

Everyone loves doing chores.

I dream about doing the laundry.

Doing the dishes is my favorite activity.

Okay, maybe that's not true for you, but here, we're using "do" to talk about this duty,

this obligation, this repetitive task.

We use "do" to talk about almost every household chore.

Do the laundry, do the dishes.

Except make the bed.

This is an exception.

But we often use "do" to talk about those household repetitive chores.

For more household chores, check out my video, 70 Cleaning Expressions in English, up here.

Number two.

I can't go play a game because I have to do some work, or maybe because I have to do some

homework.

To do work is a common expression.

Actually, I said this to Dan when I was writing this lesson.

He wanted me to play a game, and I said, "I'm sorry, I can't play the game because I have

to do some work," which was writing this lesson.

Number three.

Dan, my husband, plays hockey, and after his game, he often says, "The goalie did a good

job, but we still lost."

Or maybe he could have said, "The goalie did a bad job.

The goalie did a poor job."

Here, we're talking about doing a good job, doing a bad job, doing a poor job.

We're using the word "do" in the past to say "did."

He did a good job.

What do you think about this lesson?

Am I doing a good job explaining these expressions?

Number four.

Have you done any exercises recently?

Maybe you might say, "Well, I did some yoga yesterday, and I'm going to do some Pilates

today."

This question uses "do" in another verb tense.

Have you done any exercises recently?

This can be a little bit tricky to talk about "do" plus "exercise," because we often just

take out "do" completely and say, "Have you exercised recently?"

This is using "exercise" as the verb.

Have you exercised?

Notice the "-ed" that tells us that this is a verb.

Have you exercised recently?

But in my original sentence, "Have you done any exercises?"

This is using "exercise" as a noun, and then "do" is our verb.

So make sure that you use this correctly.

We don't want to have "do" plus "exercise" as a verb.

We need to only have one verb here.

Have you done any exercises?

Have you exercised?

Number five.

How are you doing?

I'm doing pretty well.

I'm not doing that hot.

This is a common greeting.

You might hear this all the time.

Maybe you say this a lot.

To learn some other common greetings and other ways to start sentences, you can check out

this link up here.

How are you doing?

I'm doing great.

I'm not doing that hot.

Wonderful.

Number six.

I always try to do my best.

"To do my best" is a beautiful expression.

It means you're not perfect, but you try to do your best.

If you said this in a job interview, "I always try to do my best every day at work," wow,

great.

You're hired.

This is a wonderful way to express that you are a diligent worker, you're a hard worker,

and even though you're not perfect, you're going to always do your best.

Number seven.

Please, do something.

Do anything.

Maybe if you have a friend who is single and is always complaining about not going on a

date, you might say, "Well, maybe it'd be a good idea if you got out of your house one

day.

Maybe you should go to a yoga class.

Maybe you should go for a walk in the park and talk to someone while you're walking your

dog.

Just do something.

Do anything."

We often use "do" with these words, "something," "anything."

And it's not specific.

"Something" and "anything" is not telling a specific activity, but we often use those

together.

You can also use this in a less intense situation.

Maybe if your friend's inviting you to go to a yoga class, you might say, "I can't go

to yoga class because I have to do something else."

You're not saying what you have to do.

It's kind of mysterious.

You're not saying that other activity that you need to do, but you're just saying, "I

need to do something else," to do something, do something else.

Now let's go on to "make."

These are the top 10 expressions using "make," at least according to me.

Number one.

Dan makes oatmeal for us every morning.

I like to make green tea in the afternoon.

We often use "make" with food or drinks, and it's a good way to use this naturally.

Number two.

If you watch the ad at the beginning of this video, I make some money.

Thanks.

Here, I'm not creating or producing.

I'm not printing the money myself, but here, I'm still acquiring the money.

So I want to know, when you were in high school, what did you do to make money?

Did you babysit?

Did you walk your neighbor's dog?

Did you do your neighbor's homework?

What did you do to make money?

Sentence number three.

It can be tough to make new friends when you move to a new city.

Here, we're using the expression, "make friends."

You're not actually creating your friends like Frankenstein, at least I hope not, but

you are acquiring new friends.

When I think about the friends that I have now, I made one friend at the grocery store,

I made another friend at yoga class, and I made another friend 10 years ago in college.

So as an adult, we make friends in a lot of different ways.

Have you ever made a phone call in English?

This can be a little bit scary when you do it, but with practice, it gets easier.

We have a couple expressions we use when we talk about using the phone, but when you are

the one dialing the numbers, you are the one who's making a phone call.

If you want to use some common expressions for phone conversations, then make sure to

check out this video up here.

Number five.

Make a suggestion about what kind of lesson you'd like me to make here on YouTube in the

future.

I'm asking you to make a suggestion.

Give me some ideas.

Number six.

When you make a mistake, don't make an excuse.

Just tell the truth.

Here are two for the price of one, "make a mistake" and "make an excuse."

I often hear English learners say, "I did a mistake."

And to them, I would say, "Yeah, yeah, you did.

You made a mistake."

If you want to use "did," you could say, "I did something wrong," but here, this is a

beautiful expression that you can use instead with "make."

I made a mistake.

And if you make a mistake, don't make an excuse.

No one likes someone who makes excuses.

I was tired, I was hungry, there was a lot of traffic.

Don't make an excuse, just tell the truth and say you're sorry and move on.

Number seven.

I often read reviews to help me make a decision before I buy something.

Do you do that?

Do you read reviews before you buy something?

What helps you to make a decision?

Have you ever made a decision that you regretted?

I hope you don't regret making the decision to watch this lesson.

Study these words so that you can make sure that you use them correctly.

We often say "make sure" to mean make certain, be certain, but we don't use that one as much,

so forget about that one and just remember "make sure."

We often use this as kind of a reminder.

Make sure that you finish your homework.

Make sure that you clean your room.

Make sure, make sure, make sure.

So if you use "make sure" as a reminder to someone else, make sure you say it with a

smile because it can be kind of annoying if someone says, "Make sure you do this, make

sure you do this, make sure you do this."

So make sure you say it with a smile.

Number nine.

It really makes me happy that you're still watching this video and didn't click away.

Your actions have an effect on me.

It makes me happy.

Or we could use this in a negative way.

Talking with her about her problems makes me feel drained.

Or maybe watching these lessons makes you feel excited about English.

It makes you react in a certain way.

Makes me feel happy, makes me feel drained, makes me feel excited.

I hope this lesson makes you feel excited, because I'm sitting on a log, suspended over

the creek, and it's not very comfortable.

So it makes me happy that you're still watching this and that this experience is worth it.

Number 10.

Try to use English every day.

This advice just makes sense.

If someone told you, "Study English for six hours every Saturday, and you can forget about

English the other six days of the week," this advice doesn't really make sense.

It feels really stressful to me.

So when you use this expression, "it makes sense," "it doesn't make sense," we're using

this in the sense of sensible.

This is the root word here.

It is sensible advice to study English a little bit every day.

It is not sensible advice to study English just one day for a long period of time.

You feel stressed, you don't remember things easily.

So it makes sense to study English little by little every day.

I think it makes sense to have a review now, don't you think?

Let's go back and review all of the expressions that we talked about with "do" and all of

the expressions we talked about with "make."

Let's review the seven expressions with "do."

Number one, "Everyone loves doing chores."

I have to do some work.

The goalie did a good job.

I did some exercises yesterday.

How are you doing?

I'm doing pretty well.

I always try to do my best.

I have to do something else.

And now the 10 expressions with "make."

Number one, "Dan makes us oatmeal."

Number two, "I make some money."

It can be tough to make friends.

I need to make a phone call.

Make a suggestion in the comments.

When you make a mistake, don't make an excuse.

The reviews often help me to make a decision.

Make sure you clean your room before you go to bed.

It makes me happy that you watched this lesson.

This advice just makes sense.

Great work learning the difference between "do" and "make" so that you can use this accurately

as you speak.

The next grammar lesson is going to focus on storytelling.

We are constantly telling stories when we speak.

Oftentimes, we're talking about something that happened in the past.

It might be, "What did you do over the weekend?

How was your last vacation?"

Well, you're probably going to tell a little quick story about your weekend plans or what

you did on your last vacation.

So I would like to help you use the correct verbs to talk about stories in the past.

Let's watch.

Today's lesson has three levels.

We'll start with easy, then intermediate, and then advanced.

And finally at the end, there is a quiz to see if you have accomplished the goal of understanding

and being able to use clear, natural English.

All right, let's get started with the easy level.

For our easy level, we have the past simple.

These are simply, simply, actions that happened in the past.

Most of these end in "-ed."

Let's take a look at a couple just to review.

We have "study" becomes "studied."

I studied English yesterday.

"Practice" becomes "practiced."

I practiced the piano for three hours.

I wish.

Or "learn" becomes "learned."

I learned a lot with Vanessa's lessons.

Hooray.

Now, not every past simple verb ends in "-ed."

There are some irregulars, and usually that means that the vowel changes.

Let's take a look at a couple.

"Wake" becomes "woke."

I woke up before my alarm clock.

It's a small miracle.

"Break" and "eat" become "broke" and "ate."

I broke my cookies before I ate them.

"Drink" becomes "drank."

I drank some tea this morning.

Before we go to the intermediate level, I have a quick question for you.

I can't believe that yesterday I English for 30 minutes.

Great work.

I can't believe that yesterday I speak, spoke, or speaked English for 30 minutes.

Which one do you think is correct?

I'll give you three seconds.

Three, two, one.

I can't believe that yesterday I spoke English for 30 minutes.

Congratulations.

All right, let's go on to the intermediate level.

Are you ready to level up?

Let's do it.

In the intermediate level, we have the past continuous.

Can you guess when you might use this?

When there is a continual action in the past.

Let's take a look at a quick example.

Let's imagine that you call me and I don't pick up the phone.

Well, eventually when you see me, you might say, "Why didn't you pick up the phone when

I called?"

I could say, "I was preparing to film a lesson and I didn't have time to talk."

This verb, "I was preparing," is the past continuous.

If you can imagine with me a timeline and we have an action that happened, when you

called, well, what's happening before, during, and after this?

Well, I was preparing to film the lesson.

A lot happens to prepare to film these lessons.

I need to write the lesson, I need to get ready, I need to make sure my house is quiet.

My kids need to be outside somewhere.

They need to be safely with someone outside.

I need to be feeling energized and ready.

A lot goes into preparing these lessons.

So we could say that you called and I was preparing the lesson before you called, I

was preparing the lesson during your call, and I was preparing for the lesson after your

call.

So this is a continual action that is interrupted by one singular past action.

Let's take a look at a couple other examples.

At 9:00 PM, I studied for the test.

This is the past simple.

Why?

Because it is an action that happened at a specific time.

At 9:00 PM, I started to study for the test.

But what happens if we change this?

At 9:00 PM, I was studying for the test.

This means something slightly different.

It means that before 9:00 PM, I was studying, at 9:00 PM, I was studying, and after 9:00

PM, I was studying.

This-

Vanessa: ... 9:00 PM I was studying, and after 9:00

PM, I was studying, This was a continual action that happened, including that 9:00 PM moment.

Let's take a look at another example.

I woke up early today.

Woke is the past simple.

I woke up early today.

It is finished, but let's change it to the past continuous.

I was waking up early every day during the summer.

Do you understand this slight difference here?

I was waking up every day during the summer.

This implies that this happened continually throughout the entire summer.

It was a continual action that happened in the past.

Let's take a look at another example.

I drank my tea before work.

Okay, this is past simple.

It finished before work.

I drank my tea before work, but what if we changed this to past continuous?

I was drinking my tea while I worked.

Oh, okay.

Here we have an activity that continued during the workday.

I was drinking my tea while I worked.

This is something that's continuing.

Before we go on to the advanced level, let's have a quick quiz question to test your intermediate

skills.

Can you fill in the blank in this sentence?

Sorry that I didn't call you back.

I ... English with Vanessa.

I were studying English with Vanessa.

I was studying English with Vanessa, or I studied English with Vanessa.

Hmm.

Which one is the best?

I'll give you three seconds.

3, 2, 1.

Sorry that I didn't call you back, I was studying English with Vanessa.

This is an action that was happening before the call, during the call and after the call.

I was studying English with Vanessa when you called.

Okay, congratulations.

Let's go on to the advanced level.

Now that you know each of these verb tenses individually, the past simple and the past

continuous, let's put them together and see what happens.

Do you remember the original sentence that I said in this lesson?

Dan was cooking breakfast when I woke up, and this made me say, "Oh, it surprised me."

Why did this surprise me?

Let's see.

Here, we have a continual action.

Dan was cooking breakfast, boom, interrupted by when I woke up, so that means Dan woke

up before me.

He prepared breakfast before I woke up, and he was preparing it while I was waking up,

and when I woke up, he was still preparing breakfast.

This is very kind, very thoughtful and maybe something that happens on my birthday.

So this is something we can say, "Oh!"

To when this happens.

I'm not sure if this happens often in your household that when you wake up someone else

is preparing breakfast, but if this happened in my house, it would be an amazing thing.

Let's take a look at this image.

I think this gives a good visual to the ideas that we're talking about.

We have a long, winding road.

This is the past continuous event.

Dan was cooking breakfast, but what is in the middle of this road?

It's a dotted line, so it's interrupted by events, but the road is still continuing.

So Dan was cooking breakfast, boom, when I woke up.

When I said, "What are you doing?"

When I said, "Oh, what an amazing breakfast," it is interrupted by these past simple events.

Let's take a look at a couple other examples where this past continuous event is interrupted

by some past simple events.

Let's take a look.

I haven't really studied English much lately, but when I was studying English, I practiced

every day.

Here, we have an interrupted action.

I practiced every day during the time that I was studying.

Let's take a look at another sentence.

When I was drinking my tea, boom, you called me.

When I was drinking my tea, my cat knocked over my cup.

Naughty cat.

When I was drinking my tea, my kid screamed, "Mommy!"

Do you think you can pass the advanced quiz before we go on to our final exam?

I hope so, and I hope that this sentence is not true for you.

When I ... Vanessa's lesson, I ... asleep.

Oh, no.

Let's see.

Which one of these do you think is correct?

When I were watching Vanessa's lesson, I fall asleep.

When I watch Vanessa's lesson, I fell asleep.

When I was watching Vanessa's lesson, I fell asleep.

I hope that none of these are true.

I'll give you three seconds to think of the best grammatical answer.

Are you ready?

3, 2, 1.

When I was watching Vanessa's lesson, I fell asleep.

Oh, no.

Wake up, because it is time for your drum roll, final exam.

What I'm going to do is I'm going to read a little story with some blanks and I want

you to guess the best answer.

At the very end, I'm going to read the final story, and I hope that you can pat yourself

on the back because you correctly told this story in English.

Let's see.

Last night I ... when suddenly I ... some carrots on the floor.

Let me read it one more time.

Last night I ... when suddenly I ... some carrots on the floor.

I'll give you three seconds to think of the best answer.

Last night I was cooking when suddenly I dropped some carrots on the floor.

Why did I do that?

Let me tell you.

I ... the carrots, and I ... a loud knock at the door.

Hmm.

I ... the carrots, and I ... a loud knock at the door.

I'll give you three seconds.

3, 2, 1.

I was cutting the carrots, and I heard a loud knock at the door.

I ... it was my neighbor, so I ... just a minute.

I ... it was my neighbor, so I ... "Just a minute!"

3, 2, 1.

I thought it was my neighbor, so I yelled, "Just a minute!"

Then, a little voice said, "Mommy!

I ... with my friends and I ... a snake!

Come look!"

Then, I heard a little voice that said, "Mommy!

I ... with my friends and I ... a snake!

Come look!"

3, 2, 1.

Then, I heard a little voice that said, "Mommy!

I was playing with my friends and I caught a snake!

Come look!"

Oh, my.

In just a moment I will tell you if this is a true story or not.

Let me read the entire story, and we can see how it sounds with the correct verb tenses.

Last night I was cooking when suddenly I dropped some carrots on the floor.

Why did I do that?

Let me tell you.

I was cutting the carrots, and I heard a loud knock at the door.

I thought it was my neighbor, so I yelled, "Just a minute!"

Then, a little voice said, "Mommy!

I was playing with my friends and I caught a snake.

Come look!"

Great work leveling up your storytelling skills.

Our final grammar lesson today is a big one.

It is the difference between three small but tricky words in English in, on, and at.

I get asked this all the time by English learners, so here is the lesson to help you finally

master these three tricky words.

Let's watch.

Each of the prepositions in on an at can be used to talk about space and time.

Let's take a look at some examples so that we can study before the test.

In, I put the medicine in the cabinet in the afternoon.

Here we have space in the cabinet and time in the afternoon.

We use in for an enclosed space, in the cabinet and for a general time, usually a time of

day, in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening, this general time.

On, I put my phone on the shelf on Monday.

Here we have space, on the shelf and time, on Monday.

Usually, on is with a surface.

Sometimes it's a flat surface, sometimes it's not, but we talk about on with a surface,

on the shelf.

For time, we're talking about a specific day, on Monday, on Tuesday, on Wednesday.

This video is coming out on Friday, and at, please be at the entrance of the park at 4:00

PM.

We have space, at the entrance, and time, at 4:00 PM.

At the entrance of the park is a specific place, a specific point, at the entrance of

the park.

For time, at 4:00 PM, we are talking about a specific time, at 4:00 PM, at 9:00 PM, at

3:00 AM, this specific time.

So we've had a little review here.

Don't stress too much about the rules.

I want you to look into your heart.

As I give you these test sentences, I want you to choose which word is the best to fill

in each of these sentences.

Maybe you remember the rules, maybe you don't, that's okay.

Remember those patterns we talked about?

Your brain has created some patterns already using these three words.

So let's get started with sentence number one.

Did you find your coat ... the closet?

Did you find your coat in, on, at the closet?

I'll give you three seconds to decide.

Did you find your coat in the closet?

In is an enclosed space.

The closet is an enclosed space.

Did you find your coat in the closet?

Number two, My favorite cafe is ... the end of this street.

My favorite cafe is in, on, at the end of this street.

Hmm.

What do you think?

3, 2, 1.

My favorite cafe is at the end of this street.

Here we're talking about a specific place, a specific point, at the end of the street

is my favorite cafe.

How are you doing so far?

Take a deep breath.

You got this.

All right.

Let's go to number three.

Oh, no!

I spilled my coffee ... my homework!

Oh, no!

I spilled my coffee in, on, at my homework!

3, 2, 1.

Oh, no!

I spilled my coffee on my homework!

Here we're talking about the surface of my homework.

It also happens to be a flat surface.

Like I mentioned, we sometimes use this for flat surfaces, on my homework.

Oh, man.

Now I'm going to have to explain this to my teacher.

I spilled my coffee on my homework!

Number four, I enjoy taking walks early ... the morning.

I enjoy taking walks early in, on, at the morning.

Hmm, 3, 2, 1.

I enjoy taking walks early in the morning.

Here we are talking about a general time of day.

We're not talking about 9:00 AM, we're talking about a general time, in the morning, in the

afternoon.

This is one of the keys to remembering prepositions is when you can remember a full phrase, in

the morning, you're not going to need to think about the rules.

All right, general time, specific time, time?

No, you don't need to think about that because you know the full phrase.

So sentences like this are great ways to remember these tricky words, in the morning.

Let's go to the next question.

Number five, My date will be here 5:15.

My date will be here in, on, at 5:15.

We're talking about time here.

I'll give you three seconds.

My date will be here at 5:15.

Hopefully not 5:14, hopefully not 5:16, 5:15.

Maybe not exactly, but you know what I mean.

Here we're talking about a specific time, 5:15, 6:15, 7:45, at 5:15.

All right, let's get to the next one.

Number six, I love to spend summer vacation ... the mountains.

I love to spend summer vacation in, on, at the mountains.

Huh?

Give you three seconds.

3, 2, 1.

The best answer for this sentence is, I love to spend summer vacations in the mountains.

We're not talking about digging a hole in the mountains and going inside the dirt and

the rocks.

No, this would really be an enclosed space, in the closet, in the cabinet, but sometimes

we use the idea of an enclosed space a little bit more loosely.

So here we're talking about being surrounded by the mountains.

It's the idea that you're somewhat enclosed in the warm embrace of the mountains.

So sometimes we do use this a little bit more loosely, but you can get the idea here.

Number seven, We are having dinner ... my favorite restaurant.

We are having dinner in, on, at my favorite restaurant.

Hmm.

I'll give you three seconds.

3, 2, 1.

We're having dinner at my favorite restaurant.

This is a specific place.

A specific point, at my favorite restaurant.

Well, that's where we're going to be having dinner.

We're having dinner at my favorite restaurant, a specific place.

Number eight, I jumped when he tapped me ... the shoulder.

Hmm.

I jumped when he tapped me in, on, at the shoulder.

3, 2, 1.

I jumped when he tapped me on the shoulder.

This is also a little more loose, but we're talking about the surface of my shoulder,

the surface of my skin.

When he tapped me on the shoulder, this is the surface of it.

It's not inside my skin, this is just the surface.

He tapped me on the shoulder.

How are you doing?

We have two more sentences.

Let's go to number nine.

Do you have a date ... Saturday night?

Hmm.

Do you have a date in, on, at Saturday night?

Do you remember which one we should use with days like Saturday?

I'll give you three seconds.

3,2,1.

Do you have a date on Saturday night?

We use on for a specific day, on Saturday, on Friday, on Tuesday.

Do you have a date on Saturday night?

Our final test question before we get to five fixed phrases using in, on, and at is this.

You can email me ... [email protected].

This is a common phrase we use in business or whenever you need to tell someone your

email address.

So it's a good expression to remember.

You can email me in, on or at my email address.

Hmm. 3, 2, 1.

You can email me at [email protected].

This is also a more figurative way to use a specific place.

So we said at my favorite restaurant, at the entrance of the park, but this is not a place

you can go.

You can't go physically to my email address, so we're going to use this a little bit more

loosely, and we can say, you can email me at, this is my specific email address.

You can email me at [email protected].

Great.

Are you ready for five bonus fixed phrases that include in, on, or at?

These are outside the rules of what we just talked about, but.

I want you to look into your heart and to guess which preposition do you think would

be the best fit?

Let's look at this sentence.

The building is ... fire!

Ah!

The building is in, on, at fire!

What is the fixed phrase we're looking for here?

3, 2, 1.

The building is on fire!

Ah!

Run!

So here we're using the fixed phrase to be on fire.

We can use this in a real way, that there are flames coming up from the building, so

get out of the building.

It's on fire.

But we can also use this for more figurative ways.

For example, you might say, My motivation for learning English is on fire from watching

Vanessa's video, or talking about your motivation is on fire, or we might say, I'm on fire for

English.

This is talking about a more figurative way of talking about fire, that of course, there

is not fire on you, but we're talking about in your heart there is an excitement.

There's determination, there's motivation.

I'm on fire for English.

My motivation is on fire, and that is another way to use this expression.

All right, let's go to the next sentence.

Do you believe ... love at first sight?

Hmm?

Do you believe in, on, at love at first sight?

I'll give you three seconds.

3, 2, 1.

Do you believe in love at first sight?

Here, our fixed expression is to believe in something.

You can believe in love.

You can believe in peace.

You can believe in your ability to learn English.

You can believe in something, and this means you have hope that it will happen.

You have high hopes that this will come true.

I believe in love.

Wonderful.

Question number 13, He is really good ... juggling.

Juggling is when you throw balls in the air.

He is really good in, on, at juggling.

Hmm.

I'll tell you in 3, 2, 1.

He is really good at juggling.

Here we're going to use the fixed expression to be good at something.

This is used all the time.

You might say, "I thought that I wasn't good at English, and then I found Vanessa's lessons

and realized, 'Oh, it's not too hard.

I can do this.

You can be good at English.'"

Number 14, Do you have this ... a smaller size?

This is a common expression when you're shopping.

Do you have this in, on, or at a smaller size?

Hmm. 3, 2, 1.

Do you have this in a smaller size?

This expression, to be in a size or color is commonly used when we're shopping and we're

trying to find the best thing that we are looking for.

So you might say, "Do you have this in a large?

Do you have this in a medium?"

Or we can use it for color.

"Do you have this in red?

Do you have this in stripes?"

Great.

This is a great expression to use when you're shopping.

Our final test question, are you ready?

Drum roll is, My date was ... his phone all night, it was so rude!

Hmm.

My date was in, on, at his phone all night.

Such a shame.

3, 2, 1.

My date was on his phone all night, it was so rude!

He's not actually standing on his phone, but instead that means he's using his phone.

This is a common expression, to be on your phone.

Sometimes you could say this maybe to teenagers, "Hey, get off your phone.

You are on your phone all day.

Why are you always on your phone?"

"Ah, I wish I wasn't on my phone so much."

It doesn't mean that you're standing on your phone, it just means you're using your phone.

So this is a great fixed expression to note to be on your phone.

So let's do a little review.

I'm going to read all of these sentences one more time and I would like you to try to say

them out loud with me.

Do you think you can do this?

Of course, you can because you are good at English.

Let's say all of these sentences together.

Did you find your coat in the closet?

I enjoy taking walks early in the morning.

I love to spend summer vacation in the mountains.

Do you have this in a smaller size?

Do you believe in love at first sight?

Oh, no!

I spilled coffee on my homework!

Do you have a date on Saturday night?

I jumped when he tapped me on the shoulder.

The building is on fire!

Ah!

My date was on his phone the whole night, it was so rude!

My favorite cafe is at the end of this street.

My date will be here at 5:15.

We are having dinner at my favorite restaurant.

You can email me at [email protected].

He is really good at juggling.

Congratulations.

You just leveled up your pronunciation, vocabulary and English grammar so that you can speak

advanced English.

Don't forget to download this special 24-page PDF worksheet.

This is my gift to you.

It includes everything you just learned, every pronunciation point, every sample sentence,

every piece of vocabulary and grammar.

This is mine to give to you.

So you can click on the link in the description to download this epic free PDF worksheet today.

Well, thank you so much for learning English with me, and I'll see you again next Friday

for a new lesson here on my YouTube channel.

Bye.

But wait, do you want more?

I recommend watching this video next where you will learn the top 20 common speaking

mistakes that English learners make.

You should avoid being rude, try to be polite and avoid these 20 common speaking mistakes.

I'll see you there.