Lesson 6:

50. Arrange (Could you please arrange these books in alphabetical order?) (I will arrange for a band to play at your wedding).

51. Adjust/Change (No, it’s not 7:30, it’s 8:30! You need to adjust your watch). (Cindy is from China. She has lived in Toronto for 3 years. It took her 2 years to adjust to living there.) (Change into your bathing suit. Let’s go swimming!) (Where can I change my money? I only have American dollars). (The restaurant changed their menu. They served Japanese food before, but now they only serve Korean food.)

52. Cheat (If you cheat on the test, you will get into trouble.)

53. Check (Joey said, “Do you have an extra pencil?” Cindy replied, “I’m not sure, let me check.”) (They had to arrive early to check in at the airport).

54. Cheer (Cheer up. I’m going to cheer you up.) (At the basketball game, many fans were cheering for their favourite team.)

55. Choke (It’s good to eat slowly, because then you will not choke on the food). (Help! I think this man is choking!)

56. Choose/Pick/Select (If you could only choose one book to read, which book would you choose?)(I hope they pick me to be on their team!)

57. Claim (He claimed to be the strongest man in the world!)

58. Clean  (Clean your room! He cleaned his plate).

59. Click  (Suddenly, everything clicked in his mind. He double-clicked the”OK” button on the computer screen.)

60. Close/Shut  (Please shut the door. What time does that restaurant close?)

Please look forward to Lesson 7 for next week!

Lesson 5:

39. Build (You need many people to build a house).

40. Burn (Unfortunately, the house was burned downed in a fire). (The food was so hot that my mouth was burning!) (If he stands under the sun for too long, his skin will be burned).  (He burned a disk of his favorite songs to give to her.)

41. Burp (No one said anything while they were eating dinner, until Joey burped and everyone laughed.)

42. Buy/Purchase (I’m going to buy a new cell phone.) (Slang: Do you think what he says is true? I don’t buy it. Meaning: I don’t believe it).

43. Calculate (Class, I want you to calculate how many apples I have left if I start with 9 apples and then give 3 to Joey and 4 to Cindy).

44. Call (Mom is calling you to come and eat dinner). (Call me). (Call me Joey).

45. Cancel (I decided to cancel my plan to go to China on vacation, because I was feeling sick).

46. Care (I don’t care who you are, where you’re from, what you’ve done, as long as you’re not a singer for the Backstreet Boys). (Please take care of my pet fish). (She cares a lot about her friends). (Would you care for some more rice?)

47. Carry (Let me carry those books for you; they look heavy.) (This store carries all kinds of computer supplies). (Don’t get carried away).

48. Celebrate (Tomorrow is your birthday?! We should celebrate!)

49. Challenge (He challenged me to a game of chess.)

More words coming soon!

Lesson 4:

28. Belong (Who does this car belong to?) (I’m going to leave this party; I feel like I don’t belong here).

29. Bite  (I am afraid that the spider is going to bite me).

30. Bleed (Help! This person is hurt! Their leg is bleeding.)(My newspaper got wet from the rain and now the ink is bleeding.)

31. Blow (The wind blew my paper off of my desk.) (I need to blow my nose; do you have a tissue?) (I was blown away by how amazing that movie was!) (The car crashed into a wall and then blew up.) (Can you blow up this balloon?) (You shouldn’t have blown all of your money by gambling. You really blew it this time!) As you can see, this word has many different meanings in English, particularly in spoken English. So use this word carefully.

32. Boil (Let’s boil some water so we can have hot tea.)

33. Bomb (During the war, their house was bombed and now there is nothing there.)

34. Borrow (Can I borrow your book? I will give it back to you tomorrow.)

35. Break (I dropped the glass and it broke into many pieces. ) (He ran so fast that he broke the world record!)  (Someone broke into our house and stole the Television!) (The couple was not happy, so they decided to break up.)

36. Breathe (She was so nervous that I couldn’t breathe.)

37. Bring (Don’t forget to bring your passport to the airport!) (I brought a present for you from my hometown.)

38. Brush (He brushes his teeth 5 times a day!)

Hope that helpful. I’m going to go brush my teeth now. See you next time, for Lesson 5!

-A.Z.

Lesson 3:

22. Born/to be born (When were you born? When is your birthday?) Note: There are two other forms of this verb with different usages: (Women are able to bear children. She gave birth to two beautiful babies.)

23. Exist/Be (Dinosaurs no longer exist. Don’t be angry, be happy!) Note: This is a special verb that changes depending on the subject it is being used with. Below, I have listed each form of “to be” with its matching subject.

Present: I am.   He/She/It is.   You/We/They are.
Past: I/He/She/It was.   You/We/They were.
Future: I/He/She/It/You/We/They will be.
Present Perfect: I/You/We/They have been.   He/She/It has been.
Past Perfect: I/He/She/It/You/We/They had been.
Present Conditional: I/He/She/It/You/We/They would be.
Perfect Conditional: I/He/She/It/You/We/They would have been.

This verb is more complicated than others, but not too difficult to use. Try making your own sentences with this and other verbs in my list. You can send them to me as a comment or by email, and I will make corrections or suggestions.

24. Become (If you study law and work hard, you can become a lawyer.)

25. Begin/Start (We are about to begin Lesson 4. What time does the movie start?)

26. Behave (The child did not want to behave, so he made loud noises in the library. Watch how this animal behaves when it sees a person.) The first usage indicates acting in a good or proper way. The second example indicates how the subject acts or reacts.

27. Believe (Do you believe that ghosts are real? Don’t worry, I believe in you).

That’s all for now. More words coming next week!

Lesson 2:

11. Appear (She appears to be a normal person, but in fact, she is an alien from outer space.)

12. Appreciate (I appreciate your kindness, but I cannot accept this $2 million gift.)

13. Approach (The army was approaching; as they came closer, we could hear their footsteps getting louder.)

14. Approve (He accepts that telling a lie is sometimes necessary, but he doesn’t approve of it.)

15. Argue (They always argue over such little things, like who should wash the dishes or who is the tallest NBA player.)

16. Arrive (We will arrive at the airport in 35.5 minutes.)

17. Ask/Beg (”Can I ask you a personal question?”)  (He begged me to forgive him.)

18. Attack (I said he looked stupid, and then he attacked me.)

19. Attract  (”I am only attracted to intelligent and romantic men,” she whispered in his ear.)

20. Avoid  (”Are you avoiding me because I smell bad or because I always ask you for money?”)

21.  Awaken/Wake (If we awaken the monster, he will surely eat us.) (”What time do you usually wake up?”)

More delicious words coming later this week!!

Do you want to improve your English, but have limited time to do it? Maybe I can help!

Language learning requires a lot of study & practice. But just 10 minutes each day is much more valuable than 2 hours every week! You don’t need to spend hours each day to improve. (In fact, that is more challenging for your brain). I think too many teachers and textbooks teach impractical, useless English. How can I say that?

Two weeks ago, I went to a University bookstore to find an English Teaching Book for tutoring a middle school student from China. Several books had titles like: “The 500 Most Useful English Words.” I looked through them and found ridiculous word choices, like “bewilderment.” This word, (which means the condition of being confused), is a completely impractical word. You will not hear it in the News or in daily conversation, nor will you will find it in most articles, books, or newspapers. It is a nice word, but memorizing it would be a waste of time for someone just beginning to learn English.

So I decided to create my own list of: “The Most Useful Words in English.” I have divided the list into categories, including Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives, etc. The list I am currently working on is: “Verbs“. My Oxford English Dictionary says that a Verb is: “a word used to describe an action, state, or occurence”. Verbs are really useful words because once you know some pronouns like: “I, you, we, he, she, or they”, you can add a verb and make a sentence.

This list will grow, change, and evolve (I invite & appreciate your suggestions), but it has to start somewhere. It is not perfect or complete, but it is practical. Here are the first 10 Useful English verbs.

1. Abandon (Don’t abandon hope, we will find chocolate very soon if we keep looking!)

2. Accept (I cannot accept this gift, you are too generous. Please keep it.)

3. Adapt (Humans and animals adapt to their environment to survive.)

4. Add/Increase (I hope you will add me as a friend on Facebook.) (Please increase my salary.)

5. Admit (Okay, I admit that I didn’t shower today).

6. Adopt (In the future, would you like to adopt 2 or 7 children?)

7. Agree (This movie is terrible, don’t you agree?)

8. Allow/Let/Permit (Allow me to speak honestly with you.) (Let me go!) (You’re not permitted to go in that room.)

9. Analyze/Examine (You don’t need to analyze these documents; they are useless.) (I examined it thoroughly.)

10. Answer (You didn’t answer my question.)

Note that I have put very closely related words together, like Add/Increase.  The meaning of both words is slightly different, but are mostly very similar and thus can be treated as two words with the same meaning when first learning them. I recommend you learn the meaning of each word in your first language and practice using them in YOUR OWN English sentence.

Enjoy Learning New Words!

-A.Z.