Breaking news summer update: TRAIN CRASH IN ANGROIS (SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA)

Listen to the information of Angrois-Santiago's train crash in English on these videos:

HAVE A NICE SUMMER!

This blog closes down once again for the summer holidays. Hope you have a good break and charge your batteries for the next course. Enjoy! See you again in September.

SIMPLE PAST vs PRESENT PERFECT ( CONCEPT & SIGNAL WORDS)

AT, ON, IN + TIME & PLACE EXPRESSIONS

1) TIME EXPRESSIONS

2) TIME & PLACE EXPRESSIONS

3) TIME & PLACE PYRAMID

Link to British Council video on prepositions of time.

To summarise and check:

ANTONYM MATCHER

Here's a link to a vocabulary game where you have to match each word with its opposite, its antonym. Have a try, click on ANTONYM MATCHER. Enjoy this weekend.

HOW TO SAY ZERO IN ENGLISH?

(Taken from "The World is Your Oyster")

Posted on April 9, 2013

To most of my Business English clients, how to say zero in English is very important to avoid misunderstandings, especially on the telephone or in video conferences. As a non-native speaker, you might say the figure zero as a plain zero which is absolutely fine, but often an English native speaker will use a number of ways to say zero depending on where they are from. So understanding what they mean is important.

Consequently, I often find myself dedicating part of a Business English lesson on the different ways the English Language has of saying this apparently simple figure.

In this blog post, I’m going to consider the British English (BrE) and American (AmE) versions. I’d be very interested to know if there are any other versions in other parts of the English-speaking world.

0 is zero and in British English, it’s sometimes known as nought.

In telephone numbers, room numbers, bus numbers and dates (years), we say oh.

Here are some examples:

• The meeting is in Room 502 (five oh two)
• You need to take Bus 205 (two oh five)
• She was born in 1907 (nineteen oh seven)
• My telephone number is 07781 020 560 (oh double seven eight one oh two oh five six oh OR zero seven seven eight one zero two zero five six zero)

For football scores we say nil: ‘The score was three nil (3-0) to Barcelona’.

American English uses various words for sports scores: The Yankees are winning three nothing/ three zero/ three zip.
For tennis scores we say love: ‘The score was thirty love. (30-0)

For temperatures we say zero: ‘It’s zero degrees celsius today (0°)

The decimal point (Notice that in English we say decimal point, and not a dot as in internet addresses). In British English, zero and nought are used before and after a decimal point. American English doesnot use nought.

Oh can be used after the decimal point.
Here are some examples:

• 0.05       zero point zero five OR nought point nought five
• 0.5%      zero point five percent OR nought point five percent.
• 0.501     zero point five zero one OR nought point five nought one OR           nought/zero point five oh one

Confused? Don’t be. Like everything in this world, practice makes perfect. The more you use figures in English in your job, the more comfortable you’ll be saying them.

Over to you now.  Try saying the following:

1. Can I have my bill please? I’m in Room 204.
2. The exact figure is 0.002.
3. Can you get back to me on 0208 775 3001.
4. Look, it’s less than 0.0001! Let’s not worry about it.
5. 0.75% won’t make a lot of difference.

What do you find the hardest when saying zero in English?

THE INFAMOUS "-S" (3rd person singular present, possessive, plural & contractions)

[Infographic from  Grammar.net]
Spelling of 3rd person singular present simple:

Spelling of the 'S genitive:

RAFAEL DIESTE'S 2013 STUDENT GRADUATION

Once again, another course has ended for 2nd BAC students. They had their farewell graduation party last night. As this year's 2nd BAC groups had so many students, the ceremony was held at our nearby neighbour's Andrés Gaos Auditorium within the Superior Music Conservatory. Later a cold buffet was served at the main hall of our school for students, their families and teachers.
Good luck to them all in their new future!

Their videos:

IMPROVING YOUR WRITINGS: CONNECTORS

Here are charts collecting connectors, adverbs and expressions you can use to improve your writings.

HOW TO EXPRESS FUTURE

Here are charts that summarise how you can express future in English.

Future certainty versus possibility: