Idioms from Farm Animals
HORSE: “Horsing around” – means to be fooling around, wrestling or playing physical games. Little kids are often told to stop this by parents. E.g. “You boys stop horsing around outside and come eat your dinner!” “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse” – means to be so hungry that you can eat a […]
Positive Competitive Behaviour
“There are two types of competitive behavior. One is a sense of competition because you want to be at the top. You create obstacles and harm someone. That competition is negative. But there is a positive kind of competition, which benefits the individual, the competitors, and the economy. Let your competitors also grow, without any […]
Origins of Canadian Thanksgiving (this weekend!)
Canadian Thanksgiving – How It Began The origins of Canadian Thanksgiving are more closely connected to the traditions of Europe than of the United States. Long before Europeans settled in North America, festivals of thanks and celebrations of harvest took place in Europe in the month of October. The very first Thanksgiving celebration in North […]
Clink, Then Drink! Do Not Put Down That Glass!
Hello, Here is a tradition that I have always known and obeyed, yet I cannot say for sure if it is a Canadian-only tradition. I suspect not. When someone ‘toasts’ you (proposing a toast means to say something nice about you or your personal/business relationship before drinking) it is polite to listen attentively, make eye […]
American Accent Reduction Resource
Lynn Bo is the founder of Accent Master. She is an American teacher who has an interesting blog that has videos and podcasts as well as posts regarding accent reduction or accent modification. You may find them useful, if you are interested in studying or imitating pure American English. http://accentmaster.blogspot.com/ I have a slightly different […]
Improve Your Body Language Knowledge
As most of you know, I am a big fan of studying body language. It is a huge part of interpreting other people, as well as presenting the right ‘vibe’ to others. I love teaching what I know to my clients, and seeing it in action everyday. In fact, my company is named ‘3V Communications‘ […]
Mingle with Myngle to Learn Language
Hello everyone, I have had a request to introduce to you Myngle, a cool online language-learning company. I will now let a representative from Myngle describe their company: Myngle is a pioneer of live online language learning. Based in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, Myngle removes the physical dimension for language learning, allowing students and teachers to […]
Textbooks are the Beginning, Not the End
I love books. I enjoy flipping through the pages and seeing if the style of the book matches my learning style. In that way I will know if I will read it and understand it, or if I will be bored and waste my time and money. I have taught ESL (English as a Second […]
Social Media Communications – To Tweet or Not to Tweet!
Hi folks. Have you tweeted yet today? That is the question. If you don’t know what I am referring to, don’t worry it’s nothing dirty or too personal! It is what we do when we post an update of our life on the popular social media site Twitter. I have recently had discussions about using […]
Important Idioms from Baseball
I love baseball, especially watching my Toronto Blue Jays team. It’s my favourite part of summer. I was preparing some baseball idioms and expressions for one of my clients soon, when I thought that I should at least add a few here, on this blog, for you too! 😉 It is easy to find lots […]