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Introduction Before we can look at the history of the English language, we must first look at the history of language itself. The word “language” comes from the Latin word “lingua” which means “tongue”. To this day, a language is often referred to as a tongue. Nowadays, according to language experts, there are about 3000 languages spoken in the world, not including dialects, which are different forms of the same language. In this lesson we are going to ask ourselves several questions. Some of them may seem obvious at first, but it is important to consider them all. What is language? Some definitions: 1. It is an essentially human form of communication. 2. Language and language learning have universal characteristics. 3. It is the means by which human thought and action are passed on. 4. Language is learned behavior. 5. It is systematic and generative. That is, it is organized and can be used and expanded to communicate an infinite number of expressions. It is stored in the mind and manipulated to form infinite sets of combinations. 6. Language operates in a speech community. We can talk to others that exist in the same community, but not to those outside it. Why and how do we use it? We use language to interact socially, to indicate friendliness, co-operation, hostility, annoyance, pain or pleasure. The other main usage is to communicate knowledge, skills and information. 1
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Page 1: Moreh Course

Introduction

Before we can look at the history of the English language, we must first look at the history of language itself.

The word “language” comes from the Latin word “lingua” which means “tongue”. To this day, a language is often referred to as a tongue.

Nowadays, according to language experts, there are about 3000 languages spoken in the world, not including dialects, which are different forms of the same language.

In this lesson we are going to ask ourselves several questions. Some of them may seem obvious at first, but it is important to consider them all.

What is language?

Some definitions:

1. It is an essentially human form of communication. 2. Language and language learning have universal characteristics.3. It is the means by which human thought and action are passed on.4. Language is learned behavior.5. It is systematic and generative. That is, it is organized and can be used and expanded to communicate an infinite number of expressions. It is stored in the mind and manipulated to form infinite sets of combinations.6. Language operates in a speech community. We can talk to others that exist in the same community, but not to those outside it.

Why and how do we use it?

We use language to interact socially, to indicate friendliness, co-operation, hostility, annoyance, pain or pleasure. The other main usage is to communicate knowledge, skills and information.

Wherever it originated we now use language in a very sophisticated manner. We can communicate the real, tangible facts of life, as well as the smallest intangible emotion. We can talk of different cultures, of wild fantasies, of hopes and dreams, sorrows and regrets.

Here are some examples of the functions of language.

personal: to express one’s emotions, needs, thoughts, desires, attitudes etc. interpersonal: to maintain good social relations with groups and individuals - expressions of praise, joy at another’s success, inquiries about health etc.

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directive: to control the behavior of others through advice, warning, requests, persuasion, discussion etc. referential: to talk about objects or events in the immediate setting or environment or in the culture. metalinguistic: to talk about language itself; e.g. What does ____ mean? imaginative: to use language creatively in rhyming, constructing poetry, etc.

Where did it come from?

The fact is that we really don’t know how language originated. While we can discover how different cultures lived by examining the archeological evidence, unfortunately there are no records among the ancient remains to describe language in the early stages. Perhaps because of the lack of physical evidence, there has been no shortage of speculation about the origins of human speech. We shall look at some of the theories.

The Natural Sound Source

This theory claims that language formed by the imitation of sounds from nature. So, for example, we hear sounds such as “cuckoo”, “buzz’, “mumble” and repeat them in the form of words. So when a flying object was heard to make the sound “cuckoo”, that sound was adopted to refer to the object.

An extension of this theory is the natural-sounds that we emit, such as “Ah!”, “Hey!”, etc., which are then combined to form words.

The Oral-Gesture Source

This suggests that there is a link between physical gesture and orally produced sounds. Indeed many of our physical gestures today using hands, body and face are a means of non-verbal communication, so it could be seen that there is a connection. It is suggested that there were physical gestures to represent emotions, which then developed to specific oral-gestures, involving the movement of the tongue and lips, which would accompany the physical gestures. For example, by mouthing the word “bye” while waving your hand we are orally gesturing a farewell. However, there are obviously restrictions to this form of language production.

The Divine Source

Another theory is that the ability to use language is a God-given gift, that humans have always naturally been capable of forming and using language. Some 2,500 years ago, an Egyptian pharaoh named Psamtik wished to discover man’s primordial tongue. So he entrusted two infants to a shepherd who lived in total isolation, and commanded that they should never hear a single word in any language. When the children were returned to the pharaoh several years later, he thought he heard them say “bekos” which means

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bread in Phrygian, a language of Asia Minor. As a result, he believed that Phrygian must be man’s natural tongue. In fact, it is likely that the children were merely mimicking the only sound that they had heard; that of the goats bleating.

Various experiments have been carried out from Psamtik’s time to the present day to prove this theory but all have proved inconclusive. They have involved isolating children from birth to see what happens. The mistake has been to believe that the two children could develop a sophisticated language system all by themselves. A child growing up anywhere on Earth will speak the language to which he is exposed in his community, regardless of the race, or language of his parents. Indeed, a child reared by two deaf parents learns the sign language with which they communicate just like any other child learns from his parents.

The Human-body Theory

This is perhaps the most likely, tracing the development of the human body from its primate origins. As the body developed and teeth became upright, early humans developed the ability to form different sounds. The human lips are much more flexible than those of any other animal, so it is suggested that it is a natural ability of humans to use speech.

Whatever the origins of language, it is certain that it was developed as speech, and it was only the growing desire to make a more permanent record that invoked the development of markings and inscriptions, which eventually developed into the written form that we use today.

The Evolution of Language

We may think of our ancestors as grunting, bone-chewing cavemen, but their grunts may have been in an attempt to teach young cave-girls and boys the best way to hold a bone while chewing it, or even to grunt to say that this bone was better than the one yesterday.

Which theory do you prefer?

Do you think it could be a combination of the theories? Which ones?

What properties does language have?

Whatever language we talk about in the modern world, there are four different aspects that are essential to language? Does anybody know which they are?

Speaking, Listening, Reading and Writing.

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These are the four basic skills of language. We speak to be heard, we write so that it can be read, either again by ourselves, or by someone else altogether.

These four skills can also be subdivided into 5 other categories Give examples for each.

1. Phonology: the system of different sounds (the letters d-o-g fit together to make the sound “dog”)2. Semantics: the ways in which sounds and meaning are related (the fact that the sound “tree” signifies a wooden thing with leaves in a field)3. Morphology: the rules of word formation (The letter “q” is always followed by the letter “u”)4. Syntax: how words may be combined into phrases and sentences (Subject Verb Adjectives/Adverbs, Nouns)5. Lexicon: the vocabulary of a language, or the dictionary (The word “cat”)

How did writing develop?

A large number of languages even today are used only in the spoken form. They do not have a written form. For those that do, such as English, the development of writing is only relatively recent.

We can trace human attempts to represent information visually back tens of thousands of years, such as cave drawings and ancient attempts at bookkeeping. Writing which is based on some form of alphabetic script can only be traced back to about 3000 years ago.

Cave Drawings served to record certain events (e.g. humans 3, buffaloes 1) but doesn’t specifically give a linguistic message. It’s more a form of pictorial art. When these pictures came to represent specific things in a consistent way, this became a form of picture writing, or Pictograms.

We can see that symbols can communicate a wide variety of different things, often in a more succinct and clear way than words could. Words developed directly from symbols, as we have seen. Why do you think this happened?

(As the early societies developed, the amount of symbols grew. Eventually they became confusing, and so several were combined so that a group of symbols could represent a single concept.)

These groups of symbols in turn developed into letters and words. We shall have a look at this development in the next class.

It is thought that there are pictographic origins for a large number of symbols that turn up in later writing systems. In Chinese writing, for example, the symbol

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is used for a river - a representation of a stream flowing between two banks. It is not a picture of such, but an abstract representation. When the relationship between the object represented and the representation itself is sufficiently abstract, we can see that the symbol represents words in a language.

This form is still used in Chinese today. Written symbols represent the meaning of words and not of sounds of the spoken language. One problem presented by this is the thousands of different symbols that have to be learned in order to write effectively. To reduce this difficulty, we can move from symbols that represent words, to symbols that represent sounds. This reduces the amount of symbols necessary.

One way to do this is via Rebus writing. In this, the symbol for the sound of one word is taken for the same sound that occurs in any other words. For example the symbol of an eye, used to represent an eye, could also be used to refer to the ‘I’, oneself, or with a cross to represent a Cross-eyed person. It could be used with the symbol for deaf to make the word defy, and so on.

From this stage, it is only a simple step to alphabetic writing as we know it today. Firstly letters were developed to represent the consonant sounds, and the Greeks took the process a step further by including vowel sounds in their alphabet. From the Greeks, the alphabet passed to the rest of Western Europe via the Romans, and the rest, as they say, is history.

How do we form words?

There are several different ways that words can be formed.

Be sure to elicit examples from students for each category. Put overhead projection (6) on the board.

Ways to form new words:

Invent from nothing - or the names of products that becomes the general term, such as aspirin, nylon, kleenex, xerox, coke Borrow from another language - croissant, alcohol, robot etc. Compound - two words put together to mean something different - textbook, fingerprint, sunburn Blend - the beginning of one word joined to the end of another - smoke + fog =smog, breakfast + lunch = brunch. Clip - shortened forms of other words - gasoline = gas, permanent wave = perm, public house = pub, perambulator = pram. Convert - a verb can become a noun and vice versa - paper, butter, vacation, to spy, to guess

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By Prefixing and Suffixing - adding a different beginning or ending to change the meaning of the word, e.g. strain, restrain, constrain, strained... Acronyms - VCR, NASA, ATM

Here are some examples of some other potential origins:

From the names of people:

sandwich From the Earl of Sandwich

boycott From Captain Boycott

raincoat Mackintosh (British term for raincoat)

Hoover (vacuum cleaner) From the person that bought the invention

Hoover is an interesting example, because it has spread around the world, and is recognized at least as a brand name everywhere. However, in Britain people talk about hoovering their carpets, and use it as a verb in all tenses. “Have you hoovered the carpet?” is far more common in Britain than “Have you vacuumed the carpet?” In fact it is a quirk of fate that the name is famous at all, because someone called J. Murray Spangler invented a device called the Electric Suction Sweeper. This device became very popular and could well have been called a Spangler. People could still be spanglering their floors until this day. But instead, Mr Spangler sold his invention to a local businessman called William Hoover, whose Hoover Electric Suction Company produced the first Hoover. Such an example indicates the sometimes almost arbitrary nature that words can be produced. From one man’s name comes a noun and a verb.

From Discoveries and inventions:

watt Scotsman, James Watt

pasteurize invented by Frenchman Louis Pasteur

volt from Italian Alessandro Volta

Fahrenheit from German Gabriel Fahrenheit

Braille (printing) invented by Frenchman Louis Braille

From names of places:

champagne from the French town

limousine the same

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bayonet French town of Bayonne

tarantula from Tarento in Italy

turkey the name of the country

cantaloupe (type of melon) from Cantalupo in Italy

Sardine from Sardinia, the Italian Island

tangerine from Tangiers, the Moroccan port

port (the wine), from a Portuguese harbor

Can you think of any more?

Productivity

In all languages, new utterances are created continually. When a child learns a language, they are particularly active in producing expressions that they have never heard before. With adults, new situations arise or new objects have to be described, so the speakers manipulate their linguistic resources to produce new expressions. We can see therefore that the potential number of utterances in any language is infinite.

Learners of a new language have to learn to think creatively to produce ‘new’ forms of language to convey their meaning. This is a valuable skill, as it re-focuses the language on its primary aim: communication

Extension Activity

Language has come to be used for many specific purposes and adapts itself accordingly. In advertising sections of newspapers, where space is very limited, language is used sparingly, with certain words omitted and others abbreviated.

What do the abbreviations stand for? Can it still be understood as English? Choose an ad and write what the fully English version would be. How much more space does it take up?

Discussion topics

1. During this session we have talked about the functions of language, and how language is a system of communication that is primarily vocal and visual. All languages have sets of rules that make them a complex system (such as semantics, syntax, lexicon, etc.) All languages are made up of these components, each with its own internal organization. However, they still remain interrelated to each other. While many linguists have

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recognized the extent to which all languages have certain common properties called Language Universals. Have a group discussion to evaluate what these properties are.

Expect the following potential responses:

Every language can:

be learned by children employ an arbitrary symbol system be used to send and receive messages intentionally by its users)

2. One of the means that man has come to communicate is by symbols. Symbols can be visual, audible or tactile. Discuss this and see how many you can come up with.

(Traffic signs, traffic lights, sports, stuffed-animals….)

3. What symbols does modern man have to convey meaning?

(wedding ring, red sports car, a crown)

4. Can the relationship between a symbol and its meaning change? (Wearing fur, smoking…)

Conclusion

Give a conclusion of some of the highlights of the lesson - e.g. properties of language, development of writing and word formation. Have students read "What is the origin of English?" as a homework task.

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Old English

Introduction

Now we have established how the language was formed, let’s look at some of the grammar that we have inherited from it.

Vocabulary

The vocabulary in Old English was much more limited than it is in Modern English, and it was overwhelmingly Germanic. It was thought at one time, that a great many Celtic words had been adopted by the Anglo Saxons. Any English word that had an obscure meaning used to be automatically classified as Celtic. In fact the Celtic influence was not very important - perhaps limited to twelve or thirteen words, as well as place names, which the conquerors preserved. Places like London, Dover, Manchester, Colchester, Exeter, Avon, and Thames were all borrowed from the Celts, also known as the Britons. Otherwise, it is only words to describe geographical formations that the conquerors had not previously seen, that were adopted, and many of those have since fallen into disuse. Words such as cradle, down (hill), clout, and crock were preserved.

Latin and Greek borrowings form the greatest non-Teutonic (non-Germanic) element in the language. These come from three main sources:

a) Words the Britons had adopted during the Roman occupation of the island (43-410 AD) and then taken over by the Anglo-Saxons.

b) Words that the Germans, for a long time part of the Roman Empire, absorbed while on the continent.

c) Vocabulary introduced into England by missionaries during the gradual conversion of the country to Christianity, from 597 AD onwards.

The two main occupations of the Teutons - war and trade - account for a number of Latin words that they used in their new land: camp, battle, mil (mile), pund (pound), ceap(cheap), win(wine), salary(money to buy sal(t), that the Roman missionaries were paid.

One of the greatest achievements of the Romans in the regions they conquered was the building of good roads, instead of the primitive tracks and footpaths which previously existed. Indeed, many of these roads still exist and are still used today in parts of England. They were named “strata via” (paved road); after some time the word via was dropped and the term reached English as simply “straet”, the origin of “street”. Just to show the spread of Latin throughout Europe, that same word became German “Straße”, Dutch “straat”, Portuguese “estrada” and Rumanian “stradê”.

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Over the course of the Old English period, Christianity was gradually becoming the nation’s religion, instead of the pagan gods that were formally worshipped. It was spread by missionaries, from Ireland and Europe and through their preaching they also introduced more Latin words into the language. Among the terms introduced by the new religion are:

candle (from candela, candeo - shine) altar (from altus - high) cardinal (from cardinalis - hinge) pray (from precor - to ask) mass (from dismissal) creed (from credo - I believe)

Also introduced at this time were the following words:

From Greek:

bishop devil (from diabolos - slanderer) angel (from angelos - messenger) hymn psalm priest

Latin/Greek:

demon pew podium religion

Why are some of the terms above from Greek?

(The ancient Greeks, led by Alexander the Great, had conquered Israel, and translated the Bible into their own language -Bible from Greek “biblios” - book)

Irregular Plurals

Let’s look at some of the irregular plurals that cause learners of English much grief.

Irregular Plurals - A Poem

We'll begin with a box and the plural is boxes,

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But the plural of ox is oxen not oxes.

The one fowl is goose, and two are called geese,

Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.

You may find a lone mouse or a whole lot of mice,

But the plural of house is houses, not hice.

If the plural of man is always called men,

Why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?

If I speak of a foot and you show me your feet,

And I give you a boot, would a pair be beet?

If one is a tooth and a whole set is teeth,

Why shouldn't the plural of booth be beeth?

If the singular is this and the plural is these,

Should the plural of kiss be nicknamed keese?

The one would be that, three would be those,

Yet hat in the plural would never be hose.

We speak of our brother and also our brethren,

But though we say mother, we never say methren.

The masculine pronouns are he, his and him,

But imagine the feminine - she, shis, and shim.

So English, I think, you all will agree,

Is the most wonderful language you ever did see!

Anonymous.

The Double Negative

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In Modern English, a curse of teachers worldwide is the double negative, as in “I don’t know nothing about it”, possibly due to the fact that the students’ first language uses the double negative construction, as in French “Je ne sais pas”. The double negative construction is also used in Spanish, in an expression such as "Yo no vi nada", which literally translates in English as "I didn't see nothing", meaning, "I saw something", the absolute opposite of the intended meaning. However, in Old English, this structure was quite normal. In fact it was common for a negative sentence to have several ‘nes’, because instead of cancelling each other out, as they do in Modern English, they have the effect of adding emphasis to the negation.

In Modern English, since the negative element follows the auxiliary verb, we are able to contract it, in the form of do+not=don’t and will+not=won’t. In Old English word order, however, the negative ‘not’ occurred in front of the auxiliary. For example, here’s a modern translation of the Old English form: “I not do it not…”, “I not will…”

Gender

As we mentioned earlier, Old English was, like Modern German, a gender-specific language, with three different genders.

Ask ss. What were the different genders? (Masculine, feminine and neuter.)

This has little to do with actual sex, thus, the Old English word ‘swat’ (sweat) is masculine, ‘maegden’ (maiden) is neuter and ‘tid’ (time) is feminine.

Inflections

Whereas in Modern English the meaning of a sentence is conveyed through word order and the use of function words, such as prepositions, which have little meaning in themselves, in Old English, meaning is expressed by the addition of phonetic elements to the meaningful word. This is known as inflection.

There were four different cases for inflection, as well as a different plural for each:

Nominative (as a subject) Accusative (as a direct object) Dative (as an indirect object) Genitive (for possession)

So in the sentence ‘I gave Helen’s book to her brother’, ‘I’ is in the nominative case, ‘(the) book’ is in the accusative’, ‘her brother’ is dative and ‘Helen’s’ is genitive. The Modern English plural “oxen” is a survival from Old English, which as a singular in OE would have been “oxa”. To imply possession you would use the genitive case, and would change the

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word to “oxan”. So although the “’s” is a relatively new introduction to the language, the concept for changing a word to imply possession stems from Old English.

Let’s look at an example from Old English:

Old English Singular Plural

Nominative hund hundas

Accusative hund hundas

Genitive hundes hunda

Dative hunde hundum

How many different forms are there? How many are there now? (6 then, only three possibilities now - hound, hounds, hound’s)

Pronouns

A lot of the pronouns that were used in Old English are still in use today. However, as with almost every other grammatical element, they have been vastly simplified over the years. Let’s look at an example:

Masculine Feminine Neuter

Nominative he (he) heo (she) hit (it)

Accusative hine hie hit

Genitive his hire his

Dative him hire him

In Old English, the pronoun had to agree with the gender of the noun it was used with. Now however, since most gender-specific nouns have been abandoned, only those related to actual sexual gender agree, and the neuter form is used for all inanimate objects. You can see how ‘it’ has developed from ‘hit’, but we will have to wait until a later period for the feminine forms to become more familiar.

Some inanimate objects still have a gender, however, even in Modern English. Can you think of any?

(We refer to ‘Mother’ Earth as she, as do we to sailing vessels: ‘She’s a fine ship’, never, ‘It’s a fine ship’.)

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Middle English

Introduction

Have a look at the timeline. When did the period known as Middle English begin?

(In 1066, with the Norman invasion of England.)

Middle English is a time of rapid change for the language. At the end of the Old English period there was still a form of the language that resembled a foreign tongue. By 1300, however, the language had an appearance that is much more like Modern English, and by the second half of the 16th century, the works of Chaucer do not present any significant problems to the educated reader of today.

Do you think people suddenly stopped speaking Old English and started speaking Middle English?

(No, obviously it was a gradual process and one that had a lot of resistance.)

The three centuries from 1100 to 1400 saw a far more radical change than the previous four in the development of the English language.

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Middle English

This lesson is going to examine the changes that occurred in the language, but first, they must be put into order. Work in teams of three and put the following paragraphs into what you think must be the correct order. When you have finished, select a spokesperson to give a presentation on Middle English, as if you were teaching an actual class. You can use more than one person, if you want. You don’t have to use the paragraphs exactly as they are written, but make them sound natural, not just as if you were reading from a piece of paper. You can use any other materials, as you think appropriate. After you have arranged the paragraphs into the right order, spend 10 minutes preparing your presentation with your group.

The Norman invasion affected the English language in many ways. It is thanks to this that over 40% of English is derived the French.

Middle English - A Potted History

Put the following paragraphs into the correct order, then use them to make a presentation in groups.

With the leveling of inflections, the distinctions in grammatical gender were replaced by those of natural gender. The Scandinavian they, them were substituted for the original hie, hem, of the third person plural, and who, which and that acquired their present relative functions

Midland, the dialect of Middle English derived from the Mercian dialect of Old English, became important during the 14th century, when the counties in which it was spoken developed into centres of university, economic and courtly life. East Midland, one of the subdivisions of Midland, had, by that time become the speech of the entire metropolitan area of the capital, London, and had probably spread south of the River Thames into Kent and Surrey. The influence of East Midland was strengthened by its use in the government offices of London, by its literary dissemination in the works of the 14 th century poets Geoffrey Chaucer, John Gower, and John Lydgate, and ultimately by its adoption for printed works by William Caxton. These and other circumstances greatly contributed to the direct development of the East Midland dialect into the Modern English language.

In general the Middle English Ortography was much more phonetic than Modern English; all consonants, for example, were pronounced, whereas now letters such as the l in walking are silent.

During the period of this Linguistic transformation the other Middle English dialects continued to exist and dialects descending from them are still spoken in the 20 th century. Lowland Scottish, for example, is a development of the Northern dialect.

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At the end of the ME period, a major change occurred in the pronunciation of vowels, during the 15th and 16th centuries. This change was called The Great Vowel Shift, and it consisted of a shift in the articulation of vowels in respect to the positions assumed by the tongue and the lips. The Great Vowel Shift changed the pronunciation of 18 of the 20 distinctive vowels and diphthongs of ME. Spelling however, remained unchanged and was preserved from then on as a result of the advent of the printing press, in about 1475, during the shift.

At the beginning of the ME period, which dates from the Norman Conquest of 1066, the language was still inflectional - the endings of words signified their meaning in the sentence. At the end of the period, it was the order of the words in the sentence that signified their meaning, not the different endings. As early as 1200, the three or four grammatical case forms of nouns in the singular had been reduced to two, and to denote the plural the ending -es had been adopted.

The Great Vowel shift caused the pronunciation in English of the letters a, e ,i ,o and u to differ from that used in most other languages in Europe.

In the early period of Middle English, a number of utilitarian words, such as egg, sky, sister, window and get came into the language from Old Norse. The Normans brought other additions to the vocabulary. Before 1250 about 900 new words had appeared in English, mainly words such as baron, noble and feast, that the Anglo-Saxon lower classes required in their dealings with the Norman-French nobility. Eventually the Norman nobility, although they had learned English, introduced from the French words pertaining to the Government, the church, the army and the fashions of the court, in addition to others connected with the arts, scholarship and medicine.

Middle English (cont’d)

The Norman invasion affected the English language in many ways. It is thanks to this that over 40% of English is derived the French.

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But at first, the Saxons were very resistant to the influx of the French language. Norman French was only the language of the nobility for about 200 years. The nobility (French) looked down on English, not only because they couldn’t speak it, but because it was the language of a subjected people, and so it was regarded as inferior; English was left to the boors and serfs.

So it was not until 1300 that a considerable number of French words entered the English Language. Since French is of Italic origin, the etymologies of such terms usually date back to the Latin.

The royal family used the Norman speech and there was no attempt by them to understand the language of their subjects. The structure of society prevented any grand changes in the form of the English language.

The mutual repulsion continued for a century. Then followed a century of seeming indifference, but in the third century after the conquest, the people were united in their common interest in the foreign wars of England.

The blending of French and English took place when the nobility began to mix with the subjected English people, usually as master and servant. An interesting example of this is the fact that meat was referred to differently depending where it came from and where it was being served . The animals were given English names when tended by servants in the fields, but French names when it was served at the tables of nobility. This story is humorously told in Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe, from which I will now read an extract. The word swine is an old-fashioned word for pig, which is still used by farmers.

“Why, how call you those grunting beasts running about on their four legs?” demanded Wamba.

“Swine, fool, swine,” said the herd; “every fool knows that.”

“And swine is good Saxon,” said the jester; “but how call you the sow when she is flayed and drawn and quartered, and hung up by the heels like a traitor?”

“Pork,” answered the swineherd.

“I am very glad every fool knows that, too,” said Wamba, “and pork, I think, is good Norman-French; and so, when the brute lives, and is in the charge of a Saxon-slave, she goes by her Saxon name; but becomes a Norman and is called pork when she is carried to the castle hall to feast among the nobles…”

The piece goes on to discuss the different names of all animals that changed their names when served to nobles.

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Live Animal (English) Dead Animal (French)

O.E. M.E. Mod.E. O.Fr. M.E. Mod. E.

swin swine swine porc porc pork

oxa ox ox boef befe beef

caelf calf calf veel veau veal

deor der deer venaison veneison venison

sceap schep sheep mouton mouton mutton

Words borrowed from other languages during the ME period.

Look at phrases borrowed wholesale from the French - RSVP, c’est la vie, bon voyage, par avion etc. Can anyone think of any more?

What words do we use today that originate in France?

Most titles and things connected to nobility.

Can anyone guess any words which might have been adopted?

(sir, madam, senior, duke, duchess, count, countess, prince, princess, marquis, crown, palace, realm, royal, noble, nobility)

Many terms utilized in the arts.

Any ideas?

(art, artist, artistic, poet, poetry, music, musical, musician, dance, dancer, ballad, painter, painting, colour, theatre, tragedy(from the Greek - literally “the song of the goat”, as a goat was the prize for the winning performers in old plays) comedy, literature, rhyme.)

A large number of abstract concepts.

(Religion, faith, virtue, vice, courage, chastity, pure, purity, avarice, liberty, equality, fraternity, gluttony)

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Military terms:

(army, soldier, corporal, colonel, sergeant, general, peace, officer, victory, defeat, navy, infantry, artillery, enemy, platoon, troop, trophy, cannon, hostage, siege.)

Other terms:

(catch, city, people (from Latin plebs - the common people), nation, cry, save, pass, river, sound, easy, sum, use, tax, very, face, poor, choir, ribbon, acquaint, debauchery)

Many were the battles between the English and the French people throughout their history. The positive outcome is the final cultural exchange from the resulting human contacts.

Middle English Grammar

Of the many types of nouns in OE, by the close of the Middle English period, very few are left - of those that survive, the number of forms is scarcely different than it is today. By comparing the Old English word hund, which we looked at in the last session, we will find the following differences:

Old English Singular Plural

Nominative hund hundas

Accusative hund hundas

Genitive hundes hunda

Dative hunde hundum

In total, six different forms.

Middle English Singular Plural

Nominative hound houndes

Accusative hound houndes

Genitive houndes houndes

Dative hounde houndes

In total, three different forms.

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So from six to three different forms. How many of these forms do we have now?

(Still three - singular and plural and possessive, but obviously spelled differently.)

The eventual result of the weakening of the unstressed final vowels was the disintegration of the complicated Old English inflectional system. In later Middle English, grammatical gender is completely replaced by a more logical natural gender.

Extension Activity - Spelling changes

If we look at how spelling changed during the Middle English period, we can find the reason for so many of the idiosyncrasies that English has.

Middle English orthography (the way we write) was greatly influenced by the French. One example is the substitution of “ou” for “u”, as in the word “mouth”. In Old English this was pronounced “muth”. In another group of words Old English “u” becomes “o”: “come”, “love”, “son”, from the Old English “cuman”, “lufu”, “sunu”.

Old English “ae” and “oe” were gradually replaced with “a”: saed-sad, glaed-glad

French modes of spelling showed themselves in the new symbol “q” , where Old English had the more phonetic “cw” - so cwen and cwic became queen and quick. English also borrowed the letter “j”, which until the fifteenth century was written as “i” - used in words such as “juge, jeste”, now spelt “judge, jest”

The sounds “v” and “f” are gradually indicated by these letters and begin to sound different from each other.

Old English: haerfeast, heofenum, lifian, lufu

M.E.: hervest, hevens, liven, love

Mod. E.: harvest, heavens, live, love

It is also during this period that the “ch” sound came into English, and the Old English terms “cirice” and “cild”, become “church” and “child”.

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Middle English Literature

Geoffrey Chaucer, the most outstanding writer before Shakespeare was born in 1340. The chief characteristics of his works are the variety of topics, style and tone, as well as the complexities he presents concerning man’s pursuit of a sensible existence. His writings also reflect an all-pervasive sense of humour, combined with serious and tolerant discussion of various philosophical matters. The book for which he is most known is The Canterbury Tales, about a group of travellers who agree to engage in a story telling competition on the way to a shrine in Canterbury. It consists of a variety of genres: courtly, romance, saint’s lives, fables, allegorical tales and medieval sermons. It also includes the poem The Prioresse, which we are going to look at now.

The Prioresse

(Geoffrey Chaucer)

Ther was also a Nonne, a Prioresse

That of hir smyling was ful simple and coy;

Hir gretteste ooth was but Seynt Loy,

And she was cleped Madame Eglentyne.

Ful wel she song the service divine,

Entuned in hir nose ful semely;

And Frensh she spak ful faire and fetisly,

After the scole of Stratford atte Bowe,

For Frensh of Paris was to hir unknowe.

At mete wel y-taught was she with alle;

She leet no morsel from hir lippes falle,

Ne wette hir fyngres in hir sauce depe.

Wel coude she carie a morsel, and wel kepe,

That no drope ne fille up on hir brest.

In curteisye was set ful munche hir lest.

Hir over lippe wyped she so clene,

That in hir coppe was no ferthing sene

Of grece, when she dronken hadde hir draughte.

Ful semely after hir mete she raughte,

And sikerly she was of greet disport,

And ful pleasunt, and amiable of port,

And peyned hir to countrefete chere

Of court, and been estatlich of manere,

And to ben holden digne of reverence.

But, for to speken of hir conscience,

She was so charitable and so pitous,

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She wolde wepe, if that she saw a mous

Cought in a trappe; if it were deed or bledde.

Of smale houndes had she, that she fedde

With rosted flesh, or milk and wastel breed

But sore weep she if oon of hem were deed,

Or if men smoot it with a yerde smerte;

And al was conscience and tendre herte.

Ful semely hir wimpel pinched was;

Hir nose treyts; hir eyen greye as glas;

Hir mouth ful smal, and ther-to softe and reed;

But sikerly she hadde a fair forheed;

It was almost a spanne brood, I trowe;

For, hardily, she was nat undergrowe.

Ful fetis was hir cloke, as I was war.

Of smal coral aboute hir arm she bar

A peire of bedes, gauded al with grene;

And ther-on heng a broche of gold ful shene,

On which ther was first write a crowned A,

And after, "Amor vincit omnia".

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Modern English

Introduction

The Modern English period comprises, roughly speaking, from approximately 1500 to the present day. However, three subdivisions are usually recognized:

a) Tudor (1500-1625). Shakespeare falls into this category.b) Renaissance (1625-1700)c) From 1700 to the present

Over the next two sessions we are going to look at how English has developed over that period.

In 1485, Henry Tudor defeated Richard III, the last king of the house of York, and this started the Tudor period in English history. His son, the famous Henry VIII followed his rule and broke England away from the Catholic church (Pope Paul III refused to grant Henry a divorce from his first wife…he later went on to have five more.) Following him was the bloody rule of Mary I (Mary Queen of Scots), after whom Henry’s daughter, Queen Elizabeth I was crowned. It is then that the nation began to settle down again, and it was a time captured in literature by the poet Edmund Spenser, who we will look at in a moment. Shakespeare was about to be born. England had become a major naval power, led by men such as Sir Walter Raleigh and Francis Drake.

During the Tudor stage most of the tendencies of ME were still in operation. The first two periods were basically times for experimentation with the language, whereas the third was a time for organization and selection.

In the Early Modern period, changes in sounds and simplification of grammar are even more extensive than during the Middle English period. Let’s look at a piece of poetry from the period.

A STANZA, by Edmund Spencer

So fashioned a porch with rare device,

Archt over head with an embracing vine,

Whose bounches, hanging downe, seemd to entice

All passers by to taste their lushious wine,

And did them selves into their hands incline,

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As freely offering to be gathered:

Some deepe empurpled as the hycine,

Some as the rubine laughing sweetely red,

Some like faire emeraudes, not yet well ripened.

England was again in a state of flux at this time. After the death of Queen Elizabeth I in 1603, the English and Scottish crowns were united as James V of Scotland became James I of Great Britain. It was he who supervised the version of the Bible which is still popular today, and which we looked at in the Origins of English session. The discovery of America and other lands collaborated to trigger an atmosphere of restlessness which gave way to important innovations in fields such as literature, music and science.

We are going to look at another piece of text from the early English period. See how the language has developed.

DEATH BE NOT PROUD by John Donne

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so:

For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow

Die not, poor Death; not yet canst thou kill me.

From Rest and Sleep, which but thy picture be,

Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow;

And soonest our best men with thee do go -

Rest of their bones and soul 's delivery!

Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings and desperate men

And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell;

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And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well

And better than thy stroke. Why swell'st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally,

And Death shall be no more: Death, thou shalt die!

The Transition from Middle English to Modern English

A large number of words were adopted from other languages, increasingly enriching the English language. We are going to look at a lot of these in the next session, but today we are going to concentrate on what’s probably been the main influence on the language since its Anglo-Saxon origins.

Language was also experimented with. For example, it was during the Renaissance that its was established as the possessive form of it, now surely one of the most used words in the language. A lot of words were borrowed from Latin, which had recently gained a cultural resurgence.

Exercise One

Below are some words in Latin that English borrowed during the Early Modern period. In pairs, discuss what the words might have been changed to. Once you have decided that, write a definition for each word.

maturus

industria

effectuate

artificium

canicula

negotiatio

ingenuitas

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A result of this influx of Latin words is the frequent separation between a noun and its corresponding adjective. For example, which are the adjectives connected with these nouns?

Nouns Adjectiveseye opticalsun solarmoon lunarhouse domestic

The nouns are all from the Anglo-Saxon origins, but the adjectives are from the Latin. Sometimes there are both an English and a Latin adjective, which demonstrates the richness of the English language. If we look at the Latin ones, can we guess the English ones?

Latin Adjectives English Adjectivessolar Sunnypaternal Fatherlymaternal Motherlymundane Worldlysanguinary Bloody

Synonyms in English

Many other of the words borrowed from Latin or Greek can be found in the sciences, for example, parts of the body are given common, generally Anglo-Saxon, names by the average man, but to a doctor they are known by their Latin equivalent. So, if a patient hurts his finger, he will not go to the doctor complaining of a sore third phalanx, but that is what the doctor will know it by.

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Latin-Greek Teutonicirritated hugeobscure childdemonstrate beginnecessity shownation happystudent darkodor smellgentle angryinfant heavenlystrange speedcontent deepencounter chooseenormous fastprofound getcommence endrapid countryselect kindpreoccupy happinessvelocity mistakefelicity needcelestial oddhorrible worryfinish dreadfulerror scholarobtain find

British Literature in the 17th and 18th Centuries

The introduction of the printing press to England by William Caxton in 1477 contributed to the clarification of English syntax, but also to an outstanding increase in the number of readers, and therefore in the amount of material written for them to read. The invention of the movable type by Johann Gutenberg in Germany, thirty years earlier revolutionized the world of books, until then slowly written by hand.

(Don’t say) Shakespeare

Now we’ve looked at some of the words that have helped English to become the diverse and rich language that it is today, let’s look at someone who knew the potential of this

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Lesson 4Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Courselanguage, and used it in a richer way than anyone else, either before or after him. He was the foremost writer of the Early Modern period, and is considered by many to be the most important writer ever. We are of course talking about…? (William Shakespeare)

He was born in Stratford upon Avon, Warwickshire, England in 1564. At 18, he married Anne Hathaway, who was some 8 years his elder.

He left Stratford in 1584, and we don’t know where he was until he began to gain fame as a playwright in 1592. It is possible he spent the intervening years travelling, probably in Italy, as that is the location for many of his plays, such as Romeo and Juliet, Othello, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Merchant of Venice and The Taming of The Shrew. He also wrote about Roman history, in plays such as Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra and Titus Andronicus.

He wrote epic plays about seven Kings of England - including Henry VI and Richard III. London theatres only presented plays for a short period each season, so he spent much time on other literary forms including 154 sonnets and two poems.

Plays such as Hamlet and Macbeth are particularly popular possibly because of the recognizable human emotions that the characters endure, coupled with a story with an intriguing web of plots and sub-plots. All of his plays consist of five acts, which trace a careful and deliberate development of plot and character.

Let’s look at an extract from Hamlet, one of his most famous plays. Before this speech, Hamlet has discovered that his Uncle has killed his father, in order to marry his mother. This tragedy is coupled with Hamlet’s musings on the state of humanity. He is saying that man is helpless and hopeless, unable to do anything to alter the course of his own destiny. It is probably the most famous speech in the history of the theatre, possibly because of the range of recognizable human emotions and traits that Hamlet displays.

The use of language is very poetic. Shakespeare uses repetition, rhyme, and other word-play to demonstrate both Hamlet’s condition and his own control of the English language.

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Romeo and Juliet.

The scene that we are going to look at takes place just after Romeo finds out that his beloved Juliet is a member of the hated Capulet family. When Juliet’s nurse tells her Romeo is a Montague, the former exclaims:

“My only love sprung from my only hate!

Too early seen unknown, and known too late!

Prodigious birth if love it is to me,

That I must love a loathed enemy.”

Romeo then walks by the wall of the Capulets’ orchard, and it is then that he listens to Juliet’s speech, while she has no idea that he is hidden nearby.

Modern English (Cont’d)

The big changes

The two revolutionary developments that mark the series of sound changes in the transition from Middle English to Modern English are:

a) The loss of the final vowel

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Lesson 4Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThis refers to the way that many final vowels were lost in unstressed syllables, especially the letter “e”. For example, in Middle English, the word “breathe” would have had two syllables, whereas now it has only one. There are many words in English that don’t have the final syllable pronounced. Can you think of any? (structure, someone, line, some). Many other words lost the “e” altogether. Look back at the poems and the Shakespeare extracts we looked at last session.

b) The “Great Vowel Shift”

This was mentioned in the second session, when we were looking at the Origins of the Language, and it involves the changes to the long vowel sounds in stressed syllables.

Here are some examples:

Old English Middle English Modern English

lufu love (pron.loove)

love

heorte herte heartstanas stoones stonescepan keepe keep

Another characteristic of Modern English is the disappearance of the double negative in educated speech, though this was a gradual change. Double comparatives continued for longer in standard English: “This was the most unkindest cut of all”, Shakespeare wrote in Julius Caesar, which obviously would be what now?

Even as late as Tennyson we find this phrase: “More lovelier than the world”, but by then it was more of a literary usage, so we can say that from about 1850 onwards, the double comparative had reduced to the singular one we know today.

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One important result of the loss of the final “e” in sound and in some writing is that there is often no distinction between the verb and the noun in Modern English. Therefore, the verb “lufian” and the noun “lufu” in Middle English are compounded to just “love” in Modern English. In consequence it has become very easy for a word to change from one form of speech to another: a noun may be used as a verb, a verb as a noun, or even an adjective as a verb or a noun without any difference of external form. This is particularly common in Shakespearean English: “My face I’ll grime with filth…” from King Lear. There are many examples of this in English.

“To paper the walls”, “A piece of paper”

“To wash your hands”, “To give your car a wash”

This shows a freedom parallel to modern American usage, which we will look at in the next session. Can you think of any more examples?

(to cut, a cut; to break, a break; to fake, a fake)

The loss of the final ‘e’ has also had the same effect on adverbs and adjectives. In Middle English, adverbs still ended in an ‘e’, and where able to be distinguished from the adjectives which didn’t:

fast (adjective) - faste (adverb); long (adjective) - longe (adverb)

Some verbal constructions have appeared in the language only recently; for instance, the sentence “The house is being built”. Not long ago a structure like that would have been attacked by conservative grammarians as an odd innovation and a disgrace to the English Language; instead they would have defended the older idiom “The house is building”. So we can see by this example that the passive mood is a relatively recent innovation. Can anyone give any more examples of uses of the passive?

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(To be born, a verb that can only be used in the passive; any phrase that suggests something was done to something else, e.g. "the door was closed" i.e. it didn't close itself, it was closed by somebody else.)

The exact differences in the meaning of, for example, “I write”, “I do write”, and “I am writing” were not established until relatively recently. Remember back to the last session - how Shakespeare freely used what is now the emphatic “do”:

“Thus conscience does make cowards of us all”(Hamlet).

Again, over the course of the Modern period we have been modifying and clarifying our language.

Contributions from around the world

Greek contributions have been continuous from the 5th century to the present, but up to the revival of Greek methods of learning (about 1540 AD), they entered the language second or third hand. Ever since, Greek words have been freely borrowed to supply deficiencies in English, or when new terms are required for new facts.

Modern English also continued to adapt from French, but in quite a different way to the language it had forced on it earlier. At this stage, French was considered to signify social distinction, and so by adopting certain French words people were thought to be more elegant, indeed a French word itself. Like speakers of some language intersperse their speech with English words, English speaking people do the same with French.

Spanish has also become an influence on English by the early modern period, due mainly to the commercial and political relations with Spain and its colonies, and afterwards with Latin America, mainly Mexico.

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Let’s look at some of the words we have inherited.

Contributions from Languages Around the World

Below is a “top-twenty” of languages that have shaped English today, as well as some of the words they introduced. Knowing the origin of words in English helps to explain their peculiar pronunciation and spelling.

1. Borrowed directly from Greek

analysis (like others, retaining its original plural), telegraph (from tele - far off and graphe -writing), telephone (from tele - far off and phone - sound/voice), words beginning with epi- (epileptic, epidermis, epidemic…), psychology, monopolist, anthology, zoology, utopia, cosmetic, geometry, geography, geology, crisis, criterion - criteria, philosophy

From Greek, but through Latin:

surgeon, surgery, blame, frenzy, thesis, ink, place, slander, palsy, dropsy, ideology, idiom

2. Borrowings from French:

de luxe (originally from Latin luxus - special quality),chic (originally from German - schicken = appearance), divorcee, soignée, fiancé(e), toilette - (eau de toilette), coiffure, coquette, cuisine, menu, hors d’oeuvre, entrée, nude, montage, palette, atelier, décor, coup d’etat, fait accompli, bouquet, façade, measure, massage, garage, clairvoyant, feeble, limousine, champagne, art

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Lesson 4Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course3. Borrowings from Spanish:

armada, alligator, armadillo, peccadillo, booby (as in booby prize), siesta, cafeteria, macho, renegade, hurricane, pronto, patio, guitar, cargo, cork, buffalo

From Spanish, through French

risk, castanets, bizarre, racket, cask

Through Spanish from Indian words:

cocoa, taco, chocolate, tortilla, coyote, tomato, nacho, chili

4. From Italian - musical and food words: piano, concert, violin, soprano, solo, sonata, cello, falsetto, maestro, quartet, as well as other words such as: model, profile, vista, miniature, spaghetti, pizza, balcony, gusto, isolate, ghetto, ditto, rebuff etc.

5. From German - (Most words of German origin that did not originate in OE entered in the late modern period) popular foods: hamburger and frankfurter, pretzels, noodle, delicatessen. Also words connected to the mind, which were derived through Greek or Latin: subjective, objective, extrovert, introvert, aesthetics, pragmatism, complex, narcissism.

6. From Dutch - terms connected to shipping and the arts: skipper, ship, yacht, cruise, buoy, as well as the following: dollar, boss, cookie, frolic, loiter, drum, fumble.

7. From Hebrew: certain religious words: amen, Sabbath, rabbi, hosanna, kosher, Jew, as well as the following: cinnamon, kibbutz, jockey, jubilee, cherub.

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8. From Portuguese - albatross, albino, apricot, marmalade, molasses, parasol, tank, lingo, firm, caste, fetish

9. From Russian or Slavonic - soviet, mammoth, czar, vodka, sable, ruble, slave, vampire

10. From Gaelic and Welsh - clan, plant, kilt, glen, whisky (literally “the water of life”), slogan, lass, macadam, Eire, Ulster, skip, shamrock, bog, galore, shanty, flannel.

11. From Arabic - admiral, alcove, alcohol, arsenal, artichoke, assassin, cipher, zenith, oasis, harem, mosque, coffee, garbage, cotton

12. From Syrian - abbot, abbess, abbey, Messiah, muslin, damson

13. From Persian - checkmate (=“the king is dead”), check, caravan, divan, orange, chess, hazard, lemon, bazaar

14. From Turkish - ottoman, horde, bosh (nonsense)

15. From West African - chimpanzee, gorilla, canary, guinea (pig), zebra, banana

16. From Sanskrit - jungle, crimson, ginger, chintz, indigo

17. From Dravidian - pariah, mango, curry,

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18. From Malay - bamboo, caddie, cockatoo, orangutan, gong

19. From Polynesian - taboo, tattoo

20. From Maori - kangaroo, boomerang, koala, dingo

So, through its continuous expansion into the world, as England colonized many nations, the form of English continued to diversify and adapt itself. But in a country like India, which has fifteen official languages, plus a few more unofficial ones, why is English still spoken as an official language?

(When a person who speaks Hindi travels from his eastern home to the north, he is simply not able to communicate effectively with a local man who speaks Punjabi; as a result, they both turn to English, a common language that unites them.)

This is the reason for the vast growth in English language learning throughout the world. It is becoming the language that unites different nations. The one advantage for those learning English as a second language is its remarkably simplified grammar, the main difficulty being its lack of uniform orthographic and phonetic rules.

Pronunciation

English has become less and less phonetic, perhaps due to its wide range of influences. A modern author has suggested a new way of spelling the word “fish”, as GHOTI. Write all of the phonetic sounds and the words from which they are derived on board. If we look at where he takes his phonetic sounds from, we can perhaps understand why. The GH would

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Lesson 4Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Coursesound “f”, as in “enough”; O would sound “ih”, as in “women”; and TI would have the sound “sh”, as in “action”. This proves that English is certainly not a phonetic language.

Modern Modern English

Even within the twentieth century English has changed considerably. We are going to look at two texts, one from the early part of the twentieth century and one from the last decade.

Virginia Woolf was considered one of the foremost Modernist writers and also a great feminist writer. She wrote many poems and novels, including Mrs. Dalloway and, the one that we are going to look at today is an extract from "The Waves". Woolf had a turbulent lifestyle, and suffered from chronic depression. Tragically, she killed herself by walking into the sea and drowning. When we read the text, consider that it was written by someone who was only two years away from losing her life.

"THE WAVES"

By Virginia Woolf

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Lesson 4Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe sun had not yet risen. The sea was undistinguishable from the sky, except that the sea was slightly creased as if a cloth had wrinkles in it. Gradually as the sky whitened a dark line lay on the horizon dividing the sea from the sky and the grey cloth became barred with thick strokes moving, one after another, beneath the surface, following each other, pursuing each other, perpetually. As they neared the shore each bar rose, heaped itself, broke and swept a thin veil of white water across the sand. The wave paused, and then drew out again, sighing like a sleeper whose breath comes and goes unconsciously. Gradually the dark bar on the horizon became clear as if the sediment in an old wine bottle had sunk and left the glass green. Behind it, too, the sky cleared as if the white sediment there had sunk or as if the arm of a woman couched beneath the horizon had raised a lamp and flat bars of white, green and yellow spread across the sky like the blades of a fan. Then she raised the lamp higher and the air seemed to become fibrous and to tear away from the green surface flickering and flaming in red and yellow fibers like the smoky fire that roars from a bonfire. Gradually the fibers of the burning bonfire were fused into one haze, one incandescence which lifted the weight of the woolen grey sky on top of it and turned it to a million atoms of soft blue. Slowly the arm that held the lamp raised it higher and higher until a broad flame became visible.

This is an excellent example of a very powerful descriptive style of doubtless beauty.

See how the forms discussed earlier (Thus, canst etc. from Old and Middle English) have disappeared, and the language is now totally recognizable as our own English. Think back to the first session on Old English - look how far the language has come. See also how the language has developed distinct styles of being used.

Discussion Points

Which are the most significant changes in the language over its long history?

What period do you think was the most influential in forming the language we speak today?

Out of all of the texts that we have looked at, which is the one you prefer? Why?

Discuss it in groups of three or four.

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Lesson 4Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseConclusion

We have now looked at the entire history of the English language. If we remember back to the almost incomprehensible Old English and compare that to the diverse and complex English that we speak today, it is almost as if we were speaking a different language. In the next session we are going to look specifically at American English to see how the language has developed after its spread around the world. After that we are going to look at how it continues to develop

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American English

Introduction

“How did English get to America?”

Francis Drake, although not the first European to discover the North - Eastern coast of America, was the first to claim it for the English. He was encouraged by his protector, Queen Elizabeth I, to claim certain states for England, in 1579.

In 1607, Captain John Smith and one hundred cavaliers on three ships landed on the coast of what today is Virginia. They founded the first English settlement in the New World at Jamestown, now known as Washington.

These people didn’t know they were on the shore of a gigantic land that stretched thousands of miles westward. In front of them lay long rivers, deep lakes and enormous meadows. For more than a century the European colonists knew no more than a narrow strip of land along the Atlantic coast. Afterwards as the new generations expanded to the west, they discovered a great variety of people, landscapes and climate.

The religious fanaticism in Europe made life intolerable for many. In England a group named the Puritans, fearing the constant religious persecutions under the rule of James I, ventured out of their country. They sailed from Plymouth, on a vessel called The Mayflower in 1620. They were joined en-route by a Dutch group, also escaping persecution. The Pilgrims, as the travelers called themselves, landed on December 21st and named their new home Plymouth after the point of their departure.

Let’s look at some American literature from the late 18th Century, to see how the language is used differently from British English. This extract was re-written in a conversational style of the Deep South American dialect sometime during the early 20th Century, so while it

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Courseillustrates a variety of American English, it should not be seen to be typical of all types of AE. While you’re reading / listening to it, think back to the articles that we looked at in British English. How are they different?

Handout (1) - Christy

By Catherine Marshall

Mrs. Spencer: We’d shore be awfully happy if’n you’ll come sup with us, Miss Huddleston, if it pleasures ye.

Christy: Oh, thanks a lot. I’ll be delighted, Mrs. Spencer.

Mrs. Spencer: That thar’s my husband, Jeb. Jeb, this here’s Miss Christy Huddleston, the new teacher from Asheville.

Jeb: I vow and declare! Come in, Miss. Settin’ chair over yon. We haven’t met no one from Asheville, never afore in our born days; hain’t it true?

Mrs. Spencer: Factually, that’s right. Onliest teacher that’s ever come to this here cabin, too. Hey, Ruby Mae, look-a-here! Come meet Miss Christy Huddleston - Ruby Mae’s livin’ with us now, Miss.

Christy: Hello, Ruby Mae.

Ruby Mae: Land o’ livin’! Ever-who seen such pretty wearin’ clothes as yourn, Miss Huddleston, cross my heart and hope to die!

Jeb: Have ye seen Ozias Holt, Ruby Mae? Reckon he was fixin’em pews at the mission.

Ruby Mae: I don’t wanna disencourage ye, but he ain’t workin’ none. Says hit’s jest not generated in ‘im to work no more and he’s bodaciously tired out.

Mrs. Spencer: Well, time for the dinner spell!

Jeb: Looky, I spy someone over yon, nigh the porch.

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Mrs. Spencer: Lordamercy! Come in, John Holcombe. I disremember the last time ye paid us a visit.

John: Been at Granny Barclay’s. Doctor MacNeill’s still with ‘er reckon. I’m afeard she won’t be top-side on earth long. Feel it in my innards.

Mrs. Spencer: We’re shore sorry to hear that. But, look, I want ye to meet Miss Christy Huddleston, from the city.

John: Landsakes! You’re a sight on the eyes, if I do say so myself who shouldn’t. There’s talk about ye by the train station and I thought I’d come to swap howdys.

Christy: Thank you, Mr. Holcombe. Nice to meet you.

The people in this story live in the mountains and have remained quite isolated from the outside world. Note the different spelling and grammatical constructions, and the use of old-fashioned vocabulary such as nigh, yonder, commence, afore, etc. It is very earthy, rooted in the culture that the settlers had built for themselves. In pairs, discuss how we would say the text today. What are the differences?

Words that descend from the Native American languages.

When Christopher Columbus originally landed in America it is common knowledge that he named the native Americans “Indians”, because he wrongly believed he had arrived in India. To this day this name has stayed with these native people, although the use of the term Native American is gaining popularity. Although there was some friction between the new settlers and the original inhabitants, due to the very low population density, the actual contact was pretty minimal. However, as time progressed and certain tribes integrated more closely with the settlers, language began to cross over the cultural boundaries.

What words exist in American English today that come from Indian descent?

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseAs the colonists found plants, animals and other things that they had never seen before, they adopted the native terms given to them:

Words borrowed from the Native American

moccasin a type of shoemoose a large horned animaltomahawk a light axteepee a dwelling placewigwam a kind of houseraccoon small beaver-like animalpapoose baby animalchipmunk cute animaltotem a large engraved polemaize corncod a type of fish

As well as other kinds of natural language, the names of Indian tribes, families or well-known chiefs and warriors gave origin to the names of cities, states, parks and other places in the USA:

Utah

Seattle - an Indian chief who befriended early settlers

Mississippi

Yosemite

Chicago

Delaware

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseIllinois

Cherokee

Walla-Walla

So as America expanded eastwards, more and more people arrived from different nations. It really was becoming a hot - pot of different nationalities and therefore, languages. This mixture blended into English, filling in its inadequacies and further enriching it.

The USA in the 18th Century

By the 18th century the country was attracting people from lands other than Britain. Vast numbers of Germans settled down in Pennsylvania, many Dutch people stayed in New York, formerly known as New Amsterdam. Other important groups of immigrants came from Ireland, Switzerland, Scandinavia, and Jews from diverse European nations and so forth. Since vast numbers of Indians were killed when fighting against the more sophisticated weaponry of the colonizers, the shameful trade of slavery as a means of cheap labour was instead directed against the many Blacks, shipped over from Africa.

Although a lot of the practices, which took place during this century were somewhat unethical, they did benefit the English language however, by enriching it with some extraordinary words and phrases from other languages.

As we saw on the video earlier the following words came from a variety of different sources. Can you remember where?

Hickory (Indian)

Pecan (Ind.)

Prairie (French)

Banjo (West African)

Nincompoop (Dutch)

Bayou (Fre.)

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseJazz (WA)

Bronco (Spanish)

Voodoo (WA)

Skunk (Ind)

Yankee (Dutch)

Canoe (Fre.)

Ranch (Span.)

Boogie-woogie (WA)

Lasso (Span.)

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As we’ve seen American English is continuing the trend of English throughout the ages of borrowing, adapting and otherwise molding and transforming the language to its own needs.

Because of the vast size of America, there are many different dialects and therefore forms of American English. A popular way of representing these dialects in the written form is to imitate the spoken style by the misspelling of words, as in the Christy article that we looked at earlier.

Differences between American English and British English

Because of their different histories, there are quite a few differences between American and British English, in terms of grammar, vocabulary and spelling. Now we’re going to look at some of the differences.

The main grammatical difference is the use of the past tense in American English when the present perfect is used in British English

eg. US: Did you eat yet?

GB: Have you eaten yet?

American English also uses the verb ‘to have’ differently from British English:

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseUS: Do you have a problem?

GB: Have you got a problem?

The past participle of ‘get’ in American English is ‘gotten’. In British English it is ‘got’.

US: Have you gotten to know him well?

GB: Have you got to know him well?

There are also lots of small differences in the use of prepositions. For example:

US GBcheck something out check somethingdo something over do something againfill out a form fill in a formmeet with somebody meet somebodyprotest something protest against

somethingstay home stay at homevisit with somebody visit somebodyMonday thru Friday Monday to Fridayten of eleven ten to eleven

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We’ll now look at vocabulary that is different. You may already be aware of some of the differences. Look at the hand-out and match the American English words to their English equivalents.

US GBapartment flat automobile carcab taxi can (of beans) tin candy sweets closet cupboard cookie biscuitcrazy maddrug-store chemist(‘s)elevator liftfall autumnfaucet tapfirst floor ground floorfreeway motorwaygarbage can bingas petrolhighway main roadmad angrymail postmath mathsmovies the cinemapants trouserspocketbook walletpotato chips crispsrailroad railwayrestroom public toilet

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Courseround trip return (ticket)schedule timetableschool school, college,

universityshades sunglassessick illsidewalk pavementstore shopstove cookersubway subway, undergroundtruck lorryvacation holiday

Modern American Literature

We will now look at some American literature from the 19th and 20th centuries. First, we will look at a poem by Emily Dickinson, who was born in Massachusetts in 1830. She was quite a recluse and never left her home-town. Because of her shyness she did not want her poems read by the public. Though she composed over 1,700 poems, only seven were published in her lifetime. It is really since her death in 1886 that she has come to be seen as one of the foremost writers of her period.

We’ll now look at The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, one of the most famous books ever written in American English. It is renowned for its atmospheric evocation of small town America.

The Grapes of Wrath - American English Handout 2.

A 1926 Nash Sedan pulled wearily off the highway. It pulled up to the gas pumps. A dark-haired, hatchet-faced man got slowly out. And two boys slid down from the load and hit the ground.

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseMae walked around the counter and stood in the door. The man was dressed in gray wool trousers and a blue short, dark blue with sweat on the back and under the arms. The boys in overalls and nothing else, ragged, patched overalls. Their hair was light, and it stood up evenly all over their heads, for it had been roached.

Their faces were streaked with dust. They went directly to the mud puddle under the hose and dug their toes into the mud.

The man asked, “Can we git some water ma’am?”

A look of annoyance crossed Mae’s face. “Sure, go ahead.” She said softly over her shoulder, “I’ll keep my eye on the hose.” She watched the man slowly unscrew the radiator cap and run the hose in.

A woman in the car, a flaxen-haired woman, said, “See if you can’t git it in here.”

The man turned off the hose and screwed on the cap again. The little boys took the hose from him and they upturned it and drank thirstily. The man took off his dark, stained hat and stood with a curious humility in front of the screen. “Could you see your way to sell us a loaf of bread, ma’am?”

Mae said, “This ain’t a grocery store. We got bread to make san’widges.”

“I know ma’am.” His humility was insistent. “We need bread and there ain’t nothin’ for quite a piece, they say.”

“’F we sell bread we gonna run out.” Mae’s tone was faltering.

“We’re hungry,” the man said.

“Whyn’t you buy a san’widge? We got nice san’widges, hamburgs.”

“We’d sure admire to do that ma’am. But we can’t. We got to make a dime do all of us.” And he said embarrassedly, “We ain’t got but a little.”

Mae said, “You can’t get no loaf a bread for a dime. We only got fifteen-cent loafs.”

From behind her Al growled, “God Almighty, Mae, give’em bread.”

“We’ll run out ‘fore the bread truck comes.”

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course“Run out, then, goddamn it,” said Al. And he looked sullenly down at the potato salad he was mixing.

Mae shrugged her plump shoulders and looked to the truck drivers to show them what she was up against. Mae opened a drawer and took out a long waxpaper-wrapped loaf. “This here is a fifteen-cent loaf.”

The man put his hat back on his head. He answered with inflexible humility, “Won’t you - can’t you - see your way to cut off ten cents’ worth?”

Al said snarlingly, “Goddamn it, Mae. Give’em the loaf.”

The man turned toward Al. “No, we want ta buy ten-cents’ worth of it. We got it figgered awful close, mister, to git to California.”

Mae said resignedly, “You can have this for ten cents.”

“That’d be robbin’ you, ma’am.”

“Go ahead - Al says to take it.”

(From The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck)

Discussion Point

In groups discuss the ways in which different languages can become integrated with other. For example, how did the Indian words we discussed earlier come into the English language?

Conclusion

We have seen that since being introduced into America, the chameleon language that is English has changed and adapted itself, according to its surroundings. While the two

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Lesson 5Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Coursevarieties are fundamentally the same, they are sometimes used in quite different ways. This is the also the case for Australian English and Canadian English. In places where English is a second language, the variation may be even greater, such as in some of the pidgin tongues in South Africa. Pidgin is a language loosely based on a different one, without strict adhesion to grammatical rules etc. We will look more at this in the next session.

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Lesson 6Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course

Phonetics

Pronunciation is one of the most important aspects of language learning, and yet it is one that is often underestimated when it comes to teaching.

The Phonetic Alphabet

The main way that we learn pronunciation is by imitating others. This is one of the most important elements of language learning. We listen to the way that native speakers (or teachers) say something and we mimic the same vocal patterns. This is generally a very effective method of learning about pronunciation idiosyncrasies within a language, and shedding any pronunciation hangovers from your first language.

However, there are times when a ss. listening skills can fail them - either by an inability to distinguish between two different sounds or because an overt influence from their first language inhibits them from pronouncing a sound the same as they hear it. For that reason it is sometimes necessary and always useful to refer to a written representation of the sound. However, because there are over a hundred different sounds and only 26 letters in the standard alphabet, to be able to accurately represent each different sound, it is necessary to use a different system of writing: the phonetic (or the phonemic) alphabet. It is often referred to as the IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet). Does anyone know what Phonetics is? (It is the study of speech sounds)

By combining the symbols of the phonetic alphabet, we can effectively represent any sound in any language in a manner immediately recognizable to anyone who has learnt the special alphabet and can associated the sounds to the symbols. To illustrate the variety of different sounds that each letter can have, let us take the letter c for an example. How many different ways is it pronounced in the following words? (Write on board)

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Cat, city, ocean, cello, church, cinema, cause, cease, champagne. (4 different sounds)

We need a different symbol to represent each of the different sounds, and we will look at what they are presently.

The IPA is quite similar to the English alphabet in many respects although it does use some different symbols and omit certain letters. In order to teach your ss. pronunciation, it is often very useful to refer to the phonetic spelling of a word. For example, if as many do, a ss. had a problem pronouncing a word such as through then, after having learned the phonetic symbols, the following could be written on the board to explain the actual pronunciation: (1), with the line underneath to explain where the stress of the word falls.

Teaching your ss. the phonetic alphabet also has the advantage of encouraging self-learning, as ss. can look up new words in any good dictionary and, by looking at the adjacent phonetic representation of the word, they can teach themselves the pronunciation.

Before we look at the phonemic alphabet in its entirety you should have a feel for its symbols and written form. I want you to look in your dictionaries and find the word jelly.

We will now examine the phonetic alphabet in more depth. We will look at it today in class, and tonight, for homework, you should ensure that you have learnt it thoroughly as it will be used throughout the module.

The Consonants

First of all we will look at the consonants as they are the most similar to the standard Roman alphabet. There are 25 different phonetic phonemes in North American English

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Lesson 6Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course(NAE) , and as there are only 21 consonant letters in the Roman alphabet, there is clearly the need for several more symbols. Several letters of the English alphabet are omitted for reasons of clarity - the letter c being one of them, as we discussed earlier. The other missing letters are q and x. Q is always followed by the letter u in English orthography, and always sounds like a sequence of two other consonants, /kw/, and it is represented this way in the IPA. X sounds different depending on its position in the word, but likewise can always be represented by other letters. The sequence of letters th is a non-phonetic idiosyncrasy of English and is therefore represented by distinct symbols. Ask ss. How do we pronounce the th in English, when it occurs at the beginning of a word?

(There are two ways of pronouncing the th: voiced / 8/ as in that and voiceless / 9 / as in

thirty.)

These are the two symbols to represent the two sounds.

In writing, there are an amazing 14 different ways to spell the sound sh, which in phonetics is represented by the symbol / 10/ . How many different ways can you think of?

Conclusion

Today we have only looked at the consonant phonemes. In the next session, we’re going to focus on the vowel phonemes and how they fit together with the consonant phonemes. Make sure you learn the consonant phonemes before the nest session.

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Lesson 7Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course

Vowels

Introduction

In the last session we looked at the consonant sounds of the alphabet. Today we are going to focus on the many different vowel sounds. But first of all, let's have a quick revision of the consonants.

Vowels

Now we have (hopefully) conquered the consonant sounds, we will proceed to look at the vowel sounds.

How many vowels are there in the Roman alphabet? How many vowel sounds are there? What is a vowel? (Vowels are the glue that holds words together. Consonants need vowels

to work together. The vowel is the core of the syllable, and generally syllables couldn’t exist without them. They are also the sounds that shape language musically, and make it pleasing to the ear.)

Technically, vowels are produced as sounds in which there is a continual vibration of the vocal cords and the airstream is allowed to escape from the mouth in an unobstructed manner. For this reason it is much harder to discuss the sound of vowels than that of consonants, namely because as there is no contact of the articulators (lips, tongue, roof of mouth etc.), as there is for consonants. A consonant can be voiced or not voiced (think back to the two -th sounds), but all English vowels are voiced. As we will see when we look into consonants and vowels in more depth, the fact a consonant is a sound produced through a blocked or partially obstructed passage of air makes it easier to regulate the sound. Vowels however, because of their largely unobstructed airflow are more difficult to classify as they are largely formed my minor changes in the shape and size of the oral cavity.

A common, and very serious, mistake that a lot of students make is the substitution of one vowel sound for another. This can lead to confusion and so it is the teacher’s job to

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Lesson 7Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Coursecorrect the problems. For example, a ss. could pronounce the word leaving as (write on board) / 1a / as / 1b / which would change the meaning completely. In this lesson, we will be looking at the methods by which a teacher can help their ss. to pronounce the vowels correctly.

Terms

Let’s look at some more terms that are employed to talk about phonetics. A stressed vowel can either be a simple vowel, which is a vowel without an accompanying glide movement, which we will look at in a minute. An example of one of these types of vowels is the / 1 / sound in bed. Another type of vowel sound is those simple vowels with an adjacent glide, which are vowels accompanied by a /y/ or /w/ sound, as in pain /ey/ or stone /ow/ . The other three vowel sounds are diphthongs, an example of which is the sound in boy. These are sounds that consist of a vowel sound followed by an nonadjacent glide within the same syllable. This sounds very technical, but its actually quite simple. The word I is actually a diphthong. It is a combination of the vowel sound /a/ with a /y/ at the end. The phoneme for the sound is /ay/.

Vowel Phonemes

Let’s have a look at the 14 vowel phonemes.

The eleven simple vowels and vowels with an adjacent glide are first, and the diphthongs are the last three. Let's look at the simple vowels first.

The Vowel Quadrant

Because vowels are so difficult to classify, it helps to think of them in terms of whereabouts in the mouth they are produced. If we think of the oral cavity as a resonance chamber, then the size and shape of this can by modified by the movement of the tongue and the opening and closing of the jaw. Accordingly, vowel sounds can be distinguished from each other by which part of the tongue is involved, for example, whether we produce the sound with the front, the centre or the back of the tongue, and by how high

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Lesson 7Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Coursethe tongue is when the sound is produced: high, mid-height or low. For example, when we say the sounds /iy/ and /I/, we speak of them as high front vowels as they are produced with the tongue high in the mouth, near the front of the hard palate, with the jaw in a relatively closed position. The phoneme / 2 / on the other hand, is described as a low central vowel, as it is produced in the centre of the mouth, with the tongue in its lowest position.

Have a practice with the phonemes on the handout. Where is the sound produced? What is the positioning of the tongue for each sound?

We can see exactly where each sound is produced if we look at this diagram. See how the sounds that we discussed earlier, the /iy/ and the /I/ , the vowels which we described as high front vowels are in the high front quadrant of the diagram. The high, mid and low sections of the of vowel quadrant reflect the sounds produced by the opening of the jaw and the lowering of the tongue. The front central and back sections of the diagram refer to the position of the body of the tongue, which influences the shape of the oral cavity.

Let’s go through each vowel sound.

Funny man with tongue - use in next exercise.

I am now going to say write some words on the board. I want you to tell me which quadrant of the diagram the vowel sound is produced in, and give me an explanation of how we produce the sound. For example, if the word is Heat, the /iy/ sound is a high front vowel and is produced with the lips forcibly widened to allow the tongue to come forward and go to the roof of the oral cavity. The mouth is almost closed, the teeth almost touching.

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Lesson 7Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CoursePractical Usage

Even if your ss. don’t understand all of the symbols of the phonetic alphabet, you can teach them one by one, as problems arise. For example if ss. have a problem distinguishing between the / sounds, you can introduce them to the two symbols, citing examples of words from each. Don’t worry if they can’t understand other phonetic symbols that make up the word, as their attention should be focused on the specific sound in question. You can even use your own version of the phonetic alphabet, appropriating letters from the standard alphabet. The important thing to remember is that whenever you write the pronunciation on the board, it should always be between slanted lines (/…/) to distinguish it from the actual spelling of the word.

(Still to discuss - stressed and unstressed vowels, long and short vowel sounds… Front and Back Vowels)

Teaching Vowels: Problem Spots

The large amount of vowel sounds in English can present many problems to students, whose own language probably has only 5 or 6 vowel sounds. Helping students to distinguish between the sounds is one of a teacher’s greatest tasks. But what are the specific areas of teaching vowels that present the greatest problems?

First, the place and manner of articulation of vowels is less clear-cut than for consonants, which leads to difficulties (as we have seen today?) Voicing is not an issue as all vowels are voiced. Perhaps the greatest challenge for students and teachers alike is the fact that the sound-spelling correlation for vowels is even broader than for consonants, and can very easy be misleading, as learners rely much more on what they see written than what they hear.

There are several general learner errors that we can identify. Some learners clip short all tense vowels, so that they sound like lax vowels, and this tendency is probably a hang-over from their first language. Contrast, for example the Spanish si and de. Learners may recognize the similarity between these words and the English words see and day. While a similarity doubtlessly does exist, there is actually a difference in pronunciation.

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Lesson 7Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseLook at the phonetic text for the two words

Spanish Englishsi /si/ see /siy/de /de/ day /dey/

A way of explaining the difference is to say that the NAE words have an accompanying glide, whereas the Spanish one does not.

Learners also tend to confuse vowels that occur in adjacent positions in the vowel quadrant, since these vowels are similar in the way that they are articulated. A useful way to teach these differences is to use minimal pairs practice. For example is we take two words and ask students about the pronunciation of those words.

Adjacent vowels: Minimal Pair Examples: beat/bit, keen/kin, peel/pill bait/bet, Kane/Ken, tale/tell bet/bat, men/man, sell/Sal cot/caught, Don/dawn,

collar/caller caught/coat, fawn/phone,

ball/bowl would/wooed, look/Luke,

pull/pool

These minimal pairings have sometimes been the stable diet of many pronunciation courses, and while they can be very useful, there is a limit to their effectiveness. As an introduction to the different sounds however, they can be very effective. After having the ss. pronounce the differences, elicit whole sentences to see them use the language in context. Pairs of this type enable ss. to see the potential for confusion if even a single

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Lesson 7Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Coursevowel phoneme is mispronounced. As long as this kind of activity is followed by more “genuine” communicative practice, then it can be a very useful exercise.

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Lesson 8Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course

Consonant and Vowels: A Team

Introduction

(Consonants are the solid blocks with which we construct words and sentences - they are held together by vowels, which are more fluid and can adapt themselves to the consonants around them.) As we have seen, generally they are also more constant than vowels, because whereas the 5 different vowels can be pronounced approximately 15 different ways, with a few exceptions, the consonant system has one pronunciation for each letter. This is similar to the analogy we had in the first session, where the consonants are the solid bricks of the sentence and the vowels are the malleable cement which changes shape according to position and holds the bricks in place.

Silent Consonant letters

There are many initial consonant letters that occur in two-letter sequences that are not pronounced as two sounds. They occur either because of historical pronunciation changes, or the fact that the word was borrowed from another language, which use a different method of clustering consonants to English, and have therefore been modified to fit into the English pronunciation system. The word know is an example of the former, the word psychiatrist an example of the latter.

initial k preceding n: /n/ as in knock, knee, knack initial g preceding n: /n/ as in gnat, gnaw, gnash, gnome initial p preceding n: /n/ as in pneumatic, pneumonia initial m preceding n: /n/ as in mnemonic, mnemonomy initial p preceding s: /s/ as in psychic, psychology, psalm, pseudonym initial w preceding r: /r/ as in write, wrong, wrist, wrath

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Lesson 8Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseSo far we have only looked at silent letters at the beginning of words, but of course, they occur in medial positions as well, with some very common words. What words can you think of which have a silent letter?

l after a and preceding f, v or k: calf, half, knife, knives, halves, walk, talk, chalk. Note that this only occurs after the a. Contrast elf, solve, silk, bulk where the l is clearly pronounced

l after a and preceding m: calm, palm, almond. Compare film, overwhelm where the l is pronounced.

l after a vowel diphthong and before d: (in modal verbs) could, should, would. Contrast cold, held, which are both pronounced.

g after a vowel and before final nasal sound: /m/,/n/ as in sign, align, paradigm. word-final n after m: damn, autumn, column word-final b after m: comb, thumb, lamb, limb, bomb t after f/s and before -en: as in often, soften, listen, glisten

Under certain conditions, some of these letters can be pronounced, which often occurs when derivational suffixes are added. In such cases, the first letter of the digraph becomes the last sound of the first syllable and the second letter becomes the first sound of the second syllable. For example, bomb becomes bombard, phlegm becomes phlegmatic

Voiced and Voiceless Consonants

An important way in which consonant sounds may differ from each other is in whether it is voiced or not. A word is voiced if our vocal cords vibrate as we pronounce it. A good example of this is the difference between the and thesounds. Try saying the words the and theater. Can you hear the difference?

If you put your hands on lightly against the sides of your larynx, you will feel the vibration. Try saying the sounds /z/ and /s/. Which is voiced? (/z/ is a voiced sound, /s/ is unvoiced)

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Lesson 8Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseTry saying the sounds /and / . Which is voiced? (/is voiced and /is unvoiced)

Let's look at a list of voiced and voiceless consonants. Remember that all vowels are voiced.

The voiced consonants are:

The voiceless consonants are:

As you can probably see, there are a number of pairs of consonants, which are produced from the same mouth position, but one of them is voices and one is unvoiced. Students can often get confused between these, so be aware of the similarities and differences.

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Lesson 8Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseDifferences in consonant sounds between British and American English

While the differences in consonant sounds between British and American English are not huge, there are several differences that are worth noting, more for reasons of comprehension than for production.

For the most part, the allophones /d/ and /t/ are the same in both, but in one position the sounds differ considerably. Between vowels, when the following vowel is not stressed, the sounds are softer in American English than in British. In British English the sound is a stop-sound, as in /bet-ter/, where the tongue rests behind the top teeth momentarily before the final syllable. In AE, however, the tongue flips up to the top teeth and immediately returns to the mouth to complete the word, which produced the sound /beder/. This is a common feature in many American words, such as city, pretty, body, wedding and in linking phrases such as it is, at all. In effect there is often very little difference between the words latter and ladder, kitty and kiddy in AE. Similarly, the letter r is different in AE, where it is given more priority than in BE. In the latter, for example, the sound is often seen as an extension of the vowel sound, whereas in AE, it is a separate sound. Contrast /:l/.

L,R, and Syllabic Consonants

The letters l and r are unusual are several ways. Firstly, in the way that they affect the preceding vowel sounds and secondly in their relationship to spelling. As we will see in the Spelling and Pronunciation lesson letters representing vowel sounds are often pronounced very differently before l and r than they are before other consonants. Let’s look at some examples (write the following words on the board. Have the ss. pronounce the words.)

after alter

cab car

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Lesson 8Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseWhat happens to the vowel sound when it is followed by either an l or r? (It is lengthened and softened. The // sound in after becomes a // sound in alter, and the // sound in cab becomes an /ar/ sound in car.)

Historically, the two letters have sometimes replaced each other. For example, when the French word colonel entered the English language, it came to be pronounced as / yet it is still spelled with an l. In Spanish however, it is both spelled and pronounced as coronel.

Many EFL speakers, particularly Asian speakers, who do not have the same differentiation between the sounds, get the two sounds confused. For that reason, we are now going to spend a couple of minutes looking at how the sounds are produced. Have ss. concentrate on saying words that contain either an l or an r. Have them concentrate on where the sound is coming from. What do they do with their mouth in order to produce the sound?

The reason that these two letters have peculiar tendencies is that they are what is known as liquid consonants, which means that they are produced without friction. Most other consonants are produced with the speech organs in a more or less fixed position, but the two liquids are characterized by large movements of the speech organs from one position to another. The sound /l/ is produced as the tongue moves away from the tooth ridge, just behind the upper teeth, whereas in other languages, including Spanish, the sound is made by the tip of the tongue approaching the tooth ridge.

Try saying a Spanish l and an English l. Can you tell the difference? Pronounce coal, fool, pull, like, long. Ensure that your mouth takes the correct positions.

The production of the vowel sound /r/ is produced with the tongue at the bottom of the mouth, with the middle lower than the sides. The tip of the tongue does not touch anything. The trilled r, typical of Spanish, can best be avoided by concentrating on the sliding of the sides of the tongue along the tooth ridge. By keeping the tongue relatively inactive, the r will be pronounced correctly.

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Lesson 8Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course/l/ and/r/ after Front Vowels

In the last session which sounds did we say were the front vowels? (/) Because the /l/ and /r/ sounds are produced at the back of the mouth, when they follow a front vowel, it takes a more time for the mouth to move between the two sounds. Therefore, an intermediary schwa sound is produced between the two, to bridge the gap, which creates a kind of diphthong. We pronounce wall as /wl/, but well as /. Let’s look at some more examples.

Elements Transcriptions Examples1 seal2 fill, fear3 tale4 well, wear5 shall

Once ss. know these diphthongizations, they well probably find it a lot easier to pronounce, and avoid unnatural purity in their vowel sounds.

Syllabic Consonants

It is very common misconception that every syllable must contain a vowel sound, yet in many words this is not the case. In words such as little, sudden, and wouldn’t there are only consonant sounds in the last syllable. These are known as syllabic consonants, since they consist of syllable sounds without a vowel. These can be a particular problem for EFL

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Lesson 8Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Courselearners to pronounce - often they’ll overcompensate or, if they’re aware of the rule, miss out the syllable completely. For exmaple, to use the word little, which should be pronounced / is often pronounced /or , or for the word wouldn’t, the wrong pronunciation is often heard as /orBy drawing ss. attention to syllabic consonants, we can alleviate many of the problems that EFL have with pronunciation.

Syllabic consonants occur when a syllable ends in /t/, /d/, or /n/, and the next syllable is unstressed and contains an /l/ or an /n/. Hence the word saddle is pronounced /sdl/, the word cotton is pronounced /katn/.

It is relatively easy to remember the circumstances that bring about the syllabic consonants, just the involvement of the letters /t/, /d/, /n/ and /l/ and an unstressed syllable. Let’s try some examples:

1. little2. didn’t3. student4. couldn’t5. article6. tunnel7. Latin8. harden9. idle10. important11. mountain12. hospital13. travel14. curtain15. oriental16. bottle17. saddled18. broadened19. attention

20. battleship21. suddenly22. sentences23. gardening24. certainty25. penalty26. finally27. fertilize28. ordinary29. ventilate30. monotonous31. bread and butter32. bright and early33. salt and pepper

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Pronunciation of -ed endings

One of the most common problems for EFL learners is the -ed ending, and it’s three variant forms, . However, the sound the ending will have in any given word is determined by a very simple phonetic principle. When two consonants are pronounced together, as in cared, it is easier to leave both voiceless than it is to voice one and leave the other voiced. Therefore, the ending is pronounced /d/ after a voiced sound and /t/ after a voiceless sound. How would the -ed ending be pronounced after a vowel sound? Remember that all vowels are voiced?

So what happens when you want to add the /d/ or /t/ sound to a word that already ends in one of those to sounds? It is almost impossible to do so, without inserting some sort of vowel sound between the two consonants. Because vowels are voiced, this means that the final d will be pronounced as /

Commonly, students will pronounce the ending as a separate syllable in all cases, or ignore it completely. Elicit some examples form ss.

There are two exceptions to these rules. One is a group of adjectives that end in -ed and therefore look like verbs: naked, aged etc. In this case, the ending is always pronounced as /There aren’t many of these words. Have a look at the overhead. Put up OHP 3.

A naked child

A four-legged animal

A ragged coat

A wicked idea

A rugged rock

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Lesson 8Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseA wretched day

An aged woman (compare: he has aged a lot)

The blessed Virgin (compare: the priest blessed the children)

A dogged determination

The other type of exception is in the case of adverbs that are derived from verbs, such as deservedly, supposedly, and markedly. In all such adverbs the ending is pronounced as . Look at some examples:

The patient has improved markedly

We made the decision advisedly

I will support you unreservedly /

Compare:

The patient has made a marked improvement /

We made an advised decision

I will give you unreserved support

Pronounced of -s

Similar to the -ed ending, the -s ending, which makes a noun either plural or possessive, has strict phonetic rules. It can be pronounced in one of three ways, as

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Knowing the rules for the -ed endings, can you think of the rules for the -s ending?

Give ss. a couple of minutes to work out the rules and then get them to feed back

The ending -s is pronounced in three ways. The three rules are:

1. /z/ after all voiced consonants, except /z/ and // and after all vowel sounds. E.g. games, calls, laws

2. /s/ after all voiceless consonants, except /s/ and //. E.g. grants, wraps, Jack’s3. As a separate syllable, (or) after /z/, /s/, // or //, as in dishes, George’s or

foxes.

These rules only apply when s is added to a word. If the final s is a part of the word itself, then unfortunately there is no logical way to know how it should be pronounced, as in as /z/, or in this /

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Pronunciation

From Methodology - Hamer Sharp

Pronunciation is one of the hardest things for many students to learn. Here are some tips.

Teachers should always be doing everything possible to have students string their words together when speaking. This should be in one interrupted breath, or two (maybe even three) when the sentence is long. It helps students if they can see sentences written out and visualize the way the words must be connected to each other.

Starting in English Book Two, after REPETITION AND QUESTIONS have been done, choose one of the repetitions and have students link the words in each sentence as shown in the examples below. At the beginning, you will have to put examples of sentences on the board and link the words until they get the hang of it.

The most obvious links are two totally dissimilar sounds, one at the end of one word and the other at the beginning of the following. An example is: about eight. There can also be a link between two similar sounds in those same positions, as in: about ten.

When this has been done, have students read the sentences as if each were a very long word. Naturally, sentences that are too long for one breath or that are divided into sections by commas are said in a series of long breaths. Words must be run together so that the sentences sounds NATURAL, i.e., not fast, just all together in one or several breaths.

Examples of Linking

She comes every week on the train.

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He has about eight apples.

One of our rooms is small.

We have five albums.

In order to run words together efficiently, students should be familiar with the following pronunciation rules, and be reminded of them often.

a) A vowel is always looking for a consonant. Opposites attract, and that is true of letters too. It’s very difficult for the mouth to say two or more vowels or consonants together; it always prefers to say a combination of the two. That’s why in the first example, the S in COMES naturally slips over to connect with the E in EVERY, and the K in WEEK slips over to connect with the O in ON, and so on.

b) Since it is difficult for the mouth to say two consonants or two vowel together, when they appear together in the same word, or one word ends in a sound and the following word begins in the same or similar sound, they join to form a single sound in order to make pronunciation easier. So, the rule is: Two alike or similar sounds join to make one. Some examples can be seen in can’t take and sit together, where the two Ts become one, or in always sit, where the two Ss join to become one, or in to Uruguay, where the two vowel sounds join to form one. The only exception to this rule is the CH, as in each child. These don’t blend.

c) When two Ss are separated by a consonant, the consonant disappears and the two Ss join to form one, as in lists, asks, etc. This happens when you are speaking at a normal speed, not when you just say the word all by itself. When you say “Where are the lists she always asks for?”, it sounds this way: “Where are the liss she alway sass for?”

d) In order to facilitate the joining of words preceding him, her and them, the natural tendency is to eliminate the H in him and her and the TH in them. So, take her sounds taker, like him sounds likim and leave them sounds leavem. There is nothing

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Lesson 9Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Coursewrong with this. On the contrary, students should be encouraged to do it deliberately until it becomes automatic, which means you have to do it for them to imitate. Point out that all this is what native Spanish speakers do unconsciously in their own language all the time. If they didn’t, their Spanish would sound as bumpy as their English.

e) T or D plus U or Y, as in picture, cut your hair,

education and had young people, sounds CH. T + U or Y is a stronger CH, while D + U or Y is

a softer CH.

f) T or D plus N, as in didn’t, couldn’t and but not,

forces the throat to close and the rest of the word to come out through the nose. Therefore, the second D in couldn’t and the T in but not are not pronounced as D or T, but get lost in the closing of the throat. Ask your trainer how this can be physically demonstrated so the students will understand it better.

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Stress and Intonation

Introduction

Can anybody tell me where the stress falls in the following sentence?

Ask her what she wants to do this evening.

Where does the stress fall? (On the command work, Ask, and the topic of the sentence, and the verb do.)

Why does it fall where it falls? (Stress is used to highlight the most important words in the sentence - those that actually convey the message that we want to send.)

Good morning. How are you?

Fine thanks, how are you?

What happens to your voice when you say the sentences on the board? Listen to how your voice changes. (The voice goes up and down, or rises and falls.)

Today, we are looking at stress and intonation. Stress occurs not only on a sentence level, like we have just looked at, but also on word-level too. We will start on a word level and continue up to a sentence level.

Stress

We put stress on a syllable when we pronounce it with such emphasis as to give it more importance than the surrounding syllables. As we looked at earlier, we stress syllables not only in the general sentence structure, but also in individual words. For example, the com-

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Lesson 10Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Courseof comfortable, or the det- of determine are stressed syllables. Which are the stressed syllables of the following words?

Handout 1 - Stress and Intonation

A. Underline the stress in the following words.

1. about2. after3. between4. hundred5. body6. color7. correct8. remember9. something10. without

B. Write the phonetic versions of the above words. Mark the stress by underlining.

C. Underline the stress in the following families of words.

1. abominate, abominable, abomination2. contribute, contributor, contribution, contributive3. abolish, abolition, abolishable, abolitionist4. electric, electrical, electricity, electrify5. apology, apologetic, apologize6. attain, attainable, attainability, attainment7. philosophy, philosopher, philosophical, philosophize

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8. negotiate, negotiable, negotiation, negotiator, negotiability9. material, materialist, materialistic, materialize10. liquid, liquidity, liquidate, liquidation

D. Mark the primary accent on all words of more than one syllable.

1. Would you object if I gave her the present myself?2. I don’t understand why the class should protest or rebel.3. No one suspected that the airplane had set a new record.4. He has progressed sixty miles in only sixteen hours.5. They protested at an increase of only two dollars an hour.6. The newspaper is conducting a contest to increase its circulation.7. Who is going to conduct the orchestra?8. The desert is full of contrasts.9. So far, no suspects have been found.10. We are making very slow progress today.

E. Choose the correct word from the list below and write the phonemes and the stress in each space to give the sentence its correct meaning.

Estimate, deliberate, alternate, separate, appropriate

1. I was elected an _________ representative to the college assembly. I __________ with another professor in my department.

2. The garage gave me an __________ of the cost of repairing my car. They __________ that it will cost at least $300.

3. We need to ___________ the good apples from the bad ones. Let’s put them in __________ baskets.

4. This pressure is ____________. They don’t want to give us time to ___________.5. The Congress should not _____________ so much money. It’s not ___________ at this

time, as the country is doing badly.

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E. Determine where the stress falls in the following sentences:

1. I don’t imagine you can succeed in a business venture.2. In an hour it will be ready to hand over to you.3. This red rose is to be planted here.4. He eats three full meals every day.5. I shall deliver it to you.

She said that she liked the apartment, didn’t she?

Some words have a primary and a secondary stress. Words such as apparently and congregation

Unfortunately, there are no hard and set rules for knowing which syllable of a word should be stressed. This is another reason that you have to understand the stress and phonetic symbols that a good dictionary will use, which will enable you to determine where the stress falls on any word you don’t know. There are some “rules”, however, or rather guidelines, as there are not infallible, which we will look at now..

1. The great majority of two syllable words are stressed (or accented) on the first syllable - for example: never, Tuesday, breakfast. The biggest exception to this rule is words that begin with a prefix, which will mostly be accented on the second syllable, as in exceed, display, belief.

2. Compound nouns have a primary accent on the first syllable, and a secondary accent on the second. Eg, bookstore, weatherman, plant-pot.

3. Compound verbs on the other hand, have a secondary accent on the first syllable and a primary accent on the first. Eg. Understand, overlook, outrun etc.

4. In reflexive-pronouns, the stress falls on the last syllable.5. Numbers ending in -teen can be stressed on either syllable, but it is best to encourage ss.

to stress the last, so as to distinguish between, for example, thirteen and thirty.

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6. A large number of words which can be used as either a verb or a noun without any change of spelling, will have a different pronunciation according to its usage to distinguish between the possible meanings. Generally the noun has the stress on the first syllable, and the verb will have it on the last. Examples of these words include (write on board and elicit the two different pronunciations from ss.: concert, conflict, contest, contract, contrast, convert, desert, incline, increase, insert, insult, object, overflow, permit, present, progress, project, protest, rebel, record, suspect, survey.

7. Similarly, words ending in -ate, such as alternate and separate which can be used as a noun, an adjective or a verb, have a different pronunciation according to word-type. If they are used as a noun or an adjective, they have the vowel ending unstressed, and pronounced as either / 1 / or / 2 /. When the word is used as a verb, the end vowel is pronounced /ey/. So we can have a duplicate, pronounced / 3 /, but we would say I’ll duplicate / 4 / the letter. Other examples are approximate, appropriate, deliberate, moderate, elaborate, intimate…

8. In general, when a suffix is added to a word, the new form is stressed on the same syllable as the original word. In the word abandon, the stress falls on the second a, and in abandonment, the stress is in the same place. However, in words ending in -tion, -sion, -ic, -ical, -ity and -graphy, the stress almost always falls on the syllable preceding the ending. In these cases, the stress will often be different in suffixed words than it was in the original. For example, we would say contribute / 5 / but contribution / 6 /.

Sentence Stress and Rhythm

We’ve now looked in detail at the issue of stress within a word, but as we discussed at the beginning of the lesson, this is not the only place were stress is important in English. Generally we do not talk in words, but in sentences and phrases, and it is these that we must now concern ourselves with.

In the sentence I’m glad to see you, on which word or words does the stress fall? (normally there are two stresses, on glad and see.) Both of these words are one-syllable, so they have no word-stress, but if the sentence-stress falls on a word of more than one syllable, then it usually falls on the same syllable that normally receives the stress, for example I’ll meet you tomorrow where the /o/ sound of tomorrow keeps the stress of the word.

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Lesson 10Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseOne problem for many learners of English is the fact that there is a lot greater difference between stressed and unstressed syllables in English than there is in their native language. Spanish, certainly, is very methodical and regular in its stress patterns, with stress always falling on the same syllable, unless an accent tells you otherwise. The rhythm of Spanish is very regular, and each syllable has similar weighting within the sentence structure. However, English is not like this and in actual fact, the number of sentence stresses is far more important to the sound of a sentence than the number of syllables. It could almost be said that the unstressed syllables in English do not count, such is the attention given to the stressed syllables.

See how the stress pattern tends to occur at regular patterns - it doesn’t matter how many unstressed syllables there are - the more there are, the faster they tend to be said. In the first sentence, the unstressed syllables are crushed together in order to get them said in time, and in the second sentence, the stressed syllables are lengthened somewhat, so as to compensate for the lack of unstressed syllables.

To stress or not to stress

Which type of words are being stressed? (The content words)

In general, the content words are stressed and the function words, the words that have no real meaning in themselves, are unstressed. So what constitutes a content word? They include:

1. Nouns2. Verbs (with a few exceptions - those that can be used as an auxiliary, such as be, have, do,

will, can, might etc. are often used as a function word)3. Adjectives4. Adverbs (including not and verbs contracted with not, such as don’t)5. Demonstratives: this, that, these, those6. Interrogatives: who, when, why, and so on.

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Lesson 10Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseFunction words, normally unstressed, include:

1. Articles: a, an, the2. Simple prepositions: to, of, in…3. Personal pronouns: I, me, him, it…4. Possessive adjectives: my, his, your…5. Relative pronouns: who, that, which…6. Conjuctions: and, but, that, as, if…7. The auxiliary verbs, as mentioned earlier.

Though most verbs are content words, in two-word verbs that consist of a verb and an adverb, such as to split up, to put on, etc. it is normally the adverb that receives the stress. Obviously it is important not to confuse a genuine two-word verb with other verbs, such as look and listen, that may be followed by a prepositional phrase, as in to look at him, to listen to her, which still have the stress on the verb itself.

All of these rules mean that, generally, it is quite a simple matter to detemine where the stresses are places in a sentence. Do exercise E on the worksheet.

If a native speaker of English

Intonation

We are now looking at intonation. Intonation is the tune of what we say, whether our voices rise or fall. This varies according to the nature and meaning of the sentence. For example a question, such as the one on the board, the voice would normally rise at the end of the sentence to indicate that it is a question.

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Lesson 10Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseWe can indicate where the stress falls by underlining the word. Where is the stress in the sentences on the board. (Good morning. How are you? Fine thanks, how are you?) We can mark intonation in a similar manner, by drawing a line to indicate the pitch of the voice, a high line signifying a high pitch, a low line a low pitch. Although people can use as many as twenty five different notes to differentiate the meanings of their words, for our purposes we can narrow this down to four basic pitch types. A line drawn at the base of the word indicates a normal tone, a line above the word marks a high tine. A line somewhere below the word shows a low tone and a line some distance above the word shows a high tone. Where would we draw the lines for the sentences on the board?

Usually the movement from one tone to another takes place between syllables, and it is known as a shift. A shift is indicated by a straight vertical line. Sometimes however, the voice slides from one tone to another over the course of a syllable. This movement within a syllable is called a slide.

Each speaker has his or her own range of notes, and it is not necessary to imitate note for note the speech patterns of a native-speaker. However, to speak well and sound fluent, it is important to follow the general rising and falling.

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Lesson 11Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course

Building Blocks

Introduction

Over the next weeks we are going to examine the systems of English grammar in depth, which will not only serve as a revision but also as confirmation to yourselves that you have a solid understanding of grammar. So that in the future, when a student approaches and asks a difficult question, you will be assured that you are fully capable of answering that question.

First of all, we must carefully break down the confusing language and afterwards look at how each aspect of it is constructed.

What is this? (A sentence) What is a sentence made up of? (Words) What are the different types of words that make up a sentence? (Nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns, auxiliary verbs, prepositions, determiners, conjunctions.)

We are going to have a look at each of these in turn. First though, let’s look at what makes up words.

Morphemes

Words consist of a variety of different elements called morphemes. The type that you will probably recognize more immediately will be the prefixes and suffixes that attach themselves to the beginning and the end of words. So by adding the morpheme un- to the morpheme clear gives us the opposite meaning, unclear. By the same token, adding the suffix morpheme -ed to the word print gives the past tense of the word. We use the term morpheme to describe the prefixes and suffixes that make up words. There are two basic types - free morphemes and bound morphemes.

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We are now going to look at each of the word types individually. First though, all of the types of word that we mentioned earlier can be divided into two categories. (Write onto board in two columns “Content Words” and “Function Words”) Which categories do you think each type of word goes into?

CONTENT WORDS FUNCTION WORDSnouns pronounsverbs auxiliary verbsadjectives determinersadverbs prepositions

conjunctions

Nouns

Look at these two sentences. (Write on board “I show people my art” and “I am having an art show next week”). Look the word show. It is used differently in each sentence. How? (it is a verb in the first sentence and a noun in the second). So sometimes it is difficult to tell the difference between a noun and a verb. The same forms are often used for both. Looking at the word order is the most reliable way to tell whether a word is a noun or a verb. Generally sentences have the construction of:

SUBJECT - VERB - OBJECT - ADVERBIAL

Nouns can either be proper nouns or common nouns. Proper nouns are the formal names or titles of people, countries, days and months, languages, businesses etc. which are generally identified in English by beginning with a capital letter. All other nouns are common nouns.

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Lesson 11Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseI am going to read out some different nouns. Which type is each one?

Mr. Brown day Microsoft FridayMexico place man company

Nouns can also be divided into concrete nouns and abstract nouns. Concrete nouns describe things that we can touch or sense in some way. Abstract nouns are nouns that have no substance and can only be imagined or thought about.

Nouns can either be countable or uncountable. If a noun can be counted then it must have a plural form. For example we say “I bought three apples”, therefore apple is a countable noun. However, we cannot say “there are two milks on the floor”, as milk is not a countable noun.

Verbs

Verbs are words which describe either an action or a state of being. In the English sentence they typically follow the noun, as in the sentence “The dog chases the ball”. As in this example, they are often marked with inflectional morphemes such as -s, or -ed, or -ing.

Verbs that describe an action are called dynamic verbs- they show activities, processes, and momentary events. Verbs that describe a state of being are called stative verbs; they typically show perception, emotion and relation.

Adjectives

Adjectives are words to describe nouns. They modify the noun that they occur with - they tell us qualities about it, such as the size, shape, colour, age, origin. Most adjectives in English come directly before the noun, e.g. The blue book. These are called attributive adjectives.

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Adjectives can also be separated from the noun, in which case they can come after a verb (typically to be), in a sentence such as That woman is beautiful. These are known as predicate adjectives.

Adverbs

Adverbs tell us something about the verbs that they occur with - they modify the verbs. For example, they tell us how: how frequently, to what degree, where and when they take place. They are the most mobile words in a sentence - going either directly before or after the verb, or at the beginning or end of the sentence. When it is not directly connected to the verb, it tends to modify the whole sentence rather than specifically the verb.

Adverbs can also modify adjectives and other adverbs in the same way as they are used with verbs.

Pronouns

The purpose of a pronoun is to take the place of a noun that has already been identified in the text or situation. (Put the following sentence on the board: “Julie makes cakes, but Julie isn’t very good.” Elicit that it doesn’t sound natural, and get ss. to suggest an alternative, “Julie makes cakes but she isn’t very good.”)

We don’t need to repeat the proper noun, because we have already established who we are talking about. The noun that the pronoun replaces is called the antecedent of that pronoun.

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Lesson 11Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThere are different types of pronouns (subject, object, possessive, reflexive, demonstrative). We’ll look in more depth later on.

Auxiliary Verbs

The purpose is to help main verbs accomplish certain functions - another name for them is helping verbs. The main auxiliary verbs are? (be, do, have) They can also be used as a main verb. We can tell when they are being used as an auxiliary verb as they can never stand alone. They always need a partner, whereas the main verb does not.

The auxiliary verbs also include the a group of words and phrases called modals. Unlike be, have and do, modals can never be used as a main verb. Their function is to show possibilities and obligations, which we will look at later on. Like the other auxiliaries, modals cannot occur by themselves - they need a main verb.

Prepositions

The function of a preposition is to show the relationship between two or more nouns, which most commonly refers to either time or place. Other prepositions show accompaniment (with/without), comparison (like/as), means (by means of, by), and several other functions.

Determiners

We use determiners to establish or determine certain features of a noun that are different from the features described by adjectives such as quantity (e.g. many, all, five). Determiners can also show definiteness (the), possession (my, John’s) and sequence (first, second). They always come before nouns in the sentence - in fact, it cannot occur without an accompanying noun. They often have the same form as a pronoun; for example

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Each apple costs fifty cents (determiner)

Each costs fifty cents (pronoun)

The only difference is that the pronoun can stand alone, but the determiner cannot. So, you cannot say “this is my”, or “Pass me the” as a complete sentence, because the use of a determiner always requires a noun to be present.

Conjunctions

Let’s look at our original sentence again.

What is the conjunction? What is its purpose?

The function of a conjunction is to join two or more grammatical elements. The most common ones are and, but, or and so.

What is the function of each of the main four conjunctions?

(and shows additional information, but shows contrary information, or shows alternative information and so shows consequential information.)

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Lesson 11Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseConclusion

So, now we have established the different types of word, in the next session we are going to look at how the individual words fit together to make a sentence. It is important to remember that word order is particularly important in English as it determines the overall meaning of the sentence. The same word can, in theory, perform the function of several different word classes. Let’s look at some examples:

A large record company records several types of records. (adjective, verb, noun)

Dark objects cannot be seen in the dark. (adjective, noun)

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Groups of Words

Introduction

In the previous session we looked at the names given to the different types of words. Today we are going to look at the names given to these words when they are put into groups, such as phrases, clauses and sentences. At this stage we are not going to look in depth at these features, as we will do this later on. For the time being we are just focusing on naming and recognizing the features.

PHRASES

When we write or speak English, we don’t really use individual words alone. Instead we use groups of words called phrases. A phrase consists of a main word, plus other words closely associated with it. The name of the phrase is based on the main word. For that reason, we have noun phrases based around a noun, verb phrases based around a verb and so on…. We will now look at those one by one.

Noun Phrases

A noun phrases consists of a determiner, optional adjectives, a noun and maybe a prepositional phrase. So if we look at this noun phrase (write on board): “a big hairy dog”, we can see that there is a determiner (a), some adjectives (big, hairy) and the noun itself (dog).

Elicit another example of a noun phrase.

A noun phrase will always have a determiner, even if this is a zero determiner (i.e. nothing), which occurs in the case of plural nouns, noncountable nouns and proper nouns.

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Lesson 12Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CoursePrepositional Phrases

A prepositional phrase consists of a preposition and a noun phrase. For example (write on board):

under the bed

in the afternoon

at the market

Elicit some more prepositional phrases from.

Verb Phrases

A verb phrase consists of a verb and all of the words that follow it in a simple sentence. It includes everything except the subject (who or what initiates the action). So as an example (write on board):

(John) works.

(John) works in an office.

(John) works in an office every day.

(John) works in an office in Mexico City every day.

Elicit another example from.

There is another type of noun phrase which always contains the verb be. This is called a Type II verb phrase. It is generally followed by a noun phrase and an optional adjective phrase, as well as a number of other possibilities. Let’s look at an example (Write on board):

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(Julie) is a swimmer.

(Julie) is a professional swimmer.

(Julie) is in the swimming pool.

(Julie) is training for the Olympics in the swimming pool.

As we can see there are numerous possibilities within the verb phrase, as you can combine any of the other phrases into it.

Adjective Phrases

An adjective phrase consists of any number of adjectives plus any of their adverb modifiers. Attributive adjective phrases are part of a noun phrase - they fill in the optional gap between the determiner and the noun, as in the sentence (write on board):

The dirty old green car.

Predicate adjective phrases occur after the word be, as in the type II verb phrases we were just talking about, as in this example (write on board):

The computer is the greatest, most revolutionary invention of the 20th century.

Here’s an example of an adjective phrase which also uses an adverb as a modifier (write on board):

It’s an amazingly tiring job.

Elicit some more examples of each from.

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Lesson 12Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseAdverb Phrases

An adverb phrase consists of an adverb plus any number of its adverb modifiers. They usually come at the end (or the beginning) of a sentence. Here are some examples (write on board):

I am going right now. (the main adverb is underlined)

Peter ate his dinner very quickly.

Look at other examples on page 21.

CLAUSES

As we have seen, a phrase is simply a word class with its associated modifiers. Another type of word group, more sophisticated than the phrase, is called a clause. A clause is different from a phrase because it always shows a subject-verb relationship. Here are some examples of clauses (write on board):

SUBJECT NOUN PHRASE VERB PHRASEThe dog barked.Sue’s mum lives in Holland

These examples are called independent clauses, because they are complete in themselves and can stand alone.

A dependent clause, on the other hand, also shows a subject-verb relationship, but it is dependent on the presence of an independent clause. They cannot exist alone. Look at this example (write on board):

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INDEPENDENT DEPENDENT CLAUSE INDEPENDENTThe dog barked when he saw the burglarSue’s mum who made us the cake lives in Holland

The dependent clauses are dependent because of the word that introduces them. When and who establish a dependence on another factor. These words are called clause markers - they tell us that the clause is dependent. Without them, the clause would become independent e.g. “He saw the burglar”.

There are three types of dependent clauses: Adverb, adjective and noun clauses. We will look at them individually.

Adverb Clauses

The purpose of the adverb clause is to tell us when, how, to what degree etc. that the verb takes place.

The dog barked when he saw the burglar. [when]

The bus was late because there was a lot of traffic. [why]

Look at adverb clause markers on top of p24. Think of some examples using a variety of clause markers.

Adjective Clauses

The purpose of the adjective clause is to modify the noun. Unlike the majority of adjectives, the adjective clause always comes after the noun. Here’s an example (Write on board):

The dog that we got last year barked when he saw the burglar.

(Noun phrase underlined - adjective clause in bold.)

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The school that I want to go to is Yale.

Like the adverb clause markers that we have just discussed, adjective clauses also have their own markers, with words such as: who, whom, whose, which, that. These words join the adjective phrase to the noun phrase.

Noun Clauses

Like a noun phrase, a noun clause can function as the subject or object of a sentence. The difference is that it shows a subject-verb relationship. For example:

I understand why my sister wants a dog.

Where I work depends on my employer.

Look at markers for noun clauses.

There is no such thing as a verb clause or a preposition clause. We have now outlined the three types of clause. See if you can identify them in the following exercise.

SENTENCE ROLES

We have now looked at the individual words and their names, the individual phrases and clauses and their names. Now it is time to look at how all of these fit together in the form of a sentence. Each part of the sentence has a different role, known as a sentence role. When we looked at verb phrases, we said that there are how many types? (Two) In a sentence with a Type I verb phrase, the sentence roles are normally in this order (write on board):

SUBJECT VERB OBJECT ADVERBIALJane eats three meals every day

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Lesson 12Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseIn type II sentences, there are two possible forms (write on board):

SUBJECT LINKING VERB PREDICATE NOUN ADVERBIALJane is a doctor in the hospital

SUBJECT LINKING VERB PREDICATE ADJECTIVE

ADVERBIAL

Jane is happy in the hospital

The most important part of the sentence is the verb, as every sentence must have a verb. The subject slot is usually filled, but not always. The object and adverbial slots are sometimes filled, but they often remain empty.

The Subject Slot

This comes at the beginning of the sentence, telling us who or what initiates the action or state shown by the verb. It always consists of a noun phrase (or clause) and when it is linked to a predicate, it creates a complete sentence. For example(write on board):

The dog chases rabbits in the garden. (The dog is the bare subject)

When we speak of a subject of the sentence we are referring to the whole noun phrase. The core of the subject is the noun itself, dog, without any articles or noun phrases.

The policy of the US government is uncertain at present. (policy is the bare subject)

To show a change of emphasis, the adverbial slot can be moved to the front of the sentence, e.g.:

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At present, the policy of the US government is uncertain.

So sometimes the subject is not the first thing you will see in a sentence.

The Verb Slot

The verb usually follows the subject of the sentence - it shows the action that the subject performs or the state that the subject is in. Every sentence in English must have a verb - without one, it is not a sentence. For example (write on board):

The girl______her hair.

Without a verb, we can only guess at possible meanings. It makes no sense - it is not a sentence. We need the verb brushes to complete the sentence.

However, it is possible to have a sentence without a subject - for example, with commands. Tell me a command!

Elicit commands from ss. If necessary prompt with “Stand up!”, “Close the door!” etc.

With a command the subject is understood to be you, so instead of saying “You be quiet!”, we just say “Be quiet!”.

The verb slot in the sentence extends from the end of the subject to the beginning of the object (or predicate noun/adjective). It includes the core verb of the sentence as well as any auxiliary verbs or adverbs that occur before the object. For example (write on board):

The tree fell awkwardly against the house.

John has worked here all his life. (the core verbs are underlined)

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Lesson 12Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe Object Slot

The object of the sentence shows who or what receives the action that was initiated by the subject. So if we look at the examples on the board, in the first one the house is the object. Like the subject, the object slot (when used) always consists of a noun phrase or clause.

See how some of the sentences do not use the object slot. For some verbs, like the ones in the example, it is not essential to use an object. These are called transitive verbs, because they can transfer the action onto the following noun phrase. There are some verbs, however, that can never have an object after them. These are called intransitive verbs, because it is not possible to transfer the action of the verb initiated by the subject onto a noun phrase. Let’s look at some examples:

Look at examples on middle of p29. Get ss. to try to think of a noun phrase to fill the object slot. It’s not possible. Compare this

to the object slots of the earlier examples.

So, transitive verbs can have an object, but don’t have to; you can pull, leave and drink something, or you can just pull, leave or drink.

Intransitive verbs, on the other hand, can never have an object after them; it is not possible to sleep, talk or go something.

The Predicate Noun and Predicate Adjective Slot

A predicate noun or adjective can only occur after a linking verb. It is always a noun phrase (or clause) and always follows a linking verb, usually be, but it is not always a required element of the sentence. If the predicate noun phrase slot is empty, however, then an adverbial is required. Look at the following examples (Write on board):

SUBJECT LINKING VERB PREDICATE NOUN ADVERBIALJane is a doctor in the hospital

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Lesson 12Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseA cat is an animal that

chases mice.The boys were outside the zoo.

The subjects are identical to the predicate nouns. Jane = a doctor. A cat = an animal that chases mice. This is the function that linking verbs serve.

A predicate adjective on the other hand, is always an adjective phrase always follows a linking verb, usually be, but unlike the predicate noun, it is a required element of the sentence.

SUBJECT LINKING VERB PREDICATE ADJECTIVE

ADVERBIAL

The girl is terribly unhappy at workThe film was very superficialWind damage was minimal in the cities

Notice that it is possible to invert the adjective phrase to create a noun phrase: the terribly unhappy girl, the very superficial film…

The Adverbial Slot

The adverbial is the part of the sentence that shows us the time (when), the place (where), the manner (how), the reason (why), the degree (how much) that an action or state took place. Although it is usually at the end of the sentence, it can move quite freely to the front of the sentence, where it is followed by a comma. There are several different types of phrases and clauses that can occur in the adverbial slot, but the most common ones are one or more prepositional phrases. It can also be an adverb phrase or clause.

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Lesson 12Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseSo, we have now discussed all of the building blocks of English, from the types of words to the ways that they fit together and the names that we give them. Until we start using the names in the lessons that follow, they will probably seem like an alien language to you at the moment. Don’t worry; there will be plenty of practice, as we explore each aspect in greater depth.

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The Auxiliary System

Introduction

“What is an auxiliary verb?”

(Auxiliary verbs are verbs that help another verb. They do not function on their own, but only in conjunction with another verb.) For example, “The girl is sitting on the chair” (is is auxiliary, sitting is main verb.

“What are the three main auxiliaries in English?” (Be, have, do) “Are there any more?”.

(Yes, there are many other auxiliary verbs called modal auxiliaries, or modals. The difference between them and be, have and do is that they cannot function as a main verb. Be, have and do can either function as an auxiliary or a main verb. The modals can never stand alone and therefore never be a main verb.

The Auxiliary Verb BE

This is the most common auxiliary verb. It is used to express the continuous tense, as in the example above, and also for the passive voice - for example in the sentence “This horse is ridden every day”. We will look more extensively at the passive later on.

Be aware that it is not always used as an auxiliary - in the sentence “The man is angry”, be is a main verb and is therefore a content word.

When using be as an auxiliary (or as a mian verb), it is important to remember that the verb has to agree with the aubject. If the subject is singular, then the verb will take the is form, whereas if it is plural it will take the are form. If the subject is “I” then the verb form is am.For example, (write on board)

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“The children are playing outside”, but

“I am playing the piano” and

“The dog is playing with the ball”

The time of the action being spoken about is also important, as it alters the tense of the auxiliary verb. So if the three examples on the board were happening in the past instead of the present, what would we change them to?

“The children were playing outside”

“I was playing the piano”

“The dog was playing with the ball”

The Auxiliary Verb HAVE

Have is used as an auxiliary verb to construct the perfect tenses. For example (Write on board):

Sarah has returned from her holidays. (auxiliary in bold, main verb underlined)

Scientists have created a clone sheep.

Like be, have can also stand alone as a main verb, as in the sentence “We have an hour before the class finishes”.

Like be, when using have you have to be aware of the agreement with the subject and the tense.

The Auxiliary Verb DO

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Lesson 13Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseWhen we use do as an auxiliary verb, we use it to serve on of three purposes. Does anyone know what they are?

1. To show negation - “I don’t want to go”2. To construct questions - “Do you like my hair?”3. To show emphasis - “I did lose my homework, but I found it again.”

Again, distinguish between the use of do as an auxiliary and as a main verb. The sentence “I do my homework every night” is an example of do as a main verb. Like the previous two auxiliaries, do also has to agree with the subject and the time frame.

The Modal Auxiliary Verbs WILL and CAN

The main modals are will and can, which are the ones we’re going to look at here. Unlike the other auxiliaries, these don’t have a separate plural and singular form. Neither do they have specific agreements with the subject. For exmaple, we say:

I can swim, you can swim, he can swim…

A dog will bite you if you annoy it, I will bite you if you annoy me…

The main problem that people encounter with using these to modals is to distinguish between when to use which. Will indicates “high probability”, whereas can indicates “ability”. So by saying “I can swim”, you are indicating that you are able to swim, but if you say “When I go on holiday I will swim every day” it means you are intending to go swimming daily.

Using Auxiliary Verbs without a Main Verb

Although we said that you couldn’t use auxiliaries without a main verb, there are certain situations in which the main verb is “understood” and does therefore not need to be used. This can only happen if the main verb has already been used, either in the same sentence or the sentence before. It is often used like this when making comparisons or contrasts. Look at this example (write on board):

I can’t drive, but my wife can.

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Lesson 13Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe verb drive in the first part of the sentence is understood to be the verb after can, but you don’t need to repeat that verb. It sounds very strange if you do. Listen, “I can’t drive, but my wife can drive.” You can say this but it sounds a little odd. Let’s look at some other examples to see (write on board):

John has done his homework and Phil has, too.

It would sound very wordy and repetitious if we were to say “John has done his homework and Phil has done his homework too.” See that it is not just the verb that is understood, but the whole predicate or verb phrase.

Sylvia isn’t married but her sister is.

Jessica doesn’t go out often, but Jane does.

“What words are understood in these examples?”

The following are three factors to bear in mind when using auxiliaries:

1. That you make correct subject-auxiliary agreement (I have been, he has been…)2. That the tense/time is correct (past, present or future)3. That you use the correct category of auxiliary (be, have, do or a modal)

We are now going to look at some of the mistakes that students make. In pairs, discuss what is correct, and correct the mistakes.

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The Verb Tense System

Verbs are the most important part of the sentence, because they are the central component. No sentence can exist without a verb. We are now going to look at the various forms that a verb can take.

Verbs will always consist of two elements: a time and an aspect. We will look at these in turn

Time

What are the three times in English grammar? (past, present and future)

Strictly speaking English only has two tenses, past and present, because the future is formed using a modal (eg. She will go) rather than a different verb form as is the case with Spanish and many other languages. Having said that, we will still treat the future as if it were a separate tense altogether.

Aspect

The aspect of a verb describes certain characteristics of the activity or state represented by the verb. There are three aspects in English: simple, continuous and perfect.

The continuous aspect indicates an activity that continues though a period of time (eg. I am listening to music). The perfect aspect indicates an activity that began prior to the moment of speaking but has relevance only at that moment (e.g., I have worked in many jobs, so I have a good knowledge of employment.) When neither of these aspects apply, we use the simple aspect. This is mainly for expressions that indicate activities that have finished (e.g. I left school in 1985) or general expressions and habitual activities (e.g. I make friends easily, It snows in winter).

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Lesson 14Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe Inflectional Morphemes Attached to Verbs

We saw in the first lesson that there are four inflectional morphemes or endings that are attached to verbs: -s, -ing, -ed and -ed (past participle). There is also the fifth ending, which is nothing, as in the phrase “Children fight_ in the playground”.

The Verb Tenses.

There are twelve tenses in English - every possible combination of time and aspect. (Put up overhead projection) Look at the table on the board see the names given to each. Do you know all of the tenses?

Write this sentence on the board: “I do my homework” Ask “What tense is this?” (Simple Present) “Now work in pairs or threes and write down the equivalent sentence in each of the

eleven other tenses.” Check answers

The Simple Present Tense

This is the one that everyone should be most familiar with.

If we ignore the two infinitives and the word chewing (A noun), the verbs can be classified into two groups: those with an -s ending and those without. (Draw two columns on board labeled “-s” and “-“. Get ss. to read out all the -s verbs that they found in the article, and then all of the ones with nothing. Write them on the board in the respective columns.)

What is it that tells you whether a verb requires the -s ending or not? What are the subjects for each of the -s verbs? And the verbs without an -s ending? (Those with the -s are singular, those without are plural.)

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Lesson 14Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseSo, the base form of the verb requires the -s ending if the subject is singular and the “-“ ending if it is plural. The only exceptions to this rule are I and you, singular subjects which always require the “-“ ending.

Time Expressions

What were the time expressions that we underlined in the last exercise? What do they have in common? (They all indicate habitual or recurring actions - typically used in reporting facts about the world.)

See also where the expressions occurred. Three of them occur in the verb slot, before the verbs maintain, use and function. These expressions are known as adverbs of frequency, and they often, though not exclusively occur with the simple tenses. The adverbs of frequency also include the following words: normally, usually, frequently, occasionally, seldom, rarely, never. They show habitual actions that occur over the full range of possibilities, constantly to not at all.

Every day and every time occur in the adverbial slot. This is the most common location of all time expressions linked to verb tenses. Other adverbial expressions linked to the simple present include (write on board): all the time, on Sundays, every week, every month, every year, on occasion, once in a while and now and then. They show habitual actions of varying frequency.

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The Verb Tense System - Simple and Continuous

Introduction

We discussed the Simple Present tense in the last session. Today, we are going to continue looking at the Simple tenses before we move on to look at another aspect altogether, the Continuous Tenses.

The Simple Past Tense

Draw two lists on board, labeled “Regular” and “Irregular”. Get students to shout out the verbs and the correct list for that verb. (Ensure that they are not just reading them out of the book). Ignore the passive structure verbs (was elected, was added) which will be discussed later.

We can see that the regular verbs all end in -ed, and they are called regular because they consistently have this form.

Now look at the subjects and the verbs together. Is it the same as the simple present? Do verbs of the simple past agree with singular and plural subjects? (No, there is no subject verb agreement in the simple past.)

“Why are some verbs irregular and some regular?”

(It is a product of the history and development of the language, something that you will remember from the History module.) Verbs can become regular over time. For example, the verb help had the irregular past form holp in the seventeenth century, whereas now it is perfectly regular.

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Now tell me all of the time expressions that you underlined. What do most of these expressions have in common? What kind of past are they in?

(Apart from the three that could be used in any time frame (…when…, at an early age, a few days later) they all indicate a time in the past that is not connected to the present. Notice also that they all occur in the adverbial slot.)

So, we have established that the simple past can be either irregular or irregular and it does not have subject-verb agreement. The simple past is used to show actions or states that occurred in the at a time in the past that is not connected to the present.

The Simple Future Tense

Again, we are going to make a list, dividing the verbs into 2 lists. This time the headings for the lists are “Verbs with the Modal will” and “Verbs with the Modal Equivalent be going to”. We will ignore the two simple present forms (returns and get) for now. So, which verbs go into the first list?

“Why do we sometimes use will and at other times use be going to?

(Will generally serves to introduce a narrative in the future, whereas be going to tends to continue that narrative. However, this is not a concrete rule and the two are often interchangeable. Will tends to be more definite than be going to.)

What governs the choice of is or are before going to?

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Lesson 15Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course(The subject - as the tense is actually the simple present with a modal equivalent, again the verb has to agree with the subject.)

The simple future is the first tense we have looked at that requires an auxiliary verb. All simple future tense verbs have two elements: the auxiliary and the main verb. The main verb is always in its base (infinitive) form. So, if we look at the examples on the board, we will see that there is the auxiliary part and the verb in the infinitive.

Now let’s look at the time expressions that we underlined. Which ones can be used in other time frames and which only in the future?) Those that occur only in the simple future indicate a time in the future not connected to the present.

Where do the time expressions occur in the structure of the simple future sentence?

(In the same place as the other simple tenses, in the adverbial slot, either at the beginning or the end of the sentence.)

There is one more form of the simple future tense that simply attaches a future time expression to the simple present or the present continuous, which suggests that the future event has already been determined or arranged. For example, the sentence “Peter moves house next week”, or “Peter is moving house next week”. It has been determined that Peter is going to move house next week.

So now we have looked at all three simple tenses. Most of the exercises we have done have had a time expression which determines the tense to use. However, that is not the case for the majority of sentences in English. It is the context that dictates which tense to use. The verb tense itself indicates the time.

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Lesson 15Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe Continuous Tenses

The continuous aspect indicates action that continues over a period of time, usually without interruption. You might have heard of it being called the progressive aspect, which is another name for it. Like the simple aspect, there are three different forms of the continuous aspect: past, present and future.

The Present Continuous Tense

The present continuous is formed by a simple present form of the verb be as an auxiliary verb and the gerund form (-ing) of the main verb.

This time we’ll divide the verbs into three columns: is + gerund, are + gerund, am + gerund. (Get. ss to shout out the verbs they have underlined. (Elicit the verb forms from ss.)

We can see from this that the auxiliary verb of the present continuous, be has to agree with the subject, but the gerund form will always remain the same.

“What do we use the present continuous for? Look at the time expressions that you underlined and discuss with a partner how the tense is used.”

(The present continuous is used to indicate what is happening at the present moment. The event may only be of temporary duration (see “for the time being” in the text) but the important factor is that it is occurring at the time of speaking.)

The Past Continuous Tense

Now that we have looked at how to form the present continuous tense, how do you think that the past continuous is formed?

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Lesson 15Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course(With the past simple form of be as the auxiliary, plus the gerund form of the main verb.)

Make two lists on the board of verbs in the simple past and those in the past continuous. “Why do we sometimes use the simple past, and sometimes the past continuous?”. In

pairs, get them to look at the time expressions, and remember what we discussed about the simple past earlier in the class.

Get ss. to report back to the class.

(The simple past indicates an action that occurred some time in the past. We use the past continuous to indicate a time in the past when something else was happening - for example “I was washing my hair when the telephone rang.” It is generally used in the presence of the simple past, to say that what was happening was interrupted by something else. )

So, to summarize. The past continuous is formed by the simple past of the auxiliary verb be + the gerund of the main verb. The auxiliary verb has to agree with the subject. It is used in conjunction with the simple past. We use it to describe an action that was happening when another action took place.

The Future Continuous Tense

Again, the verbs can be divided into two categories - those verbs in the simple present tense and those in the future continuous. (See list in book.)

The simple present, as we discussed in the last session, indicates a habitual event or a fact. It actual fact it can also function as a narrative tense, which forwards the action whatever the time scale, and as a reference time, if there are other tenses present. It only serves the functions that we mentioned if it is alone.

So, as we have seen in the cases of the past and present continuous, the aspect indicates something which happens over a period of time. The future continuous indicates something that is going to be happening in the future. For example, “Next week I am going to be working very hard, so I won’t have time to see you”.

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As we formed the future simple in one of two main ways, either using will + infinitive or going to + infinitive, so to form the future continuous we do the same, but also adding the verb be and the gerund of the main verb. So in the case of the future continuous there are two auxiliaries, either will or going to and be.

Like the past continuous, the future continuous is not really used unless there is another verb present, with one verb showing a continuous action and the other showing something that intersects with the continuous action, as in the sentence “I will be playing golf when the judge announces the verdict.”

Review of the Continuous Tenses

As we have seen, all of the continuous tenses depend on a reference time. In the present continuous this time is a stated (or implied) time expression that indicated the present moment. IN the past and future continuous tenses, the reference time is stated (or implied) by a verb in the simple past or the simple present tenses respectively. (Explain with use of ss. given examples on the board.)

Verbs that cannot be Continuous

There are some verbs which can’t be continuous, namely those which show perception, emotion, and relation - things that are have an immediacy about them and can’t be seen to be happening over a period of time.

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Perfect Tenses

Introduction

The perfect tenses include the present perfect (I have visited…), the past perfect (I had visited…) and the future perfect (I will have visited…). They are used to indicate an activity that began before the moment of speaking, but has relevance to that moment.

The Present Perfect Tense

Elicit the verbs in the present perfect from ss. Write onto two columns on the board - Regular and Irregular.

So from this we can see that the present perfect is formed by the present simple form of the auxiliary verb have plus the past participle of the main verb. We can see that the regular past participles are all formed by the stem of the verb plus the -ed ending. Obviously the irregular verbs have no such pattern and have to be learned individually.

Why are there different forms of the verb have in the sentences in the text? (Like the auxiliary verb be in the continuous tenses, the verb have has to agree with the subject.)

Now let’s look at the time expressions, in particular the following ones (write on board): since I arrived, yet, so far, up to now. These can only be used with the present perfect. Look at the expressions in context and discuss with a partner why we use the present perfect in each case.

So we have seen how the present perfect is formed. Can someone remind us of the formation?

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Lesson 16Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseWe know that it is used to talk about events in the past that have relevance to the present (Hence the reason its called the present perfect.) For example, in a job interview, the potential employer may ask the question “How long have you been a teacher?” (up to this point in time).

The Past Perfect Tense

The past perfect is used to talk about events that occurred in the past, some time before another event occurred. For example, “I had been to the zoo many times before the tiger escaped.”

Divide the verbs into two lists one for past perfect and one for simple past.

So, we can see that the past perfect is formed in a similar way to the present perfect, but using the simple past tense of have instead of the simple present. It is therefore formed with had + past participle. Like other simple past verbs it doesn’t have to agree with the subject, so it was always be had whether the subject is singular or plural.

Now look at the time expressions. What were they? (Make a list on the board). With the exception of “for more than twenty minutes” and “right on time”, which could also occur with other tenses, all of the expressions indicate something that occurred in the past in particular relation to another event that occurred in the past. We will look at the first sentence in the passage. Can somebody read it out?

Okay, two actions are mentioned. Which happened first?

(Students had to wait before the professor turned up, so that necessarily happened first. So the first event is expressed in the form “had waited”, and the professor’s eventual

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Lesson 16Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Coursearrival in the past simple. So the earlier event is in the past perfect. This is the function of the past perfect - to show that one event was preceded by another.

The Future Perfect Tense

How do you form the future perfect?

(We use the auxiliaries will + have + the past participle.)

Look at the time expressions that you underlined. Compare them with the verbs. What kind of expressions do we use the future perfect for?

(We use it to express something that is going to happen in the future prior to another event taking place, as in the sentence “I will have been to the airport three times by the time I actually go somewhere.”)

Can you think of any more examples?

So, to summarize, we use the future perfect to show actions or states in the future that will occur before another action or state in the future. It is formed by the auxiliaries will + have plus the past participle. Like the simple future, it does not agree with the subject; all verbs in the future perfect will have the same form - it is only the past participle that will change.

Review of the Perfect Tenses

We have seen that, like the continuous tenses, the perfect tenses always depend on a reference time, which is either a stated or implied time expression that indicates the other time. In the present perfect, this time is always the present moment, in the past and future tenses the reference time is stated (or implied) by a verb in the simple past or the simple present respectively.

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Lesson 16Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe Perfect Continuous Tenses

These tenses combine the uses of both the perfect and the continuous tenses, to say something is happening over a period of time before something else happens. In formulation too, they are just a combination of the other two aspects.

The Present Perfect Continuous

“What form does the present perfect continuous take?” Elicit an example of it.

As we can see it is formed by the auxiliary verbs of have + been plus the gerund form of the main verb. Like the present perfect, the first auxiliary verb, have, has to agree with the subject, so the form of the structure will change depending on who the subject is.

When do we use the present perfect continuous? Look at the time expressions to help you.

(We use it to express something has been happening continuously for some time, is still happening and is likely to continue beyond the present, as in the sentence “John has been living in Mexico for three years”. He has already been here for three years, is still here now and will probably stay for some time more.)

So, to summarize, we use the present perfect continuous to indicate something that started occurring in the past and will continue occurring in the same unbroken fashion. It differs from the present perfect, which focuses more on the result or effect of the past event, whereas the continuous form is concerned with the duration of that event in to the present. Moreover, it suggests that the action will continue likewise into the future. For this reason it is often used to express irritation, “You’ve been annoying me since you walked into the room” with the suggestion that you are going to continue to annoy me.

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Lesson 16Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe Past Perfect Continuous

Draw two columns on the board “Past Perfect Continuous” and “Simple Past”. Get ss. to shout out the verbs that they underlined.

So, the past perfect continuous is formed by combining two auxiliaries, have and be, and the gerund of the main verb. Like the past perfect, it does not agree with the subject, so the form is always the same. The form of the auxiliary have will always be in the simple past, as had.

Look at the time expressions and the use of the simple past in the article. What do we use the past perfect continuous for?

(To indicate something that had been happening continuously up to and beyond a time in the past.)

Is it still happening? (Possibly, but not necessarily)

The Future Perfect Continuous

“How do we form the future perfect continuous?” (Using three auxiliaries, will, have and been and the gerund form of the main verb.)

Does it agree? (No, it’s like all of the future tenses. It will only ever have one form.) What do we use it for? (To indicate something that will be occurring in the future, prior to

another event that will happen.)

In usage, the future perfect continuous is the same as the future perfect, except that the future perfect is concerned with the result of the prior action, whereas the future perfect continuous indicates the duration or the uninterrupted nature of the action that will take place.

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Look again at the first sentence of the passage in ex. 4.29. Two actions are shown, which are? Which event happens first? (the spaceship has to travel before it can land) See how the first event uses the simple tense, whereas the second uses the perfect tense, or to be precise, the future perfect continuous. This is always the case in English.

Review of the Perfect Continuous Tenses

We have seen that, like the perfect and the continuous tenses, the perfect continuous tenses always rely on a reference time in a different tense. This is either stated or implied.

Problem Solving with the Tense System

Like the exercise that we did with the auxiliary system, two classes ago, where you corrected the problem sentences, stating exactly what was correct and what was incorrect, we’re going to do another similar exercise now, this time examining all of the tenses that we have looked at.

The English Tense System in Discourse

We have now looked at all 12 of the tenses in English. Knowing how to use each both with correct formulation and in the correct circumstances is one of the greatest problems for a learner of English. As well as knowing how to use them at sentence level, which we’ve looked at over the course of these lessons, it is equally important to know how to use them when compiling a paragraph.

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NOUNS

DEFINITION

A noun, in grammar is a word used to refer to a person, a thing, or an abstract idea such as a feeling of quality. The nouns are important because their function is to give names to everything, even though we don’t know the name or do not want to give a name. For example “someone” or “something”.

There are some rules that make us the job easier so we are going to study them.

RULES TO PLURALIZE NOUNS

1.- To make most nouns plural we just need to add S

CAR CARS

GUITAR GUITARS

BOOK BOOKS

COMPUTER COMPUTERS

2.- If a noun ends in any consonant and Y, we need to change the Y to “i” and then add “es”

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BABY BABIES

STORY STORIES

SECRETARY SECRETARIES

2.1.- If a Y is preceded by a vowel just add S as in rule #1

BOY BOYS

RAY RAYS

KEY KEYS

3.-If a noun ends in ch, s, ss, sh, or x just add “es”

BEACH BEACHES

CLASS CLASSES

ASH ASHES

BOX BOXES

BUS BUSES

IMPORTANT ! The pronunciation of these plural forms also change a little bit

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4.-When the noun ends in F or FE we need to change it for “ves”

HALF HALVES

KNIFE KNIVES

SELF SELVES

WIFE WIVES

5.- Some nouns ending in O form their plural by adding “es”. Words of foreign origin or abbreviated just add S and that’s it.

POTATO POTATOES

TOMATO TOMATOES

PIANO PIANOS

KIMONO KIMONOS

IMPORTANT ! Some words accept both forms: zero/zeroes, volcanos/volcanoes

6.-Irregular plural nouns are those nouns that do not have fixed rules of spelling, most of them form their plural by a change of vowel.

MOUSE MICE

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Lesson 17Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseTOOTH TEETH

GOOSE GEESE

WOMAN WOMEN

CHILD CHILDREN

OX OXEN

7.- Some nouns remain without change in their plural form

DEER DEER

FISH FISH

SHEEP SHEEP

8.- When the noun in English is taken from another language, the plural form will be the same as it is in the original language

DATUM DATA

CRISIS CRISES

RADIUS RADII

ALGA ALGAE

CRITERION CRITERIA

THESIS THESES

NUCLEUS NUCLEI

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Lesson 17Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseCURRICULUM CURRICULA

PHENOMENON PHENOMENA

PARENTHESIS PARENTHESES

EXERCISES

EXERCISE 1: Add S or ES to the following words to spell them correctly.

1. Passenger S_____2. Tax _____3. Talk _____4. Blush _____5. Discover _____6. Develop _____7. Season _____

8. Flash _____9. Hall _____10. Touch _____11. Sketch _____12. Press _____13. Method _____14. Mix _____

15. Try _____16. Tray _____17. Ferry _____18. Guy _____19. Enemy _____20. Pry _____21. Pray _____

EXERCISE 2: What do the following people or things do? Look at the example

Example: Bird watcher

Response: A bird watcher watches birds

1. Stamp collector

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2. Animal trainer3. Bank robber4. Dog catcher5. Book publisher6. Tax collector7. Ticket taker8. Fire extinguisher9. Mind reader10. Bullfighter11. Wage earner12. Storyteller

EXERCISE 3: In this exercise we will give you a list of singular written words; you have to write the plural form and write a sentence with it. Look at the example.

Ex. Child Children There are many children taking classes in the school

1. Zero2. Mouse3. Monkey4. Industry5. Woman6. Fox7. Goose8. Sheep9. Series10. Belief11. Leaf12. Curriculum

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PRONOUNS

DEFINITION

A pronoun is a word that is used to replace a noun or a group of nouns that have already been mentioned or will be mentioned later. They take place or substitute nouns or to make it easier they substitute names, the names of people, things, animals, objects etc. They, him, you are examples of pronouns, and there are seven types of pronouns: Personal, Possessive, Reflexive, Relative, Interrogative, Demonstrative and Indefinite.

PERSONAL PRONOUNS

When we are speaking we can distinguish 3 persons, in order: The first person ( You speaking) The second person (The person that you are speaking to) and the third person (The person that you are talking about)

Pronouns change depending on the person you are using and if you are talking about human beings or animal beings in singular form you have to specify if it’s a male or a female. Let’s clear this up.

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POSSESSIVE PRONOUNS

We use this kind of pronouns whenever we want to express that we or any other person or thing possesses something, they also substitute the object that is possessed. Hey teacher, why in the chart down here we do not see the possessive pronouns my, your, his, her, its, our and their? The answer is pretty easy, it’s because they are not pronouns, they are adjectives and we will study them, when we study the lesson of adjectives.

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REFLEXIVE PRONOUNS

This kind of pronouns are used when the verb returns to the person who is doing it, they are also used when something is done without help or when you want to give more emphasis to an action.

RELATIVE PRONOUNS

This sort of pronouns is used in relative clauses, a clause is a complete sentence and a complete sentence is a sentence that has both subject and verb. Relative pronouns substitute nouns and connect the relative clause to this noun. There are ten relative pronouns: Who, Whom, Whose, Whoever, Whomever, That, Which, What, Whatever and Whichever.

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Lesson 18Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseEx.

The man who wears sun glasses

The car that his father gave him as graduation gift

INTERROGATIVE PRONOUNS

They are used to ask questions and they take the place of the answer when the answer expected is a noun or a pronoun, these pronouns are: Who, Whom, Whose, What and Which.

Ex.

What are you doing here?

Whose pen is this?

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Lesson 18Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseDEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS

As the word says this kind of pronouns demonstrate something, these pronouns are: This, That, These and Those. It is extremely important to make the difference between these words when they work as pronouns, and when they work as adjectives. Look at the example.

Ex.

That pen is yours In this case the word that is telling us which pen we are talking about, the word that is describing the pen, so it is an adjective.

That is your pen In this case, the word this is only pointing out a thing (the pen) it is substituting the word it so it is a pronoun .

INDEFINITE PRONOUNS

This kind of pronouns is indefinite precisely because they are not constant, they are in some cases variable and in most of the cases you do not know the number of objects that you are talking about.

all more everything

another most few

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anybody neither somebody

anyone nobody someone

anything none something

both no one

each one

either others

everybody several

everyone some

EXERCISE 1: You have to write two examples of each kind of pronoun

PERSONAL PRONOUNS

1.________________________________________________________

2.________________________________________________________

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Lesson 18Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CoursePOSSESSIVE PRONOUNS

1.________________________________________________________

2.________________________________________________________

REFLEXIVE PRONOUNS

1.________________________________________________________

2.________________________________________________________

RELATIVE PRONOUNS

1.________________________________________________________

2.________________________________________________________

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INTERROGATIVE PRONOUNS

1.________________________________________________________

2.________________________________________________________

DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS

1.________________________________________________________

2.________________________________________________________

INDEFINITE PRONOUNS

1.__________________________________________________

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Lesson 18Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course2.__________________________________________________

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ADJECTIVES

DEFINITION

An adjective is a word that gives more information about or describes a noun or a pronoun (person, object, animal or thing), the objective of having adjectives is to have more accurate information about something. There are basically six kinds of adjectives: Quality, Demonstrative, Distributive, Quantitative, Interrogative and Possessive. And we have some examples of each one.

Quality Demonstrative Distributive Quantitative Interrogative PossessiveBig This Both Some Which MyFamous That Each Any What YourIntelligent These Every Many Whose HisPretty Those Either Few HerHandsome Neither Much ItsFat Fifty OurSmall Two Their

Adjectives in English have only one form so, they never change and we can use the same adjective no matter the person or object that we are talking about, we can say: Good boy ! Good girl ! Good dog ! Good car ! Good fellows !

There is only one exception and it is when you are using the demonstrative adjectives this, that, these, those, but the change is obvious, it is because of quantity, you can not say: “That cars” you have to say “Those cars” because they are more than one.

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Lesson 19Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseAdjectives in English usually come before their noun, that’s why you have to say: “The red house” and not “The house red”.

When several adjectives come before a noun, they are supposed to be in a particular order, but there are not specific rules that tell us accurately where we have to put a certain adjective, the following is according to experience the most acceptable order.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Demonstrative Quality Size Age Color Origin Composition Purpose Noun

Ex. A beautiful big new red Italian aluminum/iron alloy Ferrari

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

That incredible tall teenage blond American teenage university student

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

In English there are some concepts of comparison that we should know, they are three: Positive, Comparative and Superlative. The positive is a simple adjective that describes us the object or person: That car is fast . The comparative is the same but it tells us that the object is from a superior quality: That car is faster . And the superlative indicates that the person or object that we are talking about is the number one, nothing has more quality

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Lesson 19Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Coursethan this thing: That car is the fastest . There are many adjectives of comparison, let’s check some of them.

Positive Comparative SuperlativeDark Darker DarkestWhite Whiter WhitestFar Farther/Further FarthestGreat Greater GreatestBeautiful More beautiful The most beautifulStrong Stronger StrongestImportant More important The most importantYoung Younger YoungestThin Thinner Thinnest

When adjectives are only one syllable adjectives form their comparative and superlative by adding “er” and “est” to the positive form.

Bright Brighter The BrightestCold Colder The ColdestNew Newer The Newest

When adjectives have two syllables they can take either the “er and est” or the “more and most” In order to understand when a two syllable adjective takes one form or the other we have a couple of rules.

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Lesson 19Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course1. When 2 syllable adjectives end in “ful or re” they generally take more and most:

Careful More Careful The most carefulObscure More obscure The most obscure

2. When they end in “er, ly or y” generally take the er and est form

Pretty Prettier The prettiestHoly Holier The holiestClever Cleverer The cleverest

When the adjective has three syllables or more just add more and most before the positive.

Important More important The most importantUnderstandable More understandable The most understandable

English has a lot of exceptions and adjectives have their exceptions with comparatives and superlatives, these exceptions are better known as Irregular comparisons. An irregular comparison does not have rules of syllables.

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Positive Comparative Superlative ObservationsGood Better The bestBad Worse The worstLittle Less The leastMany More The mostMuch More The mostFar Farther The farthest only of distance

Far Further The furthestdistance,degree and time

Old Older The oldest people and things

With the positive form of the adjective we can also make other forms of comparison, for example as...as and not as/not so...as.

You are as tall as your brother

This spaghetti is not as good as the spaghetti my wife makes

It is common to use nouns as adjectives by putting them before other nouns.

A car bumper A strawberry and cheese pie A guitar box

When two nouns are used together, sometimes are written as just one word, in some cases a hyphen is used.

The raincoat The toothbrush

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Lesson 19Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe book-case The writing -desk.

When a noun is used as an adjective before another noun, it is almost always singular (even if the meaning is plural) People who repair shoes are called Shoe-repairers (not shoes... as we do in Spanish); People who sell houses are called House agents (not houses); a brush for teeth is a toothbrush. Plural expressions with numbers also become singular when they are used as adjectives.

five miles a five mile run

ten minutes a ten minute discussion

In some cases we change nouns into adjectives by adding “Ed”

A green-eyed man

Black-framed glasses

Some adjectives describing human values or conditions can be preceded by the, and they are used as nouns. Some of the most common are: Good, bad, poor, rich, healthy, sick, young, old, living, dead, etc.

The young = The young people

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Lesson 19Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe young are inexperienced and crash more often

The rich = The rich people

The rich are not as generous as the poor

These expressions have a plural meaning, they must be followed by a plural verb and if there is any pronoun it must be they .

EXERCISES

EXERCISE 1: Correct the order of the adjectives in the following sentences.

1. She got a German antique classic white car

________________________________________________________________________

2. He is a tango Argentine old dancer

________________________________________________________________________

3. We lived in a colorful pretty wooden little house

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________________________________________________________________________

EXERCISE 2: Write the positive, comparative and superlative for each case.

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VERBS

DEFINITION

A verb is a word which is concerned with what people and things do, and what happens to them. Verbs express action and sometimes also help to make sentences. Some verbs for example: Be, feel, and appear do not express an action, they express a physical condition.

There are two main classes of verbs in English: The auxiliary verbs and the ordinary verbs. The auxiliary verbs are those verbs that act independently, they do not need any help, all the contrary, they give help when necessary, these verbs express generally a specific time of the action or a degree of emotion, some of these verbs are: Be (am, is, are, was, were, been, being, ain’t) Do, may, can, might, must, should, will, have (perfect tenses). The ordinary verbs are the rest of the verbs.

Verbs can be classified according to the ways they function with subject, objects and other verbs. Ordinary verbs can be divided into action verbs and linking verbs. Action verbs are precisely those verbs that involve some action for example come and go, but it is important for you to know that sometimes the actions can not be seen for instance: Believe, know, understand, remember. The linking verbs are those verbs that help to make a statement and they describe conditions not actions. The verb to be is the most common linking verb, other linking verbs are: Feel, look, grow, remain, stay, smell turn taste, become. Many of these verbs can be used as action verbs too. In order to be a linking verb the verb must be followed by a noun or pronoun that names the subject, or an adjective that describes it.

The answer is no

The groups are difficult to control

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Lesson 19Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseCruz Azul will be the champion

Robert looks sad

All the ordinary verbs have five parts: Infinitive, 3rd person (only in present), Simple past, Present participle, Past participle.

INFINITIVE To eat To teach To walk To put3rd PERSON Eats Teaches Walks PutsSIMPLE PAST Ate Taught Walked PutPRESENT PARTICIPLE Eating Teaching Walking PuttingPAST PARTICIPLE Eaten Taught Walked Put

Verbs can also be classified according to their changes of spelling, the verbs are classified as regular verbs and irregular verbs. The regular verbs are those verbs that for the simple past and the past participle we only need to add d or ed to the infinitive. Sometimes the final consonant of the infinitive has to be doubled: stop, stopped, admit, admitted.

Irregular verbs just as the name says are irregular because in order to form their simple past and past participle we need to learn them by memory, some of them change just in a vowel come, came, come. Some change consonants bring, brought, brought. Some change the ending steal, stole, stolen. Some never change cut, cut, cut.

English SpanishPresent simple He sings El cantaPresent progressive He is singing El esta cantandoPresent perfect He has sung El ha cantado

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Lesson 19Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CoursePresent perfect continuous He has been singing El ha estado cantandoPast simple He sang El cantóPast progressive He was singing El estuvo cantandoPast perfect He had sung El había cantadoPast perfect continuous He had been singing El había estado cantandoFuture simple He will sing El cantaráFuture progressive He will be singing El estará cantandoFuture perfect He will have song El habrá cantado

Future perfect continuousHe will have been singing El habrá estado cantando

Modal auxiliaries He can sing El puede cantar (habilidad)He could sing El pudo (podría) cantar (habilidad)

He had better singMas vale que el cante (recomendable)

He may sing El puede cantar (quizás) He might sing El podría cantar (posibilidad)He must sing El debe cantarHe ought to sing El debería cantarHe shall sing El cantaráHe should sing El debería cantarHe would sing El cantaría

Similar expressions He is able to sing El puede cantarHe is going to sing El va a cantarHe is supposed to sing Se supone el cantaráHe has to sing El tiene que cantarHe used to sing El solía cantarHe could have sung El podría haber cantado

He may have sungEl pudo haber cantado (posibilidad)

He might have sungEl podría haber cantado(posibilidad)

He must have sung El debió haber cantado

He should have sungEl debería haber cantado (sugerencia)

He would have sung El habría cantado (posibilidad)

He has had to singEl ha tenido que cantar (obligación)

He had had to singEl había tenido que cantar (obligación)

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The present participle is very easy to form, we just need to add ing to the infinitive although sometimes we also need to double the last consonant: begin, beginning.

There are three basic tenses in English present, past and future and each one has four different forms simple, progressive, perfect and perfect continuous, so we can say only one verb in 12 different ways, sometimes we get confused with them but with this chart it will be very easy.

We will give you a list of some common irregular verbs.

Some verbs are similar in spelling and sometimes we get confused because of that. Let’s analyze them.

INFINITIVE PRES. PARTICIPLE SIMPLE PAST PAST PARTICIPLE MEANING

feel feeling felt have feltTo have a sensation

fill filling filled have filled Fill the gas tank

fall falling fell have fallenA bad step and...

fly flying flew have flownBirds fly in the air

flow flowing flowed have flowedRivers flow to the sea

lay laying laid have laid Put downlie lying lay have lain Be downlie lying lied have lied Say false thingslive living lived have lived Opposite of dieleave leaving leaved have leaved Go away

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Lesson 19Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Courserise rising rose have risen Get higherraise raising raised have raised Move up

EXERCISE 1. Give the correct ing form for the following verbs.

1. hold2. act3. open4. begin5. die6. employ7. fry

8. sit9. hide10. run11. ruin12. come13. write14. eat

15. sit16. act17. open18. begin19. die20. employ21. fry

EXERCISE 2. Give the correct ing and ed forms for the following verbs.

1. boil2. try3. stay4. offer

5. prefer6. gain7. plan8. tie

EXERCISE 3. Use the simple present or the present progressive of the verbs in parentheses.

1. Diane can’t come to the phone because she (wash)__ is washing ___ her hair

2. Katy (sit)_______________________ in the front row.

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3. Please be quiet, we (try)________________________ to concentrate.

4. I-wrote to my friend last week. He hasn’t answered my letter yet. I-

(wait)___________________________ for a reply.

5. After three days of rain, I’m glad that the sun (shine)________________________ again

today.

6. Mike is a student, but he (go)______________________ to school right now because

it’s summer. He (attend)__________________________ college from September to May

every year, but in the summers he (have)_______________ a job at the post office.

EXERCISE 4. Put the following sentences into the simple past tense. You have to add some words to give complete information.

1. He is a good pilot He was a good pilot two years ago

2. We are in Acapulco

3. Edgar has a Lincoln Town Car

4. This pencil is new

5. I’m working with a computer

6. We are good students, aren’t we?

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ADVERBS

DEFINITION

An adverb is a word that modifies a verb, an adjective or another verb. Adverbs sometimes modify phrases, clauses and whole sentences. An adverb usually answers the questions how, where, when, how often, to what extent. Some examples are: Inside, really, rarely, directly.

She went inside there

Karen looked really sick

Your performance is rarely slow

Nancy went directly to her house

Many adverbs are formed just by adding “ly” to an adjective

Nice Nicely

Rough Roughly

Hard Hardly

Strong Strongly

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Lesson 20Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseIn English there are rules for everything and adverbs are not the exception, they have rules for spelling, here we have them.

Final y changes to “i”+ ly

Happy Happily

Final e does not change

Brave Bravely

Exceptions: True-Truly, Whole-Wholly

Adjectives that end in able/ible drop the final e and add y

Inevitable Inevitably

Possible Possibly

When adjectives end in L just add another L and Y

Unusual Unusually

Useful Usefully

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Lesson 20Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThere are eight different kinds of adverbs, they are: Adverbs of manner, place, time, frequency, certainty, degree, interrogative, relative.

Adverbs of manner describe the action, how the subject is performing the action. Well, nice, slowly, quickly, beautifully are some of them.

My aunt Vicki runs slowly

They ran quickly to the beach

She played tennis beautifully

You cook well

Adverbs of place tell us where the action is taking place: Near, far, here, there, above, under etc.

The policeman was here

Huatulco is near

God is everywhere

Adverbs of time tell us when the action is done: Now, then, yesterday, tomorrow, etc.

Are you coming up tomorrow?

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Lesson 20Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseWe have to do it now.

Adverbs of frequency tell us how frequently an action is done: Always, never, sometimes, usually, etc.

We never go to Zocalo

David sometimes goes to Karen’s house

Adverbs of certainty tell us how certain we are about an action or a description: Surely, apparently, obviously, etc. are some of them.

Juan certainly is a good student

Carlitos apparently made some mistakes in December

Obviously we made a mistake 6 years before

Adverbs of degree are those that give or reduce the intensity of an adjective or another adverb. Very, truly, only, really, quite, scarcely, barely are adverbs of degree.

Carlos Hermosillo plays soccer very well

We are almost finished

He loves you badly

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Lesson 20Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseInterrogative adverbs are those adverbs that ask questions: Who, when, where, what, why, etc.

Who are you?

What are you talking about?

Relative adverbs are interrogative adverbs that can be also used to connect parts of a sentence.

The restaurant where I-met her

The girl who impressed me

EXCEPTIONS

The adverbs have some exceptions, the first is that the adverb of good is well, some adjectives that end in ly must not be confused with adverbs: Ghostly, likely, lonely, silly, ugly are some examples.

Some words can either be used as adjectives or adverbs: High, low, near, far, fast, slow, enough, little, much, late, etc.

Fairly and rather mean moderately, but fairly is used with favorable adjectives and adverbs while rather is used with unfavorable adjectives and adverbs.

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Lapuente was fairly good, but Aguirre is rather stupid

Carlitos stole fairly well in his chance, but Raulito did rather badly

With adjectives and adverbs which are not favorable or unfavorable for example fast, slow, thin, hot, cold the speaker can express approval saying fairly and disapproval saying rather.

You look fairly thin (I like your shape)

You look rather thin (I just don’t like the way you look)

EXERCISE 1. Write 2 examples with each type of adverb, you have to write 18 sentences.

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PREPOSITIONS

DEFINITION

A preposition is a word that shows the relationship of a noun or a pronoun to some other word or sentence.

One way to identify prepositions is to look for words that indicate connections between other words. Prepositions indicate not only space relationship (as in “The notebook is on the desk”) but also time relationship (“He left just after your phone call”) and they also show relationship between ideas (“All the students, including Robert, arrived on time”). Nevertheless other words also indicate relationships so, the only way to identify prepositions is to memorize the most common ones.

Most prepositions are short words. Their forms never change no matter where they appear in sentences. Here we have a list of 60 prepositions that will be useful.

Aboard

About

Above

Across

After

Against

Along

Among

Around

As

At

Before

Behind

Below

Beneath

Beside

Besides

Between

Beyond

But

By

Concerning

Despite

Down

During

Except

Excluding

For

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In

Including

Inside

Into

Like

Near

Of

Off

On

Onto

Out

Outside

Over

Past

Regarding

Round

Since

Through

Throughout

Till

To

Toward

Under

Underneath

Unlike

Until

Up

Upon

With

Within

Without

Many of these words can also work as other parts of speech. Many work as adverbs and some of them as conjunctions.

Several prepositions have usage problems, principally because in many cases the only rule to know which preposition to use, when to use it, where to put it etc. is habit. We are going to check some of the most common problems.

At, in and on are all used to talk about position in space. The differences between them are very complicated, and it is not always easy to know which of the three is correct or when to use one or another.

At is used to when we talk about positions at a point.

Ex.

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My house is at the third crossroad after the bridge

If you are at the South Pole every direction is north

I’m at home

We can say that we use at when we say that we are not in a definite position, when we are somewhere inside a big place.

On is used to talk about position on a line or a surface.

Ex.

We’ve got a nice little cottage on the river

There’s a good restaurant on the way to Toluca

Please write it on the board

You used to have some nice ornaments on this wall

We can say that on is used to indicate that something is placed on a surface and it’s touching it, and it is also used to indicate that some object is placed on the same line that another one.

In is used to talk about position inside a closed place or in a place with Length, Breadth and Depth.

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Ex.

I-think I-left my keys in your room

We are going to be in the meeting room

I-was one hour in the bank

We have to tell you that it’s not as simple as this, there are some special uses of the preposition at and we are going to study them. We may use at when the size of the place is not important, not necessarily because it is a point.

A person who comes from a small Guanajuato city like Celaya will say that he lives in Celaya, but a person who is traveling from Mexico City to San Luis Potosi will say that he stops at Celaya. For the first person, the place is well known and important, it has streets, houses, bars, shops, houses etc. but for the traveler it is just a point on a journey.

We often use at with the name of a place when we are interested in the activity that happens there, and not in the exact shape and dimensions of the place. For this reason, at is very often used when we talk about places of entertainment, cafes, restaurants, and about the places where people work or study. We also use at in addresses, when the number of the house is given.

Ex.

My friend works at Compaq Computer Inc.

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Lesson 21Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseWhy don’t we have lunch at that nice little restaurant?

Last Saturday we were at Chillis

Angeles is at school in classroom number 4

I-live at 200 East River Road

Most of the time prepositions are not interchangeable. Using a preposition when another is needed is a mistake.

Would you please write it in the board?

In this case you have to say on not in because it is very difficult to write something in the board, you have to break the board in two pieces and then write in the board, However in other cases to write in or on makes very little difference and it is acceptable.

Professor Senna is an expert in mechanical engineering

Professor Senna is an expert on mechanical engineering

Other common mistakes are omitting prepositions when they are needed, and including prepositions when they are not needed. As we said before sometimes mentioning or not mentioning a preposition makes no difference.

A bee can travel more than 20 miles (in) a day

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Lesson 21Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseIn this sentence the meaning does not change whether the preposition is included or not, both ways are acceptable.

Nancy and Brenda are going a party

In this case we must include the right preposition: To, Nancy and Brenda are going to a party.

In the following case the preposition off is sufficient by itself and does not require the help of the additional preposition of.

Take your feet off the table!, not, Take your feet off of the table!.

Some verbs and adjectives are followed by specific prepositions, not because the two are logically connected but because good speakers and writers have used them that way. For example the adjective capable is always used with the preposition of.

Green Bay Packers are capable of defeating New England Patriots.

You are capable of doing a much better job than you have done so far.

If you use another preposition instead of would be incorrect, here we have a list of those verbs and adjectives that need a preposition in order to work correctly.

Center on Common to Compatible with

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Lesson 21Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseConsist of

Capable of

Depend on

Different from

Dream of

Inferior to

Opposite of

Rely on

Similar to

Substitute for

Think of

There are also compound prepositions, which are made up of prepositions and other words; they work in the same way as normal prepositions do. Here we have a list of compound prepositions.

According to

Along with

Apart from

As for

As of

Aside from

Because of

By means of

By way of

Except for

In addition to

In back of

In case of

In front of

In place of

In regard to

In spite of

Instead of

Next to

On account of

On behalf of

On top of

Out of

Owing to

Prior to

Regardless of

With regard to

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CONJUNCTIONS AND INTERJECTIONS

DEFINITION

A conjunction is a word that joins together words, phrases or sentences. A conjunction relates a noun or pronoun following it to a word that comes before it. There are three kinds of conjunctions: Coordinating conjunctions, correlative conjunctions, and subordinating conjunctions. This is kind of complicated so we are going to call them connectors, yes, connectors of two ideas.

COORDINATING CONJUNCTIONS

Coordinating conjunctions consist of only one word, and they always join items of the same kind. They may join single words, or they may join groups of words and of course we have a list of these conjunctions.

CORRELATIVE CONJUNCTIONS

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Lesson 22Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseCorrelative conjunctions also connect items of the same kind, but they are always used in pairs. Below is a list of correlative conjunctions.

SUBORDINATING CONJUNCTIONS

Subordinating conjunctions join mini-sentences in order to form complex sentences. They can clarify time sequences, express possibilities, compare ideas, add information and express cause-effect relationships. Relative pronouns and relative adverbs work as subordinating conjunctions. We also have a list of them.

TIME:

POSSIBILITY:

COMPARISON AND CONTRAST:

MANNER AND LOCATION:

CAUSE AND EFFECT:

After, as, before, once, till, until, while As if, if, unless, whether

Although, than, though

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Lesson 22Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseHow, where, wherever

Because, since, why

INTERJECTIONS

Interjections are words used to express a sudden feeling, for example, surprise, pleasure, pain, etc. Interjections have no grammatical relationship with the rest of the sentence. They always have an exclamation mark after them.

Ex.

Hello!

Hurrah!

Oh, my God!

Hey!

Ouch!

Exercise 1: Join the following sentences by using the right conjunction.

1. Michael was reading a book. George was drinking iced tea

_________________________________________________________________________

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Lesson 22Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course2. I-have a pencil. I-have a pen.

________________________________________________________________________

3. Jim has a new Mercedes. He can’t drive it.

______________________________________________________________________

4. We can’t play base ball. We have lost the ball.

_______________________________________________________________________

5. You can’t go out. You finish your homework

_______________________________________________________________________

6. We must walk faster. We won’t get on time to the class

_______________________________________________________________________

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Lesson 22Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseExercise 2: Put each interjection in front of the sentence with which it makes the best sense.

1. Ouch! ___________________ I-didn’t expect to meet you here.

2. Hello! ___________________ You have been to Russia

3. Ah! ___________________ That hurt me

4. How interesting! _____________________ This is the book I-wanted

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THE PARTS OF A SENTENCE

DEFINITION

A sentence is a group of words that expresses a complete thought. A sentence says something, all by itself. It is complete, it can stand alone. It is followed by a period or in some cases by an exclamation point ( ! ) or a question mark (?).

A sentence consists of two parts: The subject and the predicate. The subject of the sentence is the part about which something is being said. It is the person, animal or thing we are talking about.

Ex.

We washed the car yesterday

The girl in the blue jeans is really pretty

The ignition coils will be shipped this afternoon

The predicate is the part of the sentence which says something about the subject.

The production of this plant will be doubled within three months

Both Elephants and hippos are vegetarian

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Lesson 23Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseNicole’s leather jacket was a present from Tony

The simple subject is the main word or group of words in the complete subject. To distinguish the simple subject from the complete subject, select the most important word in the complete subject. This word names the person, place, thing or idea we are talking about.

The simple predicate, or verb, is the main word or group of words within the complete predicate. It is the operative word, the word that makes the statement or tells what happened.

The simple predicate may consist of a single verb or a verb phrase. A verb phrase is a verb consisting of more than one word. A verb has many forms and may consist of several words, sometimes up to four.

Ex.

Bill washed his car

Bill is washing his car

Bill has washed his car

Bill has been washing his car all morning long

Bill would have been washing his car if he hadn’t crashed it

When a verb consists of several words, it may be interrupted by another word or words. This is particularly true in questions.

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The car will soon be washed

It could not have been better

When will the work be finished?

As you can see these interrupting words are not verb words and are not of course part of the verb.

In order to analyze any sentence grammatically, we must be able to pick out the verb and the subject. As a rule it is easier to find the verb first. We can simply ask what happened? Then by asking Who? Or What? In front of the verb, we will find the subject.

Ex.

The inflation raised a 27.7% in 1997

What happened? Something raised This is the verb

What rose? The inflation this is the subject

COMPLEMENTS

A complement is a word that completes the predicate. It completes the meaning and its normal position is after the verb.

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Ex.

Adrienne developed a new system for Microsoft.

The verb is: Developed

The subject is: Adrienne

The base of this sentence is Adrienne developed but it is not complete, Adrienne developed what? Adrienne developed a new system, the complement is new system.

The dog watched us.

The subject is: Dog

The verb is: Watched

The dog watched what or who?

The complement is: Us

The complement may be a noun or a pronoun even an adjective. It may be single or compound.

The party without Jim is pretty dull

I-told you

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Lesson 23Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseThe end of the year brought luck and fortune

OBJECTS

Objects are complements that do not refer to the subject.

Alain needs help.

Robert took his camera with him.

You don’t recognize the name.

Help, camera and name do not explain or describe the subjects Alain, Robert or you. Need, take and recognize are action verbs.

There are two kind of objects: The direct object and the indirect object. Help, camera and name are called direct objects of those verbs. The direct object of a verb is a noun or a pronoun that receives the action of the verb, or shows the result of the action. It answers the question What? or Whom? after an action verb.

Ex.

Liz told a story

Liz told what? A story

Story is the direct object.

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Lesson 23Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseDavid asked Vinnie about his thesis

David asked whom? Vinnie

Vinnie is the direct object.

The indirect object of the verb is a noun or a pronoun that precedes the direct object and usually tells to whom or for whom and also to what or for what the action of the verb is done.

Liz told her nephew a story

Liz told a story to whom? to her nephew nephew is the indirect object

My father gave me a car

Father gave a car to whom? to me

Me is the indirect object

Both direct and indirect objects may be compound.

Sam sold books and cars Compound direct object

Sam sold John and me ten books Compound indirect object

Exercise 1: Identify the simple subject and the verb from the following sentences.

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Ex. After many years his sister came back from Spain

S V

1. Mr. Smith sat comfortably in his favorite seat

2. After a president’s period the peso is devaluated dramatically

3. Only then did we realized the seriousness of our problem

4. Many years ago we had the same problem with a different person

Exercise 2: Underline the subject, verbs and complements of the following sentences.

Ex. In Mexico taxes are quite high

S V C

1. Last administration caused extensive damage

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Lesson 23Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course2. Paula has been practicing ballet for a number of years

3. A politician is a person who steals someone or something

4. You must give time and attention to your clients

Exercise 3: Underline the direct and indirect objects of each sentence.

1. My little sister told me a story

2. We will give her a doll

3. Larissa often sends us a fax

4. Mina gave the asylum a donation.

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ARTICLES

DEFINITION

An article is a determiner used to signal, limit or individualize nouns and to specify their application (definite or indefinite). Article is the term used in grammar for the words A, An and The. A and An are called indefinite articles and The is called the definite article.

The points out particular persons, things or places. In general we use the definite article to indicate that noun refers to someone or something in particular, or that the noun has already been mentioned before. The can be used with all types of nouns.

The is not used with proper nouns (except for some exceptions) or for things in general.

Ex.

We love foot ball, basket ball and golf (not the foot ball, the basket ball, etc.)

In the case of possessives (when we use ’s) the normally signals the immediately adjacent noun, even if the expression refers to the second one. If this first word is another name the is not normally used. We say Gaby’s mother not the Gaby’s mother.

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Lesson 24Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseWhen we use the title of a person along with his/her name, this title can be considered as a part of the name, so we should not use the. To say The Doctor Lindseth would be as incorrect as to say The Joseph Lindseth.

If the name of the person is not mentioned, but only the title, we may use the, for example: What did the doctor say?

The is normally used for musical instruments.

Ex.

Play the piano please Mr. Pianoman

You will play the sax tonight

A and An are used to indicate that a noun is one of a general group, but it does not represent a particular person, thing or place. It is used when we mention someone or something for the first time. It can only be used with singular count nouns (A/An are similar to one). A is used before consonant sounds while An is used before vowel sounds.

A and An are not normally before proper nouns and can not be used for possessives or names with titles just as in the cases mentioned for the. We say a friend of Jim’s not a Jim’s friend.

A/An should be used before the names of professions (without names)

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Lesson 24Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseEx.

I’m a Doctor

She is studying to be a dancer

Although a and an are similar to the word one, they are not always interchangeable. One is a number and it means one, no more, while a/an mean one of a general group.

Ex.

An aspirin is no good (I need a different thing)

One aspirin is no good (I need two or three)

When we are counting or measuring time, distance, weight, etc. we can use either a/an or one for the singular.

Ex.

My father bought a/one kilo of apples

Singular count nouns must always have an article (or another determiner). We can say a dog, the dog, this dog, my dog, but not only dog.

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Do not use the to talk about things in general.

Life is hard (not the life is...)

Do not use a/an before plural nouns.

We went with some friends (not with a friends)

Use a/an to say what people’s professions are.

He is an architect (not He is architect)

Exercise 1: Fill in the blanks with the, a or an only if necessary.

1. ____________ rose is __________ flower.

2. There is ___________ horse in ______________ fields.

3. ___________ noun is _____________ name of _____________ thing.

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4. _________ table is ___________ piece of __________ furniture.

5. _________ children aren’t always careful on ________ road

6. We get __________ milk from _________ cows.

7. You put _________ record on ____________ deck to get __________ music.

8. ____________ horses are useful to ____________ farmers.

9. You can buy more with __________ pound than with ________ penny.

10. __________ men must have _________ air to live.

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CLAUSES

DEFINITION

A clause is a group of words that contains a verb with its subject and is used as a part of a sentence.

Although every clause has a subject and a verb, not all clauses express a complete thought. Therefore we have two kinds of clauses, those that can stand alone as a sentence and those that make complete sense only when they are used with another sentence. The first kind is called independent or main clause, and the second is called dependent or subordinate clause.

An independent or main clause expresses a complete thought and can stand by itself. It is a complete sentence. It contains the main subject and verb of a sentence.

Ex.

A dependent or subordinate clause does not express a complete thought and cannot stand alone. It is not a complete sentence. It must be connected to an independent clause.

Ex.

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Lesson 25Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseMr. Wynalda works in one of the franchises in downtown Newport, and he has a successful job.

In this example the clauses are joined by a comma and the coordinating conjunction and. They could also be written with a semicolon between them:

Mr. Wynalda works in one of the franchises in downtown Newport; he has a successful job.

or as separate sentences:

Mr. Wynalda works in one of the franchises in downtown Newport. He has a successful job.

A dependent or subordinate clause does not express a complete thought and cannot stand alone. It is not a complete sentence. It must be connected to an independent clause

Ex.

After you asked for it

Because I told them

These clauses sound incomplete to our ears because we know that they play a certain part in sentences. They need an independent clause to complete their meanings.

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Lesson 25Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseEx.

We called Dr. Brown immediately after you asked for it

They went to the concert because I told them

Subordinate clauses, like phrases, work in sentences as single parts of speech. A subordinate clause can be used as an adjective, an adverb, or a noun, for this it allows us to express ideas that are difficult or impossible to state with single-word nouns and modifiers alone.

Ex.

The asylum was established in the facilities where Mr. White used to work.

The clause acts as an adjective describing the noun facilities.

When my sister visited Newport last year, she went to Cap. Conwell’s house.

This clause works as an adverb of place.

What she did there was excellent.

The clause is acting as a noun, as the subject of the sentence.

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Lesson 25Hamer SHARP Teacher’s CourseAn adjective clause is a subordinate clause used as an adjective to modify a noun or a pronoun. It describes or gives information about a noun. Adjectives usually come before the noun they describe. However adjective clauses follow the noun they describe.

Ex.

We met the actor who is perfect for the commercial.

Is this the PC which is on sale.

This is the rotor that Luis designed.

Sometimes adjective clauses divide the principal clause. However, the adjective clause must go as near as possible to the noun it describes.

The rotor that Luis designed has the approval of the customer.

The purchase order which I received is in my office.

Not putting the clause as near as possible to the noun it describes may result in sentences with no sense.

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The adjective clause who could foretell the weather describes the noun Sitting Bull therefore we have to change the place of the clause.

Sitting Bull, who could foretell the weather, earned his living by trapping animals.

The adjective clause should go as near as possible to the noun it describes.

Adjective clauses are generally introduced by relative pronouns. Examples of relative pronouns are: Who, Whom, Whose, Whoever, Whomever, That, Which, What, Whatever, and Whichever. The relative pronouns that introduce adjective clauses are: Who, Whom, Whose, Which, and That.

Ex. Do you know the player who scored the goal in Toluca?

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The woman whose purse was stolen called the police.

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MORE ABOUT CLAUSES

2. Showing opposition (Unexpected result)

All of the following example sentences have the same meaning.Adverb Clauses even though

although

though

(a) Even though it was cold, I went swimming.

(b) Although it was cold, I went swimming.

(c) Though it was cold, I went swimming.Conjunctions but...anyway

but...still

yet... still

(d) It was cold, but I went swimming anyway.

(e) It was cold, but I still went swimming.

(f) It was cold, yet I still went swimming.Transitions nevertheless

nonetheless

however

(g)It was cold. Nevertheless, I went swimming

(h)It was cold. Nonetheless, I went swimming.

(i) It was cold. However, I still went swimming.Prepositions despite

in spite of

(j) I went swimming despite the cold weather.

(k) I went swimming in spite of the cold

weather.

Exercise 2.1 Combine the ideas in the two sentences. Use the given words. Use the negative if necessary to make a logical statement.

1. We went to the zoo. It was raining.

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but... anyway.

nevertheless

in spite of

Because

2. His grades were low. He was admitted to the university.

although ________________________________________________________

yet...still ________________________________________________________

nonetheless ________________________________________________________

despite ________________________________________________________

because of ________________________________________________________

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Exercise 2.2 Complete the following with your own words.

1. I had a cold but I _____________________________________________ anyway.

2. Even though I had a cold I ____________________________________________

3. Although I didn’t study ________________________________________________

4. I didn’t study but, _____________________________________________ anyway.

5. I got an “A” on the test even though _____________________________________

6. Even though John is a careful driver _____________________________________

7. Even though the food they served for dinner tasted terrible ___________________

8. I still trust her even though ____________________________________________

9. Even though he was drowning no one ___________________________________

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Lesson 26Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course10. Although I tried to be very careful ______________________________________

Exercise 2.3 Change the sentences by using nevertheless .

1. He wasn’t tired, but he went to bed anyway.

He wasn’t tired. Nevertheless, he went to bed.

2. She wasn’t hungry, but she ate two dishes of ice cream anyway.

______________________________________________________________

3. Even though Jack wasn’t feeling good, he went to class.

______________________________________________________________

4. I still trust him even though he lied to me.

______________________________________________________________

Nevertheless and but ... anyway have the same meaning: but ... anyway occurs primarily in speaking, and nevertheless occurs primarily in writing.

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5. Sally was very sad, but she smiled and pretending to have a good time.

______________________________________________________________

6. George did not panic even though he was alone and lost in the woods.

______________________________________________________________

7. Elizabeth is not a citizen in The United States, but she has to pay taxes

income taxes anyway. ____________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

8. Even though Henry Johnson is an honest politician, I would never vote for

him because I do not agree with his positions on foreign policy.

______________________________________________________________

9. The crime rate has continued to rise even though the local police department has implemented several new crime prevention programs.

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______________________________________________________________

10. Even though math has always been easy for him, he understands that it is not easy for everyone. As a result, he is a good teacher.

Exercise 2.4 Give sentences with the same meaning by using in spite of or despite.

1. Even though her grades were low, she was admitted to the university.

In spite of her low grades

Despite her low grades

In spite of the fact that her grades were low,

Despite the fact that her grades were low,

She was admitted to the university.

2. I like living in the dorm even though it is noisy.

3. Even though the work was hard, they enjoyed themselves.

4. They wanted to climb the mountain even though it was dangerous.

5. Although the weather was extremely hot, they went jogging in the park.

6. He is unhappy even though he has a vast fortune.

Exercise 2.5 Complete the following.

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1. I didn’t...but...anyway.

2. He is very old yet he still...

3. ...nevertheless we arrived on schedule.

4. Even though she wanted ....

5. I wanted ...however I...because...

6. The teacher ...even though...

7. Although...only...years old...

8. She never went to school however she...despite her lack of education.

9. Despite the fact that my...

10. I have decided to...even though...

3. Showing direct opposition.

ADVERB

CLAUSES

Whereas

While

(a) Mary is rich, whereas John is poor.

(b) Mary is rich, while John is poor.

(c) John is poor, while Mary is rich.

(d) Whereas Mary is rich, John is poor.

Whereas and while are used to show direct opposition: “this” is exactly the opposite of “that.” Whereas and while may be used with the idea of either clause with no difference in meaning.

Note: A comma is usually used even if

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the adverb clause comes second.

CONJUNCTION

But (e) Mary is rich, but John is poor.

(f) John is poor, but Mary is rich.

In (e) through (j): as with whereas

TRANSITIONS However

On the other hand

(g) Mary is rich; however, John is poor.

(h) John is poor; however Mary is rich.

(i) Mary is rich. John, on the other

hand, is poor.

(j) John is poor. Mary, on the other

hand, is rich.

and while, it does not make any difference which idea comes first and which idea comes second. The two ideas are directly opposite.

Exercise 3.1 Complete the following. Discuss other ways of expressing the same idea by moving the position of whereas and while.

1. Some people are fat, whereas ...others are thin. (Whereas some people are fat, others are thin.) (Some people are thin, whereas others are fat.)

2. Some people are tall, whereas...

3. Some people prefer to live in the country, while...

4. While some people know only their native language,...

5. A mouse is small, whereas...

6. The climate at sea level at the equator is always hot, whereas the climate at the

North and South poles...

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Lesson 26Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course7. Some people ..., while...

8. Some countries..., whereas...

Exercise 3.2 Give sentences with the same meaning by using however or on the other hand.

1. Florida has a warm climate, whereas Alaska has a cold climate.

2. While Fred is a good student, his brother is lazy.

3. Sue and Ray are expecting a child. Sue is hoping for a boy, whereas ray is hoping

for a girl.

4. Old people in my country usually live with their children, whereas the old in the United States often live by themselves.

5. In the United States, gambling casinos are not legal in most states, while in my country it is possible to gamble in any city or town.

Exercise 3.3 What aspects of your country and the United States are in contrast ? Use while, whereas, however, on the other hand.

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1. Size ? 6. Political system ? 11. Educational cost ?

2. Population ? 7. Economic system ? 12. Medical care ?

3. Food ? 8. Educational system ? 13. Family relationships ?

4. Time of meals ? 9. Religion ? 14. Public transportation ?

5. Climate ? 10. Student life ? 15. Length of history ?

4. Expressing Conditions in adverb clauses:

“If clauses”

(a) If it rains, the streets get wet. “If clauses” (also called adverb clauses of condition) present possible conditions. The main clause expresses results.

In (a) : POSSIBLE CONDITION = it rains RESULT = The streets get wet.

(b) If it rains tomorrow, I will take my umbrella.

A present tense, not a future tense, is used in an “if clause” even though the verb in the “if clause” may refer to a future event or situation, as in (b).

Words that introduce adverb clauses

if in case (that)

whether or not in the event (that)

even if unless

of condition (“if clauses”) :

only if

providing (that)

provided (that)

Exercise 4.1 Make sentences from the given possibilities. Use if.

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1. It may be cold tomorrow.

If it’s cold tomorrow, I’m going to stay home.

f it’s cold tomorrow, let’s go skating

f it’s cold tomorrow, you should wear your wool sweater.

We can’t go on a picnic if it’s cold tomorrow.

2. Maybe it will be hot tomorrow.

3. Robert will probably study for the test.

4. Maybe you will have some free time tomorrow.

5. The teacher maybe absent tomorrow.

6. Maybe you won’t do your homework tonight.

7. Maybe you will lock yourself out of your apartment.

8. Maybe the sun will be shining when you get up tomorrow morning.

5. Adverb clauses of condition :

Using “whether or not” and “even if.”

Whether or not

(a) I’m going to go swimming tomorrow whether or not it is cold.

Whether or not expresses the idea that neither this condition nor that condition matters; the result will be the same. In (a): if it is cold, I’m going swimming. If it is not cold, I’m going swimming. I don’t care

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(or: whether it is cold or not.)about the temperature. It doesn’t matter.

Even if

(b) I have decided to go swimming tomorrow. Even if the weather is cold. I’m going to go swimming.

Sentences with even if are close in meaning to those with whether or not. Even if gives the idea that a particular condition does not matter. The result will not change.

Compare:

(c) If Ann studies hard, she will pass the exam.

(d) Even if Mary studies hard, she won’t pass the exam.

“If clauses” are followed by expected results, as in (c).

Condition: Ann studies.

Expected result: she passes the exam.

“Even if clauses” are followed by unexpected results, as in (d).

Condition: Mary studies.

Unexpected result: She doesn’t pass the exam.

Exercise 5.1 Use the given information to complete sentences.

1. Usually people need to graduate from school to get a good job. But it’s different for De. Maybe Ed will graduate from school, and maybe he won’t. It doesn’t matter because he has a good job waiting for him in his father’s business.

a. Ed will get a job whether or not ...he graduates.

b. De will get a good job even if...he doesn’t graduate.

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Lesson 26Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course2. Sam’s uncle tells a lot of jokes. Sometimes they are funny, and sometimes they are not. It doesn’t matter.

a. Sam laughs at the jokes whether ... or not.

b. Sam laughs at the jokes even if...

3. Maybe you are finished with the exam, and maybe you are not. It doesn’t matter. The time is up.

a. You have to hand in your examination paper whether ... or not.

b. You have to hand in your examination paper even if...

4. It might snow, or it might not. We don’t want to go camping in the snow, but it doesn’t’ t matter.

a. We’re going to go camping in the mountains whether ... or not.

b. We’re going to go camping in the mountains even if ...

5. Max’s family doesn’t have enough money to send him to college. He would like to get a scholarship, but it doesn’t matter because he’s saved some money to go to school and has a part-time job.

a. Max. can go to school whether or not ...

b. Max can go to school even if...

6. Sometimes the weather is hot, sometimes the weather is cold. It doesn’t matter. My grandfather always wears his gray sweater.

a. My grandfather wears his gray sweater whether or not...

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b. My grandfather always wears his gray sweater even if...

7. Your approval doesn’t matter to me.

a. I’m going to marry Harry whether ... or not.

b. I’m going to marry Harry even if...

Complete the following.

8. I’m really angry! Maybe he’ll apologize and maybe he won’t. It doesn’t matter. Even

if ________________________________________ I won’t forgive him!

9. I’m exhausted. Please don’t wake me up even if...__________________________

10. I’m not going to ________________________ even if ______________________

11. Even if _____________________________ I’m going to ___________________

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12. I’m going to _____________________ whether or not ______________________

6. Adverb clauses of condition :

Using “in case (that)” and “in the event (that)”

(a) I’ll be at my uncle’s house in case you

(should) need to reach me.

(b) In the event that you (should) need to

reach me, I’ll be at my uncle’s house.

In case that and in the event that express the idea that something probably won’t happen, but it might.*

in case / in the even that = if by any chance this should happen.

Notes: In the event that is more formal than in case. The use of should in the adverb clause emphasizes the speaker’s uncertainty that something will happen.

*In case that and in the event that introduce adverb clauses. In case of and in the event of have the same meaning, but they are prepositions followed by a noun object:

In case of trouble, call the police = In case (that) there is trouble, call the police.

In the event of rain, the picnic will be cancelled = In the event (that) it rains, the

picnic will be cancelled.

Exercise 6.1. Show the relationship between the ideas in the two sentences by using in case and/or in the event that.

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Lesson 26Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course1. You probably won’t need to get in touch with me, but maybe you will. If so, I’ll give you my phone number.

I’ll give you my phone number in case you (should) need to get in touch with me / in the event that you (should) need to get in touch with me.

2. You probably won’t need to see me, but maybe you will.

If so, I’ll be in my office tomorrow morning around ten.

3. I don’t think you need any more information, but maybe you do. If so, you can call

me.

4. You probably don’t have any more questions, but maybe you do. If so, ask Dr.

Smith.

5. You will probably be satisfied with your purchase, but maybe not. If not, you can

return it to the store.

6. Jack probably won’t call, but maybe he will.

If so, please tell him that I’m at the library.

Complete the following.

7. I’ve told you all I know. In the event that you need more information,....

8. It’s a good idea for you to keep a written record of your credit card numbers

in case....

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Lesson 26Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course9. I think I’d better clean up the apartment in case....

10. I have my umbrella with me just in case....

11. In the event that the two countries agree to a peace treaty,....

12. I’ll try to be there on time, but in case I’m not,....

13. According to the manufacturer’s guarantee, I should return my new camera to the

factory in the event that....

7. Adverb clause of condition:

Using unless.

(a) I’ll go swimming tomorrow unless it’s cold.

(b) I’ll go swimming tomorrow if it isn’t cold.

unless = if ... not

In (a): unless it’s cold = If it isn’t cold

(a) and (b) have the same meaning.

Exercise 7.1. Make sentences with the same meaning by using unless.

1. I will go to the zoo if it isn’t cold.

I will go to the zoo unless it’s cold.

2. You can’t travel abroad if you don’t have passport.

3. You can’t get a driver’s license if you are not at least sixteen years old.

4. If I don’t get some film, I won’t be able to take pictures when Ann and Rob get here.

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Lesson 26Hamer SHARP Teacher’s Course5. You’ll get hungry during class if you don’t eat breakfast.

Exercise 7.2. Complete the sentences.

1. Your letter won’t be delivered unless ... it has the correct postage.

2. I’m sorry, but you can’t see the doctor unless....

3. I can’t graduate from school unless....

4. ....unless you put it in the refrigerator.

5. Unless it rains,....

6. Certain species of animals will soon become extinct unless....

7. ...unless I get a raise in salary.

8. Tomorrow I’m going to....unless....

9. The political situation in .... will continue to deteriorate unless....

10. Ivan never volunteers in class. He doesn’t say anything unless....

11. Unless you....

8. Adverb clauses of condition:

Using only if and providing/provided that

(a) The picnic will be cancelled only if it Only if expresses the idea that there is

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rains.

If it’s windy, we’ll go on the picnic.

If it’s cold, we’ll go on the picnic.

If it’s damp and foggy, we’ll go on the

picnic.

If it’s unbearably hot, we’ll go on the

picnic.

only one condition that will cause a particular result.

(b) Only if it rains will the picnic be

cancelled.

When only if begins a sentence, the subject and verb of the main clause are inverted, as in (b).

(c) Providing/provided (that) no one has any further questions, the meeting will be adjourned.

Providing that and provided that = if or only if

Exercise 8.1 Use the given information to complete the sentences.

1. John must get a scholarship in order to go to school. That is the only condition

under which he can go to school. If he doesn’t get one, he can’t go to school.

He can’t go to school only if .... he gets a scholarship.

2. You have to have an invitation in order to go to the party. That is the only condition

under which you will be admitted. If you don’t have an invitation, you can’t go.

You can go to the party only if...

3. You have to have a student visa in order to study here. Unless you have a student

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You can attend this school only if....

4. Jimmy’s mother doesn’t want him to chew gum, but sometimes he chews it anyway.

Jimmy .... only if he’s sure his mother won’t find out.

5. If you want to go to the movie, we’ll go. If you don’t want to go, we won’t go.

We .... only if you want to.

6. The temperature has to reach 32°F/0°C before water will freeze.

Water will freeze only if....

7. You must study hard. Then you will pass the exam.

Only if you study hard ....

8. You have to have a ticket. Then you can get into the soccer stadium.

Only if you have a ticket ....

9. My parent’s make me finish my homework before I can watch TV in the evening.

Only if my homework is finished....

10. I have to get a job. Then I will have enough money to go to school.

Only if I get the job....

Complete the following.

11. Yes, John, I will marry you-but only if ___________________________________

12. I _______________________ only if ___________________________________

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13. Only if ___________________________________________________________

Exercise 8.2 Give sentences with the same meaning by using only if and unless.

1. If you don’t study hard, you won’t pass the test.

You will pass the test only if you study hard.

You won’t pass the test unless you study hard.

2. If you don’t get a job, I can’t pay my bills.

3. Your clothes won’t get clean if you don’t use soap.

4. I can’t take any pictures if I don’t buy some film.

5. I don’t wake up if the alarm clock doesn’t ring.

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