Grammar ~20 min of the core left

Make a sentence people will understand

After this lesson you can

I can say a simple sentence in three parts — who, does what, what — and not put the words in an order that changes the meaning.

Start the lesson Core 18–20 min · steps: 6 · optional: +2

Declared core time. Two of the core blocks carry no figure at all, so the real lesson is longer than this sum.

Grammar

4 min

In English the word order is not free: the order itself is the grammar. The person who acts comes first, the action comes second, everything else comes after.

who does what what
I speak English
You know my brother
We live in Rio de Janeiro

Change the order — and the sentence either changes its meaning or falls apart.

The first five verbs. For now we use the forms for I and you — they are the same as the basic form of the verb:

verb
work to do a job
live to have your home in a place
speak to use a language
know to have information; to have met a person
like to enjoy, to think something is nice

Three rules about place, and learners break all three in the same way:

  1. The adjective goes before the noun: a big city, not a city big.
  2. Nothing goes between the verb and its object: I speak English well, not I speak well English.
  3. Where and when go at the end of the sentence, not between the doer and the verb: I work in Rio de Janeiro, not I in Rio de Janeiro work. A time phrase can also go at the start: Every day I speak English. (Short frequency words — always, often — follow their own rule; that is lesson 11.)
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Common learner errors

written for your language
1

The verb at the end

✗ I English speak

✓ I speak English

In Japanese, Korean, Turkish, Hindi and Persian the verb normally comes last, so learners put it last in English too. In English, moving words does not add emphasis — it breaks the sentence: the listener expects the doer first, then the verb straight after.

2

An adverb between the verb and the object

✗ I speak well English

✓ I speak English well

In French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese the adverb usually comes right after the verb (French Je parle bien anglais), and learners copy that order into English.

Pronunciation

3 min

Not all the words in a sentence are stressed. The stress falls on content words — the ones that carry the meaning; function words are said weakly and quickly.

I work in Rio de Janeiro. I speak English and Portuguese.

In fast speech in, and, a are almost not heard — this is normal, not careless. If you say every word with the same force, your speech sounds like a list.

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Text

3 min

I live in Rio de Janeiro. I work in a big office. I speak Portuguese and English. I like my work. You know my brother Tom. You like Italian food.

Reading aloud

Exercises

8–10 min

1. Word order.

  1. [ English / speak / I ]
  2. [ my brother / know / you ]
  3. [ a big office / in / work / I ]
Show the answers
I speak English. You know my brother. I work in a big office.

2. Error correction.

  1. I speak well English.
  2. Coffee I like.
  3. I in Rio de Janeiro live.
Show the answers
I speak English well. / I like coffee. / I live in Rio de Janeiro.

3. Gap fill.

  1. I in Rio de Janeiro
  2. I English and Portuguese
  3. You my sister
Show the answers
live / work, speak, know.

4. Matching.

  1. adjective
  2. adverb well
  3. place phrase
Show the answers
adjective — before the noun; adverb `well` — after the object; place phrase — at the end of the sentence.
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Summary

Covered

  • the order "who — does what — what"
  • the place of the adjective
  • the adverb and the place phrase
  • five verbs

Next — lesson 8: how to ask a question and how to say "no".

End of the core

The lesson counts as done once the exercises are done. Everything after this is optional.

Lesson 8

optional

Vocabulary for your deck

12 words
  • work /wɜːk/ to do a job; a job
  • live /lɪv/ to have your home in a place
  • speak /spiːk/ to use a language
  • know /nəʊ/ to have information about something
  • like /laɪk/ to think something is nice
  • office /ˈɒfɪs/ a room or building where people work at desks
  • food /fuːd/ what you eat
  • well /wel/ in a good way
  • every day /ˈevri deɪ/ on all days
  • English /ˈɪŋɡlɪʃ/ the English language; from England
  • now /naʊ/ at this moment
  • also /ˈɔːlsəʊ/ too, as well

Writing

Four sentences: where you live, where you work, what languages you speak, what you like.

Example

I live in Rio de Janeiro. I work in a big office. I speak Portuguese and English. I like Italian food.

Checklist

The draft is saved on this device
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Practise this lesson in the other sections

Dictationbased on this lesson Write down what you hear. The check shows every word that differs, and how. Write the dictation Reading aloudbased on this lesson Read the lesson text aloud — speech recognition highlights the words it did not catch. Read the text aloud Reading and listeningA1–C1 Texts at every level with comprehension questions; the transcript opens after you answer. Try it

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