Grammar ~20 min of the core left

Talk about another person

After this lesson you can

I can talk about another person — where they live and work — and ask about them.

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

An English verb has only one personal ending — -s in the third person singular. It comes with he, she, it and with nothing else.

I / you / we / they work, live, speak
he / she / it works, lives, speaks

In a question and a negative the ending moves to the helping verb, and the main verb stays without -s:

statement He works in a hotel.
question Does he work in a hotel?
negative He doesn't work in a hotel.
short answer Yes, he does. / No, he doesn't.

Spelling: after -s, -x, -ch, -sh, -o you add -es (teaches, goes); after a consonant with -y the letter changes (study → studies).

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Common learner errors

written for your language
1

The lost -s

✗ He work in a hotel

✓ He works in a hotel

Many languages — Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Thai, Indonesian — do not change the verb for the person at all, so the English -s seems unnecessary. Languages like Spanish, Portuguese or Arabic have a different ending for every person, so one small -s looks unimportant. This is the most persistent error of learners at all levels — it often stays even at B2.

2

A double ending

✗ Does he works?

✗ He doesn't works

✓ Does he work?

He doesn't work. The ending has already moved to does — you cannot put it a second time.

Pronunciation

3 min

The ending -s is said in three ways — the same as with the nouns in lesson 5:

Sound After what Examples
/s/ after voiceless sounds works, speaks, likes
/z/ after voiced sounds and vowels lives, knows, goes
/ɪz/ after hissing and hushing sounds teaches, watches, uses
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Text

3 min

My brother Tom lives in Italy. He works in a hotel. He speaks Italian and English. He doesn't speak Portuguese. His wife Anna is a doctor. She works in a hospital. She likes her job. She doesn't like early mornings.

Reading aloud

Exercises

8–10 min

1. Gap fill.

  1. He (work) in a shop
  2. She (speak) English
  3. Tom (study) Italian
  4. My sister (teach) in a school
Show the answers
works, speaks, studies, teaches.

2. Gap fill.

  1. he live here?
  2. She work on Monday
  3. you know Tom?
  4. He speak German
Show the answers
Does, doesn't, Do, doesn't.

3. Error correction.

  1. He work in a hotel.
  2. Does she works here?
  3. Tom don't like coffee.
Show the answers
He works in a hotel. / Does she work here? / Tom doesn't like coffee.

4. Matching.

  1. works
  2. speaks
  3. lives
  4. knows
  5. teaches
  6. watches
Show the answers
/s/ — works, speaks; /z/ — lives, knows; /ɪz/ — teaches, watches.
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Summary

Covered

  • the ending -s in the third person
  • does and doesn't
  • the short answer
  • the three ways to say -s

Next — lesson 10: time and your daily routine.

End of the core

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

Lesson 10

optional

Vocabulary for your deck

12 words
  • study /ˈstʌdi/ to learn at a school or from books
  • teach /tiːtʃ/ to help people learn something
  • go /ɡəʊ/ to move to another place
  • watch /wɒtʃ/ to look at something for some time (TV, a film)
  • use /juːz/ to do something with a thing (use a phone)
  • hotel /həʊˈtel/ a place where you pay to sleep when you travel
  • early /ˈɜːli/ near the start of the day; before the usual time
  • late /leɪt/ near the end of the day; after the usual time
  • morning /ˈmɔːnɪŋ/ the first part of the day
  • evening /ˈiːvnɪŋ/ the end of the day, before night
  • his /hɪz/ of him (his name)
  • her /hɜː/ of her (her job)

Writing

Four sentences about a family member: where they live, where they work, what they do and what they don't do.

Example

My brother lives in Italy. He works in a hotel. He speaks Italian. He doesn't speak Portuguese.

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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