Hi everyone, today I received a comment from my friend Otávio on the post 14 tips to jumpstart your English, in which he presents an excellent method for improving your English vocabulary.This year I began a course to pass the entrance exam and today I had English class. I think that it is the class that I looked forward to the most each week. In the class of teacher Alex, they told me about a method of study so interesting that I decided to share it with you.

It is the following: You know those notebooks that have letters of the alphabet on the side? Like telephone notebooks, but it is a notebook with lines and everything else. First of all buy it. Then you will make it your personalized dictionary. Each new word that you read or learn, you will enter in the dictionary together with the translation. For example Go. Go to the G section and enter your translation. Then when you learn another word that begins with G, you should do the following: Write this second word below Go (example). When you are finished, read the first word and the second one. When you write the third one, read the first, second and the third, and so on. The beauty of the method is that if you write 50 words, the word Go you will have read at least 49 times, or that is, it will be almost impossible to forget after reading it so many times.

Thanks a lot for your tip, Luiz, I will try it.

Collaborator on the translation: MatPestana and Mary Ziller

Oi pessoal, a pronúncia de algumas palavras aparentemente simples às vezes causam a maior confusão. Hoje vamos conhecer 3: the, of e have. Provavelmente você já sabe, mas é sempre bom revisar. The – a pronuncia tradicional é /ðə/, onde o “ə” é o som de schwa, popularmente é como se fosse o som de “da”, esta pronúncia é utilizada somente antes de sons de consoantes, como no exemplo: “The book is on the table”. Quando o the está antes de sons de vogais a pronúncia muda para /ðiː/ , popularmente “di”. Veja o exemplo: The Umbrella.

Of – para pronunciar corretamente essa palavra lembre-se da palavra “ovo” sem o último “o”. Fica algo como “ãv”. Se vc pronunciar o “f” vira outra palavra, “off”.

Have – uma das maneiras de estrangeiro identificar que você é Brasileiro é essa. Normalmente os Brasileiros pronunciam “rév”. Mas o correto é “hæve”, onde o “æ” é um misto entre o “a” e o “e”.

I hope that helps.

Errata: Texto corrigido  com base no comentário  da leitora Márcia.

A couple of months ago, I sent an email to BBC Learning English asking about the English accent in American movies. Specialists from UK answered my question. If you want to hear it, click below:

Transcript

Host Man: I’ve just…got had an email just come in from Alessandro, is that the correct spelling? Alessandro. Great pronunciation yes (lots of laughs). And nice question, it’s about English… British and American English I guess. I would like to know if the British have problems with American movies, I mean the English and the grammar. And then…he says: you are top notch. Talking about the program (lots of laughs) that’s very nice Alessandro. What about that?

Guest Woman: That’s interesting, ‘cos we’ve been talking about spelling but we do find the American accents difficult to understand.

Guest Man: I find that some American accents, especially in Movies, especially with the sound may be kind of indistinct, very difficult, and increasingly difficult actually.

Guest Woman: I saw Broke Back Mountain the other day, and I have to say I really enjoyed it, but in the first fifteen minutes I couldn’t understand what was being said at all.

Presenter Woman: Although I having said that though, I think even within in the UK we also have difficulties understanding each other. For example, I sometimes find Scottish people quite difficult to understand. (Lots of laughs)

I hope that helps,

Keep in touch.

Thanks to: Adam, Antonia, Josney and Mary