Actually means “na verdade.”

Atualmente means “currently, today.”

We say, “Where are you currently employed?” or “Where are you currently working?”

We do not say, “Where are you actually working?”

That would mean the the speaker does not believe that you are working where you said you work. He is asking where you really work (na verdade).

Hello, everybody! How’s everything? Bom, hoje vamos falar um pouco sobre os binomials, uma expressão com dois termos coordenados por uma conjunção. Um dos binomials mais conhecidos é rock and roll. Em português temos binomials como vira e mexe, altos e baixos, idas e vindas, etc. mas em inglês eles são muito mais comuns.

Vejamos alguns exemplos:

Trial and error – Tentativa e erro

In this day and age – Nos dias de hoje

Supply and demand – Oferta e demanda

Wear and tear – Desgaste

Time and effort – Investimento pessoal (não financeiro) num projeto

Peace and quiet – Tempo para relaxar num ambiente silencioso

Neck and neck – sem vencedor (relacionado às corridas de cavalo)

Like night and day – totalmente diferentes

Bed and breakfast – um tipo de pousada onde você dorme e toma café da manhã

Cost an arm and a leg – Custar o olho da cara

Between a rock and a hard place – Entre a cruz e a espada

Agora é com vocês! Deixo aqui uns outros binomials em inglês e gostaria que vocês tentassem completá-los. Usar um bom dicionário monolíngüe ajuda bastante! Mais tarde publico a resposta nos comentários.

Food and _____ - condições básicas para se viver

He eats you out of house and _____ - Quando um hóspede como muito na sua casa

Bread and _____ - Seu ganha-pão

Flesh and _____ - Parentes, especialmente os filhos

Bits and _____ - incompleto, somente em partes

Bells and _____ - Cool gadgets on a car, computer, etc.

In all shapes and _____ - De todas as formas

For all intents and _____ - Na prática

Improve by leaps and _____ - Improve a lot.

See you!

Prof. Adir Ferreira - www.adirferreira.com

It surprised me to hear that we should not teach vocabulary in semantic sets because it seems logical to class words according to groupings such as colors, fruits etc. But actually my own personal experience backs up the claim that the learner is likely to confuse the words. I still confuse ‘red’ and ‘yellow’ in Portuguese amarelo and vermelho, and maybe I wouldn’t if I had learned them separately, mastering ‘red’ first and then when it was concretized in my vocabulary, then I could have learned ‘yellow’.

Robb Scott, Editor, ESL MiniConference Online provided some information about this at www.eslminiconf.net.

Semantic sets according to his article are:

- membership in a natural class (e.g., fruit names; addressed in the two studies and found to be confusing);
- relationship of a class member with name of the class (e.g., apple & fruit);
- similarity in spelling/pronunciation (particularly in the first few letters);
- similarity in length;
- belonging to a given object (e.g., keyboard, monitor, mouse, etc. belong to a computer);
- having opposite meanings (e.g., long vs. short);
- having largely overlapping meanings (e.g., lend, loan, rent, borrow; often confused in my experience);
- belonging to the same category of words (e.g., nouns);

Instead of learning lists of semantic sets, it is recommended to learn by grouping new vocabulary around looser themes, such as going out to eat, planning a trip, or celebrating an anniversary.

Learning new vocabulary through context clues is a strategy that is often recommended. But this is difficult for English as a second language learners because they often do not know enough vocabulary in English, so they miss the clues. While fluent English speakers understand a written English vocabulary of 10,000–100,000 words, most foreign students know only 2,000–7,000 English words prior to beginning to study at a university. For a reader to guess the meaning of new words using the context, he must know more than 98% of the words in the selected passage.

There are two levels of knowing a word: word recognition from the context is first level. To really know a word means knowing its “pronunciation, spelling, morphological and syntactic properties, and multiple meanings; the contexts in which the word can be used; the frequency with which it is used; and its collocates, or how it combines with other words.” according to Miriam Burt, Joy Kreeft Peyton, and Carol Van Duzer, Center for Adult English Language Acquisition.

They have the following suggestions for teaching English language learners:

1. Read passages that are only slightly above what you can read independently.

2. Learn high-frequency words first.

3. Provide learners with multiple exposures to specific words in multiple contexts. [This is what Denilso does with presenting multiple meanings of words to our blog readers].

4. Study lists of words and flashcards frequently.

5. Avoid learning synonyms, antonyms, or words in the same semantic set together.

6. Use both monolingual and bilingual dictionaries.

7. Test yourself by matching words to definitions or multiplechoice exercises periodically to see your progress in receptive vocabulary [word recognition].

8. Write sentences with the specific words and grammatical forms you have learned.

“Deal” is another word that has many different meanings in English. It is a noun, a verb, and part of several phrasal verbs as well.

In it’s simplest meaning, the word ‘deal’ means ‘contrato’ or ‘acordo,’ a business agreement such as a contract, a closed negotiation or an arrangement. The popular TV show here in the US ‘Deal or No Deal’ is clearly a good example of this use.

“I think we agree on the terms, so do we have a deal?”
“Acho que concordamos nas condições, então está tudo certo?”

In law, it is common to refer to ‘plea bargains’ as ‘deals.’

“The jury will convict you, so you should take the deal.”

“O júri vai te condenar, então acho que você deve aceitar o acordo.”

Another use of ‘deal’ as a noun is in the context of playing a card game. The act of giving everyone their playing cards is called ‘the deal.’ This leads us into the world of ‘deal’ as a verb. Giving everyone their cards is handled by the ‘dealer’ whose job it is ‘to deal the cards.’ The image of playing cards being dealt is a strong and common metaphor in our society, the ‘hand one is dealt’ indicating personal fate and destiny.

“This is a difficult time, but it is the hand that I have been dealt.”

“A situação está difícil, mas são coisas da vida.”

Check out this video where I explain a bit about this excellent metaphor.

One of my favorites is ‘to deal’ meaning ‘aguentar’ or even ‘dar jeito.’ This is perhaps a shortened version of ‘to deal with…’ something, which means the same thing.

“Do you mind picking up the kids later?”

“It’ll be tough, but I’ll deal.”

“Você pode pegar as crianças mais tarde?”

“Vai me atrapalhar, mas dou jeito.”

A slang phrase that is common is “What’s the deal?” which roughly translates to “O quê que é?” Related to that is the phrase “So the deal is…” which approximates “A parada é o seguinte…”

Also, a minor note: ‘to deal’ is the verb we use to mean ‘distribute illegal drugs.’ So a ‘traficante’ would be a ‘dealer’ in English.

Hope you all enjoyed!

Christopher - Portuguese Blog