Category Archives: Grammar

My Doctor Told Me …

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Some examples of how to tell someone else about advice your doctor gave you …

  • My doctor told me TO GET more sleep.
  • My doctor told me TO EXERCISE more.
  • My doctor told me NOT TO SMOKE so much.
  • My doctor told me NOT TO EAT so much junk food.

Don’t Say:

  • My doctor told me you should get more sleep.  (I, not you)
  • My doctor told me to don’t smoke.
  • My doctor told me to no eat so much junk food.

More Detail:

  • We usually use this type of speech to tell someone what somebody else said to you. It’s known as “reported speech“.

How Often

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  • Think of a question that starts with “How often should …“.  For example:
    • How often should I wash my car?
    • How often should I take a shower?
    • How often should my husband help me clean?
  • Then, spin the wheel, and see the answer!

The choices on the wheel are called “Adverbs of Frequency“.  Here’s a chart (some meanings are approximate).

80 Free English Class Videos

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  There is a YouTube channel called English For You.  They have recorded 80 classes of about one hour each.  They categorize them as:

The videos are a mix of American and British English.  Here’s an example – the first lesson from their elementary videos…

ESL Blues – Test Your English Grammar and Then Improve It

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The ESL Blues website has a set of “progress tests“.  When you take a progress test, it will ask you questions about different grammar points, or vocabulary.  For each question you get incorrect, it will show you the grammar point you got wrong – and a practice exercise to help you understand.

For example, one of the progress test questions is:

This is your book, not ____. That is my book over there.
a) my
b) of my
c) mine
d) to me

If your answer is not correct, you will see this:
My, mine, her, hers, etc.   (It links to a practice exercise about “mine”, which was the correct answer)

The website also has a set of tests for beginners, and short lessons to help explain common English mistakes, such as Do vs. Make and Say vs. Tell.

Never Say “I no have…”

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Don’t Say Say This
I no have time today. I don’t have time today.
I no have his phone number. I don’t have his phone number.
I no have to work tomorrow. I don’t have to work tomorrow.
I no have to work yesterday. I didn’t have to work yesterday.

Remember

  • Never, Never say “I no have“
  • For present tense, say “I don’t have…”
    • I don’t have any money.  I don’t have patience with my kids.  I don’t have to go to Boston.  I don’t have a headache.
    • Here are 25,000 more examples of “I don’t have” in American conversational speech on Youglish.com
  • For past tense, say “I didn’t have…”
    • I didn’t have school last week.  I didn’t have many friends when I was young.  I didn’t have electricity in my house until 8:00.  I didn’t have to shovel the driveway.
    • Here are 5,000 more examples of “I didn’t have”

Verb Conjugation

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  Here’s a website – called bab.la – that will help show you all the forms of most common English verbs.  For example, you can look up the conjugation of the verb EAT.  (I eat, he eats…; I ate, he ate…; I have eaten; etc. )
You can also translate each verb into any of 27 different languages.

If you have been studying English for a while, go to bab.la, look up the conjugation for a verb, and see how many of the verb forms you know.