Sunday, April 15, 2012

The English Language

English is not my first language. I have heard some people say English is an easy language. My family and I beg to differ. I learned English through a lot of repetition. There are times when my family and I are sitting around and happen to come up with the topic on languages. We always talk about the spelling of certain words and which words cause confusion in their meaning. Here are some of the things we end up getting a good laugh from. These are also the same things a lot of students ask in class when they are learning grammar and spelling in English.

A word we use many times during the day: 'understand'. It's two words made into one that gives a totally different meaning. For a child, the word understand maybe be broken down into the two different words and he/she may think "stand under what?" Should the opposite of understand be 'oversit'?

So here it goes. Some things I have come across through personal experience as well as found on the internet. Have a good laugh!

1. If you pull off the wings from a FLY, does it become a WALK instead? ... or a SWIM?...

2. Instead of a personality, does a dog have a DOGALITY? and a cat has a CATALITY?...

3. Why are tall buildings called FLATS?

4. Why do CAREGIVER and CARETAKER mean the same thing?

5. Why doesn't a BUTTERFLY fly with butter?

6. Why does the word FUNERAL begin with FUN?

7. Why doesn't LIPSTICK do what it is supposed to?

8. Why do we drive on PARKWAYS and park on DRIVEWAYS?

9. Why isn't BUT and PUT pronounced the same?

10. The homes that are stuck together, why are they called APARTments?

English is not AS easy as we think it to be. But with repetition and "understanding" it is not so bad! Improving your English can be done through reading books, reading on the Internet, doing riddles, crossword puzzles and word searches. I have also heard of people who have learned the basics of speaking English through television and the news! Keep your ears, eyes and mouth open if you want to improve your language speaking skills! Happy learning :)

1 comment:

  1. You're right. My mother learned to speak Italian listening to operas on old records! It is amazing how much we can learn by trying. I love the riddles and word searches idea. When I taught kindergarten, I used to rip apart the newspaper and circle a word in a title of the article and have the children scan for the word. Within weeks, they knew several words like "pizza", "dog" and "cat". (I only chose nice articles.)


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