Let’s talk about eloquence on a rainy Tuesday afternoon in October. Sentence structure and sharing our ideas clearly is so important in any language, but we know how tricky it can be to get those words into the right order when studying a new language. There really is no exception to the rule when speaking about word order in English, so the good news is that once you learn the rule, you will not make mistakes!

In Jason Kottke’s article, inspired by Mark Forsyth’s book The Elements of Eloquence Jason states, “…adjectives in English absolutely have to be in this order: opinion-size-age-shape-colour-origin-material-purpose Noun. So you can have a lovely little old rectangular green French silver whittling knife. But if you mess with that word order in the slightest you’ll sound like a maniac. It’s an odd thing that every English speaker uses that list, but almost none of us could write it out.”

While the Cambridge dictionary gives us a slightly different order: Opinion, Size, Quality, Shape, Age, Colour, Origin, Material, Type and Purpose, Noun. 

In other words, for a native speaker, this order is intuitive and learned. We know exactly how to construct the sentence, but we wouldn’t know how to tell you what order those words should be in. It’s the typical comment, “that’s just the way it is…” but in all truth, there is an actual order to it.

So, why don’t we try? Put the following words into the correct order:

1. table, a, square, wooden, big:

2. the,cup, tiny, plastic, blue, expensive

3. black, small, box, Turkish, old, a

Want more practice? Check out these links: 

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/english-grammar/adjectives/order-adjectives

http://perso.wanadoo.es/autoenglish/gr.adwo.p.htm

http://www.learnenglishfeelgood.com/esl_adjectiveorder4.html

And an exercise on word order in general: https://www.ego4u.com/en/cram-up/grammar/word-order/exercises?02

Finally, a lovely poem on word order by Alexandra Teague:

That summer, she had a student who was obsessed 
with the order of adjectives. A soldier in the South 
Vietnamese army, he had been taken prisoner when 

Saigon fell. He wanted to know why the order 
could not be altered. The sweltering city streets shook
with rockets and helicopters. The city sweltering 

streets. On the dusty brown field of the chalkboard, 
she wrote: The mother took warm homemade bread 
from the oven. City is essential to streets as homemade 

is essential to bread . He copied this down, but 
he wanted to know if his brothers were lost  before 
older, if he worked security at a twenty-story modern

downtown bank or downtown twenty-story modern.
When he first arrived, he did not know enough English 
to order a sandwich. He asked her to explain each part 

of Lovely big rectangular old red English Catholic
leather Bible. Evaluation before size. Age before color. 
Nationality before religion. Time before length. Adding 

and, one could determine if two adjectives were equal. 
After Saigon fell, he had survived nine long years 
of torture. Nine and long. He knew no other way to say this.

Photo Source

Post Insipired by: http://cupofjo.com/2016/09/grammar-rule/

Happy Monday and October to all of you…Today’s post comes from Los Angeles, California! Michelle Goodrich shares some very interesting perspectives on the importance of body language. How aware are you of your body language? Have you ever given it any thoughts?

Greetings from Los Angeles! I’m Michelle, a friend of Heidi’s and your guest blog writer. I’d like to introduce myself a little and then share an article about communication and our crazy presidential race here in the U.S. 

Today is the first day in a long time that the weather is cooler and we all seem to be walking just a little quicker. Did you know that summer is officially over next week? Get your light jackets out, September 22 is the first day of Autumn!

In ode to the summer and to all your brilliant summer tales this week, I thought I would share a very extraordinary story with you about a man, Gunther Holtorf, who decided to go on a 26 year holiday (177 countries and 884,000km (549,000 miles))! Talk about a very long summer.

Here’s a lovely photo-documentary by the photographer, David Lemke:

Gunther’s Travels

This article by the BBC gives you detailed information: http://www.bbc.com/news/special/2014/newsspec_8703/index.html

And before we check out for the weekend, how about an informative video on the differences between British and American English Pronunciation?British vs American | English Pronunciation Lesson

Can you tell the difference? Do you use one form of pronunciation more than the other? Or maybe you have a preference??

Photo Source: Philip Barlow

Welcome Back Everyone! As we slowly start up our motors and turn on our computers for a new season of work, I want to remind you on the benefits of learning English. Take a look at some fun facts above.

So sign up to class, join us for our Fall events and start practicing! This can only be good for you…

This summer has been a very heated season so far (up to now) and the news is unfortunately filled with a lot of stressful events and tension. I thought that perhaps the video below is a great way to remind us where we come from and that maybe, we should all be just a little kinder to each other. Or at least a little more respectful.

I have had lots of very interesting conversations this last week with many of my students and I hope this post helps spark (light) some insightful thoughts and interesting conversation on your summer table too.

And here are some ideas for Binge Watching this summer:

 http://www.npr.org/2016/06/15/481090485/read-watch-binge-like-this-movie-you-might-also-like

Feel like taking a leap (a jump, in reference to a challenge)? Here are the 12 New Books The New York Times journalists are reading this summer: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/27/books/12-new-books-were-reading-this-summer-and-6-not-so-new.html?_r=0

And for those who feel like cooking up a storm (a lot) here are some ideas:

http://www.yummly.com/

http://mimithorisson.com/my-recipes/

https://kitchenstories.io/

And please be kind to each other…

Photo Source

Yesterday was the first official day of the summer or Summer Solstice. I don’t know about you, but I LOVE summer. Long days, travel plans, beach, sun, ice cream, cool beers and lots of time outdoors with family and friends. What do you do for the summer? Do you like the summer or do you prefer another season?

In honor of summer, I thought I would share a little poem I recently came across (found) and I hope you enjoy it just as much as I do. Perhaps this is a good exercise to bring out the dictionary and add some new vocabulary to your word bank?

The Summer Day by Mary Oliver

Photo Source

Next Monday is the first official day of summer and before you pack your bags, throw on your swimsuit and slather on your sunscreen, we want to remind you that we have one last round table session to say goodbye to Spring and hello to Summer.

The last 4 sessions were a real success and it was wonderful to hear all of you share your opinions and point of views on various topics. This last session promises to be a great session as well and we will be talking about Today’s Technology and Social Media, How does it affect us? Francina, one of our loyal participants will be leading the session and I will be making a surprise cocktail to kick off the summer right.

So if you are free on Thursday, June 30th from 19.00-20.30h and have something to say on the subject of technology (who doesn’t?), join us! All levels and everyone is welcome.

When: Thursday, June 30th from 19.00-20.30h

Where: Espai 290, Aragó 290, Principal

How much: 10€ per person

Why: To exchange ideas, share opinions and improve your spoken English in a comfortable setting

Contact us if you haven’t signed up yet: hello@heidi-schmidt.com and we hope to see you there!

Photo Source & The inspiring Making of Video