Clarified English

What is the difference between Idioms and Collocations?

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Thu, 3 May 2012 19:27:00 -0700

Hello Guys,

Here we are with one more post for today!!!!

But this is a special one, because it is about a question from one of our comments...

Someone wrote on comments that he was having some problems on identifying idioms and collocations.

Well, to solve this problem we brought this video from Dr. Descomplica or Denilso de Lima as you wish.

This video is part of a program Denilso developed in partnership with a Brazillian language school called InFlux, to give some tips about vocabulary.

It's in Portuguese, so we think it can be easier to understand...

So, Did you like it?

We hope you did!

See you next time!

And don't forget, we're always available: nataliadenisethais@gmail.com

Slangs

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Thu, 3 May 2012 18:47:00 -0700

Hello everybody, what’s up? Today I want to introduce a new topic: SLANGS! But.. what is slangs? Slang consists of very informal expressions or words which normally appears in speech rather than writing and are used by people who know each other well or who have the same jobs, backgrounds or interests. They are often quite strong in emotive terms and may sometimes be found offensive to people outside the group. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/learnit/learnitv167.shtml)

I have separated three slangs to start: nest egg; turn on a dime and on a shoestring. They are all related to money! $

Here is a very interesting podcast talking about these three slangs and what do they mean. If you have discovered what are their meanings, post on our comments and then we are going to check!

http://flowenglish.libsyn.com/

See you later alligator!

The Word today is GIN! (AGAIN?!?!?!?)

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Thu, 3 May 2012 14:00:00 -0700

Hello everybody!

Yes, we have one more post for today…. we’re on fire!

And the second word is: GIN

Do you know what gin means? Probably you already heard someone ordering it in a bar. It’s is an alcoholic drink made of cereals and juniperus berries and it’s used on many cocktails such as martinis. But this word also means a cotton-separating machine.

What else? In what more cases can we use this word? Let’s find out:

Phrasal Verb:

To gin up: to excite/to boost or to drink (particularly gin)

Idioms:

gin and tonic: a beverage made of gin and tonic water

gin rummy: a card game to be played by 2 or more people, in pairs or against each other.

Collocations:

Double gin: a double measure of gin

Large gin: a big glass of gin

To Sip gin: to drink gin in small quantities

Stiff gin: a very strong gin

Well, that is it for today (well, nobody knows....)

We hope you enjoyed this post.

Any doubts, please send us an e-mail: nataliadenisethais@gmail.com

Goodbye!

The word today is PLATE!

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Thu, 3 May 2012 09:33:00 -0700

Hello buddies!

Continuing with the posts about phrasal verbs, idioms and collocations with determined words, today we are going to see some other ways to use the word plate.

As everybody knows, plate is where we put our food to eat. It can be made of glass, porcelain or plastic and we can find it at home, in restaurants, hotels.

Let’s check in which different situations we can find "plate":

Phrasal Verb:

To plate up: to arrange the food on a plate

Idioms:

Give something to somebody on a plate: to make things easy to someone

Somebody’s head on a plate: when you are very angry to someone and want him/her to be punished

Have too much on one’s plate: means the person is too busy

Collocations:

Clear plate: empty

License plate: car tag

Soup plate: a special plate to have soup

To clear away the plate: to eat all the food

Well, that is it for today.

We hope you enjoyed this post.

Any doubts, please send us an e-mail: nataliadenisethais@gmail.com

Goodbye!

Collocations

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Wed, 2 May 2012 18:50:00 -0700

Hello Everybody!

While surfing on the internet, I was wondering that there are many examples of collocations in authentic material, such as news from CNN website. On the other hand, collocations are not so easy to identify as phrasal verbs and idioms.That’s why we decided to write this post, focusing on collocations.

We already explained what collocations are (see on the first post). But now we bring a new explanation, more complete, given by the teacher trainer Denilso de Lima who studies collocations for more than ten years.

He published a book just talking about this subject (Por que É Assim e Não é Assado? Campus, 2007).

In this podcast bellow you will find a great definition about what collocations are:

PODCAST: What are collocations

And now, after you’ve heard the podcast, do you still have any doubts? If you do, we propose you a challenge:

Treasure Hunt

Access this website: http://healthmad.com/health/10-simple-ways-to-maintain-good-health/

And now try to find at least 10 collocations, one for each topic. Can you do that?

Please send us your results! nataliadenisethais@gmail.com

Goodbye!

The word today is MAKE!

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Wed, 2 May 2012 05:06:00 -0700

What’s up guys?

Continuing the last post, today’s word is MAKE! Make is a word that is very used in English. Only the word make has several meanings: fazer, construir, elaborar, and many other meanings. Here we want to show how “make” works used with other words in idioms, collocations or phrasal verbs.

Idioms:

Make do – quebra galho.

E.g.: We don’t have a stapler here, can you make do with some scotch tape?

Make fun of – tirar sarro de.

E.g.: Americans used to make fun of canadian accent.

Make ends meet – ser capaz de pagar as contas com o que se ganha.

E.g: I wonder how John manages to make ends meet on such a low salary!

http://www.englishexperts.com.br/2007/06/18/expressoes-utilizadas-pelos-americanos/

Make mistakes – cometer erros. E.g.: Everybody makes mistakes sometimes.

Make a scene – fazer uma cena, armar barraco. E.g.: When she saw her husband cheating on her, she made a big scene at the bar.

Make progress – progredir. E.g: He is making a big progress in English.

http://xokmax.com/blog/2008/03/07/expressoes-idiomaticas-com-make-e-do/

Collocations:

make a baby – fazer um bebê; ter relação sexual.

E.g.: They have been trying to make a baby for years.

Make a bath – preparar um banho na temperatura certa.

E.g.: When I get home I Will make a very relaxing bath.

Make a breakthrough – fazer uma importante descoberta.

E.g.: Pedro Alvares Cabral made a breaktrhough when she found Brazil.

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Collocations_of_do,_have,_make,_and_take

Phrasal Verbs:

Make (something) out to be - clamar; assertar.

E.g.:

He makes himself out to be an important artist but his paintings are utter garbage.
I think the critics make that movie out to be more profound than it really is.

Make ( somebody) out – entender o caráter de uma pessoa.

E.g.: Since she is normally quiet and reserved it is hard to make her out.

Make up for – compensa por alguma coisa; repor alguma coisa perdida.

E.g.:

What she lacked in experience, she made up for in the way she learns quickly.
She spend two weeks with her family to make up for her year long absence.

http://www.vocabulary.cl/Advanced/Phrasal_Verbs/MAKE.htm

Well, that is it folks!

Any doubts, please send us an e-mail: nataliadenisethais@gmail.com

Goodbye!

The word today is HORSE!

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Tue, 1 May 2012 12:10:00 -0700

Hello guys, today we’re beginning a range of posts where you can find some phrasal verbs, collocations and idioms using a determined word.

It works like this: we choose a word and show you some of the phrasal verbs, collocations and idioms that you can use with it.

By giving these examples, we believe you’ll recognize them more easily and will be able to use them correctly.

As the title already said, the word we’re working today is Horse.

Of course everybody knows what horse means, right? It is a big animal, which was very useful to men in the past, by taking them through paths and joining them in the war. Nowadays we can find the majority of them in the countryside, where they’re used to help on the fields with the agriculture and cattle farming. And they’re used in sports too, such as polo and derby.

But all this explanation above won’t help you to find out the meaning of the expressions you’re about to see.

Here we go:

Phrasal Verbs:
To horse around: to act in a silly and careless way

Idioms:

Hold your horses: restrain/control yourself
A horse of another color: a totally different subject
Beat a dead horse: to pursue a cause that hasn’t hope to succeed.

Collocations
To breed a horse: to raise a horse
To shoe a horse: to put on the horseshoes in the animal
To get the horse ready: to prepare it to ride
Horsebox: where people transport the horses
Horseflesh: horses as a collectivity (in groups)

Well, that is it for today.

We hope you enjoyed this post.
Any doubts, please send us an e-mail: nataliadenisethais@gmail.com

Goodbye!

True Story

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 14:52:00 -0700

In a common day of class, correcting a composition, I've noticed that a student wrote: “She gave me the cake”. I immediately thought where the cake could be in that context, then, I realized that the student was trying to say that a person didn’t arrive where he/she was waiting, “giving him the cake”.

This is a common mistake in English, because the students don’t know that for many expressions in Portuguese there is another one totally different in English.

Give the cake is only one example.

When someone doesn’t appear in a meeting, we usually say in Portuguese that he/she gave us a cake. But in English the expression is “Stand somebody up”.

E.g.: “John stood me up at the mall”.

After all we laugh at the situation!!

Do you want to know a specific expression? Send us an e-mail: nataliadenisethais@gmail.com!

See you!

Phrasal Verbs, Idioms and Collocations

noreply@blogger.com (Natália, Denise. Thaís) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 05:15:00 -0700

Have you already heard about these three topics above?

Do you know the difference among them?

Well, what we can say is that the more you get to know them, the more you will be able to speak English fluently as a native.

So let’s start:

Phrasal Verbs are the verbs which are formed by two words and we can use them when we want to have an informal conversation. By using them, you show that you can talk to natives in their own way (as well as using the idioms and collocations).

Examples:

To call off: to cancel

To find out: to discover some information

To get up: to arise from bed/couch/chair

To look after: to take care of somebody or something

Idioms are figures of speech that always play a trick on second language learners.

We must pay attention to them because they’re expressions compounded by two or more words and the real meaning doesn’t have anything to do with the isolated meanings of the words involved.

Examples:

Never mind: forget it

Take your time: no need to rush

Act your age: don’t be a child

How are you doing?: to ask somebody if everything is okay

Collocations are two or more words that are often combined. It’s a sequence of terms that is very used by native speakers. If you don’t use them correctly, probably people will understand what you mean, but it would sound unnatural for them.

Examples:

· Money

Easy Money

Dirty Money

To make Money

To earn Money

· Door

Big Door

Sliding Door

To Shut the door

To unlock the door

After this explanation, we can now understand the difference among idioms, collocations and phrasal verbs. In spite of all this, we must bear in mind that all of them are very useful and can give us the fluency we wish.

The Collocations, Idioms and Phrasal Verbs help us to learn a more natural Spoken English.

Any doubts? Please contact us: nataliadenisethais@gmail.com