British and American vehicules vocabulary

The world of languages

Infinitives and gerunds

Infinitives and gerunds from Ana Arias Castro

EXERCISES:

• English Page
• Englisch Hilfen 1
• Englisch Hilfen 2

Quiz about the English language

English language quiz from Ana Arias Castro

British vs. American English

Indo-European Languages

Indo-European languages are the world's largest family of languages.

Linguists believe they all came from a single language called Proto-Indo-European. This language was originally spoken somewhere in Eurasia. Today they are spoken all over the world.

The Indo-European languages are a family of several hundred related languages and dialects,including most major languages of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and South Asia.

Historically, this language family was also important in Anatolia and Central Asia.

The earliest Indo-European writing comes from the Bronze Age in the Anatolian and Mycenaean Greek languages. We can place the origin of Indo-European languages after the invention of farming, because some of the Proto-Indo-European words are farming words.


The languages of the Indo-European group have about three billion native speakers. Although it may not have as many different languages as some other language families, it has more native speakers than any other.

Of the 20 languages with the most speakers, 12 are Indo-European: English, Spanish, Hindi, Portuguese, Bengali, Russian, German, Sindhi, Punjabi, Marathi, French, and Urdu. They account for over 2.7 billion native speakers.

Four of the six official languages of the United Nations are Indo-European: English, Spanish, French, and Russian.



Text from Simple Wikipedia

European Day of Languages

Classroom language

Using the electronic Portfolio or e-PEL

This presentation explains what the Portfolio is and how to use its electronic version: the e-PEL:

O portfolio europeo das linguas from Ana Arias Castro

This is the link to the electronic Portfolio.

Bilingualism in the USA

British and American English

This presentation summarizes some of the main differences between British and American English:

British and American English from lilianamonserrat

Then if you want to try this exercise, you'll have to match the most common vocabulary which changes from one variety of English to the other.

For a more thorough explanation of these differences, read the article in Wikipedia.

Bilinguals are smarter than you think

Interesting infographic from the Khaleej Times:

Tips for English Learners

Facts about Languages

Did You Know That ?

• There are about 7,000 languages in the world.
• There are 50,000 characters in the Chinese language. You’ll need to know about 2,000 to read a newspaper.
• 12.44% of the world’s population speaks Mandarin as their first language.
• There are about 2,200 languages in Asia.
• 1/4 of the world’s population speaks at least some English.
• 50% of educational time in Luxembourg devoted to learning English, German, and French.
• There are 13 ways to spell the ‘o’ sound in French.
• There is a language in Botswana that consists of mainly 5 types of clicks.
• There are 2,400 languages classified as being ‘in danger’.
• 231 languages are now completely extinct. These include Alderney French, Soyot and Togoyo.
• Ayapaneco. In Mexico this language is in danger of dying out , because its two remaining speakers refuse to talk to each other.
• One language dies about every 14 days.
• Eastern Siberia, Northwest Pacific Plateau of North America, And Northern Australia are hotspots for endangered languages.
• There are 12 imaginary languages in Lord of The Rings.
• Marc Okrand, the man who was credited with creating Klingon, was once a linguistics teacher at the University of California.
• Esperanto is an artificial language, but is spoken by about 500,000 to 2,000,000 people, and 2 feature films have been done in the language.
• The UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been published in 300 languages. It is the world's most translated document.
• There are 24 working languages of the EU.
• There are 6 official UN languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.
• The Bible is available in 2454 languages.
• Agatha Christie's novels are available in 7231combinations of book and language. She is the world's most translated author.
• 830 languages are spoken in Papua New Guinea.
• Frisian is the easiest foreign language for English speakers to learn. It is native to part of the Netherlands and has a common history and similar sounds.
• Welsh is spoken in Wales (the United Kingdom) and Argentina, as Welsh immigrants settled in Patagonia in 1865 and kept the language.
• The oldest written language was believed to be written in about 4500 BC.
• Rotokas has the smallest alphabet, just 11-12 letters, whereas Khmer (Cambodian) has the largest alphabet, 74 letters.
• South Africa has 11 official languages – the most for a single country.
• The pope tweets in 9 languages.
• German and French have been voted the best for graduates to learn to help enhance their prospect of getting a job.
• German is thought to be the most similar to English.
• If babies hear foreign languages in their first few months, they'll find picking up languages easier in later life, a study has shown.
• Sign language also has accents.
• The US has no official language.
• You can us an ATM in Latin in Vatican City.

taken from http://www.edudemic.com/language-quiz/

European Day of Languages 2014

The European Day of Languages is celebrated every year on the 26th of September. The European Commission has prepared some activities for schools to promote awareness of the richness of knowing several languages and being able to communicate with as many people as possible. This is part of our European cultural heritage.

This is the official site where you can find more information about this date.

And if you want to learn a lot more, the European Commission has elaborated a number of documents that highlight different aspects about multilingual diversity in Europe. Just have a look.

Here you are some interesting games and activities:

• Language Trivia
• Assess your language skills
• Language Facts
• Animal sounds in different European Languages
• Language Quiz
• Palindromes
• Longest words
• Tongue Twisters
• Idioms of the World

Newspaper headlines

Newspaper headlines are usually written as incomplete sentences as they have to be short, so they are often difficult to understand. These are some of the conventions used:

• There is often no verb:
• Unexpected Visit (=There Has Been An Unexpected Visit)
• Three, four, or more words are linked together. Reading backwards -starting at the end- can help you:
• Furniture Factory Pay Cut Row (=There has been a row -disagreement- in a furniture factory over pay cuts)
• Some verb changes are commonly used:
• Simple tenses insted of continuous or perfect forms
• Forgotten Brother Appears (=A forgotten brother has appeared)
• Opposition Backs PM (=The opposition supports the Prime Minister)
• The infinitive refers to the future:
• PM To Visit Australia (=The Prime Minister is Going to Visit Australia)
• Auxiliary verbs are dropped in the passive form:
• Man Killed In Accicent (=A man has been killed in an accident)
• No articles
• President Declares Celebration (=The President has declared a celebration)
• Terror Alert In The Capital (=There has been a terror alert in the capital)
• Vocabulary. Short words are preferred, even if they are not commonly used anywhere else:
• ACT: take action
• AID (noun): military or financial help
• AID (verb): help
• ALLEDGE: make an accusation
• APPEAR: appear in court accused of a crime
• AXE (noun): abolition
• AXE (verb) abolish; close down
• BACK: support
• BAN: forbid
• BAR: refuse
• BID: attempt
• BLAST: explosion; criticise violently
• BLAZE: fire
• BLOW: bad news
• BOND: association
• BOOM: big increase
• BOOST: encourage
• CALL FOR: demand
• CAMPAIGN: organized effort
• CLAIM: make a statement that something is true
• CLASH: quarrel; fight
• CURB: restrict
• DRAMA: incident
• DUMP:dismiss
• EMBRACE: meet; agree to
• FEAR(S): worry; concern
• FEUD: quarrel
• FURY: anger
• GRAB:confiscate; steal
• HIT: affect
• HURDLE: difficulty; obstacle
• KEY: answer; solution
• OPT FOR: choose
• OUST: replace
• OUTRAGE: anger
• PLAN: proposal
• PLEA: request
• PLEDGE: promise
• PROBE: investigate
• PURGE: control
• PUSH FOR: ask for; insist on
• QUIT: leave; resign
• QUIZ: question
• RAP: criticize; reprove
• RAID: attack
• RIDDLE: mystery
• ROW: disagreement
• SOAP (OPERA): TV series
• SET TO: ready to
• SEX ROMP: sex affair
• SHAKE UP: reform
• SHUN: avoid
• SINK: destroy; eliminate
• SLAM: criticise
• SNAG: criticise
• SNUB: difficulty; problem
• SOAR: increase; rise
• SPLIT: division; separation
• STORM: attack; anger
• SWOOP: raid
• THREAT: possibility
• TURMOIL: controversy; chaoes
• VOW: promise
• WAR: rivalry
• WED: marry; get married
• WOES: problems

Read more:

• http://abceda.com/headline.html
• http://site.iugaza.edu.ps/rareer/contact/courses/media-writing/news-headlines
• http://www.slideshare.net/Elenag77/the-language-of-headlines
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headlinese

Idioms about Money

If you want to read more infographics like this, you'll find them at www.grammar.net

DUOLINGO; New application for English language learners

This new application (Doulingo)  will help you if you would like to learn or improve your English. There are lots of easy-to-follow activities that will enhance your oral and written comprehension. You can choose your mother language and the target language from a large list of languages.

According to Wikipedia, Duolingo is a free language-learning and crowdsourced text translation platform. The service is designed so that, as users progress through the lessons, they simultaneously help to translate websites and other documents. As of July 2014, Duolingo offers Latin American Spanish, French, German, Brazilian Portuguese, Italian, and Dutch courses for English speakers, as well as American English for Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Polish, Turkish, Hungarian, Romanian, Japanese, Hindi, Indonesian, and Korean speakers. 

In January 2014 has 25 million users, out of which about 12.5 million are active.

So, if you are interested, you can get it from the Google Web Store and there are also versions for iOS and Android.

Misplaced adverbs

If you want to read more infographics like this, you'll find them at www.grammar.net

Idioms about Music

If you want to read more infographics like this, you'll find them at www.grammar.net