As a language teacher, I have always had the wish to work locally as much as possible. From the moment I started my own language school in 2010, something different happened though. I got more and more customers who wanted to have lessons via Skype and often lived outside of my own city or abroad. […]
English
Get to know Holly, our new tutor for British English online lessons!
Hi! I’m Holly and I’m a native English speaker from the U.K. currently living in Visé, Belgium. Business English Since moving to Belgium 2 years ago I have taught English as a foreign language in an Immersion Business School working with adults from a variety of professional backgrounds and nationalities . Here, I have taught […]
Our new tutor Luc introduces himself
Three months ago we welcomed a new tutor to our Taaltutor pool, Luc Boeke. Luc lives in Switzerland, but is originally Dutch. He mainly works as a Dutch tutor, but can also teach French and English. Who is Luc Boeke? “Energetic, agile communicator and networker, always on the move…” These are five key ingredients that […]
Gap words in Dutch: stopwoordjes!
We have all heard the following words used by people in English: you know, actually, so, okay, I guess, well, truly, really, totally, awesome, like, about, absolutely. And many more. They don’t always add to the meaning or intention of what you want to say, but often unconsciously, creep into our way of speaking. They are also referred to as gap […]
Read The Chaos and test your pronunciation
Here is a poem that loves to be read out loud by you! It is called ‘The Chaos’, written by a Dutch Anglicist and language critic Charivarius, pseudonym for Gerard Nolst Trenité. Don’t get your tongue twisted! Dearest creature in creation Studying English pronunciation, I will teach you in my verse Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse. I will keep you, Susy, busy, Make your head with heat grow dizzy; Tear in eye, your dress you’ll tear; Queer, […]
Top 5 Free Tools For Learning English
Top 5 Dictionaries Merriam-Webster: reliable allround and famous dictionary, offers American English translations, thesaurus, tutorials, with naturally pronounced audio; Oxford Dictionaries: great dictionary, British English, with hundreds of example sentences to check your words in context; The Free Dictionary: complete dictionary that refers to other well-known dictionaries, make your own homepage or word list, play Hangman, test your spelling; Your Dictionary: English […]
Promoting English a Day
When I started thinking about how to advertise my language-app English a Day I initially wanted to hire a marketing guru. Or someone who’s more specialized and experienced in this kind of work than I am. But at the same time I had the feeling that a language app should also be shown in pictures. Not too […]
English a Day, learn bit by bit!
Every student has a different way of learning. One loves to read and learn, another likes to listen and some can only concentrate for a few minutes and need instant feedback. As a teacher I know that I should be capable of offering all of these learning styles at once. However, that’s still a big […]
Mark’s English is not bad, hoor
I was quite pleased with the fact that during this weekend’s Nuclear Security Summit in The Hague our Dutch politicians didn’t make embarrassing blunders while speaking English. At least, these mistakes have not been taped or rephrased, as far as I know. Many of us know, I think, the famous words our former premier Joop […]
Ezelsbruggetjes #2 – Grammatical memory aids
In this blog more about memory aids for English grammar. Or, with another chic word, mnemonics!* The Dutch translation for ‘mnemonics’ is ‘ezelsbruggetjes’. Last time that I wrote about ‘ezelsbruggetjes’ I did that in Dutch, because mnemonics can help Dutch learners with remembering English grammar rules. And I also found out that my blog about […]
