For those of you who keep complaining about how “strange” this or that sounds in the English language compared to Portuguese, here it is a nice approach to the difficulties a Portuguese learner goes through!!
“We don’t need ‘this’ education…”
Roger Waters wrote this song about his views on formal education. He hated his grammar school teachers and felt they were more interested in keeping the kids quiet than teaching them. The bricks in the wall were the events in Water’s life which propelled him to build this wall around him, and his school teacher was another brick in the wall. The song is meant to be satirical. Waters explained: “You couldn’t find anybody in the world more pro-education than me. But the education I went through in boys’ grammar school in the ‘50s was very controlling and demanded rebellion. The song is meant to be a rebellion against government, against people who have power over you, who are wrong. Then it absolutely demanded that you rebel against that.”
Don’t miss it! Learn and practice the lyrics here!
Is there more to life than being happy?
A good exercise to improve your listening skills and acquire new vocabulary! She speaks very clearly and you can see the language we’ve already learned in a context everybody is interested in!
Why don’t you print the transcript and give a closer look to it? Play the video with English subtitles first, work on the transcript and then turn them off to listen again!
“Lose” or “loose”!
O inglês é usado hoje sem dúvida como veículo de comunicação entre todos os países. Nas redes sociais, chats e por toda a internet nós nos deparamos com pessoas do mundo todo, e uma das razões dessa interação é que muita, mas muita gente mesmo, fala inglês. A disseminação da língua é favorável em muitos aspectos, temos mais acesso e maior volume de material de pesquisa.
E uma das coisas que podemos perceber com tantos falantes estrangeiros da língua é que as dificuldades são sempre as mesmas.
Ontem, falamos sobre a diferença entre “to miss” and “to lose“. E esta última, por sua vez, requer que agora esclareçamos a confusão geralmente causada entre “lose” e “loose“.
A diferença na pronúncia é muito sutil, veja só: loose e lose (clique sobre cada uma para ouvir a pronúncia). A palavra “loose”é pronunciada /lus/ (com som de “s” no final) e a palavra “lose” é pronunciada /luz/ (com som de “z” no final). Porém o significado muda muito. Um dos significados de “loose” é “frouxo“.
Some of the shingles on the roof were loose. [Algumas telhas no telhado estavam frouxas.]
The rope was tied in a loose knot. [A corda estava amarrada com um nó frouxo.]
She was wearing a loose dress. [Ela estava usando um vestido frouxo.]
He was punched in the face and got a loose tooth. [Ele levou um soco na cara e ficou com um dente frouxo.]
Já “lose” é um verbo, cujo significado é “perder“.
She’s always losing her gloves. [Ela está sempre perdendo suas luvas.]
Hold my hand: I don’t want to lose you. [Segure minha mão: eu não quero te perder.]
We lost the game by a score of 4-2. [Nós perdemos o jogo por um placar de 4 a 2.]
He hates to lose when money is involved. [Ele odeia perder quando tem dinheiro envolvido.]
Baseado em Livia Bueno 4/abr/2011 http://blog.influx.com.br/2011/04/04/qual-a-diferenca-entre-lose-e-loose/
Never say “abraços” to an American!
And what about XOXO? Check this previous blog post for the answer!!