Fala aí

Talking about your family

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Do you have a big family? What do you like doing when you spend time with your family?

Talking about family could be a good way to start a conversation in English, so it’s useful if you know what to say and if you have some questions to ask.

First, let’s review the vocabulary by looking at the family tree:

Watch the video to listen to examples of simple sentences.

Now gradually add more details and be more specific. Listen carefully and take notes.

You can read the full script of the video here.

So, are you now ready to talk about your family? Introduce them. Say who they are. Add details to make your answer longer and interesting.

1. Introduce your family and say who these people are:

  • There are four people in my family: my wife, my two sons and myself.

2. Talk about Brothers and Sisters:

  • I have two brothers and one sister.
  • I just have one sister.
  • I’m an only child.

Make it more interesting by adding more information:

  • I have two older brothers and one older sister. I’m the youngest in the family.
  • I just have one sister, who’s five years older than me.
  • I’m the middle child: my brother is two years older, and I have a younger sister who’s finishing university this year.

3. Immediate and Extended Family

In English, we sometimes draw a line between your immediate family (or nuclear family):

Immediate family –> you, your husband/wife, your children, parents, brothers and sisters

And your extended family:

Extended family –> uncles, aunts, cousins, nephews, nieces, grandparents, grandchildren

  • There are six people in my immediate family: my parents, my brother and his wife, my sister and me. I have a lot of other relatives, but they live in Canada so we don’t see them often.

If you want to be more specific, you can mention who is part of your paternal side of the family and maternal side of the family, the relatives on/from your dad’s side, and on/from your mom’s side of the family. 

4. Talking about Your Children:

  • I have three kids: two girls and a boy.
  • We have a newborn son.
  • We have one daughter, and my wife’s expecting our second child.

Add details to make your answers longer and more interesting:

  • I have three kids: two girls and a boy. Our eldest daughter has just started secondary school, and the two younger ones are still in primary school.

5. Talking about Your Relationship with Your Family

Finally, let’s add some information about how often you see your family, and what you like to do together:

  • I’m very close to my family. We have lunch together every weekend.
  • I see my older brother once a week; we play tennis or basketball together.
  • I try to spend as much time as possible with my kids.

There are more details you can still add!

  • I’m very close to my family. We have lunch together every weekend at my grandmother’s house. She always cooks something delicious!
  • I see my older brother once a week; we play tennis or basketball together. I don’t see my other brother so often, because he lives overseas, although we talk on Skype every so often.
  • I try to spend as much time as possible with my kids. We play cards, watch films, or go to the park if the weather’s nice.

6. Making a Longer Answer:

  • There are five people in my immediate family, although my extended family is quite large. I have two sisters, both younger, so I’m the oldest child. I don’t have kids yet but I’d like to have a big family one day. I see my parents and my sisters quite often, because we all live near each other, although I don’t see my other relatives that much.

What about you? Try to make a longer answer talking about your family. Use the vocabulary and ideas from the lesson to help you. Next time you talk about your family in English, hopefully you’ll have lots to talk about!

Rare snowfall

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A cold front reached southern Brazil from the 26th, Monday, causing rain. In its rear, a mass of cold air of polar origin advanced into the country.

Temperatures fell/dropped to below zero, with rare snowfall overnight in some places – as the polar air mass advanced toward the center-south. Ice and snow accumulated on the streets of cities where the wintry phenomenon was rarely seen. 

Many cities in the mountains of Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina, the two southernmost states, registered either snow or freezing rain late Wednesday. The unusually extreme weather in the country’s south kept the thermometers between 0 and 5° C in the early hours of Wednesday and during Thursday. Some places still had below-freezing (sub-zero) temperatures.

The relative humidity, the gusts of wind, the frost, and, consequently, the wind chill factor made us feel the cold even more intense.

Cars, streets, and highways were blanketed in ice while people took the opportunity to take pictures and play in the snow, building/making snowmen.

Snow is uncommon in Brazil, even in its southern region during the Southern Hemisphere’s winter. Brazil’s last blizzard (a severe snowstorm) was in 1957 when 1.3 meters of snow was recorded in a city in Santa Catarina state.

So, what can we do about it? Here are some tips.

Note: It’s the first time I decide to raise the issue of “ice safety.” Well,I guess change is everywhere. ?

Don’t miss out on the previous lessons on the weather!

Figure it out!

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The phrasal verb ‘to figure out is one of the most popular ones in English. So you need to understand it, as you will come across it very often.

Phrasal verbs are used a lot in spoken English, so to understand native speakers you need to know quite many of them.

Here is a challenge for you! You have only 30 seconds to ‘figure it out!’

So, were you able to figure the challenge out?

figure out

— phrasal verb /ˈfɪɡər/ US 

figure out something/somebody

figure something/somebody  out

​1. to solve a problem or to think about something/somebody until you understand them/it

  • I’m trying to figure out a way to make this work.
  • We had to figure out the connection between the two events.
  • It takes time to figure out new software.
  • Don’t worry, we’ll figure something out. (=find a way to solve the problem).
  • We couldn’t figure her out.
  • Women. I just can’t figure them out.

figure out how/what/who/why 

  • I can’t figure out how to do this.
  • I couldn’t figure out what the teacher was talking about.
  • He was trying to figure out why the camera wasn’t working.

2. ​to calculate an amount or the cost of something

  •  Have you figured out how much the trip will cost?

In the end or at the end?

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If the uses of in the end and at the end aren’t clear to you, keep reading – they’ll make perfect sense in the end, as it’s explained at the end of this introduction. Hehe…

At the end refers to a specific time or location, while in the end is an idiomatic phrase that means “in conclusion” or “in summary.”

Consider these examples:

  • At the end of the day we went home. In the end, it was a long day.
  • At the end of the game, our team won. In the end, our team won.
  • We were happy in the end. We weren’t happy at the end of the movie.
  • The heroes won in the end. The heroes celebrated at the end of their journey.

In the end

In the end means “finally,” “after a long time,“ or, “when everything is considered.“ It is often followed by a comma. Here are some sentences with this idiom:

  • We worked hard, and in the end, we achieved our goal.
  • In the end, everything is going to be fine.
  • All will turn out well in the end.
  • In the end we decided not to buy it.
  • I waited for a bus for an hour and, in the end, I decided to take a cab.

At the end

At the end is most commonly used followed by of, to refer to the end of a specific noun. This noun can be a physical object (book), a period of time (day), an event (class, game, concert), a place (street, avenue), or something more abstract (life).

Here are some sentences with at the end + of:

  • I’ll meet you here at the end of the concert.
  • At the end of the class, the teacher said she wanted to talk to me.
  • We all went home at the end of the game.
  • There’s this gigantic house at the end of the street.
  • I will have an answer at the end of the day, ok?
  • At the end of his life, he had no regrets.
  • Put a period at the end of every sentence.
  • I pay the phone bill at the end of each month.
  • There is a brick building at the end of the road.
  • My boss asked me to stay one more hour at the end of my shift.
  • The bathroom is the last door on the left at the end of the corridor.

Note: sometimes we can also omit the of with at the end, for example at the end of a sentence, but even so it is possible to see that we are talking about the end of something.

Example:

• This book is amazing, but I can’t tell you what happens at the end.

Also, remember that one of the best ways to learn them is by watching how they are used, when reading a book or watching a movie or a series. Notice how they are used in context.

Let’s have some practice now​.

Ways to say “you’re welcome”

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We all know that it’s polite to say “Thank you” to someone after they’ve done something good or helpful.

And as you hear words like “please,” “thank you,” “sorry,” “excuse me,” learning your manners in English can help you sound like a native speaker. If you don’t use them in certain circumstances, it even doesn’t look like you’re speaking English! Yeah! That’s what my experience with the English language tells me!

So if someone thanks you for something, what could you say in reply?

“You’re welcome” is by far the most common response, and there is nothing wrong with using it. That is the standard reply, and although it is, most of the time, an automatic and natural response, it’s a little bit overused. 

So it’s essential to expand your vocabulary and knowledge of English so that you have different responses, which do have slightly different meanings.

“You’re Welcome” is part of good manners

in English

If you want to sound more native, though, then in many cases, you might not even say “you’re welcome” but a variation instead!

So here is a little skit that shows you other ways to respond to a “thank you.” Try to watch it with English subtitles off. Listen carefully to pronunciation. Then watch it again with the English subtitles on, if you need them. Do that with all the videos below. 

So here are some useful expressions to respond to people’s thanks.

  • You’re welcome. (neutral)
  • You’re quite welcome. / You’re very welcome. / You’re so welcome. / You’re truly welcome. (formal)
  • Don’t mention it. (informal)
  • No worries. / Don’t worry about it. (informal)
  • It was no problem. / Not a problem. / No problem. (informal workplace/social) / No prob! (slang)
  • Sure. / Sure, no worries. / Sure thing. / Sure, anytime. (informal)
  • The pleasure is mine. / It’s my pleasure. / It was my pleasure. / With pleasure. / My pleasure. / Pleasure. (professional and social situations)
  • I’m happy I can help. / I’m happy to help. / I’m glad to help. / Happy to help. (professional and social situations)
  • It was nothing. / It’s nothing. (informal)
  • Anytime! (informal workplace and social situations)

Watch the last two responses from Bob below.

The following material has a quiz in it. 

And to finish, one more thing!
Next time you thank someone, don’t be surprised if they respond with “Thank YOU!”
If someone says this, it means that not only were you helped, but you were helping someone else in return.

You can also check Common ways to say thank you and Thank you for the gift if you need.