Articles

  • Good English? Stuff it! Try Impressive English

    How’s your English? No bluffing! “My English is good” they say. Good English! Can’t tell you how frustrating for me to hear those words. What a vague answer! It’s like someone either really sucks at English or is trying to be modest about it. In whichever case, it infuriates me. It’s an “in-no-man’s-land” sort…

  • Being great at English: How bad do you want it?

    Not only English, being great at anything pretty much all comes down to how bad you want it. You’ve got to want it! You’ve got to want it so bad that you wouldn’t want to exist in this world without it. It’s the food you eat, the water you drink and the air your…

  • Bad pronunciation: 3 don’ts

    Bad pronunciation comes basically from 3 reasons that your pronunciation may not be good enough or clear enough. We’ll refer to these 3 reasons as the 3 don’ts. We’ll use the following sentence to demonstrate the 3 dont’s. I will get back to you as soon as possible (you often say or hear that…

  • Native English or Native American

    They’re not the same. You can be speaking native English without a purely American accent, British accent, Australian accent, Kiwi accent, Canadian accent, Irish accent, Scottish accent or South African accent. It can be a mix of all these accents. Your English could borrow different attributes or characteristics from each one of the accents…

  • You’re done memorizing the dictionary, now what?

    Isn’t that what many learners do? Literally study and memorize the dictionary from cover to cover? And how many learners study every grammar rule in the textbook? Some learners seriously know about the structure of the language more than many teachers. I have also met so many of them who are extremely fluent, and…

  • Putin’ up with Putin!

    Not that my website has anything to do with politics but when Mr. Putin decides to get himself into the kind of mess he’s gotten himself into, one’s got to pause and try to figure out why this man’s just lost all his marbles, invaded a country with thousands of troops and hundreds of…

  • Get Your pronunciation corrected for FREE with FAFA.

    ATTENTION ENGLISH LEARNERS AND TEACHERS. Do you LEARNERS want to get some FREE PERSONAL feedback on your pronunciation and some FREE tips on how to correct them? Do you TEACHERS want your learners to find out what their INDIVIDUAL pronunciation problems are get some FREE advice on how to correct them? Well… FAFA IS…

  • The 9 most important sounds for fluent English!

    Aren’t all sounds important for fluent English? Yes absolutely. Yet, there are 9 sounds or phonemes which, in my opinion, are crucial for clear and fluent English. The reason that I consider these phonemes to be critical is their frequency. In other words, they are more common than other sounds, hence important. If you…

  • Spoken English through rap music

    Why rap music is good for improving English speaking and listening? Basically, I think of rap as the modern and hip version of tongue twisters. We all know what tongue twisters are good for. Rap though could potentially play a more powerful role in training the learner’s mouth and ears in producing and perceiving…