Rain on me

In this song, "on" is a preposition that shows where the rain falls.  Practice prepositions.

Do you like rain?  My daughter likes to walk in the rain.  I don't.  I like to eat though, and if there's no rain, there's no fresh food.

What do you do when it rains?

Must as speculation

Many ESOL textbooks teach using must and have to for necessity

In common speech, however, we often use must when we make a logical guess.

Look how fast his English is improving! He must take English class!

Look how slow the internet is.  There must be a lot of people on it.

Wow!  He has very big arms.  He must lift weights.

In all of these examples, must means I guess from logic, NOT it is necessary.

The grammar must ______(base verb) stays the same

I love the next song to illustrate must because when the singer sees the girl, he makes a logical guess.

She's so pretty that she must have a boyfriend.

When the girl talks, she expresses necessity.  

She  feels it is necessary to have a boyfriend when she goes out.

The chorus uses the same words.

Look around.  What logical guesses can you make from your observations?  Use "must!"

Against All Odds

Please practice English on Duolingo (a free app), and on my blogs.

Once you have been my student, you are always welcome on my blogs,

I would really like to see your comments.

Grammar I want you to know before high intermediate  (Low Intermediate Grammar)

Once you understand low intermediate grammar, the best way to prepare for high intermediate is to be very good at using have in present tense and memorizing a lot of irregular verbs.


Write about a time you beat the odds -- a time you did something other people didn't think you could do.

June 13 is National Weed your garden day.

Weeds are plants that are growing where you don't want the plant to grow.

Weed/weeding is also the action of pulling unwanted plants up by their roots.

Some people call marijuana, "weed."

Poison means it will make your sick or hurt.  Poison Ivy gives me a nasty rash.

Challenge Listening

I pull out poison ivy, virginia creeper, and pokeweed almost every day this time of year.

Do you have a garden?  What are you growing?

On the turning away (Difficult content for former students)

Turning in this song is a gerund.  A gerund is the ing form of a verb when we use it as a noun.

(Verbs are usually action words.  Nouns are people, places, things or ideas)

Swimming is fun.  Running makes me tired.  Fighting doesn't solve anything.  Crying helps.

A difficult goal in advanced ESOL classes is memorizing whether a verb can be followed by a gerund, an infinitive (to ____base verb) or both.

I like to swim./I like swimming are equally correct.

I enjoy swimming is correct.  I enjoy to swim is wrong.

I want to go is correct.  I want going is wrong.

Flashcards to practice

(The sound of the word after the verb is what you need to remember.  

Ing is for gerunds.  To is for infinitives)