Espresso English Podcast

If you watch TV and movies in English, you'll probably see a lot of new words and expressions that might not come up in your regular English study. Sometimes it’s hard to understand what certain phrases mean, so students write to me and ask for clarification. In today’s lesson, I’ll explain ten phrases from TV shows and movies that students have asked me about recently. If you ever come across a phrase that you can’t figure out, feel free to e-mail me and ask me what it means, and I’ll do my best to explain it! Informal spoken English – like the kind you hear in movies and native speakers’ conversations – is full of expressions that English textbooks often don’t teach So how can you learn these expressions WITHOUT getting confused and lost? One way is to join my Everyday English Speaking Course - Level 2! This course teaches you informal phrases, idioms, and slang in the context of conversations. It's a great way to improve your comprehension and learn a lot of surprising new expressions. Speaking Level

Today's lesson will teach you 33 collocations and expressions about decisions. Collocations are combinations of words that native English speakers use naturally. Learning these word combinations makes it easier to put together your ideas in English, so that you can express yourself better. You'll also learn some informal expressions, like "a tough call," "in a quandary," and "the lesser of two evils." Click on the lesson to learn! One major difficulty for English learners is often knowing how to put words together. How can you know if you're using the right word or expression? Learning collocations helps give you the "building blocks" for better sentences in English. That's why I wrote the e-book 1000 Collocations in 10 Minutes a Day - to teach you which words go together naturally. Each of the 50 short lessons in the e-book is accompanied by a quiz to help you practice and review. You can learn a lot in just a few minutes every day!

Here's a free sample lesson from my NEW Current Events English Course! Today I'll teach you 20 words and expressions from a recent news article about social entrepreneurs who are changing the world. Original article: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/04/15/712653034/no-fake-drugs-more-jobs-for-youth-end-child-sexual-abuse-online-a-vision-for-203 After you watch the video, download the vocabulary exercise to review and practice what you learned. If you enjoyed this lesson and want to get 30 more lessons like this, you can join the Current Events English Course to get daily lessons starting May 1. You'll learn more than 500 words and expressions inside this course - and all the lessons are based on topics that are relevant today. Remember, the course starts May 1, and that is also the last day to join. I hope to see you inside!

Join the course: https://www.espressoenglish.net/current-events-english-course One common suggestion given to English learners is to read or watch the news in English. This is a good idea, because you can learn how to talk about current events and relevant topics. But there’s one BIG problem – If you’re reading or watching the news and there are words or expressions you don’t know, this can make it hard or even impossible to understand everything else. You might miss the main points and lose track of the story, all because of the vocabulary you’re lacking. That’s really frustrating. Wouldn’t it be great to have a teacher or friend who can help guide you through an article and explain any words / expressions that are new to you? Then you could expand your vocabulary and understand the news more confidently. I’m here to help you! In May I'm creating the Current Events English Course, 2019 edition. In this course, I’ll teach you English from real news articles on current topics. I’ll explain the new vocabu

I received a great question from a student: Is it possible to use ‘to’ followed by the ‘ing’ form? For example, “I'm looking forward to seeing you.” Normally we use to + the base form (ex. "I want to order pizza.") However, there are some specific words in English after which we use to + ING, and I'm going to tell you about them in today's lesson! English grammar can be quite difficult with all the rules and exceptions! You can learn, study, and practice inside my Advanced English Grammar Course. I'll explain the grammar clearly and help you put it into practice with quizzes. There's also an option to get corrections and feedback on your writing.

April 1 is an informal holiday known as April Fools' Day! People celebrate by playing jokes and trying to trick people in funny and harmless ways. You might be wondering about this word "fool" - how is it used in English? I'll teach you all about it in today's lesson. Don't be fooled by confusing English words! There are a lot of them, and they can be very tricky to understand and use correctly. You can get clear explanations and examples inside my e-book, 600+ Confusing English Words Explained. It will help you understand the differences between similar words like farther and further, interfere and intervene, sensible and sensitive, and many more words with which English learners often make mistakes.

Do you know what to say in English in case of an emergency? In the moment, you might panic and not be able to think of the words – so it’s good to learn and practice them beforehand. In today's lesson you'll learn how to talk about various medical emergencies, accidents, and other dangers. If you want to expand your vocabulary even more, join my Vocabulary Builder Courses to learn more than 1000 useful English words with pictures and examples. There's a discount when you buy Level 1 and Level 2 of the course together!

Today I want to teach you about a tricky little grammar mistake that I see a lot of students making when using the verbs see, watch, and hear. You'll also learn how the sentence changes when we add the word "that." This was just one small grammar point... but there's a lot more grammar to learn! If you're looking for a detailed course to help you master English grammar, check out my Advanced English Grammar Course. It has 45 lessons with quizzes to help you review and practice - as well as the option to get correction and feedback on your writing.

Do you have a hard time finding the right phrase to use in your business letters and e-mails? Today you'll learn 30 phrases for business correspondence. If you want to speak English more confidently at work, join my Business English Course! You'll learn phrases for everyday professional situations, as well as lots of vocabulary for marketing, finance, entrepreneurship, and more. There are even several lessons on idioms that are often used in the business world.

Are you wondering about the differences between clean, wash, clean up, and wash up? I'll teach you how to use them in today's lesson... along with a few slang meanings you might not know yet. The English language has a ton of words that appear to be similar, but are actually different in meaning and use. I wrote an e-book explaining the differences between lots of words that my students often confuse. After you read my 600+ Confusing English Words Explained E-Book, you'll have a clear understanding of how to use these words correctly!

In the month of February I'm going to do a special series of “phrase of the day” videos - so I'll take a phrase I've heard recently on TV or in daily life and teach it to you here. Make sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel so you don't miss any phrases!

In the month of February I'm going to do a special series of “phrase of the day” videos - so I'll take a phrase I've heard recently on TV or in daily life and teach it to you here. Make sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel so you don't miss any phrases!

In the month of February I'm going to do a special series of “phrase of the day” videos - so I'll take a phrase I've heard recently on TV or in daily life and teach it to you here. Make sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel so you don't miss any phrases!

In the month of February I'm going to do a special series of “phrase of the day” videos - so I'll take a phrase I've heard recently on TV or in daily life and teach it to you here. Make sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel so you don't miss any phrases! 

Sometimes you might get discouraged when studying English. Becoming fluent takes a really long time and lots of effort and practice, so it's easy to lose your motivation.  Today I want to share some motivational quotes with you and show you how these sayings relate to your English learning. I hope this lesson will help you feel more optimistic about your English studies! My goal here at Espresso English is to help you build up your English skills, one lesson at a time! One of the best ways to learn from me is to join my Complete Program – it contains ALL my e-books and courses, a total of more than 400 lessons.  If you took 400 lessons at an English school or with a private teacher, it would cost thousands of dollars – but you can get my Complete Program for a discounted price. Click here for more information and registration.

We have a saying in English that "the devil is in the details" - this means that you need to be careful, because the small parts of a situation/task can cause major problems or difficulties. Sometimes this is the case for learning pronunciation - a tiny difference in a sound can change the word completely. In today's lesson, I'm going to help you practice 10 words that students often mispronounce, resulting in a totally different word. When it comes to pronunciation, the only way to improve is to practice a lot! Don't just read about pronunciation rules... you need to practice SAYING words and sentences repeatedly in order to develop good pronunciation habits. My courses on Pronunciation and Shadowing have great pronunciation practice exercises to help you avoid mistakes like the ones in this lesson. At the end of each course, you can send me a recording of your speaking, and I'll give you an evaluation of your pronunciation.

Many of us have hopes and plans for what we would like to accomplish in the new year! Today I'll teach you 50 common collocations with these words. Collocations are combinations of words that are frequently used together. Studying common collocations is a great way to help you form better sentences that sound more natural in English. Wow, that was a lot of collocations! Do you want to keep learning - and practice, too? Check out my e-book 1000 Collocations in 10 Minutes a Day. Each lesson will teach you collocations related to a particular topic - such as relationships, sports, memories, feelings, study, travel, weather, and more - and at the end of each lesson there's a quiz to help you review what you've learned.

This is one of my FAVORITE lessons of the year  :-) Did you know that the dictionary is updated all the time? The publishers add words that have come to be used frequently in the media and in everyday life. Let's learn some of the new English words added in 2018. There were 12 words in this lesson... but the English language has more than 170,000 words in total. How are you supposed to learn so many? My Vocabulary Builder Courses will teach you USEFUL English words in a clear and effective way. These are the words that native speakers use all the time, and the courses make it easy for you to learn and practice them. There are two levels of the Vocabulary Builder, so if you really want to expand your vocabulary a lot, I recommend joining both levels!

It's December 31st - we're at the tail end of the year! (= the very last part) In today's lesson, you'll learn 8 English idioms with the word end.Remember, don't try to translate these idioms literally word by word - if you do, they might not make sense. Instead, learn each one as a whole expression. We're about to start a new year... wouldn't you like to learn some new expressions in English? You can learn 300 Idioms in 30 Days in my course! In 2018 I updated the course with new videos  :-)  I recommend that you try a free sample to see what the lessons are like. NOTE: Even though the course is called "300 Idioms in 30 Days," you can certainly keep the lessons for more than 30 days. There's NO time limit to your access, so you can study as slowly or as quickly as you want. I hope you have a nice end-of-year celebration!

Phrasal verbs are very common in everyday spoken English - and many students ask me about the definitions of phrasal verbs they've heard in conversations, TV shows, or movies. Today I'm going to explain five phrasal verbs that you might not know yet: square away, step up, space out, blow over, and swear off. If you come across (encounter) a phrasal verb that you can't understand, please e-mail me and I'll explain it in a future lesson. Do you want to see how native English speakers use phrasal verbs in conversation? Take my Phrasal Verbs in Conversation Course! The course will help you learn more than 500 common phrasal verbs in English. You can see how the phrasal verbs are used AND practice them with the exercises included in each lesson. You can try a free sample here, and sign up for the course here.