Just for fun

 Just for fun... can you find the hidden sentence in this image?

Talking with Your Hands

Science has confirmed that talking with your hands can make you more persuasive, according to research based on over 1000 TED Talks.

If you use "Illustrator" techniques - demonstrating the size, shape or number of something while discussing it - you will be more persuasive.

"Highlighters"  - pointing to something you are talking about - and random gestures, on the other had, had little or no impact.

The full story is here: https://www.popsci.com/health/hand-gestures-persuasive/ 

 

A Winter Joke

 

Note: 

A MELTDOWN is when someone gets really angry
TO MELT is when ice or snow turns to water

New Quiz for Kids: CAN

I have uploaded one last new quiz for 2026. This is a simple quiz on the structure of CAN - previously there was only a quiz for CAN and COULD together.

It has ten simple questions, pictures and audio, making it very suitable for young learners. It is highly recommended for teachers to use with a smartboard.

The address is http://junior.roadtogrammar.com/?370 

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Microlessons for Kids

I have uploaded a set of "microlessons" for kids on the Junior section of the site, 45 in total.

These lessons are based on simple vocabulary sets with sentence examples and audio examples.

Teacher, feel free to use them in your classes; they would work well with adults too!

Address: http://junior.roadtogrammar.com/microlessons/

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Origin of the Word HOOLIGAN

Here's one for the word nerds. I was wondering where the word HOOLIGAN comes from and whether it's related to the Old English word "hloo", meaning gang.

It turns out that it's is a relatively recent coinage, appearing in the 1890s. It's origin is murky but believed to be derived from the Irish surname Houlihan and used in a comedy sketch to describe a fictional, very rowdy, Irish family. It caught on from there and is still used widely today.

 

Social Media Posts

Are you following Road to Grammar's social media?

I post 1-2 very useful words or phrases every day along with an extended explanation and further sentence examples.

You can follow on these platforms:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/roadtogrammar/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/roadtogrammar
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/do0089/

Here are some examples of posts from this week: 

New Quiz: Prepositions of Place

One topic that has long been missing from Road to Grammar, and which is a favorite of all ESL textbook publishers, is PREPOSITIONS OF PLACE.

I have now remedied this and the quiz, along with cute accompanying graphics, audio clips and notes, can be found here:

Main site: http://roadtogrammar.com/?374

Kids' site: http://junior.roadtogrammar.com/?369

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New Content for Kids

Site update:

I have added some new content to the junior version of Road to Grammar.

1 For the SIGNS quiz, I have added images to make it more impactful.

URL: http://junior.roadtogrammar.com/?275

2 I have added more content to the Listen and Read activities. There are now 17 listen/read texts in total.

URL: http://junior.roadtogrammar.com/listenandread/

 

The Different Names for @

@ is an interesting little symbol. It started life as a short form for "amphora" - a kind of large jug in the ancient world. The, in our modern world, it has become the international symbol for usernames.

English is unfortunately quite boring, we simply call it 'at' or the 'at symbol'.

However, in other languages, the names for this little symbol are much more creative:

German: "spider monkey"(Klammeraffe)
Dutch: little monkey’s tail(apenstaartje)
Italian: snail(chiocciola)
Danish: trunk-a (like an elephant’s trunk)(snabel-a)
Polish: monkey(małpa)
Hungarian: little worm(kukac)
Russian: little dog(собачка)
Greek: little duck(παπάκι) 
Hebrew: strudel(שטרודל)
Korean: sea-snail(골뱅이) 

Al- Words with an Arabic Origin

Many English words have roots in French, Latin and Greek, but let's not forget about Arabic.

In Arabic, the word for THE is AL-, and this can be seen in many English words, such as:

Algebra

Algorithm

Alchemy

Alcohol

Almanac

Alcove

These words are usually anglicized (made easier for English speakers to pronounce).

For example, the word algebra in the original Arabic is “al-jabr” and it means “the restoration” – referring to restoring (balancing) two sides of an equation.

More Quizzes on AM/IS/ARE for Kids

I have expanded the quizzes on AM/IS/ARE in the kids' section of Road to Grammar. Previously, there was only one quiz, now there are four:

1 AM/IS/ARE with pronouns.
2 AM/IS/ARE with singular and plural nouns, including names.
3 AM/IS/ARE with various tenses, passive voice and uncountable nouns
4 Question form of AM/IS/ARE

You can view the kid-friendly materials here:

http://junior.roadtogrammar.com/

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Verb Tense Occurence

Technically, future forms are not tenses, I know. But for the sake of convenience, I'm including them in this handy chart.

Listen and Read: Simple Activities for Young Learners

On the junior version of the site, I have placed a series of simple listening and reading activities that I have developed while teaching a private student. There are six at the moment, but I will add more as I develop them for my student. 

With each one, there is a short listening activity (around 50 words) where the user has to click on four words that they hear. After finding all of the words, they click on the picture to reveal the text. 

With my own student, I usually listen two or three times before trying the answers. Then I ask him to read out the text for pronunciation practice.

You can find the index page here:

http://junior.roadtogrammar.com/listenandread/

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New Quiz: Negative Inversion

Negative inversion refers to where we invert the normal sentence structure and begin a sentence with an adverb or adverbial phrase instead.

An example is: Never have I seen such a thing! (The normal structure is: I have never seen such a thing!)

As always, the quiz has accompanying notes, PDF and audio:

Quiz page: http://roadtogrammar.com?373

Notes: http://www.roadtogrammar.com/notes/?ref=125b

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