English Jokes

Let's keep it simple

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU rather than German which was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five year phase-in plan that would be known as "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the "k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be ekspekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e"s in the language is disgraseful, and they should go away.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru! And zen world!

Marking Code

• VT: verb tense - I've seen him yesterday.
• SV: subject Verb agreement - He go.
• WW: wrong word - It was raining, hen, I took my umbrella.
• AR: article - I live in the London.
• WF: wrong form - I stopped to smoke.
• SP: spelling - He's writting a letter.
• WO: word order - I get up usually at seven o'clock.
• ( ) leave out - He told me (to) me the story
• S/P singular/plural - There are two museum in the town.
• PORT: Portuguese influence - He' got a trousers on.
• P: punctuation - I like Mary.she's a nice person.
• PR: preposition -She arrived at London.
• ?: unclear
• !!: silly mistake
• //: paragraph
• γ: something is missing - I've got γ books.
• √√: good

Midterm Test Review

Try doing these exercises before the test!

Vocabulary

• What’s the meaning of these words? Can you put them in sentences?
  Geek
  Gadget
  Tar
  Screen
  Fortnight
  Text messaging

• Create a sentence with: to devote less time to
  to be classed as
  to draw the line at
  to lose yourself in
  to kill time
  to shut yourself away
  to have a row
  to flirt with
  to put one’s foot down
  to have a nap
  to nip
  
• What idea do these LINKERS convey?

Add information Show contrasting ideas Show cause and effect

• In fact
• Even so
• Also
• On the other hand
• Moreover
• Nevertheless
• Consequently
• However
• Yet
• Because of this
• As a result
• Although
• But

Grammar:

• Stative X Dynamic verbs

Stative Verbs – describe a state (knowledge, emotion, perception). Nothing happens.

Dynamic Verbs – describe an action, activity or process. Something happens.

There are some verbs which are both Stative and Dynamic, however, their meanings change considerably. These are some :

• Taste (D) = the action of eating
• Taste (S) = the perception, one of the 5 senses
• Have (D) = a figurative meaning - eg. have breakfast
• Have (S) = idea of possession
• Think (D) = the mental process of thinking, considering
• Think (S) = idea of opinion
• See (D) = visiting, meeting, working on something
• See (S) = the perception, one of the 5 senses

• Present Perfect Simple X Present Perfect Continuous

Formation: Have/ Has + been + V + ing (cont.) or Have/ Has + V (3rd. Column) (simp.)

Present Perfect Continuous + Dynamic verb (action) – describes an action which is incomplete or ongoing

Present Perfect Simple + Dynamic verb – describes an action which is complete

Present Perfect Simple + Stative verb – describes a situation which is incomplete or ongoing

Can you think of examples for each situation?

• Reporting Verbs

Are these verbs say or tell? What are their meanings?
Confirm
Assure
Declare
Convince
Announce
Mention
Insist
Reassure
Admit
Inform
Claim
Persuade
Complain
Advise
Suggest
Explain

• Prefixes and Suffixes
  

Negative prefixes:

• Un
• Dis
• Ir – used for words beginning with r
• Il -used for words beginning with
• In
• Im – used for words begining with “b”, “m” and “p”

Suffixes:

• Less (without)
• Ful (quantity / feeling)
• Ish (kind of)
• Ment – nouns
• Ly – adverbs
• Ness – nouns
• Ed - adjectives
• Able - adjectives

Complete the sentences with a suitable form of the word given:

a) Because of a ___ half the class went to a differerent classroom. (understand)

b) Maria is really ___. She’s always there when I need a hand. (help)

c)Don’t be ___, I’m sure she didn’t mean it. (fool)

d)I can’t say Alice is ___. She is always locked up in her room. (adventure)

e)We didn’t find any ___ in finding your house. (difficult)

f)Turn the TV off. What I have to say is important and I need your __ attention. (divide)

g)My brothers always ___ when it’s time to do the washing up. (appear)

h)___ of what I had said, he went to the beach anyway. (regard)

i)Kim looks repulsive. That dress she’s wearing is absolutely ___. (taste)

j)I was positively surprised by the ___ of the people from Italy. (friend)

k)I don’t believe you’ve broken it! That piece is __ (replace)

l)You are such a scheming person! What are you up, you ___ girl? (devil)

m)The govern is going to build houses for the ___ people. (home)

n)I find chocolate cakes simply __ (resist)

o)New York streets at night vcan be quite ___.(danger)

p)It was a ___ trip – everything went wrong. (hell)

Extra work: Look up the words in brackets in a dictionary and find as many possibilities of word transformation as you can.

Eg. Understand-Understandable-Misunderstand-Misunderstanding-Understood-Understanding-Etc...

Key:

a)Misunderstanding

b)Helpful

c)Foolish

d)Adventurous

e)Difficulty

f)Undivided

g)Disappear

h)Regardless

i)Tasteless

j)Friendliness

k)Devilish

l)Irreplaceable

m)Irresistable

n)Homeless

o)Hellish

p)Dangerous