#Ep. 9 English Idioms You Can Use Today!

Ever wondered why English conversations sound so natural and effortless? Unravel the secret by mastering idioms and expressions that native speakers use daily. Join me, Natalie, as we explore the art of using idioms like "break the ice" and "hit the nail on the head," and discover how these phrases can transform your language skills. We also revisit last week's adverbial lesson, perfecting sentence endings and boosting your fluency. Embrace mistakes as stepping stones on this journey, and ensure your learning is consistent and rewarding.

 I can't wait to hear your thoughts and feedback on platforms like TikTok and YouTube, as we grow and learn together. Let's continue this educational adventure, enhancing your English fluency week by week!

Chapters

• 0:00 Learning English Idioms and Expressions
• 12:09 Advanced English Learning Podcast Announcement

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hello everybody and welcome to this week's episode of Learn English with Natalie. It is so wonderful to have you here and I want to say a big well done on the progress that you have made to your English learning journey and the commitment that you are showing to improving your English by showing up here every single week. Well done to you. I hope you've had a great week. What have you been up to this week? Has there been anything exciting going on for you? Please let me know. I want to get to know my community, so feel free to leave me a comment in the show notes or on the YouTube comments, wherever you are listening to this episode. Now, before we start, please can I ask a big, big favor. I really want to grow this channel as much as possible, so if you are finding this content useful, please subscribe on the podcast that you are listening to or on YouTube. It really, really helps more than you know. Now let's get into today's lesson. Please remember that this lesson will provide the foundations of your English language learning, and you may want to revisit this information in the future, so I advise that you keep a notepad or a journal, or download the pdf activity sheet that comes with this episode and you can keep a hard copy to refer back to at a later time. Now remember my two top tips for learning a language are that consistency is key, and if you're turning up here every single week, then you are already showing that and that mistakes are there to be made. Do not be afraid to make mistakes. That is how we learn. So go easy on yourself, enjoy the episode and enjoy the learning process. Let's have a quick recap. So last week we learned about adverbials and we were learning about how we can use adverbials to describe our daily habits. Now I have listed three adverbials which I'm going to read to you in a moment and I want you to finish the sentence. So I'm going to give you an adverbial and then I want you to finish the sentence. Here we go. The first adverbial is in the morning. In the morning, can you finish that the morning? Can you finish that? In the morning, I Excellent. So you may have said in the morning I wake up. In the morning I brush my teeth. In the morning I walk my dog. The next one at work what do you do at work, super? So you may have said At work, I check emails. Or at work. I manage a team of people Depends on what you do for work. And the last one, finally, is Before I go to sleep. So finish that sentence for me Before I go to sleep. Excellent, well done. Before I go to sleep, I read my book, right?

Speaker 1: 3:17

So, as usual, this episode is going to be broken down into four sections. The first one is your teaching point and introduction. The second one is your vocabulary section and speaking practice. Part three is going to be your listening practice and part four is your independent learning. Now, as you know, I like to keep the episodes quite short so that it is manageable for you to learn English at this pace.

Speaker 1: 3:46

By the end of this lesson, you are going to learn different English idioms and their meaning. So that is our focus for today to learn English idioms and their meaning. So that is our focus for today to learn English idioms. And if you aren't sure what they are yet, then you are in the right place. You will also be able to, by the end of this lesson, apply English idioms to your everyday conversations. So, part one why do you need to learn this? So, an English idiom, it's like an expression or a phrase, and sometimes they don't really make sense, but it's just something that native English speakers use in their everyday language. These idioms will help you with your English fluency, your flow of conversation, you will be speaking like a native and you will also be able to understand idioms when someone says them to you.

Speaker 1: 4:40

Now I just want to point out here that recently, online, I have obviously my algorithm picks up English language learners like me and I'm fed their content, and I just want to give you a word of warning. I recently made a video about this. I've seen lots of accounts online and they are mainly faceless accounts, so they won't have the teacher's voice or face on the on the page, and there is lots of information going around that isn't 100% accurate. So there are some idioms that you can use and they are correct English. However, they aren't really used in everyday conversations and I'm seeing a lot of faceless pages advertising these as idioms that you should use. Now my grandma would be using the idioms they are talking about, so I'm going to make sure that I only teach you idioms that you might hear or use in everyday life. So here we go vocabulary and speaking practice.

Speaker 1: 5:49

The first idiom, and that's an expression. Remember the first idiom I will teach you is break the ice. Break the ice. Can you say that? Well done, like an ice cube? Break the ice. And this means to initiate conversation in a social setting. So you know, if you're going to meet someone for the first time, it can be a bit awkward. You need to break the ice, break the tension. So here is an example sentence we did a fun activity at the start of the meeting to break the ice. We did a fun activity at the start of the meeting to break the ice.

Speaker 1: 6:33

The next idiom I'm going to teach you today is hit the nail on the head. Hit the nail on the head, and that means that you are exactly right about something. So well done, you've hit the nail on the head. Can you say that? I'll say it one more time? Hit the nail on the head, your turn. Can you say that? I'll say it one more time? Your turn. Perfect An example of a sentence. You're right, you've hit the nail on the head, you are exactly correct.

Speaker 1: 7:13

The next idiom I want us to discuss is a very unusual one A blessing in disguise. A blessing in disguise. I'll say it one more time and then I want you to repeat after me A blessing in disguise, your turn Perfect, your turn Perfect. And this means something that seems to be bad at first that turns out to be good. So something has happened to you that appeared to be bad but it turned out to be a good thing. For example, if you were made redundant from your job but then a few weeks later you got a brand new job with a higher salary, that would be a blessing in disguise. I'll give you an example sentence when we had to change locations, it was a blessing in disguise. The party was amazing.

Speaker 1: 8:12

Another idiom for this week bite the bullet, bite the bullet, can you say that? Excellent. And that means that you are enduring something painful or difficult. Here's an example sentence you have to bite the bullet and train hard if you want to complete the marathon. You have to bite the bullet and train hard if you want to complete the marathon. I'll say it one more time Bite the bullet, your turn Excellent.

Speaker 1: 8:53

The next idiom we're going to cover is piece of cake, piece of cake. I'll say it slowly for you Piece of cake. One more time, and then I want you to repeat after me Piece of cake, your turn Excellent. And this means that something is very easy to do. I had revised a lot, so the exam was a piece of cake. I had revised a lot, so the exam was a piece of cake. Great. Now, that's a lot of information for you to remember. But if you do learn these idioms, remember that you can use these across many different contexts in your English language conversations. You're going to sound like a pro.

Speaker 1: 9:42

Part three Listening practice. I'm going to read a paragraph to you and I want you to listen out for the idioms that I say. See if you can identify and understand them. I thought it was going to be tough, but it turned out to be a piece of cake. I guess the difficult study session I had was a blessing in disguise. Let me read it one more time. Could you hear the idioms? So in that paragraph I said piece of cake and blessing in disguise. Next paragraph he introduced me to his family. I was nervous at first, but I bit the bullet and did it anyway. When we got there, we broke the ice by talking about football. I'll say that again. I changed the tense of the idioms to suit what I'm talking about here, so listen very carefully. He introduced me to his family. I was nervous at first. But I bit the bullet and did it anyway. So I said bit the bullet instead of bite the bullet. When we got there, we broke the ice by talking about football. So I changed break the ice to broke the ice to make it past tense.

Speaker 1: 11:13

Now, finally, we're on to your independent learning. Are you ready for your challenge for this week? You are going to write four sentences this week using the following idioms Bites the bullet, break the ice, piece of cake and blessing in disguise. So I'll read those again. I want four sentences, please, with the following idioms Bite the bullet, break the ice, piece of cake and blessing in disguise. And see if you can remember what these mean without looking at the PDF or watching the video. See if you can get that instilled in your memory. If you are feeling confident enough to do so, you can take a picture of this or record yourself reading the sentences and send it to me on tiktok, on tag me or, if you want, you can forward this directly to me. I try to get through as many messages as I can in my inbox Now.

Speaker 1: 12:09

Thank you so much for joining me this week and thank you for taking your time out of your busy schedule to listen to this podcast. If you are interested in learning English at a faster pace, and if you are particularly interested in reading, you may want to join my Patreon, which is available on a seven-day free trial, where I will be exploring classic and modern English novels, going into detail about the themes and the vocabulary that are used there. Now I choose specific books that are appropriate for English language learners, so they are aimed at adults, but the language used is at a level that you can understand. So thank you very much for joining me today and I hope you enjoyed this lesson. Please let me know in the comments or send me a message on TikTok or YouTube, wherever you're listening to this show. I love to hear your feedback and I look forward to seeing you next week. See you later.