PhraseMix Articles

What's funny to you in English?

When I was in college, I studied the plays of William Shakespeare. Shakespeare is probably the greatest writer in the English language, but he wrote several hundred years ago. So some of his plays can be hard to understand for modern English speakers.

The comedies were especially hard to...

Questions you might be asked in an English job interview

In a job interview, an employer usually wants to learn a few basic things about  you: your experience, your goals, and your personality. How they find out this information can vary quite a bit, though. It's useful to expose yourself to some of the kinds of questions that interviewers...

What's the difference between 'small' and 'little'?

This is a question that I answered on Quora.com. Someone asked "What is the difference between 'small' and 'little'?" Here is what I wrote:

This english.stackexchange page has a detailed discussion of the difference between 'little' and 'small': Difference between "little"...

English for talking about clothing: shirts (Part 2)

Describing materials

To talk about a shirt's fabric, use these phrases:

What's it made of?

What's this material?

Here are some materials that shirts can be made of:

• cotton
• nylon (a soft, shiny synthetic material)
• polyester (a harder synthetic material)
• spandex (a...

Phrases for talking about a dirty house

If someone's house or apartment is messy, here are some phrases that you can use to describe it:

• There are clothes strewn all over the floor.
• There's food splattered all over the microwave.
• There are crumbs all over the counter.

(As you can see, we use the phrase...

15 ways to say "Goodbye" in English

English speakers like a lot of variety in their everyday language. We have lots of different expressions for saying simple things. Previous articles have covered lots of ways to say "Hello" and "Thank you." This article does the same for different ways to say...

How to use 'a', 'an', and 'the' in English

English articles ("a", "an", and "the") come before nouns. They help to communicate which thing you're talking about, similar to words like "this", "my", and "all". And they're confusing to a lot of English learners. 

Articles are really, really hard!

If your native language doesn't use...

The Phrase Mixer is awesome.

I hope you don't mind me bragging.

I've recently updated the Phrase Mixer, the tool that lets PhraseMix Premium subscribers review PhraseMix English lessons. If you've never used it, try out the limited Phrase Mixer sample version for free.

The Phrase Mixer is something I thought of many years...

Objects

What are objects?

The "object" of a sentence is a noun which usually comes after the verb in English. Here are some examples:

I love you.

Did you pay the rent?

The object receives the action of the verb.

Sometimes a sentence doesn't have an object:

I want to rest!

Not many men know how to...

The most famous American TV catch phrases (Part 3)

In Part 1 and Part 2 of this series, I introduced 10 of the most famous catch phrases from American TV shows.

Here are 10 more, just for PhraseMix Premium subscribers:

1. “You’re fired.”

   (Donald Trump, The Apprentice)
   
   
   
   In this reality game show, contestants...