The five senses are sight, hearing, smell, touch, and taste.

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We see with our eyes, but "to see" can also be used to mean "to understand" or "to realize." "To watch" something takes longer, like when we watch television. The verb "to look" can be transitive or intransitive. You can look at something to examine it or look (as in “outwardly appear”) a certain way. 

Finally, I can see you crystal clear.

Caption 3, Adele: Rolling in the Deep

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Now I can see that we've fallen apart

Caption 27, Backstreet Boys: I Want It That Way

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Make sure you guys watch the whole video if you want to see all that footage.

Caption 22, Aspyn Ovard: What To Pack for Vacation! Tips + Essentials!

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Just look at all those acorns!

Caption 22, America's National Parks: Grand Canyon

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This may look like a massive body of water.

Caption 9, BBC News: California ‘crippling drought’ leads to strict water restrictions

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The difference between "hearing" and "listening" is a little like the difference between "seeing" and "watching." If you listen to a sound, what someone is saying, or music, you pay close attention rather than just noticing it with your ears. 

Did you hear that?

Caption 54, Abiventures: Sandwich

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And then I always listen to music because it helps me work out better.

Caption 41, Harvard: A Day in the Life of a Harvard Student

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So, now listen to how I pronounce the following words.

Caption 8, British vs American English: Pronunciation Lesson

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Our sense of touch is about physical contact and how things feel. There are many phrases that use the idea of touch to describe different types of physical and metaphorical contact. "keep in touch" (remain in contact), "lose their touch," (lose their ability to do something), or "have the right touch" (have certain skills)."

If we touch his tail, he'll get frightened.

Caption 10, Nature & Wildlife: Wild Sharks

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He must be losing his touch.

Caption 42, ALF: Some enchanted evening

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And, of course, a pineapple just to add a touch of the tropics. 

Captions 15-16, Tara's Recipes: Delicious Fruit Salad with Greek Yogurt

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Like "to look," the verbs "to smell" and "to taste" can be either transitive or intransitive. They can be used to talk about the action of smelling or tasting, but also to describe how something smells or tastes. 

I think I can smell chocolate.

Caption 23, Peppa Pig: Easter Week

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And they smell so good.

Caption 35, Blippi: Cool Science Experiment for Kids

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I'm gonna open up a restaurant, so people can taste my food!

Caption 16, Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives: Pam's Trinidadian Caribbean Kitchen

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I wanna see what the lambsquarters taste like, first of all.

Caption 38, Food Talk with Sigrid: Foraging

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You may know that "taste" is also a noun meaning someone's idea of what's good or bad and their ability to choose well. It can also refer to a short experience of something. 

This show is all about the three Ts of New York: The talent, the trends, and the taste.

Caption 2, On Deck with Lucy: TV Host Jeremy Hassell

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Another thing to be aware of: While "tasty" is a positive adjective, "smelly" means that something smells bad!

Further Learning
There are several videos on the senses on Yabla English where you can learn even more about this topic, including a detailed overview from Sigrid and a fun video about a dog's sense of smell.

For those of you reading this lesson on the day it was published, today is the Fourth of July. In many countries, it's just another day of the month, but in the United States it is a federal holiday. The date is the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, when the American colonies declared that they were no longer under the control of Great Britain.

One of the most important holidays in the United States is Independence Day or the Fourth of July. We can also say "July fourth," but when we're talking about that holiday we traditionally say "the Fourth of July."

Captions 30-33, Sigrid explains: Numbers - Part 3

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Many people in the United States celebrate this holiday with a variety of traditional activities. Let's take a look at a few of these today.

It's high summer with warm weather on the Fourth of July, so people often celebrate the holiday by going picnicking and even boating, if there is a lake nearby.

You can have a picnic, there's a lake to take boats out on.

Caption 26, Jessica: Brooklyn Sites

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Cold beer in a cooler and meat cooked on a barbecue are also Fourth of July holiday traditions, but some iced tea or lemonade for the kids and teetotalers, and some vegan sausages for the vegetarians have become traditional too!

Not to mention a cooler for the beer, and the meat for the evening barbecue.

Caption 39, The Last Paradises: America's National Parks

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Traditional Fourth of July picnic salads include potato salad, pasta salad, and a variety of fruit salads.

Then, I'm going to prepare a little salad of cherry tomatoes.

Caption 23, Food Talk with Sigrid: Simple Summer Vegetables

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But even more for its amazing flavor, no Fourth of July picnic would be complete without a fresh, ripe watermelon!

Watermelon, for its beautiful color...

Caption 14, Tara's Recipes: Delicious Fruit Salad with Greek Yoghurt

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The highlight and grand finale of a good Fourth of July is, however, the inevitable fireworks:

It started at seven and ended at one with an amazing fireworks display!

Captions 13-14, The Olympics: Interesting facts by Zara

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Further Learning
Go to Yabla English and study the captions in the videos above to get a better idea of the contexts in which they are used. Happy Fourth of July to all of you, wherever you may be!

In today's lesson, we are going to talk about the names of some major countries, the main languages they speak, and the adjectives used to describe somebody from that country. Usually the noun for the language spoken is the same as the adjective for somebody from that country. For instance in France, the French speak French. But there are also exceptions: In the United States, most Americans speak English. Note too that in English, unlike many other languages, even the adjectives are usually written with a capital letter!

Let's start off with two countries whose names have only one syllable. 

And where would I like to go? That's easy: France.

Caption 8, Parts of Speech - Question Words

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People speak French in France, and as noted above, the adjective for something from France is also "French." One of the few national adjectives in English that is not standardly written with a capital letter is in the term "french fries." This is what is called a "misnomer" or mistaken name, because so-called french fries probably came from Belgium or the Netherlands! 

He was throwing french fries at you?

Caption 38, 7-10 Split - Short Film

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And on to the Greeks in Greece, who speak Greek: 

...especially those who were considering going to Greece.

Caption 15, Job Interviews - Mr. Alan Hint Monologue

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"K" is a very old letter. It comes from the Greek letter "kappa."

Caption 12, The Alphabet - The Letter K

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There are a lot of countries whose languages and nationalities end in the letters -ish. Note that the adjective for somebody from Britain is "British," but they usually speak "English" in the form of "British English":

The day after Christmas is called Boxing Day in Britain.

Caption 38, Christmas Traditions - In the UK

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We also drop the letter "r" at the end of words in British English.

Caption 29, British vs American -  English Pronunciation Lesson

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And on to Spain, where the Spanish speak Spanish: 

I should speak in Spanish because Custo Barcelona is a Spanish designer.

Caption 13, New York Fashion Week - Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA Take Over

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Here I am in Southern Spain in the height of summer

Caption 2, Tara's Recipes - Delicious Fruit Salad with Greek Yoghurt

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Further Learning
Go to Yabla English and find more videos that use some of the following country names, languages, and nationalities. You can also see a more complete list of countries, their people, and their languages here.

Country          Language          Nationality
France             French                French
Greece            Greek                  Greek
Britain              English                British
Denmark          Danish                Danish
Finland             Finnish                Finnish
Poland              Polish                  Polish
Spain                Spanish              Spanish
Sweden            Swedish              Swedish
Turkey               Turkish               Turkish