Summer is on its way, and if you are lucky, you may have a garden in your yard that you can take care of. To do that, it may help if you know the names of the gardening tools that you may need. Let's take a look today at some of the English names of some standard gardening tools.
This is what parts of Australia looked like before the European settlers arrived with their axes and saws.
Captions 14-15, BBC Planet Wild: Alien Animals
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An ax is used to chop through the trunks of trees and large branches. The word is made plural by adding "-es" for "axes." Sometimes the singular word is written as "axe," which is grammatically correct, but perhaps a bit old-fashioned. "Ax" is also a verb, "to ax." Thus you can ax a tree down, or you can cut a tree down with an ax.
A saw is used to cut through the trunks of trees and large branches. The plural form is, as you see in the example above, "saws." You can also use "to saw" as a verb. Thus you can saw a tree down, or you can cut a tree down with a saw. A saw that is especially made for cutting branches is called a "pruning saw."
I rake the leaves with a rake.
Caption 25, The Alphabet: The Letter A
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A rake is a gardening tool with a long, usually wooden handle. It has a wide metal fork with hooked ends that allow you to gather leaves and yard debris, much as you sweep with a broom. As you see in the example above, "to rake" is a verb and a "rake" is a noun.
We helped with hands and wheelbarrows, shovels and sweat.
Captions 46-47, All Hands: Volunteers Appeal Video
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People have to shovel their driveways and sidewalks in front of the house.
Caption 43, The Seasons: Winter
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A shovel, also called a spade, also usually has a long wooden handle. Its end is a triangle-shaped flat metal piece that is used to dig holes in the ground or move dirt, sand, and even snow. As you see in the second example, "to shovel" is also a verb.
A wheelbarrow is a cart with one wheel in front and stands in the back that is used to carry dirt, sand, and other similar things. There is no verb derived from "wheelbarrow," and usually its usage is "to push a wheelbarrow."
And anyone who laid it on with a trowel...
Caption 18, The History of English: Shakespeare
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A trowel is similar to a shovel, but much smaller. It works well for making small holes to put potted plants into the ground. The phrase "to lay it on with a trowel" is also an idiom, or saying, that means "to exaggerate."
People have lawn mowers and they mow the lawn.
Captions 27-28, Sigrid Spring Musings
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A lawn mower is a machine used to cut the grass or lawn. Some of them are manual and require a lot of force to push them by hand. Most lawn mowers today have electric or gasoline motors, and some even have powered wheels. There are also lawn mowers called "riding lawn mowers" that you can sit on and drive.
Further Learning
Go to Yabla English and study the captions in the videos above to get a better idea of the contexts in which references to these garden tools have been made. You can also go to this site and see a long list of different kinds of gardening tools.
In Part II, we are going to continue 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 who resides there. 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 nationalities end with -ian or -ean:
Off the coast of Queensland, Australia, it is one of the richest ecosystems on the planet.
Caption 3, Greenpeace Australia Pacific: Eyes On The Reef
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One third of mammal species lost in the world are Australian.
Captions 56-57, BBC Planet Wild: Alien Animals
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And what about North Korea?
Caption 41, Jimmy Kimmel: Kids Answer "What is the Best Country in the World?"
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I know a little Korean. Let's try it.
Caption 10, Hemispheres: The Amazing Cell Phone
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And next some countries whose nationalities end with -ese:
You do know that in China it's not going to be a problem.
Caption 23, ABC Science Online: An interview with Douglas Adams
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There's a large Chinese population in London.
Caption 8, London: Multicultural Britain
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You came with a friend from Portugal to the United States?
Caption 13, Groucho Marx: You Bet Your Life
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While speakers of Spanish and Portuguese can often understand each other.
Caption 55, TED-Ed: How languages evolve
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The Netherlands presents a special case:
He has been told he has a long lost cousin in the Netherlands.
Caption 7, Naish Kiteboarding TV The Real Stig
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The Dutch came sharing coleslaw and cookies.
Caption 8, The History of English: American English
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So while the Netherlands (usually with the definite article "the") is the proper name of the country, it is still often called Holland—although strictly speaking, Holland is only a region of the Netherlands. The standard adjective for people from here is "Dutch." There is also the term "Netherlandish," but this does not usually refer to the language. It's an art history term used to refer to the northern part of the Low Countries in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Further Learning
Go to Yabla English and find more videos that use some of the following country names, dominant languages, and nationalities. You can also see a more complete list of countries, their people, and their languages here.
Country Language Nationality
Australia English Australian
Brazil Portuguese Brazilian
Chile Spanish Chilean
China Chinese Chinese
Egypt Arabic Egyptian
Hungary Hungarian Hungarian
Italy Italian Italian
Japan Japanese Japanese
Korea Korean Korean
(the) Netherlands Dutch Dutch
Portugal Portuguese Portuguese
Russia Russian Russian
United States English American
Thanks to you all for reading this, keep up the good work! If you have any good ideas for lesson topics, please email them to us at newsletter@yabla.com, and you can tweet us @yabla.
There are two essential prepositions for talking about how long something has been happening with the present perfect (or present perfect continuous) tense. For and since are often confused or used incorrectly, however, so let’s do a quick clarification!
The preposition since can only be used to reference a point in time, NOT a duration. So you can say since 2001, since September, since last summer, or since Tuesday, but NOT since five days.
Tom and I have been working together on Rachel's English since two thousand twelve.
Caption 4, Exercises - Tongue Flexibility and the N [n] Sound
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In fact, since nineteen sixty-nine, fifteen other rare and endangered species have also been rescued from the brink.
Captions 50-51, BBC Planet Wild - Alien Animals - Part 5
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For, on the other hand, refers to a duration. It doesn’t matter if something has been happening for 20 minutes or for 20 years.
We've been doing freestyle for a couple of weeks.
Caption 25, Kiteboarding - Sam Light Interview
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I have been working at the company Phonez and More for several months now.
Caption 1, Business English - Difficulties with coworkers and contracts - Part 1
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I've been on this boat for twenty-two years.
Caption 3, Aqua Quest - Boo Boo
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While for can also be used with the simple past tense or future tense, since is always a clear indicator of the present perfect or present perfect continuous (See this newsletter for more information!).
Further Learning
On Yabla English, for and since can be found in most videos! There is even one video in which a famous actor actually misuses the word since, which is indicated in the captions with sic (sic erat scriptum, Latin for "thus was it written"). Can you find it?
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