Get your feet wet

Getting wet is a great way to stay cool during the summer and you’re lucky if you live near the beach, a lake, or a swimming pool.

Since this blog is all about improving English, our focus is only on getting our feet wet, an idiom.

When you get your feet wet, you’re experiencing something for the first time and are slowing becoming used to the situation. The expression suggests the image of a swimmer slowly getting into the water rather than jumping in. Here are some examples:


- Christian has never played basketball so he practiced dribbling the ball just to get his feet wet.
- To prepare for her first public speech, Lisa rehearsed in front of her family to get her feet wet.
- Greg was excited to get his feet wet behind the wheel at his first driving lesson.


Are you getting your feet wet in some new activity? If so, please leave a comment. I would love to hear about it :)

Words named after people

Sometimes it’s easy to know the meanings of English words if you recognize their Latin roots:

bene --> means good --> English word = benefit

manu --> means hand --> English word = manual

There are other times when we’re not so lucky, especially when the word doesn’t give you any clue at all. Words named after people (eponyms) fit in this category.


I think the most famous example of a word originating from a person's name is sandwich, created by the Earl of Sandwich back in 1762. Let's add to the list:

Silhouette = an image of a person, object or scene consisting of the outline and a featureless interior. Named after Etienne de Silhouette in 1759. One of his hobbies was creating paper portraits.

Mentor = teacher or trusted counselor. From Ancient Greece, Mentor is a character in Homer’s Odyssey. The main character, Odysseus, asks Mentor to look after his son, Telemachus, when Odysseus departs for the Trojan War.

Boycott = withdraw from commercial or social relations with (a country, organization, or person) as a punishment or protest. Boycott is named after Captain Charles Boycott, an English land agent in Ireland who, in 1897, was ostracized (excluded from a society or group) for refusing to reduce rents.

It all makes sense when we know the stories behind the words.

Improve vocabulary with Scrabble

One word game that I really love to play is Scrabble. It's always a challenge, and most of all it's fun. That's precisely why I recommend it for improving English because games are relaxing, the opposite of work, but through competition you can improve your vocabulary.

Besides the challenge of scoring high points, creating words, and beating your opponent, you have the opportunity to improve spelling. In addition to forming whole words, one strategy is to look at elements (parts) of words and add additional letters or prefixes and suffixes to create new words, for example, round to around; mix to mixing, mixed, mixes, turn to return.

Scrabble encourages players to talk about words, grow vocabulary, define, and spell.

I have three Scrabble games constantly in play every day on my smart phone. I value the opportunity to increase my vocabulary and relax at the same time.

Combining words to make a new word

In the past I wrote about trendy words created by combining the sounds and meanings of two words together. Remember glamping and glamburger? Well, these types of words interest me and catch my attention.

Glamping and glamburger aren't in the dictionary or recognized as official words but there are many combinations used in our everyday language. For example, frenemy, a blend of friend + enemy, is a person who pretends to be a friend but is actually an enemy. This seems like a new creation but it was first used in the 1950s, so not new at all.

I never realized that there are many blended words in the English language, more that I thought, so here are some common blended words used all the time:


biopic (biography + picture)
breathalyzer (breath + analyzer)
camcorder (camera + recorder)
chexting (cheating + texting)
electrocute (electricity + execute)
emoticon (emote + icon)
fanzine (fan + magazine)
flirtationship (flirting + relationship)
infotainment (information + entertainment)
moped (motor + pedal)
sitcom (situation + comedy)
slanguage (slang + language)
sportscast (sports + broadcast)
workaholic (work + alcoholic)

. . . and more!

Are there blended words in your language?

Spelling words with the silent 'e'

If you want to become a better speaker, it helps to be a good writer. This post is a continuation of my previous one because a focus on spelling English words will help you pronounce them and we all know that's not always so easy.

We already covered the first rule: 'i' before 'e' except after 'c' (receive, for example). Can you think of any words that fit this rule? Do you know any words that defy it?

This week's rule: silent 'e' helps a vowel say its name.

When a word ends with a vowel followed by a consonant and then silent 'e', the vowel has a long sound.

That's all you need to make a difference between hat and hate, cut and cute, fat and fate, not and note, etc. One little silent 'e' can have a big impact on English words!

Spelling English words

Pronouncing many English words is a challenge. What about spelling them?
We have the silent "e", unusual letter combinations and blends, inconsistent patterns, and all sorts of obstacles. Luckily for all of us, there are a few aids or tricks to help spell many words that give us trouble.

i before e, except after c: A good and useful rule if you are unsure whether a word is spelled with the sequence ei or ie. The correct order is ie unless the preceding letter is c, in which case it is ei. For example:

friend, believe, relief
perceive, receive, receipt

The good thing about this rule is that it rhymes thus making it easy to remember. The bad thing is that there are exceptions that break this rule. There are always exceptions!

When in doubt, think of this little poem. It always helps me.

i before e, except after c.