Lama D and his family asked me to teach them English idiomatic expressions. This beats worrying and wondering about the world. I sent them to the family on WeChat social networking and now they are studying on their cell phones. The first three videos teach over 100 idioms to help them understand some tricky ways we speak English.
This “Cliffhanger” lesson teaches 46 English Idioms. For the lesson link go here.
The “Blessing in Disguise” video teaches 75 English Idioms. For the lesson link go here.
This is the “Easy as Pie” lesson, with 35 English idioms. For the lesson link go here.
Lama D’s daughter, Baby on the right, asked me for advanced tongue twisters for her and her brothers. Her most difficult letters to pronounce are Th, T, D, R, P, and B. These five videos hopefully will to help them refine their pronunciation. Inspired by Lewis Carrol’s Jabberwocky nonsense verse, they challenge a student to perfect English pronunciation. See below.
#1 Advanced Tongue Twisters: TH, English Pronunciation
Thank you for the three thousand thoughts for my thirty-seventh birthday gathering Thursday.
These thrilling things felt like thunder in the earth.
Therefore, thanks to those faithful thoughts, I think that my mother, my father, my brother and I will be healthy, wealthy, and youthful, thriving through thick and thin.
#2 Advanced Tongue Twisters: T and D, English Pronunciation
T
Two tiny tigers took two taxis to town.
Tiny tiger number one got twelve turnips and ate them right away.
Tiny tiger number two was tricky.
He bought twenty-two little teapots, twenty-two teabags, turmeric root, and took nothing to eat.
When they got home, tiny tiger number one was totally tired.
But tiny tiger number two was different.
He boiled water and made turmeric tea for twenty-two friends to make everyone quite content.
D
Monday Devi spent two Dominican dollars for a dinner of Doritos.
Tuesday Devi’s doctor David said: “Don’t buy Doritos. Buy good food instead.”
Wednesday Devi visited Dalton foods.
She decided to buy delicious food including dahl, dark rice, daikon radish, avocado, and salad.
Devi needed to spend four Dominican dollars, and she enjoyed good food for eight days.
What was Devi’s food cost per day?
#3 Advanced Tongue Twisters: P and B, English Pronunciation
P
Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
Where’s the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?
B
Barefoot Betty Bottom bought a big bag of butter
To bake her best banana bread for breakfast.
Betty’s blind husband barely took a bite, and said:
“Big Trouble. This bread is burned, and the butter is bitter.
Give me a bowl of buckwheat with barley now before I break the table!”
After breakfast Barefoot Betty ran to the store to take back the bad bitter butter.
She bought the best butter and a basket of berries.
Next morning she awoke before the birds to make a new banana bread with berries.
At breakfast Betty waited behind the broken table.
Her blind husband barely took a nibble and said:
“This is the BEST BANANA BREAD!”
So they both enjoyed banana bread with berries till bedtime.
#4 Advanced Tongue Twisters: R, English Pronunciation
Ravenous rabbits run very fast through terrible pouring rain with various umbrellas.
Running rapidly through narrow rocky roads,
They try not to worry as they carry important letters and virtual red roses
In order to marry the rich restaurant waitress Rosanna Ray.
#5 Advanced Tongue Twisters: F and V, English Pronunciation
F
Five famous fleas fix fantastic finger foods for joyful farmers in France.
Carefully they feed faithful families platefuls of perfect food, to forget a lifetime of fastidious fasting.
A farmer’s wife Fanny finishes all the waffles, fruit, French fries, fish and flatbread, feasting fast with fork and knife.
Fifty fanatic females fearful of lymphatic failure, forbid offering more food.
Finally the families defy the famous flea chief, as he falls laughing into a flower.
V
My very favorite vegetarian Victoria invited seven volunteer drivers and seven loving wives for a private view of various active volcanoes on vacation in Venezuela.
Visitors nervously viewed the violence from above as five exploding waves of vibrant lava moved out of several volcanic caves leaving vast virgin forests covered forever.