Grammar

The comma might be the most troublesome punctuation mark. This is largely due to the many different ways the comma is used. Sometimes, the comma indicates a pause that would occur if the sentence were spoken aloud. Other times, the comma separates grammatical components of the sentence. Finally, there are mechanical and stylistic uses of…

I think language is like music.  Imagine words are like musical notes and the grammar describes which notes go together, like in English it describes which words go together. As simple as that. Grammar describes the language, but it is not the language.  It’s a way of talking about it. You may find that you started to get…

Here’s a tip that I make sure all my IELTS students know – complex grammar not only improves your grammar score, but it also increases your coherence and cohesion score. Be sure to avoid the mistakes that most students make on writing by signing up for my exclusive IELTS Ebooks here on Patreon. Dave  What is…

What is Cohesion? Good cohesion is about how well your writing is linked together. For most IELTS students, this means using a good range of linking phrases. For low level students this means using a range of basic linking phrases like in the example below: Many people argue that as modern life becomes more convenient,…

Its (without an apostrophe) is the possessive of the pronoun “it”. You will also come across “it’s” (with an apostrophe). This is a contraction of “it is” or “it has”. Because they are pronounced the same but have different meanings, we call these words homophones. These words are often confused – even by native English speakers. So, how…

Review your conditionals for the IELTS test To master conditional grammar, you need to see it, hear it and use it in a variety of context and review it regularly.This lesson will help you review Conditional Grammar with 15 interactive examples to help you understand how they work in real contexts, which will help you…

1. Too Many Basic Mistakes are Very Bad for your IELTS Score. Let’s be honest, grammar is worth 25% of your writing and speaking marks, which is a lot.   If you know that you make a lot of mistakes in your speaking or writing but you don’t do anything about it, that isn’t a very…