Here are some more very commonly used idioms – try to use them and see how you get on!

In English classes at UIC you will learn idioms along with other vocabulary and more importantly will learn how to use them. This is one of the areas that you can improve in much better if you are in London than in your home country.

1. to pay lip service to (something) (an idea, a kind of behaviour etc) means to say that you will support something but then to do nothing about it – “the banks pay lip service to the idea of gender equality but then if you look around the management you see just a lot of men”

2. to toe the line means to conform to something – “there’s no point having an international agreement on free trade if the US won’t toe the line”

3. to do your own thing means to do what you want to do without following anyone else “I don’t want to settle down and conform, I just want to do my own thing”

4. to go your own way means to do what you want to do especially when it’s something different form others “we don’t have to do this together any more – you go your way and I’ll go mine”

5. to (try to) keep up with the Joneses means to try and have what others around you have – traditionally your neighbours. It’s not a good thing! “they are always worrying about keeping up with the Jones – I wish they would just be happy with what they’ve got”

6. to stand out like a sore thumb means to be easily noticed because youa re different to evetyone around you “I thought it was a fancy dress party  but I was the only one who did – I stuck out like a sore thumb”

7. to obey the letter of the law means to do exactly what the law says – in detail.

8. to be like a fish out of water means to feel uncomfortable because you are not familiar with, or do not fit in with the surroundings. “I was the only one at the party who didn’t know anyone and couldn’t dance – it was a bit uncomfortable and I felt like a fish out of water”

9. (a situation/problem/insult) to be like water off a duck’s back means that something doesn’t affect you – often an insult. “he’s so insensitive – he never takes any notice. Anything you say to him is just like water off a duck’s back”

10. to call a spade a spade means to say exactly what you mean – nothing subtle! “I don’t like fat people – I’ll say what I mean and call a spade a spade”

The Internet has hugely changed the way we gather information (obviously really) but it has also significantly changed the way students at UIC study English – both in class and outside the class. If you go back 15 years every language school in the UK would have had a library – or study centre where students would have been expected to go after classes and do homework or practise their English. Rooms full of cassette recorders for listening to different accents and for practising other skills. The reality now is completely different. As we reported in a previous blog about the computer room at UIC, we found that students simply didn’t want to go to the study centre and study – what they wanted to do was to be able to access study materials whenever they wanted – and to be honest wherever they wanted. So, we have a new vision of an independent learner in London. It is no longer someone who comes to class, then goes to the study centre and reads worksheets and listens to cassette tapes. Instead it is someone who (still) comes to class, then uses different places in the city to practise their English. Apart form the usual websites which are out there and which can be wonderful tools – like the BBC  for example, where you can not only read, but also listen to English ….. at UIC we realised we had to invest in some specialised software which would give the students access to the kinds of materials that would help their learning and also a structure for them to be better able to manage their experience.

The materials we are now delighted to be able to provide are developed by our partners and are available to all our students for the duration of their stay with us. So, the typical student now sits on the bus doing listening practise, sits in McDonalds or Starbucks (with free wifi!) doing speaking practice or grammar exercises, and even better could sit in the middle of one of London’s beautiful parks doing some reading practise with a phone which connects to the internet. We have made a significant investment in this technology and are starting to see students really enjoying using it and being able to see the benefits.

We are also aware that students want to use facebook and other social media sites and we are now working on bringing all this together – after all if you are prctising English on facebook it’s still practise!

If you still want to find some good internet sites then have a look at these:

BBC

British Council 

World English

and here is a link to 20 other sites!

When you are in the UK learning English with UIC you are surrounded by all sorts of opportunities to practise your English outside the school. One of the obvious ways you can do this is to read a newspaper – in central London you can get a free newspaper in the morning and in the evening, so even if you don’t have any money you can still do this easily enough. The free newspapers are ‘The Metro’ which you can get at tube stations in the morning and the ‘Evening Standard’ which you can get at tube stations in the evening. Although the Metro has always been free, the Standard wasn’t free until very recently so it does have a tradition of being a normal newspaper at least; the Metro tends to re-print articles from other newspapers. Both of them are really designed to be read on the journey to and from work so stories are short, very topical and there’s are not generally long complicated editorials or opinion pages. That can make them easily accessible if youa re also trying to learn Enlgish. If you want to read something else then you really have a number of choices to make – firstly whether the paper is a tabloid or a broadsheet and then which side of the political spectrum it is on. The tabloids are really like gossip magazines – lots of stories about celebrities, sports stars and a little news. You can find the Sun and the Mirror here! The broadsheets are generally much more serious – The Times, The Guardian, The Telegraph and the Independent being the best known and the most established. The Times for example was founded in 1785!  The Mail and the Express fall between the two – neither really one thing or the other. The Financial Times is a broadsheet but as the name suggests focuses pretty much on financial news.In the broadsheets you will find serious news reporting, International news, Financial news and Editorial comment as well as sports and reviews of arts and music for example. Politically the papers stand either on the right (conservative) – Telegraph, Times, Mail, Sun, express or on the left – Guardian, Mirror with the Independent sitting somewhere in the middle. There are also Sunday papers – many of the weekly titles producing a Sunday edition, but also with some other papers like the Observer (similar to the Guardian) and the News of the World (similar to the Sun). There are also lots of local newspapers which you’ll be able to get free or buy cheaply where you are  in London; these are also interesting and may mean more to you as they will be about you the local area.

At times like the present with an election coming up it’s easy to see how important it is for political parties to have the support of the papers – the Sun, for example has a regular readership of over 3 million – as does the News of the World. The papers are owned by a few groups or families and these people have a huge influence over information. For example the Sun, The News of the World, The Times and The Sunday Times are all owned by News International (who also own Sky TV).

The papers also all have websites which are free (for the moment) for example The Guardian. News International is considering charging for access to information but as things stand at the moment it is free.

So .. no excuse not to be doing a bit of reading and getting a bit of information about the UK.