Many foreign English learners have problems with the similar words. Words like ‘say’ and ‘tell’ may have similar meanings but are used in different ways. Read the article to see  how we use “say” and “tell”.

How do you know if someone is telling a lie?

Who tells more lies? Men or women? Which month do people lie the most in?

Imagine you met your friend and smiled but told her you were depressed, would she believe you?

Things to look out for to see if someone is lying,

The following are some signs you can look for when trying to spot a liar:

Body Language: Liars usually hide their hands and don’t sit straight while telling a lie. They also avoid eye contact while telling the lie.
The Eyes: Some scientific evidence shows that the direction of the eye movement reveals the function taking place inside the brain at that time. For example, looking towards the upper left side means that you are creating an image in your mind while looking at the upper right side means that you are remembering an image. So, if someone looks towards the upper left when asked about something then he or she is probably making an image of the lie they are about to tell.
The Story: If the person is lying then the story she tells might change a bit every time it is discussed. The liar will forget a word, and say something completely new or remove something that she had previously said.
Talking: When telling a lie the liar will usually makes up things as she talks. This usually results in slower talking speed or in stopping many times while talking in order to find what to say.

Vocabulary Say and Tell

We use Say when we report someone’s words

She said “This is Amazing”.

He said that he wanted a drink.
We use say when we ask about language.

Q: How do you say book in Spanish?

A: “Libro

Tell is usually followed immediately by a person. Say is not followed by a person.

He told me his name. [Not said me his name].

We use tell when we want to know how to get to a place.

Can you tell me where the train station is, please? [ Not can you say me …?]

We use tell with wh- words too. ( when, why, how, where), example: you can tell someone how to do something, where something is, why something happened.

We Tell: the time, our name, the truth, lies, the difference between two things, a story/tale.

We Say: hello, goodbye, please, thank you, congratulations, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Birthday!

 

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 26th, 2012 at 4:58 pm and is filed under Learning English. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.