“Be Supposed To”

If you’re teaching Intermediate or Advanced English as a Second Language (ESL) or English as a Foreign Language (EFL) students, you’ll eventually want to teach “be supposed to.”

“Be supposed to” is used to express the following:

1) When someone expects something to happen. For example, “The movie is supposed to start at 8:40.”
2) The correct procedure for something. For example, “You are supposed to fill out the form in blue ink.”
3) An expectation about someone’s behavior. For example, “I’m supposed to walk my neighbor’s dog tonight.”
4) An unfulfilled expectation. For example, “Where were you? You were supposed to drive me to school this morning.”

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Things Happening Recently

The main function of the Present Perfect Progressive is to emphasize the duration of something that started in the past and is still going on. For example, "She has been teaching ESL for six years" or "I have been waiting for you for forty-five minutes!

The Present Perfect Progressive (also called the Present Perfect Continuous) is also used to talk about something that has been happening recently. For example, "They have been thinking about taking a vacation" or "Lately, I've been meeting my English students at the library."

For more info on using this tense to talk about things that have been happening recently or lately, see Present Perfect Continuous Forms.

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Complaining with the Progressive Tenses

Perhaps one of the basic life skills ESL students need to learn is how to complain. After all, some say it's the American way! In fact, there are many valid reasons to complain and everyone should know how to complain, especially when he or she is taken advantage of by a merchant. Teaching ESL students how to effectively complain in such situations is a bit more complex.

However, teaching ESL students how to complain the every day way is a bit more simple. If the English language learner knows how to use the Present Progressive or the Past Progressive, then he or she knows how to complain! All you have to do is teach them to use the word "always" with a progressive tense.

Here are some examples of complaints using progressive tenses:

John is always leaving the toilet seat up!

Mary and Mark are always talking during class.

We were always arguing, so we got a divorce.

Using "always" with a progressive tense expresses anger or annoyance with the situation. I could also say, "John always leaves the toilet seat up." Using the Simple Present tense expresses his habit, and perhaps, it expresses my annoyance. However, using the Present Progressive in this situation clearly expresses my annoyance.

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Telephone Skills for ESL Students

"I am Jung. I call you to ask ...." This is a typical beginning of a voice mail left for me by many of my students. This sounds strange to any native speaker. We know that we say, "This is Jung." And then we most likely use a Present Progressive follow up.

Identifying oneself is such a basic telephone skill that I often forget to teach this to my ESL students. It's usually not until a get a message like this, or a phone call, from one of my students that I remember to teach this basic telephone skill. And since many ESL speakers feel uncomfortable using the phone, most of my communication with my students is through email.

Identifying oneself and other basic telephone skills should be a part of the basic survival skills we teach our ESL students.

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Pizza and ESL Teachers-A Joke

I came across another ESL-related joke today.

Q: What's the difference between a large pizza and an ESL teacher?

A: A large pizza can feed a family of four.

Do you have any ESL related jokes? I'd love to hear them. You can send them to me at the email link on the right of this page, or submit them through the comments link.

Thanks!

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Scam Response from Craigslist Ad

Here's the text of the most recent scam response I received from my ESL advertisement on craigslist.org. As I've mentioned before, I always receive at least one of these scam responses whenever I post a new ad.

The title of the email to me was "Good Day Teacher.........."

Here's the text of the email.

"Hello,
how are you doing today ,i took a brief look at your Advert and i am impressed and interested in your lesson ,my son is coming for an holiday coaching in your area ,he is 12years old,he knows a little about this lesson,I don't want him to be less busy in the time of the day , so i have decided to let him attend your lesson , he will be coming 3hours in A DAY (9am to 12am) or anytime you have fixed within the Day time ,so i want you to calculate the cost for 3 week and send me the total cost ,i will be paying you with cashier check ,so get back to me with your cost . i will like to hear from you soon. regards
Joel thompson"

The email address was thompsjoel@gmail.com.

Don't waste your time on these guys!

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Scams on Craigslist

Several weeks ago, I wrote about scams through craigslist.org. Advertising on craigslist is the main way I find new students. I keep one to three different ads running almost at all times. Ads expire after about a week, so I have to keep on top of it and repost my ads when they expire.

So, within 24 hours after posting a new ad, I always receive at least one email from someone who wants their child to receive tutoring for about a month. They ask for information about my fees (which I have already posted in my ad) and they ask for my full name and address. (I've written the details about these emails in my previous post, which you can see under "scams" in the Article Topics listing on the right of this page.)

The point here is that the scammers are persistent and will probably continue to try to scam unsuspecting ESL tutors and other teachers. So please be on the lookout and if the contents of an inquiry to you are similar to what I've written about in my other "scams" post, be careful not to waste too much time figuring out if the inquiry is legit or not.

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