Zoom英会話クラス(金)

Lesson Notes May 16, 2025 (FRIDAY ZOOM)

Words & Phrases

• Is she travelling with her husband and a couple they are friends with? (= “a couple” are two people who are together, usually romantically)

• They went on a trip with a couple they know from work.

• We had dinner with the couple who live next door.

• She met a nice couple at the party.

• Your grandkids are at adorable ages right now.

• Adorable (adj); Extremely cute or lovable, in a way that makes people feel affection or delight.

• That puppy is absolutely adorable.

• She gave me an adorable handmade card.

• The baby made an adorable face when he tasted lemon.

• We travelled around by Jeep. (NOT we moved by Jeep car)

• Did you go inside a pyramid?

• What’s it like inside?

• In the pond there are five adult koi and several baby koi.

• Is that a koi in the river?

• How long do koi live?

• What’s the lifespan of koi?

Grammar

A couple

• “A couple” is treated as a singular unit, so it takes “is”, not “are”.

• You shouldn’t say “my friend’s couple”, “my son’s couple”, “the neighbour couple” etc because in English we don’t “possess” a couple like that.

Koi

• You don’t need to add “-s” to make it plural

• This follows the pattern of some animal and fish names in English like deer, sheep, moose, reindeer and salmon; majority of fish don’t use “-s”, but most shellfish and others do

• shrimp / shrimps, crab / crabs, lobster / lobster, oyster / oysters, scallop / scallops, but squid, octopus

Pronunciation

• Austria (proper noun) ( ˈɒs.tri.ə ) AUS-tri-a

• Australia (proper noun) ( ɒˈstreɪ.li.ə ) aus-TRAL-ia