14 Online Tools to Supercharge Your English Language and Writing Skills in 2021
Are you having difficulty with learning the English language, both spoken and written words? Are you fed up with your lack of progress? Confused about which tools are the most reliable and helpful for learning the language? This article is for you.
The English Language can be a complex language to understand for first-time learners; even native English speakers struggle with keeping up with all its rudiments and laws. You don’t need to get a PhD degree in English to supercharge your English skills.
Relax, take a deep breath and try simpler and faster means. There are enough online tools on the Internet today that can get you from a mediocre or zero-knowledge English speaker to a competent one within a month.
All you got to do is to commit yourself to learn and let the online tools do the rest.
Why do you need to improve your English Language and Writing Skills?
As a native English speaker, you grew up singing English, breeding English and talking English. What more can these online tools teach you that you already don’t know? We get it. You don’t want to be a professor of English; you already know enough to communicate fluently in English. So, why should you use online tools?
Improving your English skill is a continuous process, the more you improve it, the better you communicate. In the course of reading, listening to audios and videos and others, even talking to friends, we come across words we have never heard before or terms we aren’t sure of the meaning. These unfamiliar words are not there to embarrass us but to expand our vocabulary.
As a non-English speaker, online tools can represent an alternative or supplement to physical English language classes. If you need budget-friendly language learning options, there are numerous free learning tools online to help.
Here are various reasons why using online tools to improve your English Language and writing skills is a top-notch idea.
- A Universal Language
Google countries where English is either their official, second or third language, and you have nearly a third of countries in the world. If that doesn’t make you recognize it as a universal language already, other facts will.
English is, without doubt, a popular and widely spoken language in the world, with presence in all continents. From Africa to Europe, to Asia, to North America, to South America, to Antarctica and Australia, English covers every continent. It is a universal language that is acceptable in many countries.
There are approximately 1.75 billion English speakers in 106 countries, which represents approximately 20% of the world’s population. One in every five people speaks the English language in the world. Want to learn a universal language? English is your best bet.
- Better Communication and Expression
It is a simple fact that the more in-depth your knowledge of English is, the better your communication range. Whether it is the official language, the second, third or fourth language of your country, improving your English helps you to better communicate and express yourself in the language.
Think about it. With the English language, you can communicate with a society of nearly 2 billion people in over106 countries.
- Better Job Opportunities
There are numerous jobs you can acquire from just improving your English. You can get a job as a news anchor, radio presenter, journalist, editor, writer, English tutor and lots more. Many multinational companies are employing English speakers as they view English as an essential language to have in the business world. It gives you an edge in your job.
- The language of the Internet
Many online articles and websites use the English language as their official language. You enjoy the natural understanding of a substantial part of the internet data from learning and improving your English.
14 Online Tools to Improve Your English language and Writing Skills
The Internet is full of tools you can use to learn just about anything. It is the most extensive database in human history. Need access to instant information? You will find it on the Internet.
Here are some of the tools the Internet has to offer that helps you become a better English speaker or writer.
- Grammar Girl
Grammar Girl by Mignon Fogarty is an excellent tool to help improve your understanding of English grammar.
English students often complain or frown at the difficulty of Grammar rules. To a non-native English speaker looking to improve his language (English) skills, grammar rules can be confusing and easy to miss out.
Grammar Girl is a great online resource to learn about English grammar and other language rules. It focuses on providing quick and ‘dirty’ tips to make you a better writer of the English language. Instead of teaching it the way a boring language tutor would, the site uses unconventional, ‘dirty’ and unforgettable tips that improve your language.
Whether you love grammar or you suck at it, Grammar Girl is an excellent pick for you. Its unconventional way of teaching the language is fun, exciting and excellent for memory retention.
Want to have fun while learning the basics of English grammar? Are you tired of the serious demeanours of other resources that aren’t working for you? Grammar Girl is the answer.
The site drops blog posts and podcasts on the common and the not-so-noticeable grammar issues that are popular among English learners and speakers. It does not just point out the wrong usage of grammar; it also explains why it is wrong, and which alternatives are right. You get detailed explanations about the rules behind punctations and word usage.
Learning and improving your English skills is made easy with the Grammar Girl website. It explains complicated English grammar in a fun and straightforward way. It also offers helpful tips and shortcuts to help you remember the seeming inconsistencies of the English language. Grammar Girl teaches you the difference between passive and active voice and other English lessons in a fun and conversational tone.
- Grammarly
Grammarly is an essential tool for everyone looking to improve their language skills. Writing with Grammarly makes your job easier.
Let’s face it, as an English learner; you are going to make mistakes. The so-called professionals do; it is not something to feel sad about; instead, it is something to improve on.
How? Keep writing. The best way to improve language skills apart from speaking is to write and have an editor show you your mistakes and offer corrections. Getting a professional editor to do this can be costly, and you won’t have on-demand access to the editor all the time.
Grammarly is the on-demand online editor you need to improve your language skills. It spots all writing errors and suggests changes. When you are writing, the app offers you improvements to your article by profiling according to the audience you have set and the tone you want to give to the text.
Grammarly is a brilliant online resource for improving your vocabulary and making gold your writing skills. It functions as an online word processor and offers better correction suggestions than your typical word processor. Grammarly highlight over 250 types of English writing errors. It also suggests similar words for repeated words and to improve the context.
Additionally, Grammarly prepares reports to help improve your writing: how many mistakes you made, what your weak spots are, and what your articles’ average “rating” is. There’s even a reward part included: you will receive Grammarly badges as you improve.
The app is compatible with Google Sheets, Medium, Chrome, Microsoft Word and others. The app is compatible with almost everything you need. Grammarly is a powerful and indispensable tool for both fluent and non-fluent English speakers. It is both an invaluable language tool for early English learners and students.
The Grammarly app is available for on the web, and it also has a Grammarly keyboard for mobile phones. You can install Grammarly as a plugin to your Chrome browser and your Microsoft Word app. Grammarly also checks plagiarism for its premium subscribers. Although it is free to install and use, Grammarly has a premium plan where prices vary for different plans. You have to buy the premium plan to enjoy the best of Grammarly suggestions.
- Hemingway
Hemingway is a popular site for students, early learners, editors and authors. This tool allows you to assess the complexity of a sentence. The software highlights incomprehensible or overly complicated sentences and offers personalized suggestions to help you streamline and simplify your text.
It is a beautiful web-based and desktop standalone software to assist you in editing your written English. The Hemingway App tackles tons of nuances in English writing, like very complex sentences, uses of passive, overuse of adverbs, and far more. Getting it as standalone desktop software for your Mac and Windows costs $9.99.
The desktop app also provides a readability score for the entered text, which you’ll use to know how complicated or straightforward is the content you’ve written. The app highlights all of your wordy sentences in yellow and extraneous content highlighted in red.
- Microsoft Word Help
We all know that Microsoft Word is a writing app for writing documents. What many of us don’t know is that it has a world help section that can be extremely beneficial to new English learners.
Microsoft World Help is Microsoft guide to language learning. There are a whole bunch of guides and tutorials to help you use the right words and boost your language skills; for example, learn how to capitalize your English text correctly and to differentiate between words that sound similar.
Whether it’s grammar or the structure of your sentences, Microsoft Word Help is here to help students and early learners master the English language quickly.
- Thesaurus
Find yourself constantly repeating the same words? Are you searching for a quick way to learn new words but don’t want to read a whole vocabulary of words? The Thesaurus your best friend if you let it be.
How does it work? You search a word that you know or are unfamiliar about, and the Thesaurus produces a bunch of synonyms (similar words) that you can substitute for that word. It also shows a bunch of antonyms (opposite words) for the searched word.
Thesaurus is an excellent tool for those looking to improve their language skills. Even the most reputable authors and English gurus use Thesaurus from time to time. In addition to synonyms and definitions, you will find grammar advice, quizzes and much more on the Thesaurus site. You can try out the fun quizzes to test your knowledge of the language.
The Thesaurus is one of the vital learning tools that every English student should have in their arsenal of tools for developing their language skills. Building on your vocabulary is essential in becoming better at English and Thesaurus offers just that.
Thesaurus helps students in becoming better speakers and writers by providing alternative words and phrases to express themselves in English perfectly. Thesaurus offers the most straightforward collection of synonyms and antonyms that you could use to enhance your vocabulary while learning the English language.
Whatever your message could be, if you’re looking to simplify your written English, Thesaurus will come to your help frequently. This website also features a collection of a number of the foremost overused words that you should try to avoid frequently using in your communications. You get to sharpen your English skills with this powerful online and mobile application tool.
- Daily Writing Tips
You can improve your language skills quickly and easily by spending five minutes a day on the Daily Writing Tips website. Five minutes a day? Yes, you can spend more but five minutes a day consistently over some time will boost your language skills for the better.
As you might have guessed, the Daily Writing Tips site offers daily tips to help you improve your language skills. New tips get added every day for you to learn every day. The tips are often presented in the form of articles, and you can sometimes test your knowledge through quizzes. Whether you want to deepen your spelling, grammar, punctuation, or even vocabulary, Daily Writing Tips will help you improve your English quickly.
- Grammar Book
Grammar Book is another simple online resource to assist you in improving your language skills. The online resource assists you learn punctuation and grammar rules through its fun quizzes and engaging blog posts.
The Grammar Book’s blog gets updated every Tuesday with a fresh blog post for both language learners. You can participate in the Grammar quizzes to enhance your English grammar skills. It also offers ‘The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation’, to assist your language skills.
- Readability-Score
Your writing has got to look and feel attractive to your readers, or they will lose interest in what you are writing. It is not just a tool to help you improve your English communication; it is a tool to help you improve the readability score of your English posts, which is also very important. If your post isn’t easy for the reader to read, there’s no point in writing it in the first place.
Choose any of your favourite articles on the online, and these articles have the most uncomplicated prose and text layout, which only cause you to read more. Readability is a facet of writing which many writers fail to take note of. Regardless of how grammatically correct your sentences are, considering the readability factor is essential in writing better English.
Readability-score is a web resource that helps writers calculate the readability of your text. On a scale of 0 to 100, it scores the text you entered for its readability factor. The higher your score, the higher is your content.
- Aztekera Passive Checker
A considerable problem English students and early learners face is knowing when to use the active voice and passive voice. The active is the voice that is more concise and easy. Use of passive voice more often hampers communication to an enormous extent.
The active voice shows confidence. Learn to spice up your language skills by using more active voice. The site offers a free online tool that helps eliminate passive phrases in your writing.
The excessive use of passive voice could be the rationale for the non-persuasive tone of your writing and speaking. Eliminate such sort of occurrence using Aztekera passive checker tool.
- Grammar Monster
Grammar Monster is one of the best resourceful tools on the Internet to help you improve your language skills. Whatever basics you need to know as an English learner about the English grammar, Grammar Monster is the place to look.
With free resources in punctuations such as apostrophe’s and commas, prepositions, adverbs, adjectives, etc., Grammar Monster has an extensive collection of articles to boost your language skills.
The easy-to-learn chunks of data presented on Grammar Monster make it one among the most straightforward online resources to enhance one’s language skills. It is entirely free to use.
- Pro Writing Aid
Pro Writing Aid is a lovely online resource to supercharge your language and writing skills. It is the industry-standard text editing software. The Pro Writing Aid app is available as a free version for web interfaces. You get to edit your text online for up to 3000 words with the free web tool.
Pro Writing Aid also checks the entered content for plagiarism, usage of vague/abstract words, alliteration analysis and more. These cool features are in addition to the regular spell-checking and other grammar tools. The tool is popular among published actors and editors and helps amplify your English writing skills. It is also an excellent tool for English learners.
- Reverse Dictionary
Have you ever had the right word on the tip of your tongue, but you cannot remember it? Reverse Dictionary is your new ally. Enter a phrase or definition that describes the word you are looking for into the search bar. Therefore the Reverse Dictionary will present you with an inventory of possible matches. It is also an excellent tool for non-native speakers to explore synonyms and grow their vocabulary. Available in Spanish as well!
- Ginger
Ginger is an online resource that catches spelling and grammatical mistakes while also helping you learn from these mistakes, just like Grammarly. Non-native English speakers can profit from using its learning centre to boost their knowledge of the English language. Ginger keeps track of your commonest grammar mix-ups and offers personally tailored reports to point out your progress over time. Additionally, to its grammar checker, Ginger includes a dictionary, sentence rephraser, text reader and translation tool.
- Online Dictionaries
Online Dictionaries are an invaluable resource to both native English speakers, competent English speakers and even non-English speakers seeking to learn the language. The English dictionary is the bible of the language. It is the centre we all flock to make references about words and their meanings.
Improving your language and writing skills for any language is impossible without the use of the dictionary.
When we read a text and come up with a new word that we don’t know what it means, what do we do? Our instinct is to check out the word in a dictionary. What if I give you an online dictionary tool that helps to list the complex words in any text that you have access to? The English Dictionary makes reading and learning easy for you.
The Beeblio Online Dictionary is more than just a dictionary that teaches you words and their meanings. It is a tool that extracts complex words from texts and searches for its meaning, which makes it easier to study any subject.
This tool is beneficial for students trying to increase their vocabulary range, writers, editors and others. It makes learning an entirely new subject like psychology easy by providing meanings to the complex words you are not familiar with. The Beeblio App also performs this task. It is not yet out, but you can subscribe here for the official release.
What is the difference between aesthetic and esthetic
At least one of these words sounds familiar. Even if they don’t, pronouncing them leaves a familiar taste in the mouth; and that’s probably because they sound so alike. They even spell the same, except of course, for the fact that one starts with the letter ‘A’ and the other does not.
Similarities aside, what is the Aesthetic and Esthetic difference? Let’s take this lesson on Aesthetic vs Esthetic
So, what are the differences?
Interestingly, you’d be surprised to find out that minus the difference in A’s, Aesthetic and Esthetic definition are indeed the same. The main difference is that ‘Aesthetic’ is used in British English spelling, and ‘Esthetic’ is used in American English spelling. This is unlike the case with than and then which are different in spelling and meaning, but may sound similar when they are pronounced.
Aesthetic and Esthetic have basically the same meaning, once the context of the sentence in question has been properly established. That is, once you’ve determined the meaning of the word, either spelling can be used.
This same phenomenon occurs in the case of ‘colour’ and ‘color’. In some countries, especially commonwealth and European countries, ‘colour’ is the accepted spelling; whereas in others, mostly the Americas, ‘color’ is used instead.
With regards to meaning, as aforementioned, there is very little difference. As we’ve established before, once the context of the sentence has been established, they mean the same thing.
Let us now define Aesthetic vs Esthetic
Aesthetic refers to a thing that possesses artistic qualities or values, thereby being or looking appealing to our senses; or it is used to describe someone’s idea of what is beautiful. Alternatively, Aesthetics is also a field of philosophy that is related with a sense of beauty, especially appreciation of beauty in nature and art.
Esthetics is a word with exactly the same meaning, being specifically used in the cosmetic industry. It is used to mean something beautiful or something showing appreciation of human beauty.
As an adjective, aesthetic or esthetic mean being concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty; giving or designed to give pleasure through beauty. An example(s) of the words in usage is;
“the pictures give great aesthetic pleasure”
“The paintings are such aesthetic objects”
As a noun, the words mean ‘a set of principles underlying the work of a particular artist or artistic movement’.
Activities such as waxing, the shaping of eyebrows, aromatherapy (which is the use of aromatic materials, including essential oils, and other aromatic compounds, to improve the pyschology or physical state of a person, facial treatments and plastic surgery, or any other activities done to improve upon what one has got since birth, are classified under esthetics.
In medical science, aesthetics and esthetics describe the occupation of someone, particularly one specialising in the provision of a wide range of skin care services.
The word Aesthetic or Esthetic is of Greek origins, having been coined from various words late in the 18th century such as ‘aisthētikos’, meaning ‘in relation to perceiving through the senses’, ‘aisthēta’ meaning ‘things that are perceptible’ and from ‘aisthesthai’ which means ‘to perceive’. It’s adoption into English language occured in the early 19th century, after the usage of the word with regards to “being concerned with beauty” coined in German mid 18th century.
In conclusion, there is no real difference between Aesthetic and Esthetic. Many parts of the world have simply changed the spelling of ‘aesthetic’ to esthetic, and so it is regarded as an alternative spelling to the former. In their usage, they both mean the same thing, and it is really just a matter of spelling preference.
SOURCES
- Esthetics or aesthetics | English language | Preply. https://preply.com/en/question/esthetics-or-aesthetics
- Aestheticology. https://www.aestheticology.net/
The difference between than vs then
Than vs Then is a battle many people face. It is easy to mix them up in writing and speech. They look alike and have three similar letters. When typing, it is possible to mix them up and your spell checker will not spot the error. For example, as I am writing this, my spell checker is suggesting I change the ‘Than’ I used as the first word of the paragraph to ‘Then’.
Remarkable!
They do not sound alike so errors arising from usage in speech are a bigger problem. If you have this problem, this than vs then worksheet is for you. The difference between than and then, like connotation and denotation, arises from its meanings. These word twins look alike on paper but sound different in speech.
The first step to knowing the difference between both words is to know their definitions.
So, what are the differences?
Than and Then are two separate words, they do not share the same meaning.
There are several instances we use the word ‘Than’. We use it for comparison. For example, she is fatter than her sister.
As conjunction – He is older than I am.
– She is smarter than us.
As a preposition – She is bigger than you.
– He is faster than me.
‘Then’ has several meanings. It indicates action (what is next) and time.
As an action – He grabbed the bag, then ran away.
– She dropped the kids at school, then drove to work.
To show time – Ever since then, she no longer walks alone at night.
– Until then, do not stop trying.
As an adverb – I lived in Alaska then.
– I worked with Frisco Farms then.
As an adjective – The then President of my country.
As a consequence – If John and Jane are siblings, then they cannot marry.
Than vs Then Rule
It is embarrassing when you make simple grammatical errors. Having an editor or friend point out to you, ‘Hey, it’s not than, it’s then” is an embarrassing moment.
These two four-letter words look alike but do not have the same meaning. Using than instead of then, then instead of than distorts the meaning of what you are saying or writing.
Then functions in sentences as an adverb while than functions as conjunction. Can you see where the confusion is coming from? They are both connecting words.
The than vs then rule is all about knowing when to use them. We use the word ‘than’ when we want to compare things or persons. It is a comparison word. We use the word ‘then’ when we want to show time.
Than – For comparing things or people.
Then – For indicating time.
Keeping these basic definitions at the back of your mind is key to ending the misuse of the words.
There is no better way to learn the difference between the two words than to do than vs then practices. Practice! And more practice is the key to all learning.
Examples of 100 compounds words
Your kids may ask “what are Compound words?”
Compound words are formed when two or more words are joined together to create a new word that has an entirely new meaning. It’s literally just the process of additions; only it’s in English!
For example, “sun” and “flower” are two very different words with their own distinct meanings but when you fuse them together, they form another word, “Sunflower”. Compound words are formed by either adding a hyphen in the middle or simply just using the two words as a single term. The spelling of the two words is not necessarily changed when they are joined together, but the definition becomes unique. There are three types of compound words for kids in this compound words worksheet;
Closed Compound words: These words are written as a single word, such as haircut, newspaper, grandmother, etc.
Open Compounds: Compound words that are written as separate words such as high school, living room, school bus, etc.
Hyphenated Compounds: Words that use a hyphen in between two words, such as well-known, second-rate, merry-go-round, etc
Here are a 100 examples of Compound words for grade 1 for your kids, and if you’re looking to further improve their vocabulary, you can do so with these learn new words list
Compound Words List
Air + Plane – Airplane
Air + port – Airport
Angel + fish – Angelfish
Ant + farm – Antfarm
Ball + park – Ballpark
Beach + ball – Beachball
Bike + rack – Bikerack
Bill + board – Billboard
Black + hole – Blackhole
Blue + berry – Blueberry
Board + walk – Boardwalk
Body + guard – Bodyguard
Book + store – Bookstore
Bow + Tie – Bowtie
Brain + storm – Brainstorm
Bus + boy – Busboy
Cab + driver – Cabdriver
Candle + stick – Candlestick
Car + wash – Carwash
Cart + wheel – Cartwheel
Cat + fish – Catfish
Cave + man – Caveman
Chocolate + chip – Chocolate chip
Cross + bow – Crossbow
Day + dream – Daydream
Dead + end – Deadend
Dog + house – Doghouse
Dragon + fly – Dragonfly
Dress + shoes – Dress-shoes
Drop + down – Dropdown
Ear + lobe – Earlobe
Earth + quake – Earthquake
Eye + balls – Eyeballs
Father + in + law – Father-in-law
Finger + nail – Fingernail
Fire + cracker – Firecracker
Fire + fighter – Firefighter
Fire + fly – Firefly
Fire + work – Firework
Fish + bowl – Fishbowl
Fisher + man – Fisherman
Fish + hook – Fishhook
Foot + ball – Football
For + get – Forget
For + give – Forgive
French + fries – French fries
Good + night – Goodnight
Grand + child – Grandchild
Ground + hog – Groundhog
Hair + band – Hairband
Ham + burger – Hamburger
Hand + cuff – Handcuff
Hand + out – Handout
Hand + shake – Handshake
Head + band – Headband
Her + self – Herself
High + heels – Highheels
Honey + dew – Honeydew
Hop + scotch – Hopscotch
Horse + man – Horseman
Horse + play – Horseplay
Hot + dog – Hotdog
Ice + cream – Icecream
It + self – Itself
Kick + ball – Kickball
Kick + boxing – Kickboxing
Lap + top – Laptop
Life + time – Lifetime
Light + house – Lighthouse
Mail + man – mailman
Make + Up – Makeup
Mid + night – Midnight
Milk + shake – Milkshake
Moon + rocks – Moonrocks
Moon + walk – Moonwalk
Mother + in – law – Mother-in-law
Movie + Theater – Movie theater
New + born – Newborn
News + letter – Newsletter
News + paper – Newspaper
Night + light – Nightlight
No + body – Nobody
North + pole – Northpole
Nose + bleed – Nosebleed
Outer + space – Outer space
Over + The + Counter – Over-the-counter
Over + estimate – Overestimate
Pay + check – Paycheck
Police + man – Policeman
Pony + tail – Ponytail
Post + card – Postcard
Racquet + ball – Racquetball
Rail + road – Railroad
Rain + bow – Rainbow
Rain + coat – Raincoat
Rain + drop – Raindrop
Rattle + snake – Rattlesnake
Rock + band – Rockband
Rocket + ship – Rocketship
Row + boat – Rowboat
Sail + boat – Sailboat
Sure your kids are by now interested in Compound words, and are looking to learn some more. We’ve got you covered. Here are some more Compound words for your kids to play around with
Schoolbooks
Schoolwork
Shoelace
Showoff
Skateboard
Snowball
Snowflake
Softball
Solar system
Soundproof
Spaceship
Spearmint
Starfish
Starlight
Stingray
Strawberry
Subway
Sunglasses
Sunroof
Supercharge
Superman
Superstar
Tablespoon
Tailbone
Tailgate
Take down
Takeout
Taxpayer
Teacup
Teammate
Teaspoon
Tennis shoes
Throwback
Timekeeper
Timeline
Timeshare
Tugboat
Tupperware
Underestimate
Uplift
Upperclassman
Uptown
Video game
Wallflower
Waterboy
Watermelon
Wheelchair
Without
Workboots
Worksheet
SOURCES
150 Examples of Compound Words for Kids – Blog …. https://www.turtlediary.com/blogs/150-examples-of-compound-words-for-kids.html
200 homophones examples list
A homophone is a word that is pronounced the same, to a varying extent, as another word but differs totally in meaning. A homophone may also differ in spelling. The two words may be spelled the same, such as rose (flower) and rose (past tense of “rise”), or differently, such as carat, and carrot, or to, two, and too. The term “homophone” may also apply to units longer or shorter than words, such as phrases, letters, or groups of letters which are pronounced the same as another phrase, letter, or group of letters. Any unit with this property is said to be “homophonous”. Homophones are often used to create puns and to deceive the reader (as in crossword puzzles) or to suggest multiple meanings. They usually occur in groups of two but sometimes they can be three or four in a group. It’s important to recognize and identify the most common homophones because the spelling can change the entire meaning of a sentence
English Language has more homophones than most languages because its pronunciation has changed a lot over time, while its spelling has changed very little. Many words have been borrowed from other languages through the centuries and this explains why English spelling is so strange (or confusing!). For example: right (Old English: riht) vs. write (Old English: writan) vs. rite (Latin: ritus). In the past, these words would have been pronounced differently, but today they all sound the same in modern English.
Homophones are a type of homonym. Homonyms, broadly defined, are words which are homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of pronunciation) or homophones (words that share the same pronunciation, regardless of spelling), or both.
You can find out more about these types of words and word types/structures in Connotation vs Denotation
Here are 200 homophones for kids to read up on. You can use also use this homophones list for a homophones worksheet
abel — able
accede — exceed
accept — except
addition — edition
all ready — already
ax — acts
axel — axle
axes — axis
aye — eye — I
ayes — eyes
baa — bah
baal — bail
bass — base
baste — based
bate — bait
bated — baited
bawl — ball
been — bin
beer — bier
beet — beat
bell — belle
berry — bury
berth — birth
better — bettor
bib — bibb
bight — bite
bury — berry
bussed — bust
but — butt
buy — by — bye
byte — bight
cache — cash
caddie — caddy
cain — cane
cheap — cheep
check — Czech
cheep — cheap
chews — choose
chic — sheik
click — clique
climb — clime
clique — click
colonel — kernel
coolie — coulee
coop — coupe
cops — copse
coral — choral
cord — cored
core — corps
cored — chord
corps — core
coughers — coffers
coulee — coolie
council — counsel
coup — coo
course — coarse
cousin — cozen
coward — cowered
coy — koi
cozen — cousin
craft — kraft
crape — crepe
crawl — kraal
creak — creek
crepe — crape
crewel — cruel
dense — dents
descent — dissent
dun — done
dye — die
dyeing — dying
fare — fair
fate — fete
faun — fawn
fax — facts
faze — phase
feat — feet
feint — faint
fends — fens
flour — flower
flow — floe
flower — flour
flu — flue — flew
flyer — flier
foaled — fold
fort — forte
forward — foreword
foul — fowl
four — fore — for
fourth — forth
gibe — jibe
gnu — knew — new
gofer — gopher
gored — gourd
gorilla — guerilla
gourd — gored
grade — grayed
graft — graphed
graham — gram
graphed — graft
heroin — heroine
hertz — hurts
hew — hue
hoes — hose
hold — holed
hole — whole
holed — hold
hue — hew
humerus
incite — insight
jam — jamb
jean — gene
jell — gel
jibe — gibe
kernel — colonel
knap — nap
knave — nave
ladder — latter
lade — laid
lain — lane
lays — laze
lea — lee
leach — leech
lead — led
leak — leek
lean — lien
leased — least
led — lead
lee — lea
leech — leach
liar — lier
lichen — liken
lie — lye
lien — lean
lier — liar
lieu — Lou
liken — lichen
lochs — locks
lock — loch
locks — lox
mints — mince
missal — missile
missed — mist
misses — Mrs.
missile — missal
mist — missed
mite — might
moan — mown
moat — mote
mode — mowed
mood — mooed
moose — mousse
morn — mourn
nice — gneiss
Nice — niece
nickers — knickers
niece — Nice
oh — owe
one — won
owe — oh
padded — patted
paean — paeon
pail — pale
pain — pane
pair — pare
pale — pail
parish — perish
real — reel
root — route
rose — rows
rows — rose
rude — rued
rue — roux
rued — rude
troop — troupe
trussed — trust
turn — tern
tutor — tooter
tux — tucks
urn — earn
use — ewes
vale — veil
vane — vein
vary — very
veil — vale
vein — vain
ways — weighs
we — wee
we’ll — wheel
weak — week
wear — where
weave — we’ve
wretch — retch
wring — ring
yew — ewe — you
yews — use
yoke — yolk
you’ll — Yule
your — you’re
yule — you’ll
Here are some more examples of homophones to play around with;
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air, heir aisle, isle ante-, anti- bare, bear, bear be, bee brake, break buy, by cell, sell cent, scent cereal, serial coarse, course complement, compliment dam, damn dear, deer die, dye eye, I fair, fare fir, fur flour, flower hair, hare heal, heel hear, here him, hymn hole, whole hour, our idle, idol in, inn knight, night knot, not know, no made, maid mail, male meat, meet morning, mourning none, nun oar, or one, won pair, pear peace piece plain, plane poor, pour pray, prey principal, principle profit, prophet
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SOURCES
- 101 English Homophones You Should Know — OTUK (Online …. https://onlineteachersuk.com/english-homophones/
- Homonym – Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homonym
- Homophones: the Most Confusing Words in English (a List …. https://www.eslbuzz.com/homophones-the-most-confusing-words-in-english-a-list-with-meanings/
- Homophone – Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound-alike_word
- 5 Examples Of Homonyms In A Sentence. https://localexam.com/search/5-examples-of-homonyms-in-a-sentence
- 101 English Homophones You Should Know — OTUK (Online …. https://onlineteachersuk.com/english-homophones/
The difference between connotation vs denotation
It is not uncommon for people to use the word denotation where they mean connotation and the other way around. It is easy to mix these two terms up.
They are two ways to define a word. This is the reason people tend to mess them up, they both deal with the meaning of a word. We use denotation and connotation in our writing and speech. The words we speak have two meanings: connotation and denotation.
Interestingly, both words have the same Latin root word. The root is ‘notare’ which translates to English as ‘to note.’
Connotation and denotation sound alike but have different meanings.
Enough of the similarities, let’s look at their differences?
So, what are their differences?
If you want to gain mastery of the English Language, and not get confused with all its intricacies, it is a must to know how to properly differentiate between connotation denotation.
What is Connotation? It is the idea a word suggests in addition to the meaning of the word; the underlying meaning or the feeling a word invokes.
What is Denotation? It is the literal or direct meaning of a word.
Words have two meanings – connotative and denotative. The problem is people make mistakes of not properly distinguishing between the connotative meaning of a word and its denotative meaning.
There is a clear relationship between words, its connotative and denotative meanings, and the users.
Has someone ever said something to you and you are like ‘Dude, what are you saying?’ It is likely the person is using a connotation while you are interpreting the speech from the viewpoint of denotation.
Another way to look at the difference between connotation and denotation is to see denotation as the primary meaning of a word, and connotation as the secondary meaning of a word.
Connotation vs Denotation Examples
The connotation is the meaning of a word according to the context (cultural or personal) usage while denotation is the standard meaning of a word you easily get from a dictionary.
There is a lot of connotation vs denotation examples in the English Language. The phrase ‘a lot of’ is an understatement. Almost all words in the English Language have a connotation and a denotation. It all depends on the context the word is used.
For example, the word home has a connotative and denotative meaning. The denotative meaning of home is ‘a building structure where people live in’. Home as ‘a place of comfort and belonging’ is the connotative meaning. It is not necessarily a physical building.
‘Jim has a home in Alaska’ – From this sentence, the meaning is clear. Jim is telling us he has a physical building in Alaska he calls home. This is an example of denotation. We do not struggle with denotation, it’s the other that’s tricky.
‘He made my heart his home’ – This is an example of connotation. We have to dig deeper than the surface meaning to understand this sentence. The person is telling us how someone made his heart their home. It is impossible to build a physical structure in someone’s heart so that thought is canceled. The connotative meaning of home here is ‘He made me fall in love with him.’
Let’s look at another connotation vs denotation activity to test how well we are getting their differences.
The word baggage has both a connotative and denotative meaning. The denotative meaning is ‘a bag where we store items for easy transportation.’
‘Sarah forgot to take her baggage to the airport.’ – The baggage here is referring to a bag. This is the denotative meaning.
‘Sarah has baggage.’ – Now, this is tricky. Do you mean Sarah has a bag which is the denotative meaning of the word, or Sarah has some drama in her which is the connotative meaning.
To know what type of baggage it is – denotation or connotation, you have to know the context of usage. If the person is talking about items, going out, it is likely the person is referring to baggage as a bag. If the person is talking about feelings, it is likely the person is referring to baggage as negative drama.
Connotation vs Denotation Anchor Chart
Using an anchor chart is an effective way to teach the difference between connotation and denotation.
|
Connotation |
Denotation |
|
This refers to the suggested or implied meaning of a word. |
This refers to the basic or actual meaning of a word. |
|
Examples |
Examples |
|
Look at that dog – If you are referring to the human, you mean that human is ugly or acts like an animal. |
Look at that dog – If you are referring to a dog, you mean ‘hey, that’s a dog.’ |
|
He is wearing a vintage shirt. |
The store downtown sells a lot of vintage items. |
This connotation vs denotation anchor chart explains everything. Knowing the basic difference between these two words will save you from misinterpreting what you read or hear.
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