Vocabulario en inglés, reported speech y modal verbs: guía de estudio con ejemplos

Vocabulario

Shaking your head: means you understand and encourage a person to continue talking.

Whistle: to make a high sound by forcing air through the lips.

Take offence: to be outraged.

Stare: looking at something for a long time, especially when you are surprised.

Blow your nose: to force air from your lungs and through your nose to clear it.

Impolite: discourteous.

Lack of offence: indifference, without consideration, rude.

A pack of lies: to be completely untrue.

A red flag: sign or warning of danger.

Lead someone up the garden path: make someone believe something which is not true.

Lie through your teeth: to say something which you know is not true.

Look someone in the eye: to make eye contact.

Practice makes perfect: you become good at an activity by doing it regularly.

Nod your head: say yes by moving your head up and down.

Blink: open and close your eyes very quickly.

Handshake: a gesture used to say hello or goodbye or to make an agreement.

Bow: bend forwards to show respect or after performing.

Bad manners: behaviour that isn't socially acceptable.

Blunt: very direct and impolite.

Spotting: identifying or noticing something that is difficult to detect.

Fidget: keep moving your hands or body because you are nervous.

Give away: make known a secret that you wanted to keep.

Clues: acts or pieces of evidence that help you discover something.

Reported Speech

To repeat what someone has said.

Aaron says: “Copy the explanation” → Aaron said that we had to copy the explanation.

Modal Verbs

Ability and permission

• Can: poder. We use can and can't in the present, and could and couldn't in the past.
• Be able to: ser capaz de. We use be able to for ability in all tenses and with other modal verbs.

Advice

• Should / shouldn't: deberías.
• Ought to / ought not to / oughtn't to: deberías.

Obligation

• Have to / haven't to: external obligation.
• Must / mustn't: personal obligation. We use must when we think something is certainly true.

Prohibition

• Can't: to explain what is not allowed. We use can't when we think something is not possible.
• Mustn't: to give more emphasis.

Possibility

We use might, may and could to say something is possible now or will happen in the future.

• May: un poco.
• Might: un poco más.
• Could: mucho más.

Relative Pronouns