How to Stay Updated with New English Words

Post 2 of ... Designing Assessments that Work for a Worldwide Audience - Design for Language Clarity and Translation Readiness Even when an exam is written in English, many of the people taking it may not speak English as their first language. That is why it is important to keep the language clear and easy to follow. Complex sentences, double negatives, subtle humor, or colloquialisms can create confusion and distract from what the question is meant to measure. When writing for a global audience, focus on being plain and direct. Keep one clear idea per sentence so the meaning is easy to understand. Avoid phrases that may not translate well across cultures, like “hit the ground running” or “out of left field.” If the exam will be translated, collaborate with a translator who understands the subject area and assessment language conventions, even if they aren’t a subject matter expert. After translation, have native-speaking SMEs review the items to confirm that the wording is accurate and that each question still measures the same skills and concepts as the original version. Taking the time to write clearly and prepare for translation makes an exam more accessible and fairer for everyone who takes it, no matter where they are in the world. Image complements of Freepik.com

What can we do when we get a new sentence in English But we can't understand the meaning of that sentence .......!!!!!! Great question — not understanding a sentence in English happens to everyone, even fluent speakers sometimes. Here's a step-by-step approach to help you understand the meaning of a new or confusing sentence. Look Up Unknown Words Use a dictionary (like Cambridge, Oxford, or Learner’s Dictionary) or a translator to find the meaning of any words you don’t know. You can use tools like: Google Translate Cambridge Dictionary WordReference (great for phrasal verbs & idioms) ChatGPT Log in You said: What we can do when we get a new sentence in English But we can't understand the meaning of that sentence ChatGPT said: Great question — not understanding a sentence in English happens to everyone, even fluent speakers sometimes. Here's a step-by-step approach to help you understand the meaning of a new or confusing sentence: 🧩 Step-by-Step Guide to Understand an English Sentence: 1. Break the Sentence into Smaller Parts Divide the sentence into phrases or smaller sections to understand each part. Long or complex sentences are often easier to understand in pieces. 2. Look Up Unknown Words Use a dictionary (like Cambridge, Oxford, or Learner’s Dictionary) or a translator to find the meaning of any words you don’t know. You can use tools like: Google Translate Cambridge Dictionary WordReference (great for phrasal verbs & idioms) 3. Identify the Subject, Verb, and Object Most English sentences follow this structure: Subject + Verb + Object Example: "The cat (subject) chased (verb) the mouse (object)." If you can find these parts, the core meaning becomes clearer. 4. Check for Idioms or Phrasal Verbs Sometimes the sentence includes idioms (e.g., “kick the bucket”) or phrasal verbs (e.g., “give up”) that aren’t literal. These need special attention — look them up directly. Rephrase or Paraphrase Try to say the sentence in a simpler way. This helps check your understanding. 7. Read the Context (if available) Understanding the sentences before or after it can help give meaning to the confusing one. 📌 Example: Sentence: “She was taken aback by his sudden outburst.” Step-by-step: Unknown phrase? → “taken aback” Look it up → means “surprised/shocked” Now rephrase: “She was surprised by his sudden shouting.” #english #spoken #speaking

Ever notice how the smartest-sounding people often make the least sense? I stumbled across a thread a while back that ruined half of business writing for me. Because once you see it, you can’t unsee it. If someone sounds full of shit, they probably are. And the proof isn’t emotional - it’s linguistic. English didn’t start as the language of empire or intellect. It started as a working-class mashup, the tongue of farmers, fighters, and builders. But around a thousand years ago, that changed. When the Normans invaded England in 1066, they brought their French, a Latin-based language used by rulers, priests, and scholars. For centuries, the upper class spoke French and Latin. The lower class spoke English. And that divide got baked right into the DNA of the language. That’s why we say ask but lawyers say inquire. We say help but bureaucrats say assist. We say lie but officials say misinformation. The words of power stayed Latin. The words of life stayed Germanic. And to this day, that’s how you can tell if someone’s trying to connect — or control. Because Germanic words are short, muscular, concrete & hit your gut. Latin words are abstract, multi-syllabic, intellectual & float above your head. That’s not just linguistics. It’s psychology. Your brain processes simple, common words faster. You trust them more. They feel like truth. It’s why political speeches, sermons, and great copy all rely on Anglo-Saxon language. You don’t win people with “optimization of scalable frameworks.” You win them with “get more done, make more money, sleep better.” One reads like a strategy deck. The other reads like real life. That’s why the best direct-response copywriters like Schwartz, Ogilvy & Halbert all leaned hard into Germanic rhythm. They wrote for the body, not the boardroom. If you can’t say it simply, it probably isn’t true. Because the moment your message starts swimming in Latin fluff, you’ve lost the sale and the reader. Go through your copy. Circle every word over two syllables. Ask if it says something you would say out loud. Most won’t survive that test. Almost anything you can express in Latin, you can express in Germanic and when you do, it converts better. The first sounds smart. The second makes money. Language is leverage. And the fewer syllables between your message and someone’s heart, the faster they buy. So next time you write, don’t “utilize persuasive linguistic mechanisms.” Just tell the truth and make it land.

One of the things I love about English? The job titles.😂😂 I find they are one of the most difficult things to translate...Sometimes impossible … and now and again they’re just hilarious. For example: Data Scientist 👉🏻 sounds like a wizard of spreadsheets 🧙♂️ Tree Surgeon 👉🏻 you mean a gardener? 🌳💉 Innovation Sherpa 👉🏻 you carry innovation up a mountain? ⛰️ I’ve noticed English has a knack for creating job titles that are quirky, unexpected, and impossible to translate yet 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒ℎ𝑜𝑤 make nearly perfect sense. 💬 What’s the funniest, most confusing or most untranslatable English job title you’ve seen? Drop it in the comments! ______________________________ ⚠️ In finance, medicine, or technical fields, words carry risk, regulation, and reputation. 🚫 Generic won’t cut it 🚫 AI can’t read the room Finding real technical translators you can trust? That’s the hard part. 👉🏻 𝐓𝐡𝐚𝐭’𝐬 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐢𝐧. ✅ High-precision translation by subject-matter experts who have done it IRL. 🔗 JYC Translations - Your Technical Translation Team 🌍 3w jyctranslations com #TechnicalTranslations #FinancialTranslation  #LanguageLovers #TranslationFun #EnglishQuirks #JobTitles #Localization

Learn English the basic grammar with Vernon Active Voice and Passive Voice? Verbs are either active or passive in voice. In the active voice, the subject and verb relationship is straightforward: the subject is a do-er. In the passive voice, the subject of the sentence is not a do-er. It is shown with by + do-er or is not shown in the sentence. Passive voice is used when the action is the focus, not the subject. It is not important (or not known) who does the action. The window is broken. (It is not known who broke the window, or it is not important to know who broke the window.) The class has been canceled. (The focus is on the class being canceled. It is not important to know who canceled it.) The passive voice is often used. (The focus is on the passive voice. It is not important to explain who the writer is.) Passive voice should be avoided when you want more clarity in writing. However, in some cases, you need to use passive voice to stress the action, not the actor. Also, passive voice can be considered more polite, as it sounds less aggressive or dramatic. That building was built in 1990. The car was invented about a hundred years ago. I was told that Mary moved to a different country. Your business is appreciated. She was elected to the city council. It was rumored that the company would lay off a few people soon. It is recommended that the billing process be shortened. You can easily rewrite from an active sentence to a passive sentence. The object in the active sentence becomes a subject in the passive sentence. The verb is changed to a “be” verb + past participle. The subject of the active sentence follows by ...or is omitted. Sam wrote a letter to Jamie. A letter was written to Jamie by Sam. The government built a new bridge. A new bridge was built by the government. I recommend that you apply for this position. It is recommended that you apply for this position. [Quiz 17.1] Rewrite the following sentence in passive voice. John gave me a bunch of flowers on my birthday. see my link for. collective courses in English https://lnkd.in/etxiMh9s [Quiz 17.2] Choose the sentences written incorrectly in the passive voice. The following sentences are badly written. You will have to correct them. 1) I was eaten an ice cream. 2) The song was sung by a singer. 3) I was deceived by the TV program. 4) The concert was finished at 12 p.m. 5) He was written a novel. 6) The tennis match was aired on TV. 7) He was treated kindly. 8) I have been managed a company since 2004.

✉️ It’s Friday, the perfect day to start writing… plainly. Because let’s be honest: You don’t need one more jargon-filled email to ruin your weekend. 🎯 Plain Language isn’t “dumbing down.” It’s smartening up, for your reader, your business, and your brain. Yet somehow, it’s still one of the most resisted practices in law, government, and business. Why? Because of myths that simply won’t die, even though empirical research has buried them again and again. Let’s bust a few: ❌ Myth 1: Plain language makes you sound less professional. ✅ Reality: Readers equate clarity with credibility. Confusion doesn’t inspire trust, it kills it. ❌ Myth 2: Judges, clients, or regulators expect complex language. ✅ Reality: They expect precision. And guess what? Clarity enhances precision, it doesn’t replace it. ❌ Myth 3: It takes too long to write plainly. ✅ Reality: It takes longer to fix misunderstandings, rework drafts, and defend poor communication. ❌ Myth 4: Plain language is just for consumers or “non-experts.” ✅ Reality: Even experts prefer clarity, because time is their most valuable resource. Plain language isn’t a style choice. It’s an ethical choice. And it's now an ISO norm. It’s about accessibility, inclusion, and understanding, all of which build better law, better governance, and better trust. Here’s your Friday challenge: Before you hit send today, ask yourself: 🪞 Would I want to read this? 🪞 Would my reader understand this on the first try? If the answer is “maybe,” then that’s your invitation to start, right now. Because clarity is contagious. And Fridays are for fresh starts. 🌍 P.S. If you want inspiration, the Plain Language Association International (PLAIN) and Clarity International are hosting their joint summit in Brussels 🇧🇪 right now, bringing together researchers, practitioners, and policy-makers advancing clarity across the globe. 🔍 P.S. 2 There's a piece I wrote for Contract Nerds 📝 🤓 and that's great place to start too: https://lnkd.in/dzcEiV_D ______________________ ♻️ Repost to make “Plain Friday” a thing. 💬 Write like you actually want to be understood. 📨 Subscribe to my Newsletter: https://lnkd.in/dhN6dReB 🔗 Follow me, Tessa Manuello - The Legal Design Coach 🔥 for more tips

Translation isn’t about words. It’s about worldviews. Because sometimes, it’s not just the language that changes, it’s the logic. On Monday, my sister texted me asking to translate my nephew’s science notes from English to French. Due to the political instability, he couldn’t make it to school, and his teacher had sent voice notes for revision. As the “writer” of the family, I said, “Sure, easy.” Until I got to flat bones. And my confident “os plats” suddenly… wasn’t giving 😅 That’s when I remembered , technical translation isn’t a word-for-word task. 📌You need context, field knowledge, and sometimes even subject-matter experience. That’s the real secret behind good translation: It’s not about being bilingual, it’s about being bicultural. Because when science, medicine, or law enters the chat, Google Translate bows out gracefully. Whether you’re writing a proposal, a report, or even training material, your translation partner needs to understand your domain, not just your dictionary. Ever come across a word that sounded “right” but just didn’t fit the context? Maybe from your local language to English or vice versa? Drop it below , let’s compare our funniest translation fails 👇🏽

Translation is trust and trust breaks when meaning gets lost. I’ve seen people lose credibility over one mistranslated word. Not because they didn’t try , but because Google Translate doesn’t know tone, culture, or context. Here’s the thing: translation isn’t about switching words. It’s about switching worlds. 🌍 When you translate without understanding the message behind the words, you don’t just lose meaning, you lose people. I’ve read NGO reports that sound like robots wrote them. Proposals that feel flat because emotion got lost mid-sentence. And academic work that’s grammatically perfect but soulless. Because no matter the language, people read emotion before they read grammar. So next time you’re translating something from English to French, or your local language to English, don’t aim to sound “correct.” Aim to sound clear, human, and credible. If your message had to cross one more language today, would it still sound like you?

Do you want to make sure all your texts are reader-friendly from the very beginning? Including all language versions? There are several steps to consider here. One of them is drafting a good style guide. First of all, an effective style guide follows the KISS principle (keep it short and simple – as one of my university lecturers once pointed out). In other words, not all tidbits of a text should be regulated; still, there are a few keypoints to take into account:   ▪️  Who is the target audience? Will the tone throughout the texts be formal or informal? ▪️What about the overall design of the texts? Will tables, images, diagrams, graphs be included? What elements do you want to highlight and how? ▪️Do you want to apply any kind of special formatting, e.g. non-breaking space between numbers and units, parts of your product names etc.? A simple style guide created according to these considerations can basically be applied to every language version. However, it is highly recommended to ask language professionals whether any points of the style guide must be changed so that the resulting text conforms to the rules of their language. These changes can then be included in separate sections for the respective languages. Applying your style guide consistently in all your texts is of utmost importance, too. An example of that can be enumerations in German texts. There are two things to keep in mind here: ·        German nouns are capitalized ·        In Hungarian, elements of simple enumerations don’t usually begin with a capital letter. And how can you confuse a language professional translating from German? Include lists, whose elements begin with nouns, other capitalized parts of speech, and other non-capitalized parts of speech, too. That actually happens from time to time. I’m sure similar issues occur in other language pairs. Especially with languages, which belong to separate families.   To sum up, an appropriate style guide promotes consistency in all your texts, whether printed or digital, by: ▪️Setting a clear style and tone ▪️ Giving them a unified structure This is why and how a style guide can be helpful. Hello! I’m István, a specialized technical translator, having experience in converting English and German texts into natural Hungarian equivalents. My posts are inspired by my experiences throughout my around 10 years long career. And what do you think about coming up with a style guide at the very beginning? Let's discuss this in the comments.