Common Error: "Hear" vs. "Sound"

"Behind the Scenes at Sitzman ABC": Sitzman ABC has a dedicated team of sound mixing technicians that spend hours and hours getting the sound perfect for each post on our site.

Just kidding. This is just a picture of a guy at a sound board, probably in a recording studio. (Image)

Hello! It's Mistake Monday again, and we're continuing with our series about senses in English. This week I want to talk about the sense of smell, but I don't have a Common Error related to smell. So, for today I decided to do one more post related to last week's topic, hearing. Then, for Word Wednesday we'll continue with vocabulary related to smell. 

How does that sound?

I hope it sounds good, because that's how it's going to be, haha! In fact, that's today's Common Error: 

Common Error: Hear vs. Sound
DON’T say this:	"The music hears excellent." "Celine Dion sound herself very bad."
WHY?	-Remember that last week we talked about the difference between hear and listen. Those are two verbs that we can use when we receive and process sound in our ears. -Sound is used to describe when we produce sounds. It's a bit complicated because "sound" can be a verb ("sonar" in Spanish) or a noun ("sónido" in Spanish). -As a verb: "This music sounds great! What exactly are you listening to?" -As a noun: "It was so quiet in the house that you couldn't hear a sound." Note: It's also common to use "sound" to express your opinion about an idea or some general information, and is often followed by "like": -"That sounds like a great idea!" -"Based on your description, Rodrigo sounds like a very nice person."
INSTEAD, SAY THIS:	-"The music sounds excellent." -"Celine Dion sounds very bad."

That's it for today! If you have questions or comments, please leave a comment or contact me. Thanks for reading, and have a great week!

Hearing, Part 2

Many thanks to my beautiful wife Angela, who very reluctantly allowed me to take this picture of hear ear for today's post!

Hello, and happy Word Wednesday! Today I wanted to share a bit of vocabulary related to hearing and ears.

The most basic word here is ear, which are the organs on the side of your face that help you hear. The bottom part of the ear is called the earlobe. That's the part that many people pierce so that they can wear earrings. In the picture above, you can see Angela's earring in her earlobe. She got her ears pierced when she was about seven years old. In her case, her sister pierced her ear with a needle, but it's also very common these days for girls to get their ears pierced at a store that uses a piercing gun.

So, what can you do with your ears? Most people can hear and listen with them (see the post from Monday for an explanation about when to use these two words). Synonyms for hear and listen can include "listen up" and "pay attention."  If you hear someone say something but the person wasn't specifically talking to you, then you overhear something. If you are deliberately spying on other people and listening to their conversation without their permission, you are snooping or eavesdropping.

Q-tips (cotton swabs). (Image Credit)

But what if your ears get dirty? Most people clean them with a Q-tip (which is a brand name for a cotton swab). But be careful! Supposedly, according to overprotective mothers all over the world, you shouldn't stick a Q-tip too far into your ear or you'll break your ear drum, one of the parts of your inner ear that helps you hear!

Finally, if you are exceptionally talented, you can wiggle your ears. "To wiggle" means to move a little bit. Watch this short clip from one of my favorite movies, The Goonies. The big man, named "Sloth," can wiggle his ears:

VOCABULARY REVIEW:

Let's review the words we covered today. Can you explain what each of these words means? If not, read the post again. The definitions are at the bottom of the post.

Words for today:

1. hearing

2. ear

3. earlobe

4. to pierce / to get a piercing

5. earring

6. to hear

7. to listen

8. to overhear

9. to spy

10. to snoop

11. to eavesdrop

12. Q-tip

13. inner ear

14. ear drum

15. to wiggle

Could you define those words? If not, check the post again. Here are some suggested definitions for these words.

Suggested Definitions:

1. hearing - interpreting sound; the general name for the sense 

2. ear - the visible part of your body's hearing organs

3. earlobe - the lowest part of your ear

4. to pierce / to get a piercing - to perforate a part of your body for decoration

5. earring - a decoration in a pierced ear

6. to hear - (see Monday's post)

7. to listen - (see Monday's post)

8. to overhear - to hear unintentionally

9. to spy - unauthorized listening to other people's conversations

10. to snoop - synonym of "spy"

11. to eavesdrop - synonym of "spy"

12. Q-tip - a cotton swab; a stick with pieces of cotton at both ends

13. inner ear - the interior parts of your body's hearing organs

14. ear drum - part of the inner ear

15. to wiggle - to move a little bit

I hope that vocabulary was helpful! If you have any comments or questions, I'd love to hear from you! Thanks for reading, and have a great night!

Senses: Hearing, Part 1

A chart showing the way our bodies hear sounds. (Image)

Hello, and welcome to Mistake Monday! Last week we looked at different words related to the sense of sight, and this week we'll examine the next sense: hearing. This is the sense that you do with your ears; it's also referred to as "listening," but what's the difference between the words "hear" and "listen"? That's a good question, and it's actually a common error that I notice in my classes. So, here is a re-posting of one of our first Common Errors to help explain the difference:

Common Error: Confusing "listen" and "hear"
DON’T say this:	I'm sorry, but I wasn't hearing to you. Hear! I think I listen a car coming! Did you listen that noise just now?
WHY?	Much like the difference between "watch," "see," and "look," the difference between "listen" and "hear" has a lot to do with intention: -You naturally hear things; "to hear" is to perceive sounds that reach your ears by using your sense of hearing. You normally don't plan to hear: it's spontaneous. -To hear of/about something means to have knowledge related to that thing. -If you listen, you carefully or continuously hear something. You have to pay attention to listen to something. If you have an object that follows the word "listen," be sure to add the word "to." -Additionally, "listen" can be used as an interjection, but "hear" generally can't.
INSTEAD, SAY THIS:	-"Listen to this CD. It's great!" -"Sorry, but I didn't hear what you said. I wasn't listening." -"Have you heard about Pete? He got fired for always coming to work late!"

Many people, especially as they become older, have trouble hearing and need to use hearing aids to help them hear. (Image)

So, I hope that helps a bit. On Wednesday we'll look at more words related to the sense of hearing. Thanks for reading, and have a great week!

Podcast: Stuff You Should Know

Good afternoon, and welcome to Fun Friday! Today's post is short but sweet. I want to recommend a podcast called "Stuff You Should Know." It's part of the site called "How Stuff Works," which has a large selection of podcasts, programs, and other interesting information. 

Every few days "Stuff You Should Know" posts a new program about a different topic. You can follow them through iTunes (that's what I do) or another podcast manager, their Facebook page, or you can also get the podcasts directly from the website. 

Some recent programs that I liked included one about tipping (definitely appropriate for people traveling to the US) and one about how dueling works. Check out the podcast and the site if you want listening and vocabulary practice.

Thanks for reading, and have a great weekend!

Recommended Podcast: This American Life

A while ago I did a blog post about Podcasts (click here to see it), but I wanted to highlight a few of them in a bit more detail. Today I'll talk about one and in the next few weeks I'll try to mention a few others I've enjoyed and recommend for language learners.

One of the most popular podcasts in The United States is This American Life. Since it's for native speakers, it's not necessarily made for English learners, but it still can be a great resource if you're trying to learn English. 

The program comes out once a week, and each episode is an hour long. Every week they focus on a different topic and talk about normal people who have experience with the topic. For example, a few weeks ago the show talked about some people who thought they had discovered the original recipe for Coca-Cola. 

One of the best things about this podcast is that it often comes with a transcript of the whole episode (Here's one from a recent episode about people in a drug-prevention program). For an English learner, these transcripts can be an incredible resource if you read along while listening to the podcast. However, doing that could also become tiring, so it might be best to break it into smaller parts.

This American Life's website is very extensive and has past episodes in its archive, but if you go through there, you can generally only listen to old episodes for free by using streaming audio. But if you get the show through itunes, it's free and you can keep older episodes for as long as you want. So that's the way I do it.

That's it for today. I'll try to highlight more recommended podcasts in the future. If you've listened to This American Life and have comments about it, or if you want to recommend other podcasts you enjoy, then please feel free to leave a comment. Thanks for reading, and have a great day! 

Common Error: Confusing "Listen" and "Hear"

We recently talked about see, look, and watch, so today let's move from our eyes to our ears and focus on another common error that language learners make:

Common Error: Confusing "listen" and "hear"
DON’T say this:	I'm sorry, but I wasn't hearing to you. Hear! I think I listen a car coming! Did you listen that noise just now?
WHY?	Much like the difference between "watch," "see," and "look," the difference between "listen" and "hear" has a lot to do with intention: -You naturally hear things; "to hear" is to perceive sounds that reach your ears by using your sense of hearing. You normally don't plan to hear: it's spontaneous. -To hear of/about something means to have knowledge related to that thing. -If you listen, you carefully or continuously hear something. You have to pay attention to listen to something. If you have an object that follows the word "listen," be sure to add the word "to." -Additionally, "listen" can be used as an interjection, but "hear" generally can't.
INSTEAD, SAY THIS:	-"Listen to this music. It'll change your life." -"Sorry, but I didn't hear what you said. I wasn't listening." -"Have you heard about Pete? He got fired for always coming to work late!"

That's it for today. If you have any questions or comments, please tell me!
Thanks for reading!