How to make Google your English Teacher

Intermediate

Posted on: 19 Nov, 2008 09:11 PM

Google is a very popular search engine, but did you know that it could also serve as a Tutor? Click here to download a 5-page guide, or scroll down to preview a few tips from the guide itself.

Enjoy...

1. Did I say that the right way?

There are often several ways to say the same thing in English. So, how do you know if the way you are phrasing your sentences is correct? I would suggest that you compare various sentences in Google and pick the sentence that is most popular among the search results.

For example, I searched the sentence "What do you mean by that?" on Google and received 489,000 search results. I then looked up the sentence "What is it that you mean?" and found 74,300 search results. From this comparison, I would deduce that "What do you mean by that?" is generally more widely used as an English expression than "What is it that you mean?"

2. Should I say that over here?"

Thanks to the movie "Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery," the phrase "Yeah Baby!" has become a popular slang phrase in America. Is this generally accepted slang in Italy? What about the United Kingdom? What about Russia?

To investigate this, I searched the phrase "Yeah Baby" and ask Google to only return search results from pages in certain locales. For example, the command site:uk only returns web pages that are hosted in the United Kingdom.

"Yeah Baby" site:uk returned 37,000 search results from the United Kingdom.

"Yeah Baby" site:it returned 5,520 search results from Italy.

"Yeah Baby" site:ru returned 17.900 search results from Russia.

So, from this experiment, I would ascertain that the phrase "Yeah Baby" is more popular in the United Kingdom than Russia and much more popular than in Italy.

Make sense?

3. Is there a word missing?

By using an asterix in a sentence, Google will assume that a word is missing and search for phrases that it thinks fills in that blank. For example...

By searching, How are you * today?

Google returns search results that includes:

* "How are you doing today?"

* "How are you feeling today?"

* "How are you guys today?"

* "How are you coping today?"

Click here to see for yourself and pay attention to the phrases that are bolded.

4. Is there another word I could use?

By using Google's Tilde command (~), you can find words that Google thinks is synonymous to the word you are searching for. For example, if I wanted to find words that are similar and/or associated with "coffee," I would perform the following search:

~coffee

Click here to see the results. What you will notice is that certain words are bolded and these are the keywords to focus on. In this case, these keywords include: Starbucks, Starbucks Cofee, caffeine and cafe.

These are just a few tips, let me know what you think?

-Jim

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samtha

Submitted by Samtha on 04 Feb, 2010 09:52 AM

Hi webmaster, commenters and everybody else !!! The blog was absolutely fantastic! Lots of great information and inspiration, both of which we all need!b Keep 'em coming... you all do such a great job at such Concepts... can't tell you how much I, for one appreciate all you do!
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althea

Submitted by Althea on 29 Jan, 2010 12:09 AM

What a smart way to learn english!

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RPettigrew

Submitted by RPettigrew on 23 Oct, 2009 06:39 PM

I've been frequently using Google as a helper for my English studying. But I didn't know that there are this many tricks. Normally if I'm not sure about the spelling of some word, I would type my guess into Google search and see if it gives any suggestion. Thank you for your tips anyway!

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jackywilli

Submitted by Jackywilli on 09 Sep, 2009 11:20 AM

EnglishCafe is the place to engage with other users to learn and practice your English. This growing and vibrant global community stretches from Brazil to Japan, from Indonesia to Morocco, from Mexico to India. Many highly-regarded and enthusiastic English tutors have made EnglishCafe their virtual classroom – and they are eager to help learners progress on their quest to master English.
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johnandy

Submitted by Johnandy on 03 Sep, 2009 05:16 AM

You know how much time you can dedicate to learning English, but a short time each day will produce better, longer-term results than a full day on the weekend and then nothing for two weeks.

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hikimiti

Submitted by Hikimiti on 18 Jun, 2009 06:43 PM

such useful tips.
i've never imagined that google could be used like this.
Lol.

very helpful tips. Thanks jim

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tracy_tang

Submitted by Tracy_tang on 23 Mar, 2009 07:30 AM

such useful tips.
i've never imagined that google could be used like this.
Lol.

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Johnson

Submitted by Johnson on 26 Jan, 2009 08:58 AM

Great tips, JimStroud! Thanks! Actually, we've been using these tips for many times, but we never noticed that, we used to these regulations but never summerize and use it more effectively. More attention we pay, more knowledge we'll get!