David Appleyard

Hi! Here you'll find some key English learning points and handy references in easily manageable, interlinked compartments. 

Knowing that for most people time is of the essence, I have attempted to fast-track users to the core subject matter and teach by example rather than lengthy explanation. This should be of particular benefit to those of you preparing to sit exams. Although the color scheme has generally been kept simple to facilitate printing, light shading was recently added to chart backgrounds to help clarify cell borders in Firefox browsers.

These pages are just part of a network of sites pieced together to present English in its cultural context. By helping students of any level put their skills to some kind of practical use (like surfing the Net, gathering world news, planning overseas trips, reading the classics, gleaning new knowledge, etc.), I hope to encourage them to pursue the subject well beyond what is taught in most schools.  

Your questions and comments are always welcome, and my special thanks to all those who have already written in!

The English Lesson by Anonymous

We'll begin with box, and the plural is boxes;
But the plural of ox should be oxen, not oxes.
Then one fowl is goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.

You may find a lone mouse or a whole lot of mice,
But the plural of house is houses, not hice.
If the plural of man is always called men,
Why couldn't the plural of pan be called pen?

The cow in the plural may be cows or kine,
But the plural of vow is vows, not vine.
And I speak of a foot, and you show me your feet,
But I give a boot — would a pair be called beet?

If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,
Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?
If the singular is this and plural is these,
Why shouldn't the plural of kiss be nicknamed kese?

Then one may be that, and three may be those,
Yet the plural of hat would never be hose;
We speak of a brother, and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.

The masculine pronouns are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine she, shis, and shim!
So our English, I think you will all agree,
Is the trickiest language you ever did see.

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough.
Others may stumble, but not you
On hiccough, thorough, slough, and through.

Well done! And now you wish, perhaps
To learn of less familiar traps.
Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird.

And dead; it's said like bed, not bead;
For goodness sake, don't call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat,
(they rhyme with suite and straight and debt).

A moth is not a moth in mother.
Nor both in bother, broth in brother.
And here is not a match for there,
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear.

And then there's dose and rose and lose
—  Just look them up — and goose and choose.
And cork and work and card and ward,
And font and front and word and sword.

And do and go, then thwart and cart.
Come, come, I've hardly made a start.

A dreadful language? Man alive,
I'd learned to speak it when I was five,
And yet to write it, the more I sigh,
I'll not learn how 'till the day I die.

Before YOU give up altogether, why not check out our Guide to English Spelling Rules!