Beginner Level

SPEAKING LESSON – GREETINGS & WAYS TO SAY “GOODBYE”

Advice: Use these expressions and phrases that you can put into practice at POC Conversational English.

POC Common Ways to Say “Hello”:

• “Hi”

This is a very common shortened version of “hello.”

• “Hey”

Another sort and casual way of saying “hello”, which is pronounced the same way as “hay,” which is horse food, but is obviously spelled differently.

• “Howdy”

This is considered a very western or country greeting.  You might hear a cowboy use it, but it is an appropriate informal “hello” for everyone to use.

• “Hiya”

This is a particularly informal greeting.  It is often used by someone in an excited mood and who know each other well.

Meeting People:

• Hi.
• Good morning. (up until about 12:00pm)
• Good afternoon. (from 13:00 till about 5:00pm)
• Good evening (from 5:00pm until about 8:00pm)
• Good night (we use “good night” or “night” as a way of saying “goodbye” to someone at night.

POC Introducing yourself:

Formal

• A: I’d like to introduce myself. I’m Louis.
• B: Pleased to meet you, Louis. / Nice to meet you, Louis.

Informal

• A: Hi, my name’s Louis. (informal)
• B: Hi, Louis.

POC Introducing someone:

• This is Natalia.
• I’d like to introduce you to Mario.
• Have you met Sandra before?
• You know Ricardo, don’t you?
• You don’t know Yurany, do you?
• Have you met my colleague, Angie?
• I’d like you to meet my colleague, Mario.
• This is Sandra. She works at POC Conversational English.
• Gabriel, this is Viviana.

Typical Greetings:

1. How do you do? (very formal and best used when you don’t know the person at all or are meeting them in an official situation)
2. How are you?

POC Informal Greetings

1. How’s it going?
2. How you doing? / How ya doin’?
3. How’ve you been? / How you been?
4. What’s up? / What up? / Sup?
5. What have you been up to? / What’ve you been up to?
6. How’s everything going?
7. Hiya doing?
8. How are you doing today/tonight / this morning / this afternoon / this evening?
9. How are you guys doing?
10. How’s your day going?
11. How’s life?

    Typical Response:

    POC Formal responses
    1. Fine, thanks / Good. You?
    2. Fine, thanks / Good. And you?
    POC Informal responses
    1. Everything all right / I’m doing well / It’s going well / good / very well / not very well
    2. I’m doin’ good / I’m doin’ okay / fantastic / I’m good / I’m great / I’m well / good
    3. I’ve been good / I’ve been great
    4. Not much / nothing much / nothing
    5. I’ve been studying English at POC / I’ve been working really hard / Just keeping busy. How about you?
    6. Everything is going well / so far so good / Great. How about you? / Alright. How are you?
    7. I’m hanging in there.
    8. Good / I’m doing ok / I am ok, thanks for asking.
    9. Great. How about you?
    10. Goin’ well.
    11. Pretty good, thanks! Yourself?

    WAYS TO SAY GOODBYE

    

    Formal                                                    Informal
    • Goodbye / Farewell                         Bye! / So long!
    • See you later                                    Catch up with you later
    • See you tomorrow                           Until tomorrow
    • Have a nice day!                               Have a good one!
    • It was a pleasure meeting you
    • See you!
    • Good night! Sweet dreams!

SPEAKING LESSON – “NUMBERS & DATES”

Advice: Use these numbers as much as you can at POC Conversational English.

POC Cardinals

Cardinal numbers are counting numbers. The numbers that we use for counting are called cardinal numbers.

1. Cardinal numbers tell us “How many?”

For example:

Q: How many teachers are there at POC?

A: There are three teachers.

2. We can use the cardinals with “How much?“

For example:

Q: How much is it?

A: 500 

3. We can use the cardinals with “How old?“

For example:

Q: How old are you?

A: I’m 26 years old.

POC Ordinals

Ordinal numbers are used to rank or order things (e.g., first, second, third). This could include placement in a race or competition, or it could simply be the day of the month (e.g., December 1^st).

For example:

Q: When is your birthday?

A: My birthday is on March 9th.

Example #2:

Q: When is Valentine’s day?

A: Valentine’s day is on February 14th.

Click the answer button to see the correct answer.