Hey subscribers welcome to another English speaking lesson by Michelle. In today’s lesson you are learning about confusing English word pairs and how to fix common pronunciation or vocabulary mistakes and errors. These common English mistakes are even made by native English speakers as these words sound similar but mean different things. Watch the complete lesson and avoid these common English pronunciation mistakes to speak English fluently and confidently.
Complete Lesson Transcript:-
Hi lovely people, welcome to my lesson, my name is Michelle and what am I wearing on my head? Is that what your question is? Well, this is called a wreath. What is a wreath? A wreath is wreathed in flowers. A wreath is wreathed in flowers? Yes, find out what does it mean to have something wreathed in this lesson with me where we are learning some words which are very confusing, very similar but they have different meanings.
So here is the list of confusing words that I have especially shortlisted for all of you because these are some words that are really very confusing and you may not find their meanings anywhere else except in this lesson with me. So the first pair that we have is insure and ensure. The first thing is we stress both of these words on the second syllable. It’s got to be insure, ensure and they are pronounced just the same but a little bit of difference. You could call this insure and you could call this ensure right. So what do we mean by insure? So you must have heard the insurance policies that you get done for yourselves in order to protect yourself or from some financial losses if something happens to you God forbid. But whenever you pay money to someone so that they can repay in case of any injury or when there is some you know, you need to get something mended that’s when you use the word insure. So this is a guarantee for safety but we usually use this for contracts when we are talking about a contract like an insurance policy. So you can use this for contracts. Alright, the next one that we have is to ensure which means to make something sure. When you want to make something sure that’s where you can use this word ensure. I’ll ensure her safety. So if you’re taking somebody out, you’re telling her parents that I’ll ensure her safety which means I’ll make sure that she will be safe with me. So to make sure okay.
Right, so the next pair we have is insolate and insulate. insolate and insulate they also sound very similar but there is some difference in these two words. Trust me they’re the hottest words on our list. So let’s talk about the first one insolate. So the word insolate comes from a Latin word called insolar, insolar okay. So as you would know that solar rays means sun’s rays. So solar of course means sun. So anything that is insolar means in the Sun is called as insolation, when something is exposed to the sun’s rays. It’s, that’s when we are insolating it, so exposing something to the sun’s rays all right. So when you’re feeling really cold and you want to get warm you would insolate yourself but when will you insulate yourself? So this is to receive heat okay insolate is to receive heat but insulate is to keep the heat with you, to not let it leak. So to prevent the leakage of heat is insulation. So in winters, when you wear a lot of sweaters and jackets on and you do not, why do you do that? You do that to insulate yourself so that the heat in your body does not leak out. So to get warm you insolate but to stay warm, you insulate all right.
With that, we look at the next pair that we have, tortuous and torturous. So this single R, if you misplace it, it makes for a very unpleasant meaning. Yes, be very careful about this R. So tortuous, both of these words are adjectives. I mean they describe the quality of something. So tortuous can be used to describe a way that is very crooked, means a way that is not straight. That’s when you say a tortuous path. The path to Beverly Hills is very tortuous. So it’s a crooked path alright and you stress it at tor, tortuous. The next one that we have is torturous, as you would know this word anything which causes you a lot of pain that is torturous. So sometimes you’re in a situation where you really want to speak out but you can’t speak out, that’s when it’s very torturous to shut up means it causes you a lot of pain to keep quiet. So something that causes pain, being in the classroom for three hours and listening to a lecture is really torturous for me right.
So let’s look at the next pair that we have altogether and all together, altogether and all together. They even spell the same almost. Both of these words are adverbs and they are used to describe a verb, which means used to describe an action. So altogether, this adverb, this means wherever we’re talking about the entirety of something, which means something in its fullness, the whole of something, the whole of something right. So our plan for the picnic was altogether spoiled by the rain, means was entirely spoiled by the rain. So entirely would be a synonym for this one. The next word all together, this means everyone is coming together to do something. So let’s all raise the toast, let’s raise the toast all together, where everyone is doing something together.
The final pair that we have on this side of the board is capital or capitol. The single a can change the entire meaning for these two words and even the form for that matter. So capital, so what do we mean by capital? London is the financial capital for England, you know what it means right. So capital could be a city means the head city, the main city. So capital here means head or most important but capitol? So US Capitol, where is Capitol located? Capitol is located in the US capital of Washington DC. Here we are talking about Washington DC which is the US capital but Capitol is a building. This building is used by the US Congress or Parliament to make it easy for you but it’s actually called the US Congress. So the building used by US Congress. So Capitol is the building used by the US Congress in the US capital of Washington DC.
Let’s come to the next set of words that we have and this is stationery and stationary. You pronounce them just the same way but they are spelled differently as you can see. So stationery, so stationery, the first one is you know this pen, anything that you used to write or maybe you know an envelope, all of these things that you use to write, they come together and they are collectively called as stationery, ery it’s a collective noun. I know it’s very hard to remember it, so maybe you can remember the e with an envelope because that’s a part of the stationery alright and the next word that we have is stationary. This one means something that is not moving. So I crashed into a stationary car this morning, so means I crashed into a car that was not moving, so unmoving or not moving, unmoving car or unmoving anything.
The next one feint and faint. Similar actually same pronunciation but different spellings. So feint comes from the word feign, feign actually. Feign means to deceive someone, to fool someone. So you’d call this feint and this one faint, a slight e, feint and faint. So this is usually used for boxing. So whenever you’re, not you but the boxer is hitting another boxer and he’s making a move to fool the boxer, he’s acting like he’s going to hit him in the head. So the other boxer tries to protect his head while he actually hits him in the chest. So he’s trying to give him a feint blow which means a fake blow, so a fake blow and when the other boxer gets a feint on his face he faints. Of course, you know of fainting is, fainting means to lose consciousness right.
The next pair, I started the lesson with this, the wreathe and the wreath. So the wreath is what I was wearing on my head and I said it was wreathed in flowers. So this wreath is what I was wearing on my head, it’s a noun but when I say that it was wreathed in flowers which is a verb, it means it was encircled in flowers or covered with flowers. So anything that is covered with something encircled with something, it’s wreathed with it.
Right so our next pair actually next group is wreathed with mystery and we are going to find out what it means, so eminent, immanent and imminent. They are pronounced the same way, these two and this is pronounced as eminent. Right, so eminent is something possibly a person who is of a very high authority, an eminent person or something which is very known, noticeable. So on a face if a person has a slightly funny nose; his or her nose is very eminent means very noticeable. So high or noticeable and immanent and imminent. Immanent is something that you’re inherited with. So I have an eminent art of painting. So I’m born with the art of painting, born with and the last one imminent, imminent means something that is bound to happen. Are you going to enjoy my next video? Yes, it’s imminent, means it’s bound to happen, it will happen.
I hope your confusion has resolved and not increased after this lesson. Please come back for more lessons with me. I had a great time teaching you all these words take care, bye- bye.
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