Latest blog posts

Idioms about the Five Senses

The term ‘five senses’ is used to refer to the faculties of sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch. Today we’re going to take a look at five idioms about each of the five senses and tell you what they mean. Sight: In the blink of an eye - in an instant Out of sight, out of mind – an expression used to suggest that one is likely to forget someone/something when they are/it is no longer present/visible The apple of someone’s eye – a person whom someone admires very much To see things eye to eye – to agree on things To turn a blind eye – to pretend not to notice Smell: To follow your nose – to follow your insti...

Twenty Idioms about Nature

Last Friday was the first day of spring. All over the country, leaves are turning green, blossom is blooming, and flowers are pushing their way up out of the ground – it’s no wonder nature has inspired many an English expression! Here are twenty idioms about plants, flowers, and trees: “Oops-a-daisy!” – an expression of encouragement said to a child who has fallen/has hurt him or herself, an expression of mild annoyance used when something has gone wrong a late bloomer – someone who is slower than their peers to develop in a particular field a needle in a haystack – something that is difficult/impossible to find because...

Twenty Idioms for New Beginnings

January always feels like the perfect time of year to make some lifestyle changes – last week we even looked at five New Year’s resolutions to help you improve your spelling. Here are twenty idioms for new beginnings: a change is as good as a rest – a change of occupation can be as relaxing as a break. at the crossroads – at the point where you must make the choice between two courses of action with diverging consequences. early bird catches the worm – the person who takes the earliest opportunity to do something will have an advantage over other people. a breath of fresh air – a refreshing or invigorating change. &...

2014 Spellzone Blog Round Up

2014 has been an exciting year for all of us here at Spellzone – we reached over 400 likes on our Facebook page; have been shortlisted for the UK Blog Awards (thank you to all of you who voted for us!); and even connected with a school in Montserrat! Here are some of our favourite articles from over the year: This year we began looking at pairs and groups of words which are easy to mix up, and we shared tips and tricks to help you remember when to use which word. The pairs and groups of words we looked at include: accept vs. except, lose vs. loose, bought vs. brought, break vs. brake, to vs. too vs. two, desert vs. dessert, allowed vs. aloud, less vs. fewer, uninterested vs. d...

Three Commonly Confused In- Words: Infamous, Invaluable, and Inflammable

Often, when a word starts with in-, we can assume that it means the opposite of the same word without the in-. ‘Invisible’, for example, means ‘not visible’, or ‘intolerant’ means ‘not tolerant’. This is because one of the translations of the Latin prefix in- is ‘not’. Today, we’re going to look at three exceptions to this rule. Scroll down to make sure you’re using the following in- words correctly! Famous vs. Infamous If someone isn’t famous, it doesn’t mean that they’re infamous. Let’s take a look at the Spellzone dictionary definitions of each word: Famous: widely know...

Five expressions you may be saying or writing incorrectly

We briefly wrote about these expressions on Facebook back in May, but since they’re so easy to muddle up, we thought they were worth taking a look at in more detail. Scroll down to make sure you’re aren’t accidentally implying that you want to bite someone on their bottom! “Lo and behold…” What does it mean? This little phrase is usually used to present a new situation or a seemingly surprising turn of events which, in retrospect, could have been predicted. Example: Tom went to parties instead of practising his spelling and, lo and behold, he wasn’t happy when results day rolled around. Don’t say/write: “Low and behold...

10 Common Mistakes

We’ve shared some of these tips on Facebook and Twitter over the last few months, but we thought it would be useful to round up these easy-to-avoid mistakes for those of you who don’t use social media. YOUR vs. YOU'RE. Can the word you want to use be replaced with 'you are'? If so, use 'you're'. ITS vs. IT'S. Can the word you want to use be replaced with 'it is'? If so, use 'it's'. WHOSE vs. WHO’S Can the word you want to use be replaced with ‘who is’? If so, use ‘who’s’. THERE vs. THEIR vs. THEY’RE There = a place. Their = a person. T...

Thirty Sports Idioms to Help You Through the Summer

With everyone’s attention on Wimbledon and the World Cup at the moment, it’s hard to leave home without sports coming up in conversation. But do we actually talk about sports more than we realise? Today – just in case you’re not sick of sports quite yet – we’re sharing some sports-related idioms alongside their definitions. across the board – applying to all at this stage of the game – at this point during the activity/event ball is in your court - it is up to you to make the next move ballpark figure – an approximate guess blow-by-blow – detailed step-by-step description ...

Commonly Confused Words: Accept vs. Except

Happy New Year, everyone! To help those of you with spelling-related New Year’s resolutions, we’re going to start the year with a series of posts on commonly confused words. Here at Spellzone we believe that looking at the origins of a word can be really beneficial when trying to get your head around its spelling and meaning – and today we’ll start by taking a look at the words ‘accept’ and ‘except’. Make sure you check out our blog archive for previous posts on other commonly confused words. What does each word mean? The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) defines the word ‘accept’ as: ‘consent to receive or undertake (s...

Latin expressions used in English - Part 2

Today we’re back with more Latin phrases. You may think of Latin as a dead language, but in actuality we still use many Latin phrases as part of modern English. If you would like to read Part 1 of this series (including terms like ‘et cetera’ and ‘in camera’), you can click here. Ad hoc is one of those terms that is thrown around in the workplace all the time. For years, I was too scared to ask anyone what it meant. When I finally did, the person who used it said: ‘You know, I actually have no idea…’ . The phrase translates to ‘for this’, and describes something that is created or done for a specific and immediate purpos...

A Word for Wednesday: Diversity

Yesterday was World Day for Cultural Diversity; a relatively new cause adopted by UNESCO just over a decade ago. But what is Cultural Diversity Day? The United Nations describe the campaign on their Facebook page: ‘This Day raises awareness on the richness of world cultures and the opportunities that cultural diversity can bring to societies.’ I think it is a great incentive to explore the output of other cultures, from music, food and film to their literature, traditions and languages. So, if you have a spare moment this week, why not endeavour to understand another culture a little bit more? I recently discovered the music of a band named Baka Beyond. They manage to bl...

Ways to Tackle Tricky Spellings: A Recap

Over the last few weeks we’ve been sharing different methods which we hope will help make learning to spell a little easier and a bit more fun. Here is a recap of our posts – which ones did you find most helpful? In our blog post about why English spelling is so difficult, we discussed heterographs, homonyms, and heteronyms. These groups of words make it difficult to solely rely on the ‘sound’ of a word in order to figure out its spelling. The word heterograph refers to words that sound the same, but have different spellings and meanings. Hetero- comes from the Greek heteros which means ‘other’ or ‘different’, whilst -graph comes ...