Learn English with Bob the Canadian

Bob the Canadian

If you want to learn English you've come to the right place. I'm Bob the Canadian and I make videos on Youtube (Just search for "Bob the Canadian" on Youtube!) as well as podcasts right here to help you learn English. Each week I teach a lesson and I host a question and answer session about the English language. During these sessions I will my best to answer as many questions as I can that you have about the English language!

  1. 3d ago

    Learn the English Phrases "the real deal" and "to keep it real"

    In this English lesson, I wanted to help you learn the English phrase "the real deal." If you say someone is the real deal, it means they're really good at what they do. If you think about the sport of soccer or football, and you think about a player like Messi, he's the real deal. When he plays soccer, it's obvious that he knows how to play the game at a very high level. If you were to go see someone like Ed Sheeran in concert, he's the real deal. He has these loop pedals I've heard and he plays guitar and he sings and he makes like a beat on his drum like he's the real deal he's a real musician and a really good singer-songwriter. So when you say someone is the real deal it just means they are really good at what they do the second phrase I wanted to teach you today is to keep it real when you keep something real when you keep it real it means that it's truthful, it's honest, it's authentic. When I do these English lessons, I try to keep it real. It's just me. I'm just some guy in Canada making videos for you. There's no elaborate script. There's no photo crew. I just try to keep it real. I tell you about my life, and I hope that as I do this, you're able to learn English through the things that I share as I keep it real. So to review. If something's the real deal or if someone's the real deal, it just means that it is the... the best thing in that category, or the best person in that category, and to keep it real means to keep it honest, to keep it truthful, to keep it human, to keep it very, very authentic. But hey, let's look at a comment from a previous video. It's a pretty long one, so I might skip part of it for the sake of time. But I really enjoyed this comment from Harald. Hello, Bob the Canadian. I imagine you've already received plenty of compliments and thanks for the exceptional way in which you do these learning videos, I would like to thank you personally and in a very special way. I've been trying to learn English for about 3 years now, unfortunately with very little success. I suppose that when you're already 68, you don't learn as easily or as quickly as you used to. Anyway, I was so frustrated that I decided to give up learning. As a sort of farewell, I had one last look for learning videos on YouTube and stumbled across Bob's Short English lessons by chance. I was thrilled and now after about 4 weeks, I've decided to carry on learning English. My compliments, you've given me new energy and renewed courage. Thank you, Harald the Austrian. And then Ismail quickly points out, "Hi Harold, I'm not sure if you've come across Bob's main channel as well. Learn English with Bob the Canadian. So a little shout out there from Ismail. Thank you very much. And then my response: "It is never too late to learn, and I'm so happy to hear that you have found new motivation from my channel. I try to keep things real, as we say in English." You'll find if you follow me here and on my other channel, you'll not just learn English, but I'll try to give you a window into an English speaker's life. Enjoy and welcome. So thank you so much, Harald, for that comment. That is one of the nicest things I have heard someone say in a comment on one of my videos. Now, I'm not trying to take away from the other nice things people have said, but I felt very humbled and honored to know that you found my channel and that gave you motivation to keep learning English. So, that's great. So, all the best to you and to all of the rest of you out there who have similar stories, where you have maybe lost your motivation and found it again through a song or music or a video or a YouTube video. That's just awesome. Keep at it. Keep doing it. You're doing a great job. So I have to be honest with you. It's not Tuesday. And I know you're watching this on Wednesday. It's actually Monday. I'm trying to get ahead of my YouTube work before the first week of teaching starts.

    Learn the English Phrases "the real deal" and "to keep it real"
  2. Sep 2

    Learn the English Phrases "Good catch!" and "a real catch"

    In this English lesson, I wanted to help you learn the English phrase "good catch." We say this phrase when someone else tells us about a mistake we've made. Let's say you put two big crates on the back of a truck, and you put straps on the one crate to hold it down, and you forgot about the second one, and someone said to you, "Hey, you forgot to put straps on that crate." You would say, "good catch." Sometimes when I give students a test I make a mistake, and a student might say, "Hey, question number four has a mistake in it." And I would respond and say, "Good catch." Basically, it's kind of like saying, "Thank you for finding the mistake." If one of you heard me make a mistake in a video and you mentioned it in a comment, I would reply by saying, "Good catch." Basically saying, "Hey, you noticed the mistake. That's awesome." The second phrase I wanted to teach you today is the phrase "a real catch." When you say someone is a real catch. It means that they are a good person to have as a boyfriend or girlfriend, and maybe eventually marry. So here's a good example. Let's say your cousin is dating someone, and he's a doctor, and he has lots of money, and he's kind and generous, and he's not selfish, and he treats your cousin really, really well. You would say, "Wow, he's a good catch." Basically, a good catch, a real catch, a catch. You can use any of those. He's a real catch. Basically, saying that. Wow, you found a really special person to be your boyfriend or girlfriend. But hey, oh, to review, good catch means hey, you saw a mistake and you told me about it and I thanking and I'm thanking you for it. A real catch or a catch is simply someone, just a really nice person. They don't have to be rich, they don't have to be a doctor, but just someone who you would want to spend the rest of your life with. Sorry, I'm a little distracted at all the traffic, and I also feel like my new haircut. And this sky always makes me look like I have no hair at all. I don't know, it's kind of weird lighting. Anyways, let's look at a comment from a previous video. This is from Prince. Please also do C1 - C2. I can't find enough good material on YouTube, cause most is basic. Thank you. And then my response, good point. Most of my lessons are based on phrases I've heard in real life the past week, so I'm sure some C1 - C2 slips in once in a while. So Prince, thank you for that comment. And yes, that is the reality that there are going to be some words that slip in because I don't actually, it's kind of loud over there. I hope you can't hear that. I don't actually look for A2, B1, and B2 phrases to teach you. I actually just listen and I think to myself, oh, that's an interesting phrase. I should explain it to all of my viewers. So yes, because of that, there will occasionally be C1 and C2 phrases that come in. Hey, do you want to see the town I'm in? This is the town of Fenwick. You might have seen that when I was doing the first part of the video. There was a nice sign. I thought I would show you this town because it is a typical small Canadian town. I don't think I've visited this town to make a video at all. But you can see there is a nice little family restaurant, and they even have a patio that you can sit on. There's parking along the road, which is kind of handy because I parked my car down there. I think up here we have a post office as well, so you have the Fenwick post office. Honestly, the post office is looking a little bit dated, which means it looks a little bit old. Across the road, you have a coffee shop. I think it's called, I'm not sure what it's called. I thought it was called the Bin, and then a little convenience store. And then, of course, because I'm in North America, we always have really fancy pickup trucks to look at. There's no shortage of those. Anyways, thanks for watching. You're all awesome. I will see you next week with another short English lesson and leave you with a nice view of the truck. Bye.

    Learn the English Phrases "Good catch!" and "a real catch"
  3. Aug 26

    Learn the English Phrases "Go figure!" and "Tell me about it!"

    Read along to learn the English phrases GO FIGURE! and TELL ME ABOUT IT! In this English lesson, I wanted to help you learn the English phrase "go figure." When you say to someone "go figure," it means there's a situation that is illogical and doesn't make any sense and is hard to understand. Here's a great example: in Canada, gas is a dollar seventy a liter, and the federal government removed the carbon tax a few months ago, and they're going to put it back on in September. Go figure. Basically, what I'm saying there is the government putting the tax back on doesn't make sense. Gas is already too expensive, so I say go figure to indicate that I find that situation illogical and hard to understand. The other phrase I wanted to teach you today is the phrase "tell me about it." When you say to someone "tell me about it," it means you agree with what they just said. If someone said the price of gas is way too expensive, I might say "tell me about it." Basically meaning tell me more about it, but it really just means I agree with you. If you said my lessons were awesome, I might say tell me about it. Sorry, that was a little bit cocky there. Anyways, to review, when you say go figure, it means you're expressing your opinion about a situation that doesn't make sense, that is illogical. I actually think it's short for go figure it out. Like you need to actually research and think about it to understand it. And tell me about it simply means tell me... sorry simply means I agree with you. Sorry... I in my mind I was finishing this phrase and thinking I forgot the comment from the previous video in my van, which is a kilometer away. It was a longer walk than I expected here, but it's in my pocket. So hey, let's look at a comment from a previous video. This comment is from Tacagero. C2 English, a bit complicated for me now, but thanks. And my response: You're right, Tacagero, I try to target B1 to B2, but I guess I overshot a bit. Here is the ChatGPT breakdown. So I put the script, the transcript into ChatGPT from the last video. I'd rate this video B2 overall, with a few C1 phrases and features. I definitely would not call it C2, but it's considerably considerably above A2. The interesting distinction is that your delivery and sentence structure are often B1 B2, but the target language pushes parts of the lesson into B2 C1 - from ChatGPT. And and then I'm writing again. I'd say a lesson like this helps a lot of you because I'm floating around the B1 B2 area with how I talk and explain, but I'm helping you learn a C1 phrase. Works for me! And I hope it works for you too. So yeah, I try to kind of have this balance where I'm talking using B1 language as much as I can, B2 language, which is actually common in everyday English. That's not like me trying to sound simpler. It's just how I talk. And then sometimes I will teach phrases that are C1 or C2 level maybe. But hopefully most of you on this channel at least don't mind it being a little more challenging. Hey, so where am I today? Well, I am by a body of water. Which you might think, I think there's a loon there. By the way, that's the bird that's on our coin, the loony. Which you might think is a river, but it's actually an old shipping canal. And what they've done is they've put this bike path or walking path along the edge. There's even a nice pavilion over there. I don't want to disturb the person sitting over there having a peaceful day by videotaping, but yeah, it's just nice. I guess this canal, which I think is part of the old Welland canal system, became too old and then they dug another one. So this is used a lot for recreation. People use this for boating and jet skiing and water skiing and all that kind of stuff. Anyways, thanks for watching this short English lesson. I hope you enjoyed it. I'll see you next week with another one. Bye.

    Learn the English Phrases "Go figure!" and "Tell me about it!"
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About

If you want to learn English you've come to the right place. I'm Bob the Canadian and I make videos on Youtube (Just search for "Bob the Canadian" on Youtube!) as well as podcasts right here to help you learn English. Each week I teach a lesson and I host a question and answer session about the English language. During these sessions I will my best to answer as many questions as I can that you have about the English language!

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