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. 4d ago

    Learn the English Phrases "track record" and "to get sidetracked"

    In this English lesson, I wanted to help you learn the English phrase "track record." When you refer to someone's track record, you're talking about how they've performed in the past. As a teacher, I think I have a good track record when it comes to doing my job well. I've done this job for almost 30 years. Wait, has it been 30 years? It's certainly been a long time, and I think that when you do something that long, you must have a good track record. If they look at how well I relate to students, how well I grade the work that they give me, my consistency year to year. I think I have a good track record. So, track record is a phrase we use to describe past performance of a person at a job or at a place where they're volunteering or anything that they are doing. The other phrase I wanted to teach you today is to get sidetracked. So, this has the word "track" in it. I I try to keep the phrases related. When you get sidetracked, it means you're not doing what you're supposed to do. A common goal for students in a classroom is to get the teacher sidetracked. I remember when I was in grade six, no, it might have been grade five, we had a teacher where if we asked him questions about what it was like living in the Netherlands when he was young, he would get sidetracked and instead of teaching math, he would talk about growing up in the Netherlands. He he got easily sidetracked. I sometimes get sidetracked as a teacher if students talk to me about farming. I love talking about farming. I don't have a lot of students who live on farms, so sometimes I get sidetracked if they ask me about farming. So to review, if you have a good track record, it means you've done well as a politician, as a teacher, as a worker, as a manager. It simply means that over time you've been doing a good job consistently, and to get sidetracked means to get off topic, to talk about what you're not supposed to do, or to do what you're not supposed to do when something else important needs to be said or done. But hey, let's look at a comment from a previous video. This comment is from Vladimir. Bob, you have a unique memory. I've been watching your videos for five years now, and there are no repeats in them. I don't recall YOLO ever being used before. And my response, I'm sure there are a few phrases. I've covered twice or maybe even three times, but other than that, I think my track record is pretty good. So thanks, Vladimir, for that comment. And I used the phrase track record there just so you could have another example of me using the phrase. Well, hey, during my live stream this past Saturday on my other channel, the geese were very, very loud. So I'm going to walk down there right now, and you won't be able to see them too well. But you'll be able to see them in the distance. Let me turn and give you a bit of a view. There are some geese in the river, but there's actually more geese on my field, and I hope they're not eating the newly emerged wheat. I don't think the wheat is actually out of the ground yet, but you can see. Let me see if I can point right there. There are some geese in the river and right there, there are some geese, who I think are eating soybeans. When the combine comes and combines the crop, sometimes some of the crop does fall on the ground. That's not, you can't really prevent that. And so often, geese will come, and they're either eating the soybeans that fell out of the combine, which is the harvesting machine, or there might be some wheat laying on the ground from the planter. Whenever you lift the planter at the end of the field as you're planting, a little bit of wheat, or other seeds fall out depending on what you're planting, so they might be eating that. But yeah, a beautiful fall day here in Ontario, Canada. The leaves are just starting to turn. If you look way in the distance, well, if you look at these trees, you can see a bit of yellow. But we're not in full on fall yet, but it's definitely close.

    Learn the English Phrases "track record" and "to get sidetracked"
  2. Sep 23

    Learn the English Phrases "You can't take it with you!" and "YOLO!"

    Read along to learn the English phrases YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU and YOLO! In this English lesson, I wanted to help you learn the English saying, "You can't take it with you." When you say you can't take it with you in English, it's a humorous way to talk about the fact that when you die, it's a loud train, eh? Can you guys hear that? I'll just keep going. It's a humorous way to talk about the fact that when you die you can't take your house, your car or your money with you. And so it's kind of suggesting that you should either, a) Spend all of it before you die, or what I think is a better idea, b, give away generously some of the money to causes that need it. So you can do either, and the phrase can mean the same thing for both. You can't take it with you simply means, well, why are you saving all of your money for a later day when eventually you're going to die and you can't take that money with you to whatever lies beyond. The second phrase I wanted to teach you today is YOLO. It's actually an acronym. I think I might have taught this one before, but YOLO is kind of like a young person's way of saying you only live once or just have a really good time because you're gonna die eventually. You only live once. YOLO. You'll hear this sometimes when you watch TV or other shows. So to review, you can't take it with you. A humorous way to talk about money and things and material possessions. You can't take it with you, so you might as well enjoy them while you're here. And my suggestion would be is if you can afford it, donate to worthy causes. And the second one is YOLO. Sorry if you're wondering what all the noise is, we now have a garbage truck going by. YOLO means you only live once, so enjoy life as much as you can. By the way, did you see the there's an actual barber pole here. That's kind of that's kind of a Blast from the past, but hey, let's look at a comment from a previous video. This comment is from Unsal. I was wondering how common are fences in residential areas in Canada? Is privacy that important for most homeowners, or are fences mostly used to mark property lines? Just to mark property lines. Thanks for another great lesson. You're awesome. Have a great day. Bye. My response: Very common. It is usually the first thing a homeowner builds when buying a new house in a town or city. They are far less common out in the country. So yeah, fences like people build fences, especially in residential areas, as you mentioned. I'm just going to move my tripod off to the side here. There's a few more people out and about today than I was expecting. Yes, generally every house in a town or city in the backyard will have a fence so that you have some privacy, even if the yard is really, really small. You'll have some privacy. So yeah, there's a barbershop here. So that's kind of cool. So a barbershop is traditionally a place where men would go to get their hair cut. It looks like they offer haircuts. I don't think I'm getting the sign on there very well. And all kinds of other things. So I've never been. I still just get my hair cut at home by Barber Jen. She takes care of that for me. So now it's quieted down a little bit. It was extremely busy in town. There were people on the sidewalk. There was, so we found him. There's the garbage truck. He's actually putting the garbage into the back now. And maybe as I speak, it's actually picking up a little bit again, a little bit more traffic. I'm not normally here this early in the morning. I had to bring my daughter to school, which this year she's going to drive by herself, but we just had a little bit of yeah we have enough vehicles we just aren't using them efficiently right now so anyways it's almost 4 minutes you I feel a little bit distracted this morning which is pretty normal for a Tuesday I also stayed up way too late last night so that might be having some effect. Anyways thanks for watching this short English lesson I'll see you next week with another one. Bye.

    Learn the English Phrases "You can't take it with you!" and "YOLO!"
  3. Sep 16

    Learn the English Phrases "that kind of money" and "rolling in it"

    In this English lesson, I wanted to help you learn the English phrase "that kind of money." We use this phrase in a humorous way to talk about really, really wealthy people. You might be wondering, Bob, why don't you have a Ferrari? Why don't you have a Lamborghini? Well, it's because I don't have that kind of money. That kind of money is a phrase to refer to people like Ed Sheeran or LeBron James or Wayne Gretzky or Messi. He probably has that kind of money, but normal people like us, we don't have that kind of money. I just drive normal vehicles because I'm a normal human being. The other phrase I wanted to teach you today is to be rolling in it. This is basically another way to describe really, really wealthy people. You could say, "Oh, he's rolling in it." Mick Jagger, lead singer from the Rolling Stones, he's rolling in it. He has so much money. I guess the image is he has so much money he could just lay it out on the floor and roll around in it. So to review, that kind of money is a funny way to refer to very very wealthy people who have lots of money and to be rolling in it simply means to have a lot of money. But hey, let's look at a comment from a previous video. This comment is from, I believe, Sylvia. I feel like there's mosquitoes out here today. It has been a bad year for mosquitoes. Here we go from Silvia. Harold's comment was so touching. A person who was going to give up but didn't because of your inspiring videos must be very comforting to you. I love how you make your videos and keep them real. I don't realize that I'm improving day by day, sharing with this Canadian guy who feels close to me. On the other hand, I agree I agree that Lionel Messi is the real deal. As an Argentinian, I felt very happy that you take him as an example of the real deal. And my response, cool that you're improving day by day. That is... That is kind of the secret. Slow and steady wins the race. So thanks, Silvia, for that comment. You know, for me, I don't really think too much about the fact that lots of people... Sorry, I got distracted for a sec. Should I have done this video about privacy fences? This is definitely a privacy fence. Let's go, let's go see. Okay, so this, in Canada, is what we would call a privacy fence. This person definitely doesn't want other people looking in their yard. I would build a fence like this, but I don't have that kind of money. This guy must be rolling in it. Anyways, what was I saying? I don't... Two things. I don't often think about the number of people who watch my videos because it makes me nervous. I like to think about the people who I've gotten to know in the comments and during live lessons. So I'm doing this video for those people. There's a number of people that I recognize, and have regular conversations with. The second thing I was going to say is that I totally lost track of the second thing I was going to say. Let me see. I was going to say I don't think about it. Oh, I wanted to talk about how doing a little bit every day is always the secret to learning English and to doing a whole bunch of other things in life. Can you hear my shoes? I'll go walk on the grass instead of the gravel. When you want to be healthier, you exercise and you do a little bit every day and slowly you become healthier. When you want to learn a language, if you do a little bit every day and then a year later you look at what you've done, you would be shocked at what you have accomplished. If you want to build a fence and you put up, oh look, it's even higher over there. It's like higher yet. Oh, and then at the end, I've never... I don't... I'm not sure I've ever seen a fence that tall, but if you wanted to build one, working on it a little bit every day is the way to build something that massive. That's yeah, they even had to cut out a little part for the tree, so that's nice. I like that. Anyways, some sort of compound in the middle of this town. Thanks for watching.

    Learn the English Phrases "that kind of money" and "rolling in it"
4.7
out of 5
83 Ratings

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!

You Might Also Like