https://trytotalk.com/ Learn English with movies, master English movie vocabulary, and get English listening practice with movies. Try to Talk is an AI English tutor helping you achieve natural fluency. https://trytotalk.com/highlights/used-to https://trytotalk.com/highlights/used-to Mon, 20 Jul 2026 16:00:00 GMT A quick Try to Talk grammar highlight explaining how to use used to for past habits and past situations that are no longer true. https://trytotalk.com/highlights/so-and-such https://trytotalk.com/highlights/so-and-such Tue, 14 Jul 2026 16:00:00 GMT A quick Try to Talk grammar highlight explaining how to use so and such to make adjectives, adverbs, and nouns stronger. https://trytotalk.com/highlights/enough-and-too https://trytotalk.com/highlights/enough-and-too Sun, 12 Jul 2026 16:00:00 GMT A quick Try to Talk grammar highlight explaining how to use enough and too to talk about sufficient and excessive amounts. https://trytotalk.com/highlights/had-better https://trytotalk.com/highlights/had-better Sat, 11 Jul 2026 16:00:00 GMT A quick Try to Talk grammar highlight explaining how to use had better for strong advice when there may be a problem or consequence. https://trytotalk.com/blog/introducing-english-by-algorithm https://trytotalk.com/blog/introducing-english-by-algorithm Mon, 15 Jun 2026 22:00:00 GMT Announcing English by Algorithm, a free 48-lesson series that teaches you to read any English sentence by its shape, from your first words to dense academic prose. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/study-program-zero-to-hero https://trytotalk.com/lessons/study-program-zero-to-hero Mon, 15 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT The final post: a roadmap that ties the whole series into a study plan from zero to mastery. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/academic-register-hedging-cohesion https://trytotalk.com/lessons/academic-register-hedging-cohesion Sun, 14 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Sound academic: the register, hedging, and cohesion devices that make formal English read smoothly. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/vocabulary-building https://trytotalk.com/lessons/vocabulary-building Sat, 13 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Grow vocabulary the smart way, through word families, frequency, and the collocations that words keep. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/pronoun-reference https://trytotalk.com/lessons/pronoun-reference Fri, 12 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Make every it, they, and this point clearly to the right noun and avoid confusing references. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/sentence-generation https://trytotalk.com/lessons/sentence-generation Thu, 11 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Turn the rules around and build correct English sentences from the ground up, like a machine assembling parts. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/structural-ambiguity https://trytotalk.com/lessons/structural-ambiguity Wed, 10 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT When one sentence allows two structures: how ambiguity arises and how to resolve it. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt6-hidden-connectors https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt6-hidden-connectors Tue, 09 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Reduction transformation 6: restoring the hidden to and the hidden that that English leaves out. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt5-clause-edge-participial https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt5-clause-edge-participial Mon, 08 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Reduction transformation 5: participles at the edge of a sentence, and how to avoid the dangling trap. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt4-adverbial-reduction https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt4-adverbial-reduction Sun, 07 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Reduction transformation 4: the shrunken clause left behind after if, when, and although. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt3-conditional-inversion https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt3-conditional-inversion Sat, 06 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Reduction transformation 3: the hidden if inside inverted conditionals like Had I known. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt2-reduced-relative https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt2-reduced-relative Fri, 05 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Reduction transformation 2: the reduced relative clause, the master key to reading dense, formal English. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt1-double-np-reduction https://trytotalk.com/lessons/rt1-double-np-reduction Thu, 04 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Reduction transformation 1: spotting the missing that that hides between two nouns. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/what-reduction-transformations-are https://trytotalk.com/lessons/what-reduction-transformations-are Wed, 03 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT The master secret of dense English: how the language hides words, and the method for restoring them. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/cleft-and-emphasis https://trytotalk.com/lessons/cleft-and-emphasis Tue, 02 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Spotlight one part of a sentence using cleft and emphasis structures such as It was John who. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/punctuation https://trytotalk.com/lessons/punctuation Mon, 01 Jun 2026 13:00:00 GMT Punctuation is not about pauses or breathing; it marks structure, and each mark does a specific grammatical job. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/comparatives https://trytotalk.com/lessons/comparatives Sun, 31 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Comparing things in English with bigger, the biggest, and as tall as, and the rules behind each form. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/reported-speech https://trytotalk.com/lessons/reported-speech Sat, 30 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Telling what someone said: how tenses, pronouns, and time words shift when speech becomes reported. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/coordination-parallelism-ellipsis https://trytotalk.com/lessons/coordination-parallelism-ellipsis Fri, 29 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Joining equal pieces with and, but, and or, plus the parallelism and deletion that keep the result balanced. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/adverb-placement https://trytotalk.com/lessons/adverb-placement Thu, 28 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT The three positions an adverb can take in a sentence, and how placement shifts emphasis and meaning. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/adverbs-and-adverbial-clauses https://trytotalk.com/lessons/adverbs-and-adverbial-clauses Wed, 27 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT How adverbs and adverbial clauses add when, where, why, and how to the action of a sentence. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/two-functions-of-to https://trytotalk.com/lessons/two-functions-of-to Tue, 26 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT The word to does two completely different jobs, as a preposition and an infinitive marker, and how to tell them apart. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/boundary-markers https://trytotalk.com/lessons/boundary-markers Mon, 25 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Find the seams in a long sentence: the signals that show where one clause ends and the next begins. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/tag-questions https://trytotalk.com/lessons/tag-questions Sun, 24 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT How short question tags like aren't you are formed, and why they flip the verb and the pronoun. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/mandative-subjunctive https://trytotalk.com/lessons/mandative-subjunctive Sat, 23 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Why English says that he be present: the quiet subjunctive after demands, suggestions, and requirements. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/conditionals https://trytotalk.com/lessons/conditionals Fri, 22 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT The four conditional patterns of if and then, from real possibilities to imagined and impossible ones. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/modal-auxiliaries https://trytotalk.com/lessons/modal-auxiliaries Thu, 21 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT can, must, should, may, and might: how the modal force words add possibility, obligation, and permission. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/negation https://trytotalk.com/lessons/negation Wed, 20 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT How English turns a sentence negative: where not goes, which helper it needs, and the patterns you can trust. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/forming-questions https://trytotalk.com/lessons/forming-questions Tue, 19 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT The inversion algorithm behind English questions: how helping verbs move to turn a statement into a question. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-ing-puzzle https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-ing-puzzle Mon, 18 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT One reliable procedure for sorting out every -ing word, whether it is a verb, adjective, noun, or reduced clause. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/tense-and-voice-matrix https://trytotalk.com/lessons/tense-and-voice-matrix Sun, 17 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Read time and voice straight off the verb with a matrix that maps tense and active or passive at a glance. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/phrasal-and-prepositional-verbs https://trytotalk.com/lessons/phrasal-and-prepositional-verbs Sat, 16 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Make sense of multi-word verbs like turn off, give up, and put up with, and where their pieces can move. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/gerund-vs-infinitive https://trytotalk.com/lessons/gerund-vs-infinitive Fri, 15 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT When a second verb takes -ing and when it takes to, and how to choose between gerund and infinitive. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/verb-valency https://trytotalk.com/lessons/verb-valency Thu, 14 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT How each verb decides what can follow it, from no object to one, two, or a whole clause. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/word-formation-morphology https://trytotalk.com/lessons/word-formation-morphology Wed, 13 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Read words you have never seen by decoding the prefixes, suffixes, and endings that reveal a word's grammatical job. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/nominal-structures https://trytotalk.com/lessons/nominal-structures Tue, 12 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT When an entire clause behaves like a single thing, acting as subject, object, or complement inside a bigger sentence. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m5-zone https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m5-zone Mon, 11 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT A major milestone: full relative clauses that describe a noun from the M5 zone. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m4-zone https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m4-zone Sun, 10 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Describing a noun from behind, with prepositional phrases and other modifiers that fall in the M4 zone. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m3-zone https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m3-zone Sat, 09 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT When one noun describes another: how English stacks nouns together in the M3 zone. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m2-zone https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m2-zone Fri, 08 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Adjectives and describing words in the M2 zone, and the surprising link they share with the Boot. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m1-zone https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-m1-zone Thu, 07 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Start assembling bigger noun phrases by adding the front words, the M1 zone, that sit before a noun. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/agreement-hard-cases https://trytotalk.com/lessons/agreement-hard-cases Wed, 06 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Subject-verb agreement beyond the basics: collective nouns, distance, and tricky subjects that catch even strong learners. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/nouns-and-countability https://trytotalk.com/lessons/nouns-and-countability Tue, 05 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Why the noun quietly controls the whole sentence, and how countable versus uncountable shapes the words around it. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-boot https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-boot Mon, 04 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Discover the Boot, the single most versatile tool in this series for seeing how English clauses fit together. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-sentence-engine https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-sentence-engine Sun, 03 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Meet the handful of core patterns that every English sentence, short or long, is actually built from. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-structural-mindset https://trytotalk.com/lessons/the-structural-mindset Sat, 02 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Train your eye to spot the skeleton of any sentence so the meaning falls into place instead of getting lost in the words. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/first-sentences-and-pronouns https://trytotalk.com/lessons/first-sentences-and-pronouns Fri, 01 May 2026 13:00:00 GMT Build your first real English sentences from subject, verb, and object, and meet the pronouns that stand in for them. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/letters-sounds-and-the-a-an-rule https://trytotalk.com/lessons/letters-sounds-and-the-a-an-rule Thu, 30 Apr 2026 13:00:00 GMT A gentle start with the English alphabet and its sounds, plus the a/an rule that trips learners up for years if they miss it early. https://trytotalk.com/lessons/why-structure-comes-first https://trytotalk.com/lessons/why-structure-comes-first Wed, 29 Apr 2026 13:00:00 GMT Before vocabulary, learn to see an English sentence's shape — and why structure, not word-by-word translation, makes hard sentences readable.