Idiomatic expressions with "of"

ESL students spend a lot of time memorizing prepositions and the words they go with. These expressions are purely idiomatic. That means there is no way we can explain why a particular word takes a particular preposition. For example, we use the preposition ‘on’ with ‘dependent’ and ‘of’ with ‘independent’.

• He is dependent on his parents. (NOT He is dependent of his parents.) It is not easy to decide which preposition to use with which adjective. In addition, American usage sometimes differs from British usage. Here is a list of adjectives that take the preposition of.

Weather Idioms

Any port in a storm This means that in an emergency any solution will do, even one that would normally be unacceptable.

Billy Wind (UK) If the wind is so strong it is howling, one might say, "Wow- can you hear Billy Wind out there?" like Jack Frost.

Blue skies A overly enthusiastic outlook or disposition. The sales team had blue skies projections for their deals, although not many of those deals were signed.

All about the Weather

Weather Expressions

Prepositions “By” & “With”

I like to make my own pizza by hand. I make it with homemade crust and sauce. The crust is made with flour and I make the sauce with fresh tomatoes. At my neighbourhood, the pizza is made by an old Italian guy who opened the pizzeria about 40 years ago. He makes all of the food there by hand, except the pasta. That is probably made in a factory by machine.

14 English Words with 4 Forms

Many English words have multiple forms – a noun form, verb form, adjective form, and adverb form. Not all words have ALL the forms, but here are 14 words that do.

Make sure to read the example sentences below the table, because there are some slight differences in meaning!

Breakfast Idioms

Yum! A table of breakfast idioms to get your teeth into: