ENGLISH LANGUAGE O LEVEL(FORM ONE) NOTES – LISTERINING TO AND NDERSTANDING

LISTERINING TO AND NDERSTANDING SIMPLE TEXTS ABOUT A VARIETY OF EVENTS AND SITUATION

Graduation day

The morning was full of drumbeats, laughter and everybody was happy. It was a graduation day for standard seven leavers. All students looked very smart including Kadoka who was always dirty. In the morning we were given a timetable showing what would happen through the day. The following is the graduation timetable.

GRADUATION TIMETABLE

VOCABULARY

• Graduation – a party of students who have finished school
• Activities – work
• Arrange – plan
• e.g. The teacher said that we should arrange our chairs properly
• Imagine – think of it
• Example: Imagine a female present in Tanzania

Exercise

Make two sentences using the words; Graduation and activities

1. …………………..
2. ………………….

STRUCTURE

Prepositions of Time “At” and “in”

Examples

1. The party started at 8:00
2. The guest of honor arrived at 12:00
3. We ate lunch in the evening
4. They sleep at night
5. We arrived at school in the morning

Exercise

Write a composition about your first day at school

MY FIRST DAY AT SECONDARY SCHOOL

My name is Evelyn Livoga, my father’s name is Mr. Livoga and my mother’s name is Mrs. Grace Livoga. I am fifteen years old. I am black in colour and tall, thin in size.

My first day at secondary school was exciting. I was very excited. When I arrived at school, I saw some of my friends who came to me and helped me with my luggage to the Head Mistress office for checkup. I waved goodbye to my parents and they gave me a hug.

When I went to the office, they checked my luggage and showed me the way to the dormitory. I went to the dormitory hurriedly and kept my luggage. Then I took a bath and went to class.

When I reached the class, I made friends and they gave me a lot of loving company. After half an hour, the bell rang and everybody followed the bell.

All the teachers came in front of us and started introducing themselves and lastly the Head Mistress introduced herself. Her name is Sis. Magreth.

When it reached seven o’clock, we had our first dinner at this precious school called St. Joseph Millennium Secondary School. After one and a half hours, we had our evening prayers and we went to our dormitory to sleep. Since then, our patron came and showed everybody her room.

After that, I prepared my bed and had it ready to sleep. My room was very charming and the patron was very good. I prayed for myself and I slept. I hope my road to success will be successful at the end.

SPORT DAY

(Story book about sports example football)

Vocabulary

1. Suddenly – Quickly
2. Spectator – People who are watching something
3. Exciting – something you enjoy so much
4. Attract – make people like to see something

EXERCISE

Make two sentences using the words spectators and exciting

(i) ————————– (ii) ————————–

AN ACCIDENT

(Story/text book about accident)

VOCABULARY

• Tough – difficult, hard
• Restless – worried
• Obviously – very true
• No more – dead

EXERCISE

Make two sentences using the words restless and no more

(i) ————— (ii) —————

Structures

Personal Pronouns

Words like I, we, he, she, etc. are called Personal Pronouns. They are divided into singular and plural.

Structures

NOUN: Is the naming word of people, places or things.

Examples: Ally, Jack, Tanzania, Kariakoo, Arusha.

EXERCISE

1. Write down five nouns for each of the following:

1. Animals
2. Building
3. Lakes
4. Mountains

Singular and plural

1. Sheep – sheep
2. Halves – half
3. Wolves – wolf
4. Feet – foot
5. Armies – army
6. Inches – inch
7. Loaves – loaf
8. Wives – wife

Structure

Singular and Plural

1. Plural Nouns can be formed by:

Adding “s” to the singular Nouns.

Example: Circle – Circles

Day – days

Roof – roofs

Tutor – tutors

2. Changing “y” to – ies

Example:

Army – armies

Aunty – aunties

Lady – ladies

Factory – factories

Note: In nouns ending with “y” do not change ”y” if it is preceded by a vowel.

Example: toy – toys (simply add “s”) but if “y” is preceded by a consonant change “y” into “i” and then add “-es”

Example: fly – flies

3. Add “es” to singular Nouns ending in “s”, “ss”, “x”, “z”, “ch”, “sh” and “o”

Example:

Match – matches

Gas – gases

Princess – princesses

Tax – taxes

Hero – heroes

4. Changing “f” or “fe” in singular Nouns to “-ve”

Example:

Calf – calves

Half – halves

Knife – knives

Life – lives

Thief – thieves

Note: Seven Nouns change their vowels:

Man – men

Foot – feet

Goose – geese

Woman – women

Tooth – teeth

Louse – lice

Mouse – mice

Pronoun and verbs

• Is – are
• Was – were
• He/she/it – they
• Him – them
• I – we
• That – those
• This – these
• My – our
• Mine – ours
• His/hers – theirs

Note: Noun:

Irregular Plurals: Nouns with the hissing sound

• -sh
• -ch
• -x to be in plural add -es
• -z

EXERCISE

Write the plural of the following nouns:

1. box
2. hero
3. knife
4. leaf
5. church
6. inch
7. fly

Exercise

Make the following sentences plural (Remember to change the pronouns as well):

Example:

That chair is broken

Those chairs are broken

1. That baby is sick
2. He broke his foot
3. I am a good student
4. That thief has a knife
5. That boy has a phone

HOW TO ASK QUESTIONS

There are many ways of asking questions. You can ask a question using the word “is” – Is she late?

• Is she in this class?
• Is she sick?

Asking questions using “are” – Are they late?

• Are they in this class?
• Are they sick?

Asking questions using “was” – Was she late?

• Was she in this class?
• Was she sick?

Asking questions using “were” – Were they late?

• Were they in this class?
• Were they sick?

Exercise

Fill in is, was, are, were in the right space:

1. ________ they punished yesterday?
2. ________ they doing maths now?
3. ________ she suffering from malaria?
4. _____ we going home now?

LISTENING TO DICTATIONS

1. Tail / tale
2. Glow / grow
3. Sun / son
4. Bare / bear
5. Hair / hare / heir
6. Sea / see
7. Beep / bip
8. Deep / dip
9. Raise / rise
10. Lake / like

Structure

PROPER AND COMMON NOUNS

(a) Proper Nouns:

A single reference. Example: Mt. Kilimanjaro refers to one particular mountain. We normally use capital letters for the first letter of a proper noun.

Example: Kibile and Riwa are Proper Nouns.

Chair and bus are Common Nouns.

(b) Common Nouns:

Are ordinary groups of names of persons and things such as child, gentleman, students, cow, city, chair, etc. There is no uniqueness in common nouns.

For example, if one says “a city” it can be any city. It is different from Dar es Salaam or Kilimanjaro which is the only city called so. We do not use capital letters for the first letter of a common noun.

The Differences between Proper and Common Nouns

Proper Nouns differ from common nouns in three ways:

1. They are not usually used with articles. We cannot say, for example:

• A London
• The John
• A Nairobi

2. Proper Nouns do not usually allow plurals

Examples:

• Kilimanjaros
• Two Aminas
• Musomas

Note: You must use articles with common nouns (unless they are uncountable)

For example:

Book is black,

But you can say a book is black

EXERCISE

Write the following sentences correctly:

1. I went to Arusha last week
2. Please bring me a table
3. Are you a Rose?

(d) Elephant is a big animal

GIVING DIRECTIONS

The main purpose of this topic is to give compass directions, mainly four cardinal points i.e. East, West, North, South.

The compass

The compass is an instrument for finding direction. It has a magnetized needle which sits on a face. The face has different directions drawn on it. The needle always points to the magnetic north. The compass is sometimes called Magnetic compass.

Common words include: left, right, straight, crossing, opposite, adjacent, behind, in front of, next to, nearby.

Asking for and giving directions

Rehema: Excuse me, could you tell me the way to the pharmacy?

Suzy: Yes, it’s that way. Just go straight away after two houses, turn left, it’s on the corner opposite the post office.

Rehema: Thanks, I have only been in town for a few days, so I really don’t know my way around yet.

Suzy: Oh! I know how you feel. I was born in this town so I know where everything is.

• Interrogative / ways to ask or show directions
• Can you direct me to ……………… Response direction
• Turn left/right, go straight to ……… at Zebra crossing, take a bus to………………. On your left, follow Hanang street then keep right.

Exercise

Look at the map below. Imagine you are one of the children asking for directions. Practice asking for and giving directions to:

1. The mosque
2. The dispensary
3. The market
4. The school
5. The agriculture office

Locating places

Discuss the location of the school:

• Where is the school situated in Tanzania? (north, south, east, west or central)
• Is it in town or in the countryside?
• Are there any houses, shops or offices nearby?
• How many roads lead to the school?
• Do the roads leading to your school have names?

Structure

Comparatives and superlatives

There are three main ways of making comparisons:

1. AS + ORDINARY FORM OF THE ADJECTIVE OR ADVERB + AS

E.g. His essay is as long as mine.

This book is as interesting as the one we read last Monday.

2. COMPARATIVE FORM OF THE ADJECTIVE OR ADVERB + THAN

E.g. That house is bigger than mine.

They did the test more carefully than we did.

3. LESS + ORDINARY FORM OF THE ADJECTIVE OR ADVERB + THAN

E.g. The tail of the ship is less long than that dog.

This news is less interesting than the one I read last weekend.

There are three main patterns of making superlatives:

i. definite article + superlative form of the adjective or adverb

E.g. The giraffe is the tallest of all animals.

ii. One of + definite article + superlative form of adjective

E.g. This novel is one of the most interesting we have ever read.

iii. Definite article + least + ordinary form of adjective or adverb

E.g. Of all the books we have read, this one is the least interesting.

Words used to compare things are called COMPARATIVES.

Examples: big, bigger, biggest.

Note:

1. “-er” must go with “than”

Example: An elephant is the biggest animal.

If a word cannot take “-est” use “most”.

Example: Suzy is more beautiful than Rhoda.

2. “-est” must go with “the”

Example: An elephant is the biggest animal.

3. If a word cannot take “-est” use “most”.

Example: Suzy is the most beautiful girl in the class.

Exercise

Change the words in the brackets and write the whole sentence correctly!

1. An apple is (small) a pumpkin.
2. Airplanes are (fast) than cars.
3. A snail is (slow) a snake.
4. James is (tall) me.
5. Miss Tanzania is (beautiful) my sister.