Shadowing Practice: EASY ENGLISH CONVERSATION: Learn to Talk About GIFTS & PRESENTS - Learn English Speaking with Video

Hello. My name is Emma, and today we are going to be talking about presents and gifts and the English we use to talk about presents and gifts. So, this is a vocabulary lesson.

It's also a cultural lesson. We will talk about what are some common gifts people give each other in North America, and we're going to talk about some things we say when we give a gift or receive a gift. So, let's get started with the word "gift" and "present". So, this or this, we can call these "gif", we can also call them "presents". These two words have the same meaning. So, if one is easier to pronounce, you can use that one. "Gift" might be a little bit difficult to pronounce; "present" might be a little easier. They have the same meaning. So, a "present" is something you give or you get on a special occasion. So, what are some examples of special occasions? Well, you might get a present for your birthday, maybe for an anniversary, like a wedding anniversary or a special anniversary. Weddings are places we often give presents. Same with holidays. So, depending on your religion or your culture, you might give a present, for example, at Christmastime or on a different holiday. "Baby showers", this might be a new word. A "baby shower" is when someone is having a baby, so we celebrate by giving them presents because they will have a baby so they have a party. We call the party a "baby shower". Another time you might give a present is for a housewarming party. A "housewarming party" is when someone moves to a new apartment or a new house. It's the first party in the new house, you might give somebody a present and say, "Congratulations on your new house." So, these are just some special occasions when you might give a present, especially in North America. There are other occasions as well, but these are some of the most common. So, I want to talk a little bit about verbs.

What verbs do we use when it comes to presents and gifts? We can use the verb "buy". "Buy" is in the present tense. Many people forget the past tense of "buy", which is "bought".

"I bought a gift for my mom.", "I bought a gift for my teacher.", "I bought a gift for my boss." So, we often use the verb in the past tense, "buy", and the past tense is "bought".

Same with "give". You can use the word "give". We often talk about presents in the past, so we might use the past tense. "I gave a present to my sister.", "I gave a present to my friend for her birthday." So, you can also say, "I gave my friend a present." So, that's another verb we commonly use with present or gift. And then finally "get". "Get" is a little informal, but we use it a lot with presents. So, "I got my brother a great present.", "I got my friend a good present.", "I don't know what to get for my boss for Christmas this year." These are some examples of how to use "get". And again, the past tense of "get" is "got". "Today, I got a present." So, now we're going to look at what do we say when we give a present, and what do we say when we receive a present? What is the polite English we can use? Okay, so we often say the same thing when we give a gift. Here are some things we might say. "This is for you.", "This is for you.", "I hope you like it." We might also say, "It's just a little something." If we don't want the person to feel bad that we got them something big, we might say, "Oh, you know, it's just a little something for you.", "I got you something small." So, these are common things we say when we give a present. "This is for you." When we receive a present, so when someone gives us a present, we often say, "Thank you so much." or "Thank you." We might also say, "You shouldn't have." So, this is a very polite thing to say when someone gives you a present. "Oh, thank you. You shouldn't have." It means that you really appreciate what they've done, that they've given you a present. "Thank you, but you shouldn't have.", "Thank you." So what are some common gifts you might receive in North America? Well, I've actually brought some common presents I got in the past. So, the first one I notice people give a lot in North America, and this is usually to acquaintances or maybe coworkers or your bosses. So, I'm not saying to get this for the person, you know, who's the most special in your life.

This is just a common thing we might give somebody. So, things like lotions or hand creams, these are common gifts in North America.

What's another common gift? This is a gift card. So, it's actually common to give somebody a gift card in North America. You would not give this to someone who is very close to you. I would not give a gift card to my grandmother, for example, but maybe a coworker or my boss, I might give a gift card, or a teacher, for example. So, it's not rude in North America to give a gift card; it's a common present.

Okay, so we talked about hand creams, gift cards. Another present that's very common, mugs or cups. We often give people a cup or a mug, very common gift. You might find one that has a funny message on it if you want to make it more personal. Wine is a very common gift, especially for a housewarming party, you might give a bottle of wine or a plant. Plants are a popular present as well. And then, baskets. People often give baskets. So, baskets can be filled with all sorts of things a person likes. You might have a fruit basket, maybe you have someone who loves coffee, so there's a basket with different coffee in it, or maybe there's somebody who loves cookies, so there's junk food in the basket. So, there's a lot of different gifts; these are some common ones.

Now, I'll show you the best gift I ever got. So, this is from my nephew. He made me a Pokémon.

Now, I love this gift because it's homemade, he spent time making this, so I think it's a really cute gift. And it's what he likes, and he thought I would love it. So, yeah, this is one of the cutest gifts I've ever gotten.

What is the best gift you've ever gotten? You can write it in the comments below. I'm really curious to learn about, in your country or in your culture, what is common for giving gifts, what are typical gifts people give, and what's the best gift you've ever gotten or received?

Now, one other thing about culture, gift-giving is very cultural, so people in different places do different things. In North America, if somebody gives you a gift, it's normal to open the gift in front of them. So, in some cultures, you don't open a gift in front of somebody. In North America, you usually open the gift in front of the person who gives it to you, and then you say, "Wow, thank you so much. Oh, you shouldn't have. Thank you. I really like it." So now what I want to do is just talk a little bit more about the English of gift-giving.

We're going to look at a couple more expressions we use when talking about gifts.

The first word I want to teach you about gifts is "wrap". For many people, they like to wrap a present in special paper. The paper they use is called "wrapping paper" or this is "tissue paper". So, I wrapped this present with tissue paper. So, at Christmas time, I celebrate Christmas, I wrap all the presents in wrapping paper. Sometimes I put presents in bags, especially when I'm a little bit lazy and I'm not great with wrapping presents, I might use these instead. But yes, so the verb is "wrap a gift" or "wrap a present".

When you open a present, you can use the word "open" or "unwrap". So, for example, if I open this, my hand cream. All right, I unwrapped the present. I opened the present. So it just means to remove the wrapping paper or the tissue paper.

Exchange gifts is another very good one to use. When you exchange gifts, it means that you and another person both give presents and receive presents from each other. So, for example, imagine you and I work together, I give you a gift and you give me a gift, we can say we exchange presents. It's very common in North America to exchange presents with coworkers. Sometimes we even play a game around Christmas time called Secret Santa where everybody has to exchange presents with someone else. So when you exchange presents, you give and get a present.

Finally, the last word, "re-gift". "Re-gift" is a funny word. You have here "re-" which means again, again gift. When you re-gift something, it means you give someone a gift you previously got. So, for example, imagine I got this hand cream. I get a lot of hand cream. So I got the hand cream as a gift, but imagine I smell it, I don't like the smell, I wouldn't do this, but some people do. They put it in a box or, you know, they wrap it again and they give it to someone else because they don't like the present, they give the present to someone else. We call that "re-gift" to give someone a gift you already received, but you do it secretly. You don't want people to know you're re-gifting.

I promise I don't re-gift, but many people do in North America.

Okay, so we've covered a lot when it comes to talking about giving gifts and receiving gifts.

We've talked a little bit about the culture of giving and receiving gifts. So again, if you haven't already, write in the comments below what was the best gift you ever received or the worst gift you ever received, and if there's anything special in your culture when it comes to giving gifts, you can write it in the comments as well. I'd be really interested to know the cultural differences with gift giving.

So, we learned a lot today. It's always good to practice what you learn, so I invite you to come visit our website at www.engvid.com, and there you can take a quiz to practice the words from today. So, thank you so much for watching, and until next time, take care.