English Grammar for Teaching
Build the foundational language awareness needed for Cambridge TKT Module 1. Learn to analyze English structures, separate form from function, and diagnose real learner mistakes.
Like Duolingo, but for English Grammar for Teaching. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
A short one: 12 levels across 2 sections, about 24 minutes end to end, roughly 5 days at five minutes a day. It moves through Analyzing Word Roles and Meaning and Verbs, Time, and Learner Slips. It starts from scratch.
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Key ideas in English Grammar for Teaching
- A word's part of speech depends on its job in that specific sentence, not its default dictionary entry
- Words cannot be categorized accurately in isolation without looking at how they interact with nearby words
- Content words (nouns, main verbs, adjectives, adverbs) carry the core meaning of a message
- Open classes easily expand with new coinages (like 'to google' or 'selfie'), while structure words do not
- Determiners (e.g., 'the', 'those', 'every') signal and limit following nouns
- Prepositions (e.g., 'under', 'during') locate elements in time or space
- Pronouns (e.g., 'they', 'it') replace nouns to avoid repetition
- These structural categories form a closed system that rarely accepts new words
- Conversion allows an unchanged word form to move between classes (e.g., noun to verb)
- The presence of auxiliary verbs or direct objects marks 'booked' as a verb, while determiners mark 'book' as a noun
- Looking at neighboring cues (like 'to' or determiners) reveals the part of speech faster than analyzing the word alone
- Following an infinitive marker 'to' and taking a direct object ('the park') signals an action/main verb
- Grammatical form labels structural building blocks like verb tenses, parts of speech, and word order patterns
- Communicative function labels what the speaker aims to achieve socially with the utterance
- TKT exam tasks routinely require classifying descriptions into either form or function categories
- The grammatical form remains identical (a negative present simple question)
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives English Grammar for Teaching the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
Someone shows you the single word 'round' on a blank card. Why is it hard to name its part of speech?
Get it right to open this lesson and 11 more in the app.
Where English Grammar for Teaching takes you
- 1
Analyzing Word Roles and Meaning
- Parts of Speech in Action
- Form Versus Function
- 2
Verbs, Time, and Learner Slips
- Tense, Aspect, and Time
- Diagnosing Common Grammar Errors
2 sections · 4 units · 12 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
You pick the voice
English Grammar for Teaching is taught in the The Bestie style: your friend who just gets it. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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