Cafetalk Tutor's Column

The Starry Night: Painting with LEGO

The Starry Night was painted by Vincent van Gogh in June 1889, but it didn’t become famous until lo...

Identity poems: Where I’m from

I recently did an activity with my colleagues to get to know each other better and it was a kind of...

Getting serious about UFOs

Image: An alleged UFO seen from a farm near McMinnville, Oregon, 1950 from https://www.britannica.c...

Talking about NHL hockey in English: Part 2

The teams A hockey team typically dresses (has) 20 players, 18 skaters and 2 goalies (goaltenders/g...

Talking about NHL hockey in English: Part 1

I recently posted about the NHL Playoff Season and promised to add another post with more vocabular...

NHL Playoff Season

Ice hockey (usually just called hockey) is one of Canada’s national sports (the other is lacrosse)....

Coming soon to a galaxy near you

Image: Star Wars Day promotion from LEGO.com May the 4th is unofficially known as Star Wars Day, a...

Talking about birthdays in English

In my last column, I wrote about celebrating birthdays, so today I’d like to introduce some words a...

Enjoying your birthday

Childhood is usually a time filled with amazing birthday parties with themes and lots of friends, f...

Something funny and something creepy

Image: Calvin and Hobbes by Bill WattersonAlthough I enjoy reading a variety of genres, the only bo...

Before I was a teacher

Image: Armistice by Zach McLaughlin (pastel)I started teaching in 2010, but before that I had sever...

Talking about learning during the pandemic in English (Part 1)

The past two years have made us all more familiar with working and learning online, and this situat...

The news in Canada: April 2022

Although international news continues to dominate the headlines in Canada, there are some interesti...

More good tunes

Image: Franglish - Vibe (2021) album cover I’ve written a few column posts about my favourite music...

My captains

There are many people that I admire, some real and some fictional. I’ll introduce one of each today...

Spring holidays in Canada

Photo: LEGO Brickheadz Easter ChickAfter Valentine’s Day is over, the next holiday that people star...

Using motion verbs in English

There are a couple of ways to express motion in English. One way is to use a simple motion verb wit...

Thanks for 1,000 lessons!

I recently completely 1,000 lessons and would like to thank all of the people who have taken lesson...

Confusing negatives in English

Recently, I wrote about perseverance in studying, and I used a confusing negative sentence (see bel...

Hang in there!

Photo by Candra Winata on Unsplash Persistence/Perseverance is, in my opinion, the most important f...

Good habits

Good habits can reduce stress in your life and help you think more clearly. I believe that I have t...

Talking about habits and routines in English

This week’s column topic is How do you keep your schedule?, so for anyone studying English, here ar...

Is it wrong or is it new English?

Native speakers of every language make plenty of mistakes.  In English, there has always been conf...

2022 Playlist

Photo: Best of alexrainbirdMusic // Vol. 6 (800k Subscribers Playlist) These days, there are four k...

Teaching styles and learner expectations

Teaching styles and expectations can be very different in different cultures. Some teachers prefer ...

Short videos for listening practice in English

Today I’d like to share some resources for interesting short videos for English listening practice....

Talking about resolutions in English

Many people have been talking about their New Year’s resolutions recently, and I’ve had some great ...

Life without a cell phone

Photo: Raffi - BananaphoneIt’s rare these days to meet someone who doesn’t have a cell phone. For m...

New Year’s resolutions

Photo: Kingston, Ontario When it comes to making resolutions for a new year, I like to plan someth...

Indoor winter activities

"Canoe Lake" painting by Darrell Bush It’s been pretty cold in Toronto recently, and Covid-19-rela...