EASY ENGLISH CONVERSATION: Learn to Talk About GIFTS & PRESENTS

0:00 Hello.

0:00 My name is Emma, and today we are going to be talking about

0:06 presents and gifts and the English we use to talk about presents and gifts.

0:11 So, this is a vocabulary lesson.

0:14 It's also a cultural lesson.

0:16 We will talk about what are some common

0:19 gifts people give each other in North America,

0:21 and we're going to talk about some things we

0:24 say when we give a gift or receive a gift.

0:29 So, let's get started with the word "gift" and "present".

0:34 So, this or this, we can call these "gif", we can also call them "presents".

0:43 These two words have the same meaning.

0:47 So, if one is easier to pronounce, you can use that one.

0:53 "Gift" might be a little bit difficult to pronounce;

0:57 "present" might be a little easier.

0:59 They have the same meaning.

1:02 So, a "present" is something you give or you get on a special occasion.

1:13 So, what are some examples of special occasions?

1:17 Well, you might get a present for your birthday,

1:23 maybe for an anniversary, like a wedding anniversary or a special anniversary.

1:31 Weddings are places we often give presents.

1:34 Same with holidays.

1:36 So, depending on your religion or your culture, you might give a present,

1:42 for example, at Christmastime or on a different holiday.

1:47 "Baby showers", this might be a new word.

1:51 A "baby shower" is when someone is having a baby,

1:57 so we celebrate by giving them presents because they

2:01 will have a baby so they have a party.

2:05 We call the party a "baby shower".

2:09 Another time you might give a present is for a housewarming party.

2:16 A "housewarming party" is when someone moves to a new apartment or a new house.

2:25 It's the first party in the new house,

2:28 you might give somebody a present and say,

2:32 "Congratulations on your new house." So,

2:35 these are just some special occasions when you might give a present,

2:42 especially in North America.

2:44 There are other occasions as well, but these are some of the most common.

2:50 So, I want to talk a little bit about verbs.

2:55 What verbs do we use when it comes to presents and gifts?

3:00 We can use the verb "buy".

3:03 "Buy" is in the present tense.

3:06 Many people forget the past tense of "buy", which is "bought".

3:10 "I bought a gift for my mom.", "I bought a gift for my teacher.",

3:19 "I bought a gift for my boss." So,

3:23 we often use the verb in the past tense, "buy", and the past tense is "bought".

3:31 Same with "give".

3:33 You can use the word "give".

3:35 We often talk about presents in the past, so we might use the past tense.

3:41 "I gave a present to my sister.",

3:44 "I gave a present to my friend for her birthday." So,

3:50 you can also say, "I gave my friend a present." So,

3:56 that's another verb we commonly use with present or gift.

4:00 And then finally "get".

4:01 "Get" is a little informal, but we use it a lot with presents.

4:07 So, "I got my brother a great present.", "I got my friend a good present.",

4:15 "I don't know what to get for my boss for Christmas

4:21 this year." These are some examples of how to use "get".

4:25 And again, the past tense of "get" is "got".

4:29 "Today, I got a present." So,

4:32 now we're going to look at what do we say when we give a present,

4:38 and what do we say when we receive a present?

4:41 What is the polite English we can use?

4:44 Okay, so we often say the same thing when we give a gift.

4:50 Here are some things we might say.

4:53 "This is for you.", "This is for you.", "I hope you like it." We might also say,

5:02 "It's just a little something." If we don't want

5:05 the person to feel bad that we got them something big,

5:09 we might say, "Oh, you know, it's just a little something for you.",

5:12 "I got you something small." So,

5:15 these are common things we say when we give a present.

5:19 "This is for you." When we receive a present,

5:23 so when someone gives us a present, we often say,

5:28 "Thank you so much." or "Thank you." We might also say,

5:33 "You shouldn't have." So,

5:34 this is a very polite thing to say when someone gives you a present.

5:40 "Oh, thank you.

5:41 You shouldn't have." It means that you really appreciate what they've done,

5:45 that they've given you a present.

5:48 "Thank you, but you shouldn't have.",

5:51 "Thank you." So what are some common gifts you might receive in North America?

5:57 Well, I've actually brought some common presents I got in the past.

6:03 So, the first one I notice people give a lot in North America,

6:09 and this is usually to acquaintances or maybe coworkers or your bosses.

6:14 So, I'm not saying to get this for the person,

6:17 you know, who's the most special in your life.

6:19 This is just a common thing we might give somebody.

6:24 So, things like lotions or hand creams, these are common gifts in North America.

6:32 What's another common gift?

6:34 This is a gift card.

6:37 So, it's actually common to give somebody a gift card in North America.

6:42 You would not give this to someone who is very close to you.

6:47 I would not give a gift card to my grandmother, for example,

6:51 but maybe a coworker or my boss,

6:54 I might give a gift card, or a teacher, for example.

6:59 So, it's not rude in North America to give a gift card; it's a common present.

7:07 Okay, so we talked about hand creams, gift cards.

7:10 Another present that's very common, mugs or cups.

7:18 We often give people a cup or a mug, very common gift.

7:25 You might find one that has a funny message

7:29 on it if you want to make it more personal.

7:33 Wine is a very common gift, especially for a housewarming party,

7:37 you might give a bottle of wine or a plant.

7:41 Plants are a popular present as well.

7:45 And then, baskets.

7:46 People often give baskets.

7:48 So, baskets can be filled with all sorts of things a person likes.

7:53 You might have a fruit basket, maybe you have someone who loves coffee,

7:58 so there's a basket with different coffee in it,

8:02 or maybe there's somebody who loves cookies, so there's junk food in the basket.

8:07 So, there's a lot of different gifts; these are some common ones.

8:11 Now, I'll show you the best gift I ever got.

8:18 So, this is from my nephew.

8:22 He made me a Pokémon.

8:26 Now, I love this gift because it's homemade,

8:29 he spent time making this, so I think it's a really cute gift.

8:34 And it's what he likes, and he thought I would love it.

8:38 So, yeah, this is one of the cutest gifts I've ever gotten.

8:42 What is the best gift you've ever gotten?

8:45 You can write it in the comments below.

8:47 I'm really curious to learn about,

8:49 in your country or in your culture, what is common for giving gifts,

8:55 what are typical gifts people give,

8:57 and what's the best gift you've ever gotten or received?

9:03 Now, one other thing about culture, gift-giving is very cultural,

9:08 so people in different places do different things.

9:11 In North America, if somebody gives you a gift,

9:16 it's normal to open the gift in front of them.

9:20 So, in some cultures, you don't open a gift in front of somebody.

9:24 In North America, you usually open the gift

9:26 in front of the person who gives it to you,

9:29 and then you say, "Wow, thank you so much.

9:33 Oh, you shouldn't have.

9:34 Thank you.

9:35 I really like it." So now what I want to do

9:39 is just talk a little bit more about the English of gift-giving.

9:43 We're going to look at a couple

9:45 more expressions we use when talking about gifts.

9:47 The first word I want to teach you about gifts is "wrap".

9:53 For many people, they like to wrap a present in special paper.

10:00 The paper they use is called "wrapping paper" or this is "tissue paper".

10:07 So, I wrapped this present with tissue paper.

10:12 So, at Christmas time, I celebrate Christmas,

10:16 I wrap all the presents in wrapping paper.

10:19 Sometimes I put presents in bags,

10:22 especially when I'm a little bit lazy and I'm not great with wrapping presents,

10:28 I might use these instead.

10:30 But yes, so the verb is "wrap a gift" or "wrap a present".

10:36 When you open a present, you can use the word "open" or "unwrap".

10:42 So, for example, if I open this, my hand cream.

10:48 All right, I unwrapped the present.

10:52 I opened the present.

10:55 So it just means to remove the wrapping paper or the tissue paper.

11:03 Exchange gifts is another very good one to use.

11:07 When you exchange gifts, it means that you and another person both

11:12 give presents and receive presents from each other.

11:16 So, for example, imagine you and I work together,

11:20 I give you a gift and you give me a gift, we can say we exchange presents.

11:29 It's very common in North America to exchange presents with coworkers.

11:34 Sometimes we even play a game around Christmas time called

11:39 Secret Santa where everybody has to exchange presents with someone else.

11:44 So when you exchange presents, you give and get a present.

11:50 Finally, the last word, "re-gift".

11:53 "Re-gift" is a funny word.

11:57 You have here "re-" which means again, again gift.

12:03 When you re-gift something, it means you give someone a gift you previously got.

12:11 So, for example, imagine I got this hand cream.

12:17 I get a lot of hand cream.

12:22 So I got the hand cream as a gift, but imagine I smell it,

12:27 I don't like the smell, I wouldn't do this, but some people do.

12:33 They put it in a box or, you know, they wrap it again and they give it

12:40 to someone else because they don't like the present,

12:43 they give the present to someone else.

12:46 We call that "re-gift" to give someone a gift you already received,

12:50 but you do it secretly.

12:52 You don't want people to know you're re-gifting.

12:58 I promise I don't re-gift, but many people do in North America.

13:04 Okay, so we've covered a lot when it

13:08 comes to talking about giving gifts and receiving gifts.

13:11 We've talked a little bit about the culture of giving and receiving gifts.

13:16 So again, if you haven't already,

13:18 write in the comments below what was the best gift

13:21 you ever received or the worst gift you ever received,

13:26 and if there's anything special in your culture when it comes to giving gifts,

13:31 you can write it in the comments as well.

13:34 I'd be really interested to know the cultural differences with gift giving.

13:40 So, we learned a lot today.

13:43 It's always good to practice what you learn,

13:46 so I invite you to come visit our website at www.engvid.com,

13:51 and there you can take a quiz to practice the words from today.

13:57 So, thank you so much for watching, and until next time, take care.