Oh this word can cause even our advanced students to roll their eyes. Fortunately or unfortunately IDIOMS are a part of every language. IDIOMS are a bunch of words together which separately don’t mean anything, but together take on a whole new life. Knowledge and use of these idioms will help language learners “to fit in with” a culture and its language. Are they challenging? Sure they are! Can you learn them? Sure you can! It’s only a matter of following the 3 R’s. Repeat, Review & Remember. Or as the saying goes; “What we practice grows stronger.” So it’s important for you to try and include these expressions in your everyday speech. You can check out our daily Instagram stories in order to be in contact with different idiomatic expressions every day, or go to our Idioms & Highlights folders. Please enjoy reading two homework assignments by our students where we can see the idioms put into use in stories.
Cindy’s Story
Once upon a time, there was a beautiful, smart and humble girl called Cinderella, but everybody called her Cindy.
Cindy used to work at an internet cafe from 8 am to 9 pm, so she had no time to do anything else. After working the whole day, she had to clean her house for her stepmother and her stepsisters. They lived in the middle of nowhere, so Cindy had to get on two different buses to commute to her job.
Cindy wanted to be a famous pastry chef, to travel around the world and to earn a lot of money, but when she told her family about her dreams, her stepmother just said it was easier said than done. She was fed up with her!
Cindy used to think: this lifestyle is a dead end, just my luck, I can’t study or do anything else except work and work and work, everything is going downhill and I can’t stand it!” She was up in arms because her stepsisters never worked or did housework but they always hung out with her friends.
One day, a virus was spread around the world and everybody was in the same boat because they had to stay at home. Many people lost their jobs, and so did Cindy. She had mixed feelings because maybe she had to start from scratch, but it could also be a blessing in disguise.
Cindy started watching videos about bakery and pastries, she was in love with them! At the beginning, she didn’t have the faintest idea about ingredients, recipes, ovens, costs, budgets and everything related to pastries but she worked on doing her best. She looked up to pastry chefs like Paulina Abascal and José Ramón Castillo.
Sometimes, she ran out of some ingredients so she had to improvise and her creations were amazing Cindy started selling her cakes, pies, tarts, cupcakes and everything she baked.
Suddenly, Cindy was selling a lot of pastries!! All her clients were satisfied with her creations. Cindy was so excited because she was earning a lot of money. Although Cindy started being successful, she always bore in mind to help someone else, sharing her recipes by making videos and posting them on YouTube so many people got their act together by following her recipes.
Cindy’s stepsisters did not follow the rules and broke the lockdown, so they got sick. Cindy found out about her stepsisters’ disease, she was upset but she didn’t want to have a chip on her shoulder, so she had a change of heart and helped them by paying the best hospital and doctors, fortunately, she had been saving up!
Cindy´s stepmother was so thankful and said she was a breath of fresh air and bent over backwards to help her daughters.
Nowadays, Cindy and her family are on the same wavelength. Cindy is a very famous pastry chef and the stepsisters are her helpers, they are a real and lovely family, but achieving allof this, almost cost her an arm and a leg!
By: Diana Rodriguez
Suko the Cat
Once upon a time, there was a little black cat with white stains named Suko, he was happy but that he wasn’t always like that. Let’s start this story from scratch.
It was a rainy day when Suko was abandoned in the main park, just his luck. He was hungry, wet and he didn’t have a clue what was about to happen with him and he had a gut feeling, he was going to be ok, but how? suddenly, He saw a young lady, she was running to the bus stop and when she saw Suko she feel in love, she was always bendind over backwards to help animals and Suko wasn’t the exception. She took him and adopted Suko, she knew she was in hot water with her mom but she also knew it was only a matter of time that her mom would fall in love with Suko too. She was always keeping her finger crossed, and he never left her.
The end.