Email Format

To:
Use informal language (well, of course,
Subject:
anyway, you know, you see, actually,
Hi Jane, by the way, just in case)
Use short forms, exclamations and
How are things? I hope everything’s OK. xxxxx direct questions (What are you up to?)
(你最近在忙什么?)
xxxxx

xxxxx

That’s all from me. Let me know how everything turns out. / Let me know what you think as soon as
possible. I’m counting on you 我靠你了. / I hope I have provided you with the much-needed advice.
See you soon!

All the best/Warmest regards,

Weichun

Expressing enthusiasm
Wow! That’s great news!
I was sorry to hear that you’ve got problems.
Accepting an invitation
Sure! How could I say no?
Refusing an invitation
Unfortunately, I’ll have to let you down.
Giving news
Well, you won’t believe what happened to me the other day!
Making suggestions
Why don’t you ...?
What do you think about ...?
It would be great if we could ...
If I were in your shoes, I’d ...
Asking for advice
I don’t want to be a nuisance 麻烦, but I need your advice.
I feel terrible down/helpless and don’t know what to do.
Giving advice
I’ve been thinking about your dilemma. Maybe I can give you some advice and things will get
better soon.
Don’t worry. You’ll get over it.
Asking for reply
Be there or be square! 如果不赴约就是无趣的人
BOMBASTIC PHRASES
Be bound to get a good bargain 必拿下优惠
Story

 It was too good to be true.

 I couldn’t believe my eyes!
 I was in/out of luck.
 It was a real shock.
 All of a sudden,
 To my surprise,
 I held my breath!
 There was no hope left.

Report

To: Use Passive Voice to make it

more impersonal formal
From:

Subject:

1. Introduction

The aim of this report is to ...

2.

3.

4.

5. Conclusion

All in all, ...

 Examples Sentence connectors Cohesive devices
To start First of all - First and foremost,
- To begin with,
Cause & Effect Because/Thus/So - Consequently,
- As a result,
- Therefore,
- Hence,
Comparison Like - Similarly,
- In contrast,
Contrast Yet/But/Whereas - On the contrary,
- Conversely,
- Nevertheless,
- However,
- On the other hand,
- Even though...,
- Despite...,
- In spite of...,
Addition And/Also/As well as - In addition,
- Furthermore,
- Moreover,
- Besides that,
- On top of that,
- Apart from that,
Illustration Such as/Especially - For instance,
- As an example,
Emphasis Actually - In fact,
Persuasion Indeed - Of course,
- Undeniably,
- Undoubtedly,
Qualification Except/Unless/Either - Mainly,
- Generally,
- In other words,
- To put it more simply,
Possibility If/Whether/Or -
Time expressions - The next day
- Just then
- Afterwards
- Much later
Conclusion Finally - In a nutshell,
- All in all,
- Taking everything into
consideration,
Others - On the double, 立即/迅速
 Heart was in my mouth Fear
Jumped out of his skin
Over the moon
On top of the world Happiness
In seventh heaven
A pain in the neck
Drives me up the wall Annoyance
Hot under the collar
Went red as a beetroot Embarrassment
Wanted the ground to open up and swallow me
Down in the dump Sadness

Article

Ending

Humorous
If you know what I mean, exactly.
When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.
When you’ve got a bunch of rotting cucumbers, put them in a jar and call them pickles.
Thought-provoking
I stand by everything I said.
Don’t you think it’s dumb to put yourself into that problem?
Don’t you know what is good or bad?
If others are doing it, why shouldn’t I?

Language Bank

PG15, 27,