The #1 Expression to Speak English Politely

Hi how is it going? This is Greg from OnlineLanguageAcademy.com  and in this video I’m going to teach you the No.1 expression that you need to know if you want to speak "Polite English" and it's nice to be nice, so keep watching.  

So before I explain the expression and how to use this expression in English just do me a favour and click subscribe in the corner of the screen or on the red button below the video or the OLA logo at the end of the video... there are seriously too many ways to subscribe that it's easy to subscribe than to not subscribe so just click the button.  

 Right! Let's go...  

Let's be polite in English, you know, if you're a tourist in England and you want to give a good impression of your people, your country, your fellow country people so let's do it, alright? The expression we're going to use is "Would you mind...?"    

We don't like being direct in English so it's not very nice to say to somebody:  

-Shut the door!

-Open the window!  

-Help me with this bags!  

 No! We want to be polite, we want to ask them is it ok with them if they do something. So, this why we use the expression "Would you mind...?”  

We follow this with the gerund (the "ing" form of the verb), so with those 3 examples I just gave you...  

-Would you mind closing the window?

-Would you mind closing the door?  

-Would you mind opening the window?  

-Would you mind helping me with these heavy bags?  

It’s just a really nice way to ask somebody to do something for you and it's not a complicated expression, really.  

Would you mind? Would you mind? Repeat it over and over again!  

-Would you mind...?  

-Would you mind opening the window?

-Would you mind taking me to school tomorrow?  

-Would you mind helping me with my homework?  

-Would you mind calling me when you have a minute?    

Use it! One other structure that we can use is if you're asking for permission to do something so you can ask someone: “Would you mind IF I opened the window?”  

-Would you mind if I + Past Simple  

-Would you mind if I opened the window?

-Would you mind if I closed the door? 

-Would you mind if I called you later to talk about it?  

So, two simple expressions, right? Learn them and repeat them.

Think of one or two sentences that you often use. Maybe you're at work and you often ask someone if you can borrow their pen.  

-Would you mind if I used your pen?  

-Would you mind lending me your pen?  

Think of common expressions you use, learn them, memorize them, use them and you will internalize the expression, you will internalize the grammar so that when you want to use it in a different context it will be there! It will be much easier to use!  

I hope this has been useful for you. I would like everybody to speak polite English, not just good English, so if you’ve liked the video, don’t forget to click subscribe to show your appreciation and thanks again for watching. I look forward teaching you more English in the next videos.    

Bye for now!