HOW TO TRANSLATE 'ME SUENA' INTO ENGLISH

‘Me suena la cancion’. Two good options for translating this phrase into English would be the following:
1. ‘The song seems/sounds familiar (to me)’
2. ‘The song rings a bell’

Like in ‘me suena’ the key thing is that you are not totally sure if you know the song or the object of the sentence. Naturally, there would be some doubt about the object. http://www.clasesinglesonline.com 

ENGLISH COMMON ERROR: DIFFERENCE BETWEEN 'SHADE' AND 'SHADOW'

Now that much of Europe is experiencing a heatwave many people need to take refuge from the heat in the shade. In English, When we talk about being in the darker area where sunlight doesn't directly hit, we call this 'the shade'. This is uncountable so you can't say 'a shade' in this context. If you want to speak about a specific darker area outside which doesn't directly catch sunlight, we call this 'a shadow', a countable noun. For example we can say 'the shadow of the tree is very big' or 'if I go into the sunlight, I will have a shadow'. So use 'shade' in a general sense and 'shadow' in a specific sense. Hope this helps. http://www.clasesinglesonline.com

'ASIGNATURA' IS 'SUBJECT', NOT 'SIGNATURE'

When we are talking about studying in English students often translate ‘asignatura’ (for example, ‘maths’, ‘history’…) with ‘signature’. Unfortunately, we have a false friend here. A ‘signature’ is a person’s name written in a distinctive way as a form of identification in authorizing a cheque or document or concluding a letter. This is normally translated to Spanish by the word ‘firma’. ‘Asignatura’ would be ‘subject’ such as history, maths or linguistics. For example, ‘the subjects I will study for my A-levels are biology, chemistry and physics’. Instead of ‘subject’ you could also use the words ‘discipline’, ‘field’, ‘branch of study’ or 'area'. http://www.clasesinglesonline.com

Use of ‘health/healthy/healthily’

First, health means ‘salud’ so we can translate ‘el sistema de salud’ with ‘the health service’. We can also say ‘do you have good health?’ for ‘¿Tienes buena salud?’.

Second, and this is the most problematic area with our English students, is that ‘saludable/sano’ means ‘healthy’ and these are all adjectives. Thus, we can say ‘the food is healthy’ or ‘it is healthy to go hiking’. However, since ‘sano’ or ‘saludable’ can also be adverbs such as in sentences like ‘como sano/saludable’, students often say ‘I eat healthy’. Unfortunately, this is incorrect and we must implement the adverb form of the word in English which is ‘healthily’. Therefore, the correct sentence would be ‘I eat healthily’.

Lastly, if we want to say something will do your body good we would often inplement the following phrase: ‘it’s good for your health’. This sentence could refer to the person/people you are conversing with or it could talk about the health of people in society in general.
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'UN RESPONSABLE' SHOULD NOT BE TRANSLATED BY 'A RESPONSIBLE'

‘Un responsable’ is a false friend when translated from English to Spanish. You cannot translate this literally as the word ‘responsible’ is not a noun in English but it is an adjective. Thus, if we wanted to say ‘mi responsable es muy patiente conmigo’, we must not say ‘my responsible is very patient with me’. In fact, it needs to be ‘my manager is very patient with me’. So use the word ‘manager’ or ‘boss’ when you are talking about the person who leads or manages at work. Obviously, there are other translations of ‘un responsable’ such as ‘a supervisor’ or ‘a superior’.
Remember, in English, ‘responsible’ is an adjective so we could say ‘my manager is very responsible’.

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE USE OF 'WHO' AND 'WHOM'

I know a lot of our students in our Skype English classes perhaps wrongly get taught this in school in Spain and elsewhere but I'm not sure if it should be focused on due to the fact that 'whom' has become somewhat redundant in the English language. Very rarely do you hear it. Anyway, Azucena in Switzerland asked me about this the other day during our class so here is the explanation:
'Whom' is an object pronoun. It should be used to refer to the object of a sentence. While 'who' is a subject pronoun which refers to the subject. If you're stuck, you can try this rule: if the pronoun can be replaced by he or she, then use who. If the pronoun can be replaced by him or her, then use whom.

he/she = who
him/her = whom
Examples:
Who/Whom wrote the letter?
He/she wrote the letter. Therefore, 'who' is correct.
Who/Whom should I vote for?
Should I vote for him/her? Therefore, 'whom' is correct.
As indicated in the beginning, the reality is that ‘whom’ is nowadays not used very much. We tend to use ‘who’ for everything now. Have a great day!
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PREPOSITION WITH EASTER IS 'AT'

Like with Christmas (e.g. 'at Christmas carols are sung') in English the preposition that goes with Easter is 'at'. For example, 'in the UK at Easter it is very common for large chocolate eggs to be given. These are called Easter eggs'. Remember, the preposition 'during' could also be employed. http://www.clasesinglesonline.com