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Lesson 47 / Housing
5 phrases · 12 minutes · Look, listen and try.
Moving house with your family, renovating and keeping things neat.
Match words to pictures →Play What is She/He doing? →
A randomly assigned, fixed male or female synthetic voice for each phrase or sentence · Slow playback at 0.7× preserves pitch.
We will move in when the new house is ready.
We will move in when the new house is ready.
My family moved in last Saturday.
My family moved in last Saturday.
“Move in” emphasizes starting to live in a place, not just entering a room.
Cambridge Dictionary · move in
We packed our things before moving out of the old house.
We packed our things before moving out of the old house.
The family next door moved out last week.
The family next door moved out last week.
Emphasis on leaving old place of residence. If there is a place name, use "move out of".
Cambridge Dictionary · move out
Let us take down the paper decorations before we pack.
Let us take down the paper decorations before we pack.
Mum took the picture down from the wall.
Mum took the picture down from the wall.
In the lesson, we are removing the object hanging above. With pronouns, say “take it down”; past tense “took”.
We are doing up the living room with new curtains and paint.
We are doing up the living room with new curtains and paint.
They did the old house up before moving in.
They did the old house up before moving in.
In the lesson, it is about renovating or renovating a house or room; different from buttoning a shirt. Past tense “did”.
I mixed up the labels and messed up our packing plan.
I mixed up the labels and messed up our packing plan.
It is all right if you mess it up. We can try again.
It is all right if you mess it up. We can try again.
Informal expressions to make mistakes or cause things to not go well. Not consistent with just making the room messy.
The examples were written for this course. Usage was checked against Matt Errey’s book, pages 88, 88, 127, 37, 87. A2–B1 is the course’s intended level.
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Sentences using suggestions are counted as needing more practice. Review schedule based on each phrase's meaning.
OBSERVE · UNDERSTAND · MATCH
Drag a wire from the dot beside a phrase to the dot beside its matching picture. You can also tap a phrase, then a picture. Drag again to change a pair before checking.
Read the picture descriptions for more context. Similar expressions are accepted when they fit the particular scene.
An and Minh carried the box of things into the new house.
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An and her family carried the last box out of the old house.
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An and Minh removed the paper decorations from the low wall.
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An helped Minh redecorate the room with new paintings and curtains.
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An realized she had mistakenly labeled the picture on two boxes and corrected it.
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Choose a phrase to begin.
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Read the conversation and find the expressions you have learned.
When are you moving into the new flat?
When are you moving into the new flat?
On Friday. We must move out of this one first.
On Friday. We must move out of this one first.
I can help you take down the shelves.
I can help you take down the shelves.
“Move in” means start living somewhere; “move out” means leave that home. Moving a few boxes does not necessarily change where you live.
Try answering before revealing the suggested answer. This practice is not scored.
The answers below are models. Other answers can also work if they preserve the facts, meaning and structure requested in the task.
A family leaves a rented room and begins living in a cottage. Shelves must be removed before leaving.
Describe leaving the old home.
The family is moving out of the rented room.
Leaving the old rented room is “moving out of”; “out of” introduces the home being vacated.
Replace “the shelves” with “them”: Take down the shelves.
Take them down.
“Them” replaces the shelves being removed, so use “take them down” with the pronoun before “down”.
Write the next stage using move in.
We will move into the cottage after we return the old keys.
“Move into the cottage” starts residence in the new home; the following clause places this after returning the old keys.
The usage comparisons are checked against the Cambridge Dictionary entries linked beside the compared expressions. The additional conversations and exercises are written for this course.
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