Idioms are colourful phrases with secret meanings! They are a fun way to spice up your English, so I always make sure my students learn and use them whenever they can. Here are three tips to help you get the ball rolling with idioms!

Be all ears

It may be difficult to wrap your head around idioms at first because their literal meanings are rarely helpful at all. Instead of hitting the books, learn how to use them properly by keeping an eye on how others do it: if they can, so can you! Plus, in this way, you can filter out those which may look good on paper but are not practical at all. Kill two birds with one stone!

Take baby steps

Don’t bite off more than you can chew, start with what you already know and simply replace words you use a lot with idioms. For example, instead of ‘very happy’, say ‘over the moon‘ or ‘on cloud 9‘. Other ideas are replacing ‘my favourite’ with ‘my cup of tea‘. See? It is a piece of cake!

Get the picture

Draw your idioms. No need to start from scratch: search online to pick others’ brains, and either make your own versions or to simply collect your favourites. Visual association can work wonders for the memory!  You can even play Pictionary or charades with them!

And there you have it, three ways to start your idiom journey, the easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy way!