Speaker 1: Have you ever tried talking about sports in English and
suddenly you get mixed up with using play or do
or go? Is it I play skiing, I do skiing,
I go skiing, or maybe you've heard things like I
play tennis, but also I go swimming, and then someone
says I do yoga and you're thinking, wait, wait, wait,
what's the rule here? Don't worry, You're not alone. This
is one of the most common questions English learners have
when it comes to talking about sports. In today's podcast
English Lesson, we're going to look at how to use play,
do and go when talking about sports and activities, and
how you can sound more natural when you talk about them.
Speaker 2: Welcome to another Happy English podcast, coming to you from
New York City. And here's your English teacher, Michael.
Speaker 1: Alrighty, thank you John, and thanks everyone. It's Michael here
from Happy English and I help people speak English better.
And this is Happy English Podcast, Episode oneenty twenty two, Play,
Do and Go How to talk about sports naturally. Let's
start with play. We use play with sports that involve
a ball or things like a ball, like a hockey puck.
You can say things like I play soccer or Jenny
plays tennis, or we play badminton in the summer. We
also use play for sports like baseball, volleyball, and even
ice hockey, even though ice hockey uses a puck. A
simple way to remember this is when a sport has
a ball or something like a ball, use play. In fact,
they start a baseball game by saying play ball. That's
easy to remember. Next, let's look at go. We use
go with sports and activities that end in ing. You
can say things like I go swimming, or let's go skiing,
or we go hiking on the weekend. The pattern is
go plus a verb plus an ing. These sports and
activities are usually things you can do alone, and they
often describe movement or exercise. By the way the root
word of these ing sports where it is a verb,
you can also just use the verb itself, like Jenny
swims twice a week, or let's hike up this hill.
You can go swimming, or you can swim, go hiking,
or hike. The meaning is the same. So what about
do we use do? For activities that are not ball
sports and those that don't use the ing or verb pattern,
you can say things like I do yoga or my
mom does pilates or the kids do karate. A simple
way to think about it is use do for general activities,
exercise or martial arts. So far it seems pretty simple, right.
We use play for ball sports, use go for ing sports,
or we just use the verb and we use do
for other sports like yoga or karate. But now let's
talk about something very important. Real English doesn't always follow
simple rules. There are some common exceptions, and this is
where things get interesting. For example, let's look at bowling.
You might think it uses a ball, so I should
say play bowling, but we don't say that. Instead, you
can say I go bowling or just eyebowl, but not
play bowling. English is strange, isn't it. Golf is also
an exception to the rule. You can use play or
go or just the verb hmm, I play golf, or
I go golfing, or I golf on Sundays. All three
are natural and native speakers use all three of them.
And here's another one. What happens at the gym when
you try to build your muscles well, you lift weights,
or you stretch or you exercise. In other words, sometimes
instead of play, do or go, we use a completely
different verb. So let's recap. We use play for ball
sports I play tennis. We use go for ig sports
I go swimming, We use do for most other sports.
I do yoga, and sometimes we just use the verb
I swim. And remember there are some exceptions like I
go bowling and I lift weights. And to be honest, instead,
instead of trying to memorize the rules, it's better to
learn these as patterns and get used to hearing them
in real conversation also as patterns, and here's an interesting
way to think about all of this. These patterns also
reflect how people connect to sports in real life. Some
people play sports like I play tennis or I play soccer.
Some people don't really play, but they do activities for
exercise like I do yoga or I do pilates. And
other people enjoy activities where they go somewhere and do
them like I go skiing, or I go hiking, or
I go shopping. And of course some people don't play
sports at all, they just watch them. Understanding these patterns
doesn't just help your grammar, it helps you talk about
your lifestyle in a more natural way. By the way,
if you want to learn how to talk about watching
professional sports, check out podcast, Episode oneenty twenty one. Here's
your challenge this week. Try talking about your hobbies or
activities in English. You can say things like I used
to play tennis in high school, or I go jogging
in the morning, or sometimes I do yoga after work.
When you use new vocabulary like this, you make it
your own and keep in mind the best way to
remember English like this and any other word or phrase
in English, is to take that word or phrase, write
it in a sentence that's true for you or true
in your world, and then memorize your sentences. Hey, thanks
for listening, and remember learning another language is not easy,
but it's not in and I'm here to help you
on your journey.
Speaker 2: This podcast was brought to you by Happy English. Please
visit Myhappy English dot com. Show your support for Happy
English by leaving us a review. Get English, Get Happy,
Happy English.