hi everyone today I'm going to do the first video in a series of videos about idioms and
the reason that I'm talking about idioms on my channel is because they are really important for
intermediate and advanced level English learners if you know some common idioms it will help you
to understand more when you read and listen to English so in today's lesson I'm going to talk
very briefly about why idioms are important and I'll give you a couple of tips for learning idioms
and then I'm going to present 10 common idioms that use body parts and as always if you find this
video helpful please give it a like and subscribe as you probably know English idioms are common but
they can be challenging to learn one reason that they are tricky is that they don't have a literal
meaning so what does that mean an idiom is a group of words like to give someone a hand
and we use these words together but the meaning is not literal that means that you don't
literally gives someone a hand instead the meaning of these words is a special meaning
that you have to memorize and it has a meaning that is figurative or the meaning is different
from the actual exact words sometimes the words can help you to know the meanings but other times
you just have to memorize them and know how to use them the second reason that idioms are tricky is
that it's hard to know what idioms to learn and so uh one thing that you want to remember is that
British and American English have many different idioms some idioms are used in British English
some are used in American and some are used in both so this is a time that it's important to
think about what type of English you're learning and then to focus on the idioms that are used in
that type of English idioms can be different depending on age or generation so there are
a lot of idioms that everybody uses old people young people people in the past people nowadays
but there are some other idioms that change over time and I'll give you an example one famous idiom
that a lot of English learners learn is to break a leg have you heard this before to break a leg
to break a leg means good luck like if my son is gonna go to a soccer game I can say break a leg
but this idiom is not used often anymore it's kind of an old-fashioned idiom and not many people use
this nowadays if you want to learn more idioms you need to think about how you can best spend your
time learning them you want to think about which idioms are more important now so start with idioms
that are the most common try to pay attention to what idioms people are using in conversation
or on tv shows you can also ask a native speaker for some tips about idioms that they use you can
try to do some research online about common idioms and you can use the Learner's Dictionary online to
help you and I'm gonna explain how to do that in the description box below finally with idioms you
want to pay attention to the words in the idiom because most idioms you cannot change the words
you need to say the idiom as a set phrase of exact words going back to my example about give someone
a hand we never say give someone the hand or give someone two hands or give someone hands it's
always to give someone a hand so pay attention to the words in the idiom and make sure that you
use them correctly so in today's video I'm going to talk about 10 common idioms that include body
parts and for some reason body parts are really common in idioms there are many many of them but
I'm going to focus on just 10 common ones today so let's get started number one rule of thumb
rule of thumb a rule of thumb is a guideline or a way of doing things that's based on experience or
common sense a rule of thumb is not a strict rule it's not a rule that everybody follows it's not
a rule that people must follow instead it's a way of doing things that most people or many people do
because it's a good way or it just makes sense so let me give you an example a good rule of thumb
for keeping your closet organized is to get rid of clothes that you haven't worn for a year
so again this is a kind of way of doing it that is based on common sense and not everybody does
it this way it's not a rule everyone must follow but it's a rule of thumb here's another example
as a rule of thumb stocks that have greater risk also have the potential to earn you more money
number two to give someone a hand so in this idiom the word hand here means help so to give someone a
hand means to give someone help or to help someone and this idiom actually can change so let me show
you what you can do you're always going to keep a hand the same but the other verb can change so if
you want to ask for help you can say I need a hand or can you give me a hand or I can use a
hand if you want to offer help you can say do you need a hand with that or can I give you a hand
or can I lend you a hand we can also use the verb lend or would you like a hand with that
meaning can I help you with that and we use the preposition with to talk about help with something
can I give you a hand with that suitcase number three off the top of my head this is a really
common one and it means that you can think of something or remember something very quickly
without having to stop and think about it so try to imagine like information going off the top of
your head quickly without having to stop and think about it for example I can think of three japanese
car companies off the top of my head toyota nissan and honda if a student in my class asks
me for some examples sometimes I can say I can only think of one example off the top of my head
give me a few more hours and I'll try to think of some more examples and I'll get back to you
we often use this one in the negative to say that we can't remember something quickly like I can't
remember her name off the top of my head or I want to make this type of soup that I love but I can't
remember the recipe off the top of my head I'm gonna have to look it up number four to have a
good head on your shoulders to have a good head on your shoulders means that you are responsible that
you're a good person that you don't do bad things and we usually use this idiom to describe young
people who are mature and responsible and who make good decisions so for example I can say my nephew
is only 20 years old and he's moving to Germany next month but I'm not worried about him because
he has a good head on his shoulders number five to have cold feet or to get cold feet to have cold
feet means that you try to do something that's dangerous or something that's like super important
and you just get really nervous at the last minute you get cold feet I'm sure that in your language
you have a similar idiom we use this idiom a lot to talk about what happens before someone gets
married sometimes before the wedding a person can get cold feet and they just get really nervous and
they almost change their mind or sometimes they even change their mind we can say for example she
wanted to marry him but the day before the wedding she got cold feet and she called off the wedding
so again to get cold feet is to get really nervous to the point that you think about maybe
you will not do it and sometimes you actually change your mind and don't do it
another example could be I wanted to go bungee jumping but at the last minute I got cold feet
so this is an example of an idiom that doesn't really have another way to express
that meaning um every time that we talk about this situation we're going to use this exact
idiom because there isn't really another way to express this number six to have a foot in the door
this is a very common idiom that's used in work situations or when you are applying for a job
to have a foot in the door or to get a foot in the door means that you take the first step
to get noticed by a company or an organization so for example I had an assistant a few years ago who
wanted to get a better job at the college where I teach and I told him you know it's not easy
to get jobs here so you might want to do some volunteer work or continue working part-time
to get a foot in the door the idea here is that if you have your foot in the door that after a
while the company will notice you and maybe they will open the door and give you a job here's
another example he took a job as a secretary to get a foot in the door at that company
so he wanted to get a better job at that company but the first step was having a job as a secretary
to get that first step in number seven to play it by ear this is another really common one
that we use a lot when we talk about plans so to play it by ear means to do things without a plan
or to act spontaneously and this probably comes from the um situation when a musician would play
a song not with sheet music on paper but would play the song based on what they could hear
with their ears and playing spontaneously so that can kind of help you to remember this idiom
we use this a lot to talk about things that we will do in the future but we don't have a plan
and we're going to have to go step by step based on how things are or based on conditions so for
example if I want to go to San Francisco tomorrow and the weather is not going to be good I can say
that I'm going to play it by ear if I feel like going to a museum I will that I don't have a set
plan so here's an example sentence I'm going to San Francisco tomorrow but I don't know exactly
what I'm going to do yet because it might rain I'm going to play it by ear number eight keep an eye
out for so we also say keep an eye open for but keep an eye out for is more common and notice that
it's just one eye keep an eye out for this means to be aware of something in case you notice it
it doesn't mean to actively look for something it just means that you know that something is missing
or you know that someone is looking for something and you're gonna just stay aware of that in case
you come across it sometime the police can tell you to keep an eye out for a person that they're
looking for or if I lose my keys I can tell you I lost my keys yesterday can you keep an eye out
for them or my neighbor lost his dog and we are keeping an eye out for it so we're just
staying aware just in case we see it at some point number nine to keep an eye on something or someone
to keep an eye on sounds similar to keep an eye out for but the meaning is totally different
to keep an eye on something means that you are watching something I use this all the time because
I tell my kids please keep an eye on our dog if I have soup on the stove and it's cooking I can
say that I need to keep an eye on the soup I can't walk away and just leave it alone I have to watch
it finally number 10 to have a sweet tooth this is an easy one to have a sweet tooth means that
a person loves sweets they love candy chocolate cake and we just use this a lot to describe
the type of food that people like so I can say for example I don't eat cake I don't really have
a sweet tooth or I can say I'm trying to cut down on sugar but it's not easy because I have a huge
sweet tooth let me know in the comments below if you can think of other idioms that include
body parts and I'll let you know if those are idioms that we often use and be sure
to let me know if you have questions and stay tuned for more videos coming soon about idioms
as always thank you so much for your support take care and I'll see you soon!