Welcome back to Learn Academic English! I'm Jenna and in today's lesson I'm going to teach you all
about the word ‘especially’ especially is a super common word that we use both in writing
and especially in speaking so it's a really important word for you to know how to use
before we get into that I'd like to remind you to please give this video a like, leave a comment,
where you can practice with me in the comments below, and subscribe if you want more lessons
like this one. So first let's talk about how to pronounce the word ‘especially’ ‘especially’ has
stress on the second syllable so you're going to say ‘esPEcially’ ‘especially’ make sure that
that ci sounds like a sh ‘especially’ What does ‘especially’ mean? well especially is an adverb
and that means that it can be used in different places in the sentence and we'll look at that in
a little bit but especially means that it's to emphasize that something is more important or
that something happens more often than others you can think of it similar to more than usual
how about some synonyms of especially well two synonyms are particularly and in particular but
we don't use those words as often especially in speaking particularly and in particular are
harder to pronounce and they're also a lot more formal so we use those words more in writing so
let's look at a few examples and I'll talk about where we can put ‘especially’ in the sentence
number one I don't like hot weather, especially when it's humid okay so here we have hot weather
and then we're going to focus on or we're going to emphasize when it's humid so that means that
I really don't like humid weather more than just hot weather in general and we can use especially
after the comma before a clause next I prefer healthy food, especially salads okay here again
we have a larger group healthy food but then we want to emphasize one of those things which is
salads so again we would have the noun and then a comma and then especially and the example that
I want to emphasize I like all kinds of foods but I especially like salads and fresh fruit
okay here we're gonna put especially in between the subject and a verb which is a very common
place for this word and as you know a lot of adverbs go in between the subject and the verb
another one this equipment is used especially for research so here especially means maybe more
similar to for a particular purpose and it's to emphasize that it's for that purpose for research
but we'll look more at how to use especially in a sentence in a moment however it is important
to note that we don't use especially at the beginning of a sentence before the subject so
some adverbs we put at the beginning of a sentence but especially we don't put it there when it comes
before the subject for example: Especially I like healthy food such as salads. okay we
don't say this this is considered incorrect so if you want to use especially at the beginning of a
sentence put it after the subject before the verb I especially like healthy food another way that
we sometimes use especially is in the negative and the negative means not really for example
Storms in California are not especially common. so they're not really common or He didn't especially
want to take a nap, but we finally persuaded him to do so. so he didn't really want to take a nap
which one is more common not really or not especially not really but you can hear not
especially sometimes okay so let's look more closely at how to use especially in a sentence
and I'll go through some various locations where you can put especially first you can
put especially before an adjective for example many Americans are especially worried about gun
violence so this means that they're worried about some things but especially more about gun violence
or I'm not especially good at singing so I'm not really good at singing another
place we can put it is before the verb children especially enjoy playing with stuffed animals
or I will especially remember our trip to Italy so what does that mean that
means that I will remember many trips but I will especially remember that trip to Italy
okay another place where we can put especially is for a prepositional
phrase for example I made this bracelet especially for you so that means that I
made it just for you or I listened to Jazz all the time especially in the morning
okay another place where we can put especially is before a noun for example
a common challenge for English Learners is writing, especially essays and reports.
okay so that emphasizes that essays and reports are more challenging than others I love healthy
food, especially kale salad and chia pudding. so you may not be familiar with those foods but those
are sort of um popular or well-known very healthy foods in the United States we also sometimes will
put especially before a person's name for example Everyone in my family is worried about inflation,
especially Lisa. or we could put it after the word family: Everyone in my family, especially Lisa,
is worried about inflation. another place where we can put especially is after a comma and before
a clause for example: Occasionally I play the lottery, especially when the prize is very large.
and finally we can put especially at the beginning of a sentence and remember that I
told you not to do it when you put especially before the subject but we can put it at the
beginning of a sentence if it's before other words like this: Especially at the beginning,
the new employee needed extra help. now in this case we could move that and we could say The new
employee needed extra help, especially at the beginning. but both of them would be possible
okay finally let's talk about the difference between especially and especially this is a very
commonly confused pair of words and to be honest with you it's kind of hard for me to even explain
what the difference is but I'm going to tell you two things first of all especially is used much
more often than especially so I would say probably if we look at 100 times when those words are used
maybe 99 or 98 of them would be specially so if you're not sure go with especially specially is a
little bit different because it's also an adverb but it's the adverb form of the word special
so for example we could say This kitchen was specially designed for this family's unique needs.
okay so that means that the kitchen had a special design a unique design and we could use specially
as the adverb instead of the adjective special or The bride-to-be is having jewelry
specially made for her wedding. so again this would mean that the jewelry is special
so again it's a little different from especially because special is really the adverb form of the
word special but remember that especially is much much more common so let's practice together in
the comments below you can answer a couple of questions so one of the questions could be what
parts of English are especially challenging for you so you might think about different things in
English that are challenging but what is especially challenging extra challenging
or tell me about food what kind of foods do you especially like for example for me I love Italian
food especially pasta and gelato so I hope that this is helpful for you don't forget to give it
a like if you enjoyed it and leave a comment and I hope to see you back here next time take care!