Mate, your girlfriend looks like she wants to eat me. Is she all right?
She's fine! We've never seen a hungry girlfriend before
She just needs pizza
No mate, I've seen a hungry girlfriend
That is something else
We should make her a pizza then because she's.. she's really scary.
Yeah in a minute
How could he say that in a different way?
Could he add more meaning to it?
First let's look at that word should
Some of my students think that "should" is the same as "must"
No
Should it's not a rule. It's not an obligation
You're giving advice
You're just saying: this is a good idea
For example
If your friend has a cut on his leg, it's bleeding
But it starts to turn green, or blue, or purple
or black.
Maybe you'll say this:
You should see a doctor
It's a good idea to see a doctor
Again, It's not an obligation
It's not "you MUST see the doctor, you HAVE to"
It's not that. No
You're giving advice. That's it
If you use the negative "Shouldn't"
That just means it's a bad idea.
Hmm. Maybe don't do this. That's my advice
For example
You shouldn't try to sneeze with your eyes open
If you don't know, a sneeze is the "Atchu" thing
Is that true? I don't know
That can't be true
Why would that be bad?
I tried
And of course, the question form is like this
So, okay. Let's change the word "Should"
We can use "had better" to replace "should"
It basically means the same thing and
grammatically, it works the same
The verb after, should be the infinitive verb
The original verb without "to"
For example
A positive sentence could be this:
So "had better" very useful, but not as common as "should"
So when should I use "had better" and not "should"
Well, you'll mostly hear it and use it, when there's some urgency
So you should do this, but quickly. Come on! Now!
for example
Or when it's like if you don't do the thing
Something bad will happen
For example if your friend has to go to the airport
But he's sitting there playing on his phone
like I do all the time
you might say
You'd better leave
because if you don't...
You'll miss your flight
something bad will happen
Also, some of you are thinking
if I'm late for my flight, or bus, or train
Shouldn't I say lose my flight? Lose my train? Lose my bus?
Nope
The verb is miss
You miss your flight, miss your bus, miss your train.
It could be a threat
like for example
So, in this case, it's like a threat
If you don't do it
Something bad will happen
Notice how in all of these situations
I'm not saying you had better
No. I'm using the contraction
that's because in speech the contraction is always best
Unless you want to really emphasize something
Make it sound strong
then you might say
Yeah, pretty much
We always just use the contraction
you'd - I'd - we'd
In fact, actually, we often drop the "had" in speaking
and casual writing like with your friends
Don't write it in an exam. That would be bad.
But in spoken English, it's fine. Don't worry about it.
I need to talk about pronunciation because
Maybe you noticed
I just said better. "I better go"
And I pronounced the "T" like a "Duh"
That's like American English... Bleh
But actually, when you say "I better", "you better"
You have three ways to pronounce it.
"I better" it's fine.
"I better" that's fine as well
"I better" as a glottal T, and also that is fine
So, of course you've got "I better"
[singing Eminem]
So your reply, if the context is obvious
Can just be
You could drop the "had"
Or... Even
That's fine too
So write your own examples
Your own bits of advice in the comments using "had better"
Practice it. Positive, negative and question form
Also give someone some advice using "had better" in your Instagram stories
Tag me at @PapaTeachMe
and I'll repost the best ones
see you in the next class
Do you think I should order a pizza now?
Yeah, I think you'd better, before she eats me