7 highly useful ESL (English) vocabulary words

 

to assassinate someone – an assassination is a political murder or a murder of someone in politics or government. i.e. Abraham Lincoln was the first US president to be assassinated. This happened in 1865 when an actor shot Lincoln at a Washington D.C. theater. Or: Four US presidents have been assassinated because it is so easy for people to get guns in the USA. Two other presidents were shot, but they were merely wounded and did not die.

a version of something – a different copy of something that came before it. i.e. I don’t know how many versions of the iPhone there have been so far. Each version has a slightly better camera and memory capacity, I suppose.  Or: The writer came up with three different versions of the ending of her book. She decided to finally choose the happiest version to make her readers feel good.

to dock your pay – this is when an employer takes money out of an employee’s paycheck, usually because the employee has been late or violated some other company policy. i.e. I live near one of the worst subway lines in the city and I sometimes can’t get on the train in a timely manner because service is so bad. But my company docks me a significant sum each time I am late. It’s so unfair. Or: Because Joe kept coming in to work ½ hour late each morning, his company has now threatened to dock him a big chunk of money for each time he is late in the future.

to sneak into a place – to go into a place, usually without permission, in a very quiet way. i.e. In New York City the subway fares are kind of high, so many poor people will try to sneak into the system. If they get caught, they will be punished with a fine (they will have to pay money). Or: Trump does not like illegal immigration because he says people sneak into the country and use educational and medical services for free. According to Trump, this hurts the economy.

to be vulnerable – capable of being hurt. i.e. It is important to be kind to children as much as possible because they are developing and very sensitive. They are super vulnerable and can be really hurt deeply if we are not careful. Or: We need to be very nice to Joe over the next few days. He just broke up with his girlfriend and he is quite emotionally vulnerable now. He seems to get hurt emotionally very easily these days.

periodically – every once in a while, not a lot but not a little, and not according to a set schedule. i.e. I used to go to Hong Kong from Shenzhen periodically. I averaged maybe once every three weeks. Because of the protests, I have stopped going completely. Or: A good supervisor will have meetings with individual staff members periodically to provide useful and supportive feedback.

superficial – on the surface. i.e. There are many people who look cool in Brooklyn, but when you talk to them, they are kind of stupid. These are just superficial people who want to look interesting, but who are not interesting. Or: Superficially the deal between our companies looked good. But when I read the details of the agreement more carefully, I realized we needed to avoid this agreement.