Essential Vocabulary for Daily Life Situations
Job Hunting and Workplace Vocabulary
Getting a job: interview, salary, pension, application form, benefits, advertisement, qualifications, reference, apply, vacancy, experience, CV.
Talking about your work: do, as, for, in, earning, employed, from home, long hours, made redundant, pay rise, permanent, promoted, set up, temporary, the officer, training, unemployed.
Company Roles and Finances
Who works in a company: accounts manager, boss, chief executive, managing director, personal assistant, personnel manager, receptionist, secretary, sales manager, sales representative.
Money: bills, wages, mortgage, rent, interest, taxes, loss, poor, owe, expense, profit, afford, rich.
Technology and Political Terms
Using a computer: delete, open, close, edit, exit, save, copy, paste, cut, print, click, highlight, key, scroll.
Politics: government, ministers, politicians, president/prime minister, be in power, candidates, elect, hold an election, policies, political party, vote for.
Conflict and Language Essentials
War and peace: ally, army, civilians, enemy, prisoners, troops, attack, capture, ceasefire, declare, defend, invade, peace talks, retreat.
Talking about language: accent, adjectives, adverbs, formal, grammar, informal, nouns, pronunciation, translate, vocabulary.
Time and Everyday Items
Expressions of time: for ages, now and then, these days, so far, at last, no longer, from now on, at once, at the moment, in time, on time.
Everyday objects: lighter, keys, umbrella, diary, train, timetable, loose change, plasters, brush, glasses, scissors, tissues.
Household and Descriptive Words
Household objects and tools: ashtray, coat hanger, light bulb, tape measure, torch, vase, screwdriver, drill, saw, hammer.
How good/bad something is: entertaining, great, fascinating, enjoyable, brilliant, exciting, wonderful, amusing, interesting, terrible, disappointing, boring, dreadful, dull.
Describing and Using Objects
Describing objects: made of, stuff, thing, use for, use to, cardboard, glass, material, metal, paper, plastic, rubber, wood.
Using your eyes: wink, examine, frown, peep, look for, squint.
Movement and Phrasal Verbs
Ways of walking: crawl, creep, hop, limp, march, paddle, skip, slip, stroll, trip.
Phrasal verbs: calm down, cheer up, come on, hang on, slow down, speed up, make, pick, put, take.
Opinions and Physical Traits
Giving your opinion: as far as I’m concerned, I believe in, I have my doubts about, I’m against, I’m in favor of, in my opinion, in my view, to my mind, about, agree, disagree, of, think, view.
Physical description: medium height; thin/skinny, slim/slender, fat/plump, chubby, obese, stocky/stout; wheatish, tanned, dark-skinned; bald; squint; pimples, mole, dimples; untidy-looking/scruffy, willed/determined.
Intensifiers and Verbs
Very: rude-vulgar, short-brief, boring-dull, good-superb, hot-scorching, cold-freezing, hungry-ravenous, slow-sluggish, poor-destitute, rich-wealthy, tired-exhausted, fast-rapid, large-colossal, creative-innovative, neat-immaculate, far-remote, scared-terrified, drunk-intoxicated, nice-awesome, beautiful-gorgeous, happy-jubilant, worried-nervous-anxious, thirsty-parched, clear-spotless, dirty-squalid.
-To sign, fight, declare, defeat, capture, succeed, ascend, be accused of, cast, vote for, hold, lead, hide, cross