Like most other countries in the world, English-speaking countries have a seven-day week, but traditionally the countdown begins on Sunday rather than Monday.

Days of the week in English as proper names are always (even when abbreviated) written with a capital letter, and are also used with the preposition on.

They are going camping on Saturday - They are going camping on Saturday.
With the words any, all, this, last, one, next, every, each, the preposition is not used before the names of the days of the week:

last Friday - last Friday.

Days of the week in English idioms

A large number of English idioms contain the names of the days of the week:

• That Monday morning feeling – Monday is a hard day
• From here till next Tuesday – At a great distance (for a long time, for a long time)
• A man/ girl person Friday – errand boy/girl
• Sunday driver - slow driver
• Bloody Monday - (student) the day of punishment for violators on the first day of vacation
• Friday face - lean face, lean face
• Sunday face - hypocritical look

Months of the year

As in Russian, the names of the months of the English language have Latin roots. These names contain the names of gods (March - Mars), and ancient Roman rulers (July - in honor of Julius Caesar), and the names of holidays (February - the month of purifications), and serial numbers in the calendar (December - ten).

Month names should be capitalized.

Often in English the abbreviated spelling of the names of the months (short) is used. Wherein:

• names are usually shortened to 3 letters;
• September is shortened to 4 letters – Sept.;
• June and July are contracted in American English;
• The period at the end is placed in American English (not in British English).

In the case when we are talking about a specific date, the preposition “On” is used:
on October 31st – October 31st.
When talking about a specific month, the preposition “In” is used:
My birthday is in July - my birthday in July

What about the clock?

In English, unlike the Russian language, it is usually not 24-hour, but 12-hour time, and the day is divided into the time before noon - 00:00 - 12:00 (Ante Merediem or AM), and after noon - 12: 00 - 24:00 (Post Merediem or PM).

Instead of a.m. you can use the expression in the morning, and p.m. - in the evening. It should be noted that time can be used without it’s at the beginning, and in the morning, in the evening and am, pm are used in cases where it is not clear from the context of the conversation what time we are talking about.

Time in hours and minutes in English is indicated using 3 prepositions: at (at), past (after), to (before).

• Each hour is divided into 2 parts - half an hour each.
• To indicate time up to half an hour inclusive (when the minute hand is from 12.00 to 6.00), use the preposition PAST - after:
  At six minutes past four- Six minutes past five.
• When the minute hand points to the interval from 6.00 to 12.00, use the preposition TO - until:
  At five minutes to four- Five minutes to four.
• A quarter of an hour (15 minutes) – quarter, which is always used with the indefinite article “a”, can be before or after half an hour.
  At a quarter to four- A quarter to four.
  At a quarter past four- Four fifteen.
• Half (30 minutes) is denoted by the word “half” without the article.
  At half past four- At half past five.
• Whole hours, without minutes, are indicated using the word o`clock:
  At four o'clock- Four o'clock exactly.
• To the question What time is it? (What time is it?) The answer should begin with the words It is...
  It is four o'clock- Four o'clock.

Hello! We continue to get acquainted with everyday English vocabulary. In addition to the names of the seasons and months, we often call the days of the week. This article is devoted specifically to them: their origin, name, use and memorization techniques. If you want to learn to speak English, then you should be one of the first to learn the days of the week in English.

English-speaking countries, like us, use a seven-day week. In most of them, the seven-day period begins on Monday, that is, the first day of the week is Monday. But in the USA, Canada, and Israel, the countdown starts on Sunday. However, working days are from Monday to Friday. Remember this rule so as not to get confused when studying the American calendar.

Another distinctive feature is that English days of week refer to proper names. This means that they, like months, are always written with a capital letter, regardless of their order in the sentence. Including an abbreviated form of designation of days. days of the week abbreviated Another unique thing about the English days of the week is that to abbreviate them in the calendar, the first two letters are simply taken from the word - Mo., Tu., We. In Russian, the abbreviation occurs according to two consonant letters - Mon., Tue., Sat. sometimes English may use one or three letters - Fri., Thu., Sat. And when writing a date, the day of the week is written first: Sun, 9 March 2014.

How to correctly pronounce the days of the week in English?

To learn how to correctly pronounce English days of week, carefully study the table and transcription:

Watch also the video pronunciation lesson

Grammar

Before moving on to the rules of grammar, let’s find out how to say the time of day in English:

• Day - afternoon [ˌɑːftə"nuːn]
• Night
• Morning - morning ["mɔːnɪŋ]
• Evening - evening ["iːvnɪŋ]

times of day in English Grammar rules regarding English days of the week and day can be reduced to the following several laws:

• Always capitalized: I like Sunday
• When denoting days, they are used with the preposition “till, by, from, on”: Christmas on Saturday, and when denoting the time of day - the preposition “in”: in the afternoon
• Used with the following prepositions and definitions: this, every other, next, by / before, every, last
• The preposition is not used in combination with these words: last Wednesday
• The article is usually not used

Everything is extremely simple, understandable and accessible.

Methods for remembering English days of the week

In order to remember something, use any, even the most illogical and sometimes crazy, methods. The main thing is the result, but how you achieve it is not important. I will offer several options, and you choose the one you like or come up with your own.

Option number one. Based on a sound analogy:

• Monday - Monkey - monkey or Moon Day - lunar day, and sometimes maybe Monster Day (especially after yesterday)
• Tuesday - True - real or Use Day - a useful day, spend it productively
• Wednesday - Wedding - wedding or When is Day - day of questions
• Thursday - Syoss - a well-advertised shampoo today. Headwash Day
• Friday - Freedom - freedom (work week ends) or fraternity day
• Saturday - Satan - the devil, on Saturday we party like the devil, but for some it’s Sad a Day - sad Saturday
• Sunday - Sun - sun, the most cheerful and bright English days of week

days of the week Second option. Use rhyming memory songs:

Monday's child is nice and slow
Tuesday’s child is go, go, go Wednesday’s child is very funny
Thursday’s child is happy and sunny
Friday's child is like a king
Saturday's child can dance and sing
Sunday's child can stand on her head
And count the ghosts under her bed!

Listen to the pronunciation of these words in English, look for something familiar in their sound, draw analogies, come up with memorizations according to the principle: the funnier the faster. And you will succeed!

And finally, option number three. By origin. The names of the days of the week in the Romance and Germanic languages ​​came from the names of celestial bodies, which, in turn, received their names from the Old Norse and Roman gods. Even in ancient times, people found out that the planets move, and began to measure the passage of time according to their movements.

So they took the lunar month, which was approximately 29 days, as the main time unit of time. This period, in turn, included 4 lunar phases, which lasted about 7 days. It was from the lunar phase that the seven-day period appeared. Then people knew only 7 planets, and then they decided to name them in honor of the most revered gods. English culture adopted several names from the Romans:

• Monday - Moon
• Saturday - Saturn
• Sunday - Sun

Saturday - Saturn The remaining names were formed later from the Scandinavian mythical gods, whose motifs were brought to the British Isles by the Vikings:

• Tuesday - Tiw
• Wednesday - Woden
• Thursday - Thor
• Friday - Freya

As a result, the now familiar seven-day week for the British appeared:

Choose the option you like and study days in English using any of the methods, or come up with it yourself. Watch the video to practice your pronunciation. You can show educational cartoons for children.

Time is a relative concept. And the more we think about it, the more often we come to the conclusion that people invented time periods for convenience.

But physicists have long understood that time does not exist; there is a coordinate system that helps us navigate in time, for example, to be on time for work or not to miss a favorite movie. Scientists from the American National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have long informed everyone that their ultra-precise clocks do not measure time, time is determined by marks on the clock. And it is thanks to such marks that each of us can organize our day by planning all our affairs, otherwise chaos would befall us.

The inhabitants of Ancient Babylon started talking about time, whose sacred numbers were 12 and 60. This is how the division of the day into 2 by 12 hours appeared, and 60 minutes appeared in an hour. However, we note that throughout the world the time system consists of 24 hours.

The time of day in English is quite easy to remember. You won’t find the word “day” among the British; they often say day or twenty-four hours. So, twenty-four hours are divided into day And night(day and night). Used to indicate time a.m. (ante meridiem) – before noon, and also p.m. (post meridiem) - afternoon. Accordingly, if you want to schedule a meeting at 8 pm, you must indicate this moment by indicating two letters ( p.m.) after the number 8. Remember that the countdown a.m. starts at midnight ( midnight), i.e. from 00.00, and ends at 12.00 at noon ( midday or noon).

If you want to say "good morning" ( Good morning), you can safely use this expression from 6 a.m. to noon. From 12 noon to 6 p.m. it will be important to express your wishes for a good day ( Good afternoon). From 18.00 to 00.00 you can safely say “good evening” ( Good evening). Let us also note an interesting point that the time from midnight to 6 am is the time when we sleep. However, despite this, when we meet a person during this period of time, we still have to say “ Good morning!”.

Expression " Good night” is used only if you say goodbye to a person and go to bed, wishing him good night. But remember that “ Good night” can also be used as an interjection in colloquial speech, meaning “My God!”

Good night! Must you chew that gum so loud? - Oh my God! Can't you chew gum more quietly?

There are also a number of idioms in which the words “evening”, “afternoon”, “night” can be traced, for example:

In the afternoon of life, when his powers began to fail, he turned to an easier field of endeavor. “In his declining years, when his strength was no longer the same, he began to do lighter work.

In the afternoon of one's life- in his declining years

In the north of England and Scotland there is an expression “afternoon tea”, which means an early dinner with tea.

When you come home from work, you can call your friends and say “ I have a night off“I have a free evening. If you decide to go to a disco in the evening and spend the whole night there, you can say “ I had a perfect night out” – I had a great time away from home.

Night out- a night spent away from home

A popular expression also remains “ yesterevening" - last night.

Learn English and always keep up with the times!

Times of Day (time) It's quite easy to remember in English. You won’t find the word “day” among the British; they often say day or twenty-four hours.

So, twenty-four hours are divided into day And night(day and night).

To indicate time we use:

a.m (ante meridiem)– time before noon, i.e. means the first half of the day (from 00.00 at night to 12 noon)

p.m. (postmeridiem)– time after noon, i.e. second half of the day (from 12 noon to midnight) Accordingly, if you want to make an appointment at 8 pm, you need to indicate this moment by indicating two letters (p.m.) after the number 8.

Sapsan Express Train leaves at 8 pm. - The Sapsan high-speed train leaves at 8 pm.

Prepositions with time of day in English.

The preposition is used with names of the time of day in and the definite article is obligatory:

in the morning- in the morning

in the afternoon– during the day

in the evening- In the evening

However, please note that in cases where you need to talk about night time, the preposition is used at!

at night- at night

Greetings in English at different times of the day.

If you want to say "good morning" (Good morning), you can safely use this expression from 6 a.m. to noon.

From 12 noon to 6 p.m. it will be important to express your wishes for a good day (Good afternoon).

From 18.00 to 00.00 you can safely say “good evening” (Good evening).

Let us also note an interesting point that the time from midnight to 6 am is the time when we sleep. However, despite this, when we meet a person during this period of time, we still have to say “ Good morning!”.

Expression " Good night” is used only if you say goodbye to a person and go to bed, wishing him good night. But remember that “ Good night” can also be used as an interjection in colloquial speech, meaning “My God!”

Good night! Must you chew that gum so loud? - Oh my God! Can't you chew gum more quietly?

There are also a number of idioms in which the words “evening”, “afternoon”, “night” can be traced, for example:

In the afternoon of life, when his powers began to fail, he turned to an easier field of endeavor. “In his declining years, when his strength was no longer the same, he began to do lighter work.

In the afternoon of one's life- in his declining years

In the north of England and Scotland there is an expression “afternoon tea”, which means an early dinner with tea.

When you come home from work, you can call your friends and say “ I have a night off“I have a free evening. If in the evening you decide to go to a disco and spend the whole night there, you can say “I had a perfect night out”– I had a great time away from home.

Night out- a night spent away from home

A popular expression also remains “yesterevening”- last night.

P.S. We hasten to inform you that we still have no analogues.

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