can’t/couldn’t very well do sth = used to say that something is not a suitable or practical thing to do
You can’t very well expect other people to be nice to you if you aren’t willing to lead the way.
English Vocabulary Profile at C2
In the English Grammar Profile, A1 point 13 in the category of ADVERBS / phrases:
‘very’ to modify common gradable adjectives.
In the English Grammar Profile, C1 point 102 in PRONOUNS/quantity is defined: MODIFIED: ‘few’ and ‘many’ with ‘very’, ‘too’, ‘so’ as intensifiers For example: If the chef answered YES to the number being less than 500, we‘d have four options, which is too many. TED It‘s been a crushing disappointment for me and for so many. TED And very few have it in them. LISTEN *’very few’ + noun is B2 A search in iWeb for: * * too|very|so many|few . 1 THERE ARE SO MANY. …
Few is a word that means “not many” or “a small number of”. It is used to refer to countable nouns, such as people, books, or cars. For example, “Few people attended the event.”
In formal written contexts, such as reports or surveys, few can be used to emphasize the relative scarcity or lack of something. For example, “Few respondents expressed satisfaction with the service.”
Few is different from a few, which means “some” or “more than two but not many”. A few has a positive emphasis, while few has a negative emphasis. For example, “A few people enjoyed the movie.”
C2 FOCUS = The + premodifier + thing | fact | point | problem | reason’ + BE (that)
We believe it is important to ask questions about the presentation of grammar points. The English Grammar Profile doesn’t clearly state in the definition that a clause must follow this structure to make it C2. It seems a ‘(that)’ clause is optional, so let’s explore!
Following a lexical verb with a degree adverb is possible but much rarer than following a lexical verb with a preposition and a little rarer than following a lexical verb with a general adverb. Here we have kept the results with _VV _RG 11 TAKES ABOUT 36989 All in all, the process takes about a month, give or take. listen 12 LOOKS VERY 34563 …
B2 English Grammar point 59 in the category of DETERMINERS and quantity is defined as: modifier + ‘little’ + uncountable nouns and modifier + ‘few’ + countable nouns, to indicate a lack of something or not as much as expected of something. We also have an earlier post for ‘very few + noun.’ _RG\w* (little|few) …
Where to start teaching noun phrases to your beginner to pre-intermediate class?
Here are my top 10 vocabulary items I would teach alongside “very few” to an upper-intermediate class.
For this C2 grammar, ‘major’ is an adjective meaning: important, serious, or significant. ‘Very’ is an adjective meaning: actual or precise, with emphasis on the exact quality of the following noun or an extreme point in time/space. Point 73 under the category of adjectives in C2 on the English Grammar Profile these two vocabulary items …
‘major cities’, ‘very beginning’ (major | very + noun) Read More »
In the English Grammar Profile, B2 point 51 in the category of adverbs/phrases is defined as: degree adverbs (‘almost’, ‘very’) to modify determiners. Adverbs phrases can be put together with degree adverbs such as “almost” and “very” to modify determiners, such as “all” and “few”. *.[RR] *.[DB] After removing a few unrelated results to the …
