Unit 1: Pop-ups
Present simple, present continuous & present perfect
Select a unit
- 1 Pop-ups
- 2 Hidden talents
- 3 Can't buy me love
- 4 Travellers' tales
- 5 The colleague from hell
- 6 Jurassic mystery: unpacking the past
- 7 Career changes
- 8 Art
- 9 Project management
- 10 The dog ate my homework!
- 11 The diary of a double agent
- 12 Fashion forward
- 13 Flat pack skyscrapers
- 14 Extreme sports
- 15 Food fads
- 16 Me, my selfie and I
- 17 Endangered animals
- 18 A nip and a tuck: cosmetic surgery
- 19 I'm really sorry...
- 20 Telling stories
- 21 Fakes and phrasals
- 22 Looking to the future
- 23 Becoming familiar with things
- 24 From rags to riches
- 25 Against the odds
- 26 Our future on Mars?
- 27 Where is it illegal to get a fish drunk?
- 28 Dodgy dating
- 29 Annoying advice
- 30 I'll have been studying English for thirty weeks
Session 1
Hyphens: those little dashes we sometimes use in English to make compound nouns and adjectives like hard-working. But how do you know when to use a hyphen and when not to? This session will help you.
Activity 2
60 years old today!
'Sixty years old' or 'sixty-year-old'?
Sometimes phrases with numbers need hyphens, and sometimes they don't. Why not try our five-minute quiz to see how much you know?
Read the text and complete the activity
To do
Try our numbers and hyphens quiz. Have a look at the notes in the vocabulary box if you need help - or go back to activity 1 of this unit to listen to 6 Minute Vocabulary again.
Number and hyphen gaps
7 Questions
To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? Fill the gaps...
Help
Activity
To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? Fill the gaps...
Hint
Is the phrase with the number before or after the noun?Question 1 of 7
Help
Activity
To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? Fill the gaps...
Hint
Is the phrase with the number before or after the noun?Question 2 of 7
Help
Activity
To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? Fill the gaps...
Hint
Is the phrase with the number before or after the noun?Question 3 of 7
Help
Activity
To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? Fill the gaps...
Hint
What is the rule about ordinal numbers? And what is the rule about numbers between 21 and 99?Question 4 of 7
Help
Activity
To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? Fill the gaps...
Hint
Is the phrase with the number before or after the noun?Question 5 of 7
Help
Activity
To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? Fill the gaps...
Hint
Is the phrase with the number before or after the noun?Question 6 of 7
Help
Activity
To hyphenate, or not to hyphenate? Fill the gaps...
Hint
Is the phrase with the number before or after the noun?Question 7 of 7
Excellent! Great job! Bad luck! You scored:
Next
How did you get on? In the next activity we'll practise using hyphens in phrases without numbers.
Session Vocabulary
Hyphens and numbers
- We use hyphens in adjective phrases with ages and numbers before a noun:
I have an eight-year-old daughter.
My mum drives a two-door car.- We don't use hyphens when an adjective phrase with an age or number comes after the noun:
The students are eighteen years old.
My car only has two doors.- We use hyphens in ordinal numbers:
My birthday is on the twenty-seventh of June.
- We use hyphens in numbers between 21 and 99:
Mario dieted for sixty-two days until he reached his target weight.