Responding to Suggestions in English – Responder a sugerencias

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Conversation Strategies #6: Responder a Sugerencias – Responding to Suggestions

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Thank you for your visit. Today we have a new lesson brought to us by Ayleen Woodhouse who is our teacher collaborator from WeSpeakidiomas.com. This is her sixth lesson on her section CONVERSATION STRATEGIES. In this lesson she will be teaching us some ways of responding to suggestions.

Conversation Strategy es una sección en donde nuestra profesora Ayleen nos da consejos de como mejorar nuestras habilidades comunicativas con lecciones completamente en inglés. Hoy es la sexta entrega en esta sección. Hoy nos enseña como podemos responder a sugerencias y consejos.

Si quieres clases privadas con Ayleen pueden contactarla por email. Toda la información de contacto la puedes encontrar al final de esta lección. Pueden también agregarme a Whatsapp a +51997746013 y pedirme más información.

Conversation strategy: Responding to Suggestions

Picture this, you meet with your friends and would like to go to a coffee shop. One of them suggests: why don’t’ we go to Starbucks? How do you respond to that suggestion?

  • Suggestions that we like

You can use these expressions to respond to suggestions that you like:

That’s a great idea /   That sounds great.  /   I’d love to. /   Sure

A: We could go to a bar.  B: That’s a great idea.

B: Why don’t we have Chinese? B: Sure

A: Let’s go to that coffee shop that serves coffeetails. B: That sounds great!

By the way, there is a coffeeshop that sells coffeetails, like cocktails but with coffee. It’s a little hole in the wall in Chiang Mai, Thailand. I was actually going to another coffee shop but I kind of got lost and ended up going to this little café called “Graft café”. If you ever go to Chiang Mai and are a coffee lover, I highly suggest you check out this tiny, unique coffee place.

So, if someone suggests going to Graft café, I will always say That’s a great idea! Or That sounds great!

  • Suggestions we don’t like

You won’t always want to accept a suggestion. For example: There’s a Peruvian dish I hate called “Olluquito”. If someone suggests having Olluquito for lunch, I would probably say: “I don’t know. I don’t really like that dish”.

To respond to suggestions that you don’t like you can use these expressions:

Maybe.  /  I guess we could, but . . .  /    I don’t know.  /  I’d like to, but . . .

A: We could have a pizza or something. B: I don’t know. We had pizza last weekend.

A: Why don’t we have an early dinner? B: I guess we could but then I’ll get hungry again by midnight.

A: Let’s have vegetarian. B: Maybe, but you know it’s hard to find good vegetarian restaurants here.

A: Why don’t we have pasta? B: I guess we could, but we’re in Thailand you know? Thai food makes more sense.

If someone suggests going to a vegetarian restaurant in my city, I wouldn’t be so excited about it because there aren’t really good vegetarian restaurants and the few good ones are kind of expensive. Chiang Mai, on the other hand, is well-known for offering good and affordable vegetarian food. Here I had the best Pad Thai made with papaya noodles; it was absolutely delicious.

After making a negative response, people usually offer an explanation or excuse:

A:  We could just work remotely and go backpacking for a few months.  B: I don’t know. I’d like to, but it’s not that easy. I doubt my boss would agree to that. (a little dosis of reality there).

I guess

You can use I guess when you’re not 100% sure about something or if you don’t want to sound 100% sure. It can make what you say sound softer:

A:  We could just work remotely and go backpacking for a few months.  B:  I guess it’s not that easy.

A: Let’s go window shopping. B: Maybe. It’s actually kind of risky, though. I guess I could end up buying something I can’t afford.

Acerca de Ayleen:

Ayleen Woodhouse,tiene 14 años de experiencia en la enseñanza del inglés como lengua extranjera, en la actualidad es profesora de inglés online y fundadora de Wespeak (wespeakidiomas.com). En sus clases incorpora interacción en vivo en una clase (trabajo sincrónico) y trabajo trabajo autodidacta (asincrónico) realizado por cada alumno desde el lugar de su conveniencia y en el horario de su preferencia.