In this mini episode, you will learn the interjection “oops.”
Episode 373 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a mini episode that teaches you the interjection “oops.” Send your questions about English and your comments and suggestions to EverybodyESL@gmail.com! (And let me know if you’d like to record the introduction to a future episode.)
Intro
“Hi, this is Atena, from Iran. And you’re listening to Everybody ESL.”
Welcome to episode 373 of Everybody ESL, the podcast for everybody who wants to improve their English, practice their English, or just learn more English. My name is Ben, and I have a mini episode for you today, where I am going to teach you about one English topic. You can subscribe to the Everybody ESL podcast at Apple podcasts and wherever you find your podcasts. If you like Everybody ESL, leave it a good review so other people can find out about it too. And if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for me, please send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. Okay! Let’s get on with this mini episode.
The episode
In this episode, I am going to teach you an interesting word that you might not learn from a textbook or from an English lesson.
This is an interjection. That means it’s one of those words that people use kind of automatically to express certain feelings or reactions to things that happen.
The word I’m thinking of is oops. Oops. O-o-p-s. Oops.
Oops is an interjection that means somebody made a mistake. It might mean I made a mistake. Or it might mean that you made a mistake. Or somebody else made a mistake. If that kind of thing happens, people might say, “Oops.”
One thing you should know about the word oops is that it is only used when somebody makes a minor—a small—mistake. It’s only used for unimportant mistakes. Little mistakes. Mistakes that might not really matter very much.
If you made a terrible mistake, a very serious mistake, a mistake that hurt somebody else, or a mistake that caused a big problem, and you said, “Oops,” that could sound very inappropriate or very rude. It would not be okay. We use oops when we see that someone has made a small mistake.
Another thing you should know about the word oops is that there are two other, very similar, interjections.
One of them is spelled the same way, but it’s pronounced a little bit differently. Instead of oops, this other form is [oops]. [Oops.]
That’s kind of a strange vowel, isn’t it? That [oo] sound. That’s the same vowel you can hear in the word good. Or book. Or look. [Oops.]
And there’s a version that is similar to [oops], and that is whoops. Whoops. That is spelled w-h-o-o-p-s.
And so we have these three forms that are similar, and they mean the same thing.
We have oops. We have [oops]. And we have whoops. I think these are three little words, three interjections, that are very natural. They are a part of natural conversational English. And I think this is something that you should know.
Outro
This is the end of episode 373 of Everybody ESL. Remember: if you have questions about English, or if you have comments for me, or if you would like to record an introduction that I can play at the beginning of future episodes—the same way Atena recorded the introduction you heard at the beginning of this episode—send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. I’ll be back soon with a new episode. And until then, keep going, keep practicing, and keep learning. I’ll see you soon. Goodbye!