Agnes Inglese

AGNES INGLESE ENGLISH FOR REAL CONVERSATIONS B1+ English · Useful phrases · Speaking practice How to Say No Politely in English Without Overthinking Someone asks you for a favour. You want to say no, but you are not sure how to say it. Will you sound rude? Do you need to explain everything? Here are 12 useful phrases for saying no at work and in everyday life, with short dialogues to help you use them. By Agnes Inglese · B1+ with a few more advanced expressions “Can we meet on Thursday?” “Thursday doesn’t work for me. Could we try Friday?” A clear answer, a friendly tone and another option.    What makes a refusal polite? A refusal is an answer that says no to an invitation, offer or request. To decline means to say no politely. ...

English for real life Small Talk at Work: What to Say Before a Meeting By Agnes Inglese · 7 min read B1 English B1 English · Work & conversation You arrive five minutes early. Two people are already in the meeting room. You say hello, sit down and open your notebook. There is a short silence. You would like to say something, but you cannot think of a question. A few minutes before the meeting. What could you say? Small talk at work is a short, informal conversation about everyday things. Before a meeting, you might talk about your morning, the journey to the office or your plans for the weekend. You can use simple English and keep the conversation short. Here are some questions, answers and short dialogues you can use when those quiet moments happen. One question to remember “How’s your day going so far?” It gives the other person a choice. They can tell you about work, mention something outside work or simply say, “Good, thanks. How about you?” 01 How to start small talk before a...

 When people start working in another language, they usually expect practical challenges: vocabulary gaps, grammar mistakes, or maybe feeling less confident in meetings. What they don’t expect is something more subtle. Over time, many professionals notice that using another language doesn’t just change how they speak. It changes how they show up. I’ve seen this from several angles. Teaching English to professionals has given me a close-up view of how this shift happens. At the same time, I’ve experienced it myself. First with English, which I’ve used since childhood and which became my second operating system and more recently while developing another one in Italian. At the beginning, most people try to sound exactly like themselves, just in another language. They aim to preserve the same complexity and control they have in their native tongue. That approach works, but only up to a point. As people start using a foreign language regularly at work, especially in real situations with...