Ways of Giving Advice in English

Ways of Giving Advice in English

Hi English learners. Welcome to a new lesson. Teachers at My Lingua Academy are doing their best to teach you how to speak English properly and help you improve your grammar and vocabulary. In today’s lesson, we will talk about different ways of giving advice in English.

Many are ways of giving advice, but we will look at 5:

1. Using modal verbs
2. Using conditionals
3. Using questions
4. Using suggestions 
5. Using recommendations

Using modal verbs to give advice

We can use a variety of modal verbs for giving advice in English such as should, ought to, had better, have to, must, etc. 

Let’s look at some example sentences.

• You should see a dentist about that tooth.
• You ought to phone home if you don’t want your family to be worried.
• Your sister had better do more exercise to recover from the accident.
• You have to be a good student if you want to succeed.
• You must be careful when driving in the fast lane.

You can read more about modal verbs of advice here.

Ways of giving advice in English

Using conditionals to give advice

We can use the second conditional to give advice. The most commonly used phrase for giving advice is “if I were you” but you will also hear “if I were in your shoes“.

• If I were you, I’d take some time off work and have a rest.
• I wouldn’t trust that man if I were you.
• I’d think of another solution to the problem if I were you.
• If I were in your shoes, I wouldn’t bother cooking while on holiday.
• What would you do if you were in my shoes?

Using questions to give advice

We can give advice by using question phrases such as “how about…?’, “what about…?”, “why don’t you…?” “have you thought about…?”, “have you tried…?“

• How about making a commercial for your product? I’m sure it’d sell out.
• What about getting a babysitter tonight so you can have an evening off to do whatever you want?
• Why don’t you get another job? I think you need to slow down.
• Have you thought about eating lighter meals for dinner? I’m sure you’d sleep better.
• Have you tried taking a bus to work instead of driving? It could save you a lot of money.

Ways of giving advice in English

Using suggestions to give advice

We can use all kinds of formal and informal phrases for making suggestions to give advice. Let’s look at some example sentences:

• What about/how about getting to the job interview 15 minutes earlier so you have time to get ready?
• If you can’t sleep at night, why don’t you do some yoga for relaxation?
• Shall we go to the theatre? There is a great comedy on; it’ll help you cheer up.
• Can you read the label before buying a product to make sure that it’s healthy?
• Could you call customer service and complain about the bill? 
• Would you like me to get you a painkiller? I’m sure it would help you with that headache.
• Do you want me to talk to my lawyer about the legal problems you have? I’m sure he’d help you.
• Let’s try to get home before it gets dark. We don’t want to be late for the football match.

Ways of giving advice in English

Using recommendations to give advice

We can use a variety of phrases for giving recommendations to give advice.

• I recommend sleeping at least 6 hours at night for proper functioning.
• I’d highly recommend cycling or swimming three times a week for better health.
• You might want to try our new skin care product. I’m sure it would help you with that rash.
• Don’t bother ironing jeans. You can wear them even when they’re wrinkled.

Don’t forget to look at some useful phrases for asking for, giving and responding to advice on this link

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