Top Language: I’m a little rusty

I was subbing for one of our trainers today who is on her honeymoon. My learner, Ms A, was  telling me that she plays tennis and beach tennis on a regular basis. I told her that I hadn’t played tennis in ages and this is why the expression “I’m a little rusty!” came up.

Rusty is an adjective that is related to rust (i.e. corrosion). ‘I’m rusty’ means that I am out of practice.

Here is the expression in context:

• I studied Spanish at University but I don’t use it very much nowadays. I am very rusty.
• I hadn’t been skating in ages. When I got on the ice rink, I fell a few times. I was a little rusty.
• I used to work with excel a lot in my past job. I tried to program a spreadsheet today and I couldn’t remember how to do it. I guess I’m a bit rusty.

Rusty fence/railing (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Fluency Builder: Discuss the following questions with your teacher or a chat buddy.

1. What foreign  language do you speak?
2. Do you ever feel rusty when you don’t have exposure to that language?
3. What tricks can you use to keep your language skills from getting rusty?
4. What language would you like to learn if you had time?

Lem..xo!

p.s. Great lesson with Ms A today! I’ve been teaching much more in the past few months. I’ve missed it!