Learning English

FDR, CVs and scuba diving

In the 1930s, the American government under Franklin D Roosevelt introduced a number of new departments known by their initials, such as the Public Works Administration (PWA), the National Recovery Administration (NRA) and the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA). As a group, they were called the 'Alphabet agencies', or sometimes 'alphabet soup'. President Roosevelt himself was known as FDR.

ነቲ ጽሑፍ ብምንባብ ነቲ ስራሕ ዕመምዎ

Today there are acronyms and initialisms everywhere: in the news, at school and probably on your CV! CV itself is short for Curriculum Vitae – a Latin term that means 'the course of your life'.

Quite often, we use acronyms so much that we forget the original words they represented. Many native English speakers don't know that scuba diving is an acronym. It's actually short for self-contained underwater breathing apparatus.

So – what should you do if you see an unfamiliar jumble of capital letters? Before looking it up online, try to work out what it means from the context.

To do

Read these six sentences. Each one contains an acronym or an initialism. The game underneath the six sentences asks you for the meaning of each acronym or initialism. Good luck!

1) Only one quarter of workers around the world have permanent jobs, according to a report by the ILO.

2) The WTO has struck a deal to cut tariffs on $1.3 trn worth of technology products around the world.

3) ASEAN was set up in 1967 in Bangkok by Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore, it has since been joined by Brunei, Laos, Vietnam, Myanmar and Cambodia.

4) Can you send me the rent ASAP. I need it urgently!

5) BTW, I'm going to be busy tomorrow morning.

6)If you have any questions about our site, you can check our FAQ section.

End of Session 1

And that's it. From ASAP to AOB in three activities! We hope you've learned a few more acronyms in English. Next, in Session 2, we take a look at defining and non-defining relative clauses, which are easier than you think...