Hobbies and Free Time
Learn 20 easy A1 English words for hobbies and free time - draw, collect, club, enjoy, interesting - plus the enjoy + -ing rule, a story and a quiz.
“What do you do in your free time?” comes up in every speaking exam, every job interview and every first conversation in English. Answering it well needs 20 words and one rule: after enjoy, like and love, the next verb takes -ing. Learn the words, then come with me to a small photography club above a shop, which is where I finally found an answer to that question.
20 words to learn
The 20 words
/ˈhɒbi/
Something you enjoy doing in your free time. Plural: hobbies.
Photography is my only hobby.
/friː taɪm/
The hours when you are not working or studying. Also spare time.
I have very little free time this month.
/riːd/
To look at words and understand them. Past tense: read, said RED.
I read before I sleep every night.
/raɪt/
To put words on paper or a screen. Past tense: wrote.
She writes a few lines every evening.
/drɔː/
To make a picture with a pen or pencil. Past tense: drew.
He can draw anything he sees.
/peɪnt/
To make a picture with colours and a brush.
She used to paint before the children came.
/sɪŋ/
To make music with your voice. Past tense: sang.
My brother sings only in the car.
/dɑːns/
To move your body to music.
Everybody danced at the wedding.
/ˈmjuːzɪk/
Sounds made with instruments or voices. Uncountable.
I cannot study without music.
/ˈfəʊtəʊ/
A picture you take with a camera. Short for photograph.
I took two hundred photos on that trip.
/ˈɡɑːdnɪŋ/
Looking after plants as a hobby.
My father says gardening is the only real hobby.
/fɪlm/
A story you watch on a screen. Americans say movie.
We watched an old film on Friday.
/ɡeɪm/
Something you play, on a board, a phone or a pitch.
My cousins play the same game every evening.
/kəˈlekt/
To keep things of one kind because you like them.
He collects old coins.
/pleɪ/
To do a sport or a game, or to make music on an instrument.
I play cards with my grandmother.
/dʒɔɪn/
To become a member of a group or club.
Why do you not join us on Wednesday?
/klʌb/
A group of people who meet because they like the same thing.
There is a small photography club in town.
/ɪnˈdʒɔɪ/
To like doing something. Always followed by -ing.
I enjoy walking in the evening.
/ˈɪntrəstɪŋ/
It makes you want to know more.
That was a very interesting talk.
/ˈbɔːrɪŋ/
Not interesting at all. It describes the thing, not the person.
The second half of the film was boring.
Now read the story
Story · all 20 words
Wednesday Evenings
For most of my life my answer to “What do you do in your free time?” was simply: nothing. I was not being modest. I genuinely did not have a hobby.
It was not for lack of trying. At nine I wanted to sing, and after four months my family very gently suggested that I try something else. At eleven I wanted to dance, and that lasted one term. At thirteen I decided to collect old coins, and I still have nine of them in a box on top of a cupboard.
Then at sixteen a friend made me join a small photography club that met on Wednesday evenings in a room above a shop. I only went because he was going. On the first evening a man of about sixty showed us how to look at a photo instead of just taking one, and for the first time in my life something stayed.
I am still not very good. I practise most weeks and I am slowly becoming less bad. But now, on a free Friday, I take the camera out and walk, and four hours disappear without making any noise at all. I have even started to write two or three lines under every picture, and that has somehow become the part I like most.
Everybody in that club came for a different reason. Rania used to paint before her children were born and wanted something of her own again. Sami likes to draw a building first and photograph it afterwards. Huda arrives straight from work, puts her music on, and speaks to nobody for ten minutes. Marwan wants to make a film one day and says that this is where you start.
At home my sister thinks all of it is boring and would much rather read a novel or play a card game with her friends. My father does not understand any of us: he says the only real hobby is gardening, and he has been saying it since 1998. Which is completely fine. The point is that everybody enjoys something, and it is the most interesting thing about people that it is never the same something.
The rule this whole lesson turns on: after enjoy, like, love, hate and do not mind, the next verb takes -ing.
✓ I enjoy reading. ✗ I enjoy to read.
✓ She loves swimming. ✗ She loves to swimming.
(Like to and love to are also possible, but enjoy to never is. Use -ing after all of them and you will always be right.)
Play, go or do? Three fixed groups:
play + games with a ball or a board: play football, play cards, play chess
go + activities ending in -ing: go swimming, go shopping, go running
do + exercise and martial arts: do exercise, do yoga, do karate
One extra: with musical instruments we add the – play the guitar, play the oud – but never with sports: play football, not play the football.
-ing or -ed? You met this in the feelings lesson and it comes back here: the film is boring, and because of that I am bored. Never say I am boring unless you mean it.
Spelling: in British English the verb is practise (with an s) and the noun is practice (with a c). Americans use practice for both.
Quiet hobbies: read, write, draw, paint, collect, gardening, photo.
Loud hobbies: sing, dance, music, film, game, play.
The people: club, join.
Talking about it: hobby, free time, enjoy, practise, interesting, boring.
Now answer the exam question properly, in three sentences: What do you do in your free time? How often do you do it? Why do you enjoy it? Use enjoy + -ing at least once.
Now practise with the questions below.
Check your understanding
Answer the questions below. You will see instantly if you are right.
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