Master Native English | Speaking Skills, Grammar, and More

1. Course Introduction: have you ever had the feeling of knowing exactly what you want to say? But being unable to get it out because you can't find the English words you want to use to sound natural? Or maybe you said what you wanted to say, but you're not sure if it had the right tone. Maybe it offended someone, hurt their feelings. Or maybe it just didn't have the right effect. Well, this is very common stuff, and this course is meant to help you with these things. That's what this course is all about. This course is huge, and we're going to cover a wide range of things. For example, you'll learn how to express yourself in common situations like ordering things, giving a presentation, meeting someone at the airport and so on. You're going to learn how to handle those things politely and how to express yourself exactly how you want to. Instead of just saying some words that are in your head, you'll be able to give detailed, vivid descriptions of things on different levels so that you can correctly communicate what's in your head to others so that they understand you completely so that no one will ever again be confused about something that you said you're going to learn how to ask interesting questions. How to keep small talk going when you're having a conversation, how to express things in order and tell stories and a bunch of other really essential skills You're also going to learn, by the way, hundreds of words and phrases that you can immediately start using in your daily life. And you'll know that because you learn them in this course they're actually useful. You won't have to wonder. Oh, is this really common? I don't know if I should use this. Is this weird? In this situation, we'll talk about how all these things are used and we'll learn them in context. Most of the lessons in this course are going to have assignments attached to them. That means you'll be able to practice all of the things that you're learning so that you can build the correct habits so that you can start using the things that you learn in the course. Naturally, I'm also going to include many examples Native English examples to show you how the things that you're learning can be used naturally in riel situations. how they can be expressed as a native English speaker would express them. So if you're ready to take the next step in your English language journey, sign up for this course. I'm confident that if you go through this course seriously and I know it's long, I know that. But if you go through this course seriously, you are going to become far more confident in your ability to handle situations that you come across in your daily life. You're going to be able to express what you want to express when you want to express it naturally, so sign up for the course. I hope you enjoy it, and I will see you in the first lesson. 2. Things to Keep in Mind: Hi there. My name is Luke. And welcome to the course. I'm going to be the teacher for this entire course, and I want to. In this first video, this introduction just basically introduced a few things about the structure, that style of the course, as well as share a few tips. Things I'd like you to keep in mind. Things I'd like you to remember throughout the course as you go through it. Let's first just talk about the style of the course throughout this course for the entire course, you're going to see me. We're going to see my head, see my face and see the blackboard. I'll be writing on the blackboard throughout the course. There will be no lessons in which you see the board or a screen and not me. There'll be no lessons in which you see me, and not the board will always be together. Me and my me and my best friend, the blackboard. That's a heart that's bad. Speaking of a bad heart, there will be times when my writing will be man, maybe a little bit, just a little bit messy, because I'm writing quickly. I think you will get used to how I write over time. So if you find it difficult in the first or second lesson to understand what I'm writing, sometimes I think it'll get better after a couple more lessons. Okay, because you have to get used to someone's writing style to be able to easily read it. And if I write very slowly, then it will be extremely boring, right? Okay, next, let's talk about what we're going to learn in this course. Well, you can read through all of the lessons in the course and see what the contents are, but I want to just say something about how I've decided to structure it. That means how I've decided to organize it. I've said before I've been working on this course for a very, very long time years, and I've organized the lessons in this course so that it's number one building upon things we learned previously. That means we learned something, and then later on, we'll use it, for example, will learn about descriptions early in the course and then use those skills later on, but also to keep it interesting. So we might do something social kind of fun, like a situation that you'll encounter in daily life. Lots of those. And then we'll have something a little more technical, such as a particular English skill that you need to do a particular thing and then maybe the next one will be a little bit more fun. And by doing that and having that variety, I hope that the course will continue to be interesting and continue to stay fresh. There will certainly be a couple of times when maybe, ah, particular thing that we're learning is a bit a bit dry. I try my best not to make it boring. Dry means boring, although those skills are very important. Everything I've put into this course is important for people who want to improve their English. If you're working on, you're spoken English, even your written English. This course will help you, and everything in this course is meant to be useful in your real life. Just one more thing I want to mention before we talk about what to keep in mind throughout the course, and that is that I've broken lessons down into smaller parts. If you have a long video that's 45 minutes long, it can be quite difficult to go through that whole thing, right. It can be something that you might think about for a whole week. Oh, I have to do this 45 minute video, right? It's like it's like needing to run up a big hill. But if it's smaller, if it's 10 minutes, it's easier to digest. The hill is a little smaller, so even though it's part of a larger lesson, each piece is easier to eat. Each hill is smaller, so that's why I have done that. The lessons are broken up into smaller pieces now, things I'd like you to keep in mind throughout the course, keep in mind means things to remember throughout the course. Number one. It's very important that you take notes. They're sitting down at your computer. If you're using your phone, whatever. Take notes. If you take notes on your computer, that's fine. If you want to take notes on a piece of paper or in a notebook, that's fine. I don't care, but you want to take notes so that you're doing some action connected to what you're learning. If you're on Lee listening, it may be hard to remember the things that you're learning. But if you have some action, you're putting the things that you're learning into the real world. And by doing that, the things that you're learning are going to stick more next. Don't hurry through this course. If you rush through this course and try to finish it in several days, I think that you'll probably miss a lot of stuff unless you're a super genius and great at remembering every little thing you hear. I recommend that you take your time. Watch one video a day or one video every two days. That's OK. Don't rush through the course when you take your time. You allow yourself time to practice what you've learned to review your notes and to just think about what you heard in the previous lesson. That time to think is as important as actually learning the stuff right. When you become a painter, you paint and then you think, Oh, I don't like this. I could be better. You go away, you think about what you did, what you could do better. You come back and then you paint better the next time. Well, that's true for a lot of things and It's true for learning as well, so I recommend that you have some space between each video so that you have time to review . You have time to practice and you have time to reflect. To reflect means to think. Walk around, look at the clouds. Have a cup of coffee, whatever you need to do. OK, very important as well. Next you need to review. You've gotta review with each lesson. There's something you can practice and I've attached basically an assignment to each lesson what you can do to practice what you've learned. There's one really great way to practice English spoken English without actually talking with a friend. Now it's great if you can. Great. If you have a teacher, that's great. You have a friend you can talk with. That's wonderful. But if you want to practice the stuff that you've learned in each lesson by itself by yourself, turn on your phone, open the recording app or whatever you want to use and record the practice. That is a sign. So by recording yourself, you're doing what I mentioned earlier. When you're taking notes, you are putting something out there. You're making something input output input, output input and output goat very well together when it comes to learning and recording is a great way to do output output when it comes to learning languages when it comes to learning new spoken skills. Then if you feel like you didn't really get something, go back and review. Watch a lesson twice. Watch a lesson three times if you need to. When you finish this course, go back and watch it again. Whenever I read a book, I usually read that book twice. That way I make sure I don't miss anything right. If I went through it once, I might have missed a couple of small things. I go back. I can catch those things that I might have missed the first time through. I want to just mention one thing that's very important and something I would like you to keep in mind as you go through this course, and that is the importance of awareness. As you're practising what you learn, it's very important to be able to pay attention to what you're saying. A lot of people, when they're they're speaking, they don't pay attention to what sounds are coming out of their own mouths gotta be able to pay attention to what you say so that recording exercise is a great way to do that, because you're catching things that you wouldn't normally catch. But then you can start to do that for yourself. When you're speaking on that allows you to build better habits. So I hope you can. As you go through this course, pay very careful attention to not only the sounds that I'm making right in the way that I'm saying what I'm saying, but also, when you're practicing what you're saying on the sounds that you're making and how you're saying what you're saying, it's very, very important to develop your awareness. And that is the key to the next step, which is building better habits. Building better habits is the key to ultimately becoming, ah, more natural English speaker. Finally, before we get started on the first lesson of this course, I'd like you to remember to keep an open mind. If there's something that you think is true about English, maybe you learn that in school, and it's not quite right. So be open minded. Maybe maybe a way that you've learned is either incorrect or correct and not natural. Maybe native English speakers say something a different way, even though that different way is not technically correct. There are many examples of that in native spoken English, and I will share some of those in this course. Okay, so I'd like you to make a commitment to yourself to be open minded. If you're close minded and you're always saying, Well, that can't be right, that can't be right. That can't be right. Then you're not going to learn as much, so I encourage you to be more like a sponge. A sponge absorbs things than the more you absorb. You can begin to process it, and you can start using it in your daily life. Learning English is all about ultimately, really. It's about learning to communicate with other people in writing or in conversation. And that's the main point of this course to give you the skills and the knowledge that you need to go out into the world and use your language skills to communicate with people in a wide variety of situations. This course will help you in many different areas, improve your skills, improve your knowledge and improve your ability to communicate in English with other people and without any more delay. Let's go to the actual first lesson of the course. I want to just say that I hope you enjoy it. 3. Describing Things - Overview and Key Vocabulary: now, in this first riel lesson, we're going to start with description. Description means being able to explain what something actually looks like, or to give details about something so that other people can really understand. We're going to talk about description first, because it's so important whether you're telling somebody what to do, how to do something, what something looks like. For example, if you're on the phone and you're talking to somebody, you need to be able to explain sometimes where to go or what you're looking at because you're on the phone, they can't see what you're seeing. So if you're able to describe something very, very clearly, then you'll be very, very powerful. Okay, so in this first riel lesson, we're going to focus on that because it's the foundation of a lot of basic communication. So we're gonna use a visual example today. That means we're gonna actually look at something and talk about how to describe it well, but I want to be clear that you can use a lot of the things that we're talking about today . In many other situations. We're going to start by talking about a few key words. Some vocabulary words. And then we're gonna work on a few skills, really important description skills, and then we'll do an example, actually have made something for you to look at, and we're gonna actually try to describe it together so that we can really get ah feel for this. Okay, So some basic vocabulary first, before we do anything, we need to know the word physical. So physical thing is something that you can touch something that you can feel something that you can look at often we say we say an object. So this word has several different meanings. But one meaning of this is is a thing. Ah, physical thing is often called an object. So when we're describing a physical thing, will use colors, will use texture. Uh, texture is the surface of something. But if it's not something that we're feeling than we might talk about the materials, we might talk about the materials, and that means what it's made off, right? So there are a lot of different things that make up something that is physical. If it's not physical, then we say it is non physical. What would be something that's nonphysical? Well, we often call non physical things, things that happen maybe in our minds, like a dream. Let's say you have a very, very strange dream where you would describe that right? But that's something that didn't really happen. You can't touch it. And so it's non physical or how you feel an emotion, right? That's a thing. But you can't really touch it. So it's nonphysical an idea. Hopes, you know, this sort of thing. Describing something that happens here is often nonphysical. Okay, so hopes, dreams, ideas are nonphysical. I'm looking down to see and I'm looking down sometimes to see what I'm actually writing. Just so you know. Okay, atmosphere then atmosphere has lots of different meanings, but in this case were using atmosphere to talk about the feeling of a place. When you go into a restaurant, you say, Oh, I really like the the atmosphere here. We often also use the word vibe. If you really like how a restaurant feels you can say this restaurant has a really, really nice vibe. I like the vibe here. Okay, this is also the atmosphere. Atmosphere can also be, for example, for a whole city, the city of Chicago has a very, very cool atmosphere, a cool vibe. Now you can use vibe for people. I get a very strange vibe from that guy. A very strange vibe. But we usually don't use atmosphere for people. We wouldn't say You are giving me a very strange atmosphere, probably not. So we're going to use atmosphere in this class to talk about the general feeling of the place of a location. We also need to talk about two specific words that we're going to use later on in the class when we actually look at something. One is cottage, and a cottage is a very small, simple house, and it's often made of stone, and it's often by a lake or something near some water. Usually we call it a cottage. Okay, a chimney is then something that goes on top of the house on the roof of the house and has smoke going through it. If there's a fire in the house in the fireplace, in the fireplace, then there will be smoke coming through the chimney, and usually the chimney is made of stone or brick, so those two words will make sense more later in the class when we actually practice description. So physical, nonphysical atmosphere, the feeling of a place, the vibe we need to also know cottage and we need to know Chimney will learn other words to later on in the class. But make sure to especially remember these key words because these are important in this class. 4. Describing Things - Basics of Description: if you remember anything at all about this lesson, remember this. This is probably the most important thing to know when it comes to describing things Clearly, if you could do this, well, you should be able to describe anything you need to describe and put the idea of that thing very clearly in another person's mind. So this is it. Okay, We're gonna look at these four very simple sentences, and we're gonna look at why it's bad. And then we're gonna talk about how we can make it really clear. The first sentence of a description is really, really important. If you say the basic details of something much, much later, when you're describing it, then people will be lost from the beginning, Right? So we need to know how to say the most important simple details first, like the foundation of a house. Then we can build on that by adding things to it. For example, if we're telling a story, if you just say and I was so scared because the horse jumped right over the fence and nearly crushed me, people will say, What horse? What fence? What's happening here. But if we set the scene we say. Set the scene. Where? When? What? Who? What's going on here then? People have a clear picture of Okay, You're here Was this time. I know you know how big the horse was and why you were in this place. Then you can say how you felt. Then you can explain Mawr details about what happened right. Then you can talk about your ideas or whatever, but you have to have that thing at the beginning. Okay, So let's look at these four sentences and talk about how we can do this. How we can set the scene and give the basic details first in our description. So number one, I have a car. It's a Ford, for it is a brand of car. I think you probably know that it has four doors. Okay. It is yellow. It is yellow. It has a good stereo. A stereo is, uh, stereo, by the way, if you don't know is the sound system in the car or when you have two speakers left and on the right. Okay. This is not good, right? Because so many sentences and each sentence only has really one piece of information. One thing to know, but it's not very good. It's better if we use one sentence, maybe two, to say all the basic details we need at the beginning of a description, I would recommend you use one sentence. So rule number one, use one sentence at the beginning of a description. Use one very clear sentence. Rule number two is used more than one adjective Mawr. Then one adjective I'm going to write a deejay. That's a J more than one adjective when you're describing something in front of your main now. Okay, so just to be clear adjectives things like yellow, right? And we can make other adjectives to make it clear what we're talking about. We can use more than one, but we also need to know what our main noun is. So we have to choose a main now and then put three or four adjectives in front of that to make it really, really clear what we're talking about and to give the other person a very clear picture. Okay, so more than one adjective and three have a main noun. Okay, so we use one sentence. We use more than one adjective, and we have a main. Now let's look at how we can do that with these sentences. OK, so which of these can we turn into or use as adjectives for the main now and which is the main known? Well, this sentence is not really necessary, so we can cancel it if Ford is our May now, because Ford is a kind of car, right? So if we say Ford is our main now, we don't need that. And maybe we can even ADM or information. Let's say this. This Ford is from Let's say it's from 1998. Let's say it's 1998. That's an additive. 1998 can be used as an adjective can be yellow. Obviously, yellow is an adjective. Four doors. Can that be made into an adjective? Yes, if you have something like a five year old child, right, a five year old child or five year old girl, for example, or, ah, 32 page book. All you're doing there is adding, Ah, hyphen. It's a hyphen. It's called a hyphen. H y p h e N h y p H e n. And you're making it into an adjective. Ah, 42 hyphen page book. Ah, five hyphen year hyphen old girl, five year old girl. You're making new adjectives. So all we have to do to make this an adjective is take off s because adjectives cannot be plural can have yellows, for example. And we make it for hyphen door four door. So let's see what we can dio may now Ford Adjective 1998 four door adjective yellow adjectives. We're going to use three adjectives here in front of the main. Now we could do for But let's use three for now and then in the same sentence we're going to put with and then we're gonna add something about the stereo. We can do the same thing within sometimes if we want to say the location. But this is all going to be one sentence. So let's try this. I have a yellow four door, 1998 Ford. And if we wanted to say what type of car it is maybe an SUV or a van or a truck. If it's a special type of vehicle, then that's your new may now do. It's a yellow Ford or 1998 Ford SUV. Now SUV is the main known, and Ford becomes like an adjective. It's used as an adjective, but let's just say Ford for now I have a yellow Ford or 1998 Ford with, ah, good stereo. Look at this one sentence and we have so much information. A yellow very clear. Four door. Okay, Got it. 1998. Okay. Kind of old Ford brand. Got it with a good stereo. I have a very clear picture. Now. In my mind, I didn't need to make many sentences on. I say it right at the beginning. So now I can say something else about it. Now, maybe I can tell a story about my 1998 car. My 1998 Ford, right? I can tell a story because you started with this clear picture in your mind. The story will now make sense. So whatever we add after it is going to make more sense because the first sentence was extremely clear. Okay, this is the main idea. This is the most important thing to learn about description. If you could do this, choose your main noun. Have several adjectives. 234 Sometimes five. If you can turn some things into adjectives like four door, and you can use noun Xas adjectives like 1998 and Ford. If we want to say SUV. If you can do that, then you become a lot more powerful with your descriptions, and then you can add more stuff after it in the same sentence with a good stereo. Now let's see if we can do this with a real picture. We're going to take a picture on. We're going to talk about how we can describe it clearly as part of a kind of story or the beginning of a story. 5. Describing Things - Description Practice: Okay, so now we have our poorly drawn cottage. Remember the word cottage? This is our cottage. And hey, the other word chimney. There it is. There's the chimney. Needs a little smoke, I think. Obviously, smoke smoke makes that sound right. That's really not good smoke. I'm sorry about being such a bad artist. I'm not an artist. I did my best. I did draw this all by myself. All right, so we have a cottage, It's got a chimney. If cottage, it's got a chimney. And what's the material? We need to first pick out our adjectives in our main now. But why don't we just use cottage as our main? Now, make it simple. And this is what this will be our m in. Why not? Are in will be our main now and then we have here. Uh, what's it made of? Those look like looks like stone. Right? Okay, So materials stone, is it? Is it big or is it small? Is pretty simple. It's pretty small. What feeling do I get when I look at this whole scene? What is the atmosphere? Remember we talked about atmosphere earlier in the class, The feeling we get from a place. Well, the atmosphere here is if I look at this scene a little, a little lake here that's supposed to be water, it's a lake. Trees, nothing else around. Pretty lonely. Let's use lonely. And where is it? Where is this place? Well, it's Let's just say it's in the countryside, so we'll add countryside. That's where it is. And I'm gonna make countryside, Not the adjective for this. I'm gonna make countryside where it all is. So we use small stone, lonely three adjectives, and we use cottage. Remember, we used with for the for the car we say with for what? The cottage has its got A got a roof, but it's kind of a special roof, right? It's kind of a weird roof. This kind of roof with straw on the top is called a thatched roof thatched. I didn't mention this in the vocabulary at the start of the class, because if you don't remember the word thatch, that's OK. It's not a really common word, so let's just use fast as a way to describe the roof. And it's obviously beside a lake, so I think we can put thatched countryside we can talk about the roof. We can put all of this in our first sentence. I will write it all down very clearly later on. But we could say, as our first sentence, there is always a good way to begin a description of something you're looking at. There is a small, lonely stone cottage with ah thatched roof thatched roof beside a lake beside a lake and we could say beside a blue lake. Or we could add adjectives there, too. Beside a lake in the countryside, there is a small, lonely stone cottage with a thatched roof beside a lake in the countryside. Okay, so that's a pretty simple first sentence. Again, I'll write it down in a little bit, but that's a pretty easy way to describe it. And the picture that you get in your mind is very clear. But now we want to go further. We want to describe the other things, too. There's a lot more going on here. What else does the cottage have? Well, it has a square window, a little, a little square windows, a little square window, small, that's the size. Don't use small again because we already said small, and if you use small, small, small too many times, that's not good. That's called repetition. We don't usually want repetition. If you can use another word like teeny or little or something like that, that's often better because it it's different. It sounds better, so little in the shape square window, and that's at the front of the house. So there's a little square window at the front, and then beside that, we can connect the door to the window. And beside that, beside what side? The window beside that beside that is a single wooden door. Wooden is the material. If you want to say, would that's announce, it is, would adjective is wooden. A single one would endure beside that right with Now we can connect this little this little thing here. This is called a Let's call this. Ah, the path and an adjective for the path may be narrow. And what's the material of the path? Well, it's It's dirt. It's a dirt. It's a dirt path with the d I rt. So notice that it's not on Lee. The 1st May. Now that I'm adding more additives to, I'm doing it for several of them. OK, so there's a narrow dirt path that is leading away leading away from the from the wooden front door or leading toward something leading away from means. It begins there and goes away. Leading towards something is what it's moving in the direction off now. Is the path really movie? No, it's not. But we can use that action to make it feel like it is right. The road is winding up the mountain. Is it really The road is is just there, right? Yes, that's true. But the feeling of it is that it's winding, its winding up the mountain, winding, its winding up the mountain. So that can really help us make the description that we have feel very active. It's a really good way to describe things. So I've talked about the door, the window, the path, the roof, the chimney, the the actual cottage itself, where it is its location. We have a lot of information, but I want to say a couple other things before I actually get to my my story part. Okay, So what about the trees? So we could say that the tree is beside the house, right? We can use beside. You could say beside the house there is right beside the house there is or if you want to make it a little bit more active, you could say, standing standing beside the house there is or standing beside the house is a tree, and again we can try to make it mawr interesting by adding other adjectives. This tree, this tree here it doesn't look very doesn't look very healthy. Right? So let's use an interesting adjective. Let's use I'm going to use the adjective scraggly. If I have room to write this, I'll write it down at the bottom. This is about the tree. Okay. S C r a g g l Y. It's an interesting adjective to use. Ah, scraggly tree. Scraggly tree beside the house of standing beside the house is a scraggly tree. But there's another tree. Where is the tree? What we could say that the tree is in the distance. We could say the distance, or we could say in the background, in the distance, in the background. So if you look at this other tree here, it's in the distance, and there is kind of Ah, a row of something here. Let's call these bushes hedges. It's called him Hedges, Hedges H E D G s. So we have one tree here, its scraggly. We have another in the distance and it's by a row a row, a row of hedges. So we kind of have all the pieces. Now we want to put all the pieces together, and then we want to use our imagination. So what we're going to do next is I'm going to put all this into one clear description, a few sentences, and then I'm going to add what I think is going on in this picture. Ah, little bit of a story based on my own imagination, what I would like to add. But it's very important to understand. And remember that when you're describing first you start with the basic details. First, you make clear sentences that have lots of information. You use lots of adjectives in front of May now owns, and then you can add interesting stuff. You can say who lives here. You can say how long they've lived here, but if you start with that in many cases it will be more confusing and people will go, huh? What's he talking about? Who's living here? I don't Where are they living? What? So let's look at how we can put it all together. 6. Describing Things - Full Example Description: Okay, so let's look at what we have all together. Okay? There is a small, lonely stone cottage with a thatched roof beside a lake in the countryside. It has a little square window at the front, and beside that, a single wooden door with a narrow dirt path that leads away toward the nearby village. Okay, maybe there's a village nearby. Okay, Standing beside the cottage is a small, scraggly tree, and in the distance there's a bigger one behind a row of hedges. Bigger what one means a tree because we just mentioned tree. So if we say one, we know it's a treat. Ah, bigger one. Um ah, bigger one behind a row of hedges, an old potato farmer lives here with his dog, Linus. It's my imagination. It's a peaceful place again. That's the atmosphere. It's a peaceful place. They sometimes go for walks along the lake in the evening, when the weather is warm, the sun setting over the water reminds the old man of strolls. Strolls means slow, casual walks, strolls he used to take with his wife before she passed away. This is a very sad story, I imagine. What's wrong with me? Why did I have to put that sad thing at the end? Oh, my goodness. I have a real problem so you can see how it all fits together. Before I mentioned my imagination, I make sure to say the important details. Then when I get into my imagination this sad story of this lonely man and his dog, Linus, who lived by the lake, I would like to reminisce. And remember, the old times. Sad story is first based on that description. But you're now there with me in your mind, right? Because we've been through the description. You have a clear picture first. Then you're able to feel something when I actually describe what the man does. The potato farmer that I invented that I imagine. OK, so that's the basic idea of describing things clearly again. You can use it for lots of different situations. Not only describing houses okay can use it for many different things. You can use it to describe your dreams. You can use it to describe ideas. You can use it to describe what you're looking at out the window. What you want somebody to buy at The supermarket description is one of the things at the very foundation of being able to express yourself in English. Clearly now your assignment to practice is to do the same thing. What I'd like you to do is find a picture of a house and then try to describe it in vivid, very clear detail. Make sure that you use several adjectives and make sure that you choose a May now, especially for the first sentence. Then, after you do that and you've made a couple of clear sentences to describe what people can see to get a feeling for the place, then imagine a story and add some interesting description in your story that is based on based on your basic description. Okay, so try this. Practice it. You can do it for a couple different things. If you want to try, Ah, picture of a person or if you want to try maybe something, you just imagine that's fine. But make sure that you actually are doing something as a way to get comfortable with description, because it's again really, really important 7. Tough Verb Tenses - Overview: So in the last lesson, we talked about how to describe things clearly right in this lesson. We're gonna also focus on something that's very, very important to, ah, to know how to do to know how to use. If you want to be able to speak English well, if you feel very, very comfortable with different verb tenses, which is what we're going to talk about in this lesson, you can skip this one and go to the next. But if you don't feel totally confident, then you really need to watch this lesson very carefully. We do this one and the last lesson because it's so important to have these things first before we go on to some of them or funds stuff like inviting people to do things or hanging out at a coffee shop or ordering stuff that's a lot more. Maybe fun and interesting, but we really need to make sure we have the what I would call fundamentals. Oh, I don't even have room. Ah, fundamentals down. This should not be done fundamentals down before we get into that other stuff. So a tense. What is that? What is what is a verb tense well in English. When you're saying things that happen, you're talking about what happened, and you need to say when it happened yesterday, tomorrow, today. Now we use different verb tenses to basically say when the action happened. We have to change verbs. I'm sure you know this. We have to change verbs according to when things happen so that they agree with each other , right, And this can be a little confusing. Sometimes it's simple. Sometimes it's not. We're going to go through these, and I'm going to give you examples. Examples are the best way to learn how to use verb tenses because knowing these names simple, right past simple tents, progressive, tense. Knowing these names is not that important. If you don't learn the names of grammar things, that's fine, because you're not an English teacher, right? I need to know the names of different kinds of grammar, but nobody else does. So don't worry about that so much. Focus on the examples and try to get the feeling for them. And then I'll give you some practice to do so that you can actually understand, hopefully deeply how to use different verb tenses, and it can become, I hope, a habit for you so that when you're speaking, you don't have to think about it. Okay? That is the goal that you can use these Naturally, you don't need to think so. Let's get started. 8. Tough Verb Tenses - Simple Past: Okay, so we'll start from the simplest thing, how we talk about something in the past when something happened. Before it's done, it's finished and we don't really care about maybe the details of it happening before Another thing that happened. It's just something that's finished. We use what we call the simple past, and when we do this, we need to change verbs into the past tense. The only thing that's really hard about this is knowing that sometimes you add e d two words, and sometimes you don't, and the best way to learn that is to just see many examples and get the feeling for it. So make sure when you're watching movies or reading, you pay attention to the different ways that verbs are changed into the past tense. But anyway, just a couple of very simple examples. I think you probably already know this so well, we'll keep it really, really basic. Okay, actually, you know what's the hardest part about this? The hardest part I find with students who are learning English is remembering to do it. For example, maybe a student will say I run to the store. I run to the store And then if I say you said I run to the store, then the student will say I said, Run to the store. I should have said I ran to the store and then I'll say But you didn't. You said I run to the store and they go, Oh, so actually, the tough part for many learners of English is not knowing, You know, that ran that ran is the past tense for run. You probably know that, but when you're speaking, you're thinking about a lot of different things at the same time. Which words should I use, what things should be in the past and what things should not. How do I fit this whole sentence together? What am I going to talk about next? And because you have so many things going on at the same time, it's easy to make a mistake. So when you're speaking, you have to be very careful. You have to pay attention to what's coming out of your mouth if to hear yourself and try to catch it and correct it right away, And if you do that, you can get into the habit off saying it the right way. if you're always correcting yourself after you say it because you said the wrong thing and you heard yourself say it, that's the first step. Then change it. Correct it. Then you can start doing it in your head. If you can start doing it in your head, then you're OK. You're expressing it correctly. Okay, so really, pay attention. Slow down. When you're speaking, don't worry about speaking very quickly. You don't have to speak quickly. Speak slowly and listen. Be aware of yourself. Awareness awareness. Today is the day where I'm breaking words and half awareness is the key to changing habits . And one of the one of the worst speaking habits for English learners is not changing very simple verbs into the past tense. So awareness is the key to changing speaking habits. So remember that for everything, but especially for this lesson. Okay, so some examples take walk. Okay. Walk is e d. Okay, this is a regular one. So to make walk the past tense, we just add e d. No problem. Very easy. I Super easy. I walked. I walked to work yesterday. Piece of cake. That means something is very easy. It's a piece of cake I walk to work yesterday. Change that, Tedy, and we're fine. No problem. OK, how about find its find? Find it. No, it's not. So this one is not regular E d. Listen, is what we would call Irregular. Irregular, so this would be found, right? I found this in my car. Pretty simple. Pretty simple. It's the same as saying I find this in my car. The only difference is that we've changed into the past tense. We've changed the verb into the past tense. Everything else is the same. Doesn't need to be changed. Pretty, pretty simple. Okay, let's just do just do one more, really, really quick example. Wait, wait, All right, that's a regular one. That's e D. So But this one pronunciation, we don't say wait or something like that we say waited. It's very clearly pronounced as it because of the T sound. If you don't know how to use the E d pronunciation, then you need to watch one of my other courses about pronunciation to know how to say that correctly and other E D. Sounds. Anyway, let's look at the example. Then I waited on a lot of people will pronounce this as waited. Waited. It's almost a d sound. Waited. I waited. I waited all morning for the call. I waited all morning. I waited all morning for the call. Pretty simple. Okay, why is it simple past? Why's that? This one wise it waited instead of another one because it's finished. It's a thing that happened. Now it's done. We don't have to worry about its relationship to other things that happened. And so we just use this one. It's pretty simple. OK, now I hope you have a pretty clear idea about how to use the simple past. That's really just a warm up. Let's get into some of the more complicated stuff, some of the more difficulty and juicy bits of past tense. This is where it hopefully gets a little bit more interesting. So let's let's get started on that 9. Tough Verb Tenses - Past Progressive Tense: Okay, so now we'll look at what's called the past progressive or the past, continuous. And again, don't worry about the names so much, not so important. But really, this is all about how we describe things that happened in the past. And we wanna focus on being in the moment or actually experiencing that time. Because usually when we use this either another thing was happening at the same time. Two things at the same time or one thing was happening and something stopped it. That's how we usually use this. Something was happening and then another very important thing went and stopped that thing or interrupted it. And we say that thing that was happening as a way to se basically a little bit of context or a little bit of background before we say this really important thing. All right, so let's talk about the 1st 1 first, the one where there are two things going on. We use often waas waas or were. And then when we use the verb we use i n g, we use i n g after it. So if you use was and were the verb after, it will usually be I and G. Okay. And two things are happening at the same time. He waas, he waas, he was playing football and she waas watching. Watching what? We're watching him play football. But he was playing football and she was watching. If we use we, then we would say we were right. He was playing football and we were watching two things going on. Same time, one action. This person, one action. She or one action, We okay? That one's pretty simple. The other one actually is a little bit more common. So let me erase this and then we'll look at the other one. All right? Now for this one, we often use this one when we're telling stories because some important thing happened in the story on you want to give a little bit of background information about the thing that was happening right before that important thing? OK, so we have an action whom we have an action that's going on and then do you The thing stops it, we often say, But when is probably the most common? Sometimes we also use until and then when we say the second action, that one should be just simple past, so waas i n g were I n g. And then until when? On then simple past. Let me give you an example. All right. Example example. I was I was eating. I was eating lunch. When? When? Guy. So it was eating lunch. When? Now the important thing happens. I got simple passed. I got a phone call or a phone call and then we can say what the phone call was about. I got a phone call from my sister who told me that bubble above lava Something important happened. Something terrible happened. Something great happened. Whatever. But we use this to give a little bit of background before the phone call. This is really, really common. So here's another one we were waiting for the call or the gift or the letter or whatever. It doesn't matter. We were waiting for the call, but it never came. We were waiting for the call were waiting, but it never came. Came is the simple past tense. Okay, that was pretty simple as well. We want to focus on the fact that it didn't come. Okay? It never came. But we want to say we were waiting to give us a feeling that this is an important thing, that this didn't happen. This is really making me angry. We waited, uh, 10 10 weeks for this letter to come, and it never came right. So you can show your frustration by using this war. Waiting was waiting. Okay. She waas speaking about her passion for accounting. The little boring, right? Until someone that's an M. Someone in the audience stood up and said, Stop. Okay, so put quotes around this. Okay, so said is the simple past. That's the thing that happened. But if someone just stood up and said Stop, there would be no context, no situation if we say she spoke and someone stood up and said, Stop, that's not really what was happening before. It doesn't give us a feeling of this action, and then something that completely stops it. So we need to use was speaking here. She was speaking until someone in the audience stood up and said, Stop! Now that's a kind of a weird example. But hopefully it gives you an idea for why we would use was or were. Plus, I n g on then used the simple past and I want to make make sure I'm clear that I'm not trying to offend any accountants out there. If you're an accountant, I admire you because I think accounting is a little boring. And so if you're able to do something that's very hard, I respect you. 10. Tough Verb Tenses - Present Perfect Tense: Okay, so we've talked about the It's a dog barking outside. We've talked about the past progressive tense where something is going on. And we talked about the simple past. Pretty simple. Pretty easy. Now it starts to get a little bit more complicated. We're going to talk about present. Perfect. Okay, I'm gonna try to draw it out so you can get a picture of why we would use this. And then we'll, of course, look at some examples. This is a bit tough because of when we use it. And it's also a little bit tough, because how you make it is more than just changing one word. Usually the present perfect focuses on something that we say now about the past as well. It includes the past and the present. The 1st 1 that we use is to express something that we do now or is still going on now. But which began before I was sort of combining the fact that it began before and has continued up to the present moment. So all the way up until now to do that, we use, have or has and then we use the what's called the past participle. The past participle is a special verb. OK, it's a special ver because it's sometimes different than the simple test. For example, you know, go and you know, went right, went is the simple past. But gone is the past participle. Gone is the past participle. So have gone would be the correct way to use it. Okay, have gone, and there are lots of different past participles. The difficult thing is that sometimes they're different from the simple past, and sometimes they're the same. For example, we talked about the word walked before have walked is also the past participle. W a l k e d. I walked, I have walked. It's the same. But for this one, go went and gone. It's different and you just have to get a feeling for it. Or, if you really want to get serious, you can look up a long list of verbs and study what the past participles are. I would recommend just reading and watching movies and talking to people to get a feeling for which ones they are. And I think you probably know many of them now. You would have also seen another form where you have have has, right? I have. She has it. Has they have? Then you have the past participle been B e n yes. Yes, been It's got to be been okay, be waas or were And the past part of civil is been I have been she has been It has been they have been on then a verb But we're like this Plus i n g Okay, for example, She have or has has been living i n g living. She has been eating. She has been going. She has been talking whatever she's been talking for 45 minutes. Oh, when was she finished? That means she's still talking now he's been walking for a week. He's been walking for a week. That means he's doing it still and it started a week ago. This is how we usually use this kind of grammar this kind of tense. Okay, something that started before and continues now. So we'll look at some examples of how we do that and then we'll talk about this next kind which is a little bit more. It's a little bit more complicated. Okay, so this type I I have been playing football for three years, OK? Does that mean that I'm playing football at this moment? No, that means in my life, right? I started three years ago and I still play. Maybe I only play once a week or once a month, but the point is, it's still going on now for me. Okay? I have been playing football for three years continuing. Okay, let's try another one. I've We can also say I've I've means I have, right? I've been working overtime. Ah, lot recently. Now for this one, we don't say how much time has passed, and that's okay. The point is that it did begin before some point, maybe a week or two weeks or three weeks. We don't know exactly, but it's still going on now. That's the important point. Okay, so something started before continuing. Now I have been working overtime a lot recently. Working overtime, by the way, means that you go over 40 hours in a work week. Usually so usually supposed to work eight hours a day. Maybe you work 10 hours every day. It's called overtime called overtime. Been working overtime a lot recently. So this one is kind of simple right now, the other way that we use this kind of tense is to talk about something that's about the past. It's true about the past, but we're saying that it's it's true now about the past, that might be a little bit confusing, right? But if I give you a couple of examples, I think you get the idea a little bit better. So this one we usually don't say have been blah, blah, blah. We just say, I have done that. We just used the have and then past participle, for example, I have visited Canada three times totally in my life. Now, why wouldn't I just say I went to Canada three times? What's the difference between I have been to Canada three times and I went to Canada three times. When we're talking about how many times we've done something totally right, or within a certain time period, we could say I have been to Canada. I have visited Canada totally right or within one year or whatever three times, and we don't care about when each time happened. So then we use this one. That's how we use it. That's true now about the past. If I want to say when I went, then I'll use the simple past. I've been to Canada three times. I went last June and I went twice the year before, so we often use the simple pass to talk about the specific times and or when it happened. And we use this one to just say totally this many times. Don't worry about the details were not gonna focus on the details were just talking about right now at this point in my life, How many times has this thing happened or has it happened or not? Sometimes when we want to say, did it happen or not? We used the same way we can say, For example, I have seen you before. I seen is the past participle of See, I have seen you before. It's true. I've seen you before. You don't need to say I saw you before because then we might focus on the details I tell you before last Tuesday. I saw you last week, the details right. But if we say I have seen you before, we don't care about when it happened. It's just true, right? So we use this one often when we're talking about just the reality. The truth, right? If we wanted to say the opposite I have never seen you before is also correct. We can add the word never here. I've never seen you before. It is not true that I have seen you. But sometimes it really is exactly the same as the simple past tense. And you can choose either one. It doesn't really matter. You can say I already ate. It happened. You're done. OK, I have already What should I put here? What's the past? Participle for eight eaten. I have already eaten. I already ate. Is it different? Not really. So sometimes they're kind of the same and you can choose either one. But in many cases, many times they're not the same. And you need to be careful. If you want to talk about details, maybe use simple past. If you want to talk about totally how many times Oh are totally Did it happen or not? Is it true? Then maybe use the present perfect tense 11. Tough Verb Tenses - Past Perfect Tense: So we've talked about the simple past. We talked about the past, progressive or continuous. We've talked about present. Perfect. Now we need to talk about past perfect. This one is a little bit difficult, so we have to use a lot of examples to kind of get the feeling for it. However, we can make it a little easier by saying that it's grammatically similar to the present. Perfect where we say have, for example, I have been the only change we make is saying had been had been going instead of have been going okay or we can say I had finished. I had finished. Doesn't have to be I n g. So that way it's similar to the present perfect tense, the one we did before. But when we use it is a little bit more complicated. It can be used to express what I call ah, past of a past if you want to use it in the same way as the present perfect where it goes up to some point, it's like that. But then that point is not the present. Not now. It's in the past, and now is over here. So that's a little bit complicated, but I'll give you some examples in a minute. We can also say, just like we did with the present perfect tense. We can also say that something happened, Ah, certain number of times where something happened or didn't happen before. Another thing that happened in the past and now is over here. So this happened and this happened. And then here's last Tuesday and then this is now. All right, so it's two things happened before this happened. Totally. It's three things, but two things happened before that. So let's look at some pretty simple examples with this past perfect tense. I had been going to the gym every day until I got my new job. Okay, I had been, so that thing was going on. It's like saying I have been going to the gym. Every day I have been would mean that it's going on now, but I got my new job maybe a month ago, and so it stopped when I got my new job. So now I'm not going to the gym. It stopped. In the past, I have been going to the gym. Up until now, I had been going to the gym up until a past point. I had been going to the gym every day until I got my new job. Now, Okay. How long had you been waiting? Before I arrived? This should be B E F O R E. Sorry. How long had you been waiting before I arrived? Okay, so I arrived at 2 p.m. Now it's five pm. It's over here. Five PM now. This is two PM okay? And you are waiting for me, right? I have been waiting. If you arrive and I'm sitting here, I'll say I have been waiting up until the present right now. I've been waiting for an hour. Oh, I'm sorry, but this is in the past two PM How long had you been waiting before I arrived? How long had you been waiting before I arrived? So you can think of it in a similar way to the other one. We learned. But you just push the present back into the past and now we have Ah, now here. Right. But basically the idea is the same. I hope that's clear. But we'll go over a couple more examples anyway. OK, so a few more examples here. We had been friends. We had been friends, okay? For many years until we started at different high schools. Okay, so that means now. Are we friends? No. No, we're not. Probably not friends anymore. We had been friends. We had been best friends until we started at different high schools. We started a different high schools. Maybe 15 years ago. 15 years ago, we started at different high schools. We had been very, very good friends up until then. Okay. Can we say we were very good friends until high school? Past tense? Yeah. Yeah, you can. You can say that in this case, but sometimes it makes it more clear to use this past perfect tense. I had seen the movie once already, but went again and then we could say maybe last night. Because why? Because I really liked it or I really like it. You still like it So you can use that to So on Tuesday, I saw the movie the first time. Wow, Such a good movie. Right on. Then last night I went another time because I enjoyed it. Now it's maybe three days later. So I have seen the movie. How many times. Totally. I have seen it twice. I have seen it twice. But when I want to talk about seeing it the last time I saw it, right, three days ago, I saw it, most recently three days ago on. Then talk about how many times before that passed thing. I saw it one time. Then I would say I had seen it once already, but went again last night for three days ago, in my other example, trying to confuse you there. How about this? I went to Canada. Okay. I went to Canada on Monday. I had already been there three times. Okay, So how many times have I been to Canada for? I had already been there three times before. I went there on Monday. Now I'm not there now. I'm back where I live, right? So we basically are talking about past things that happened before. Another past thing. I went to Canada on Monday. I went to Canada on Monday. I had been there three times before. Okay, let's try another example. I had asked her to wait for me, but when I came outside, she was gone so we could just say I came outside and she was gone. That's a simple past thing that happened, right? Simple passed. I came outside and she was gone. But if I want to give that more detail on, I want to express Maura about the whole situation. I can talk about what I did before I came outside and saw that she was gone. Well, what did I do before that? I asked her to wait for me outside, So I want to express a past thing that happened before another past thing. That's when it's really, really useful to use past perfect tense. I had asked her to wait for me, but when I got outside or when I came outside, she was gone. Now we have a really clear picture of the whole thing that happened in many cases using this style of grammar. Using this tense makes it really clear the difficulty is, how do you do it right? Getting enough practice is really important, so you can get the feel for how to use this more difficulty type of grammar. This more difficult, uh, tense. So practice it. I'll provide the examples. Make sure you review those really carefully. Lots of examples are a great way to get the feeling for something. But it's also very important to do lots of practice because then it can become a habit. And when you want to express yourself, it's right there. All right, so an assignment to practice this make at least two sentences, with each tense each each one. We learned the simple past. The past progressive right was going the present perfect and the past perfect practice. All of the different types make two sentences orm. Or don't worry too much about remembering the names, right? Focus on the examples that I gave you in this lesson and then just make sure you feel really comfortable using each one. You need to get comfortable with it. If you do, you'll be able to express things in time wherever you are, especially in the past, which is the most difficult. Would be able to do those things really easily, and that will give you a lot of power, because when you speak, people will go. Oh, wow. I understand exactly what you're saying. You have command over time. Practice is really important. And so I hope you practice a lot and umm if it's boring, just remember, you know it's going to get more interesting. It's got to get more fun, all right. 12. Inviting Friends - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about tenses, basically, how we change verbs in time, and that's very important. That's really important to understand. But we also need to begin to use English in real situations. We need to be able to apply it two things we need to do in real life. So in this lesson, we're going to talk about how to invite people to do something. We're gonna go through lots of examples, and we're gonna frame this around a phone call because that just helps us make it pretty simple. We're going to do it as a single phone call, one friend inviting another friend to go out to eat. That will be basically our situation, and we're gonna go through lots of words and phrases and the steps of the call how it usually happens. Basically, the things we learned in this lesson I want to be very clear, can be used in lots of other situations. And just because we learned something doesn't mean that's the only way this can be done. There are many ways to invite. There are many phrases that we will not learn today that you can use, which are also correct. So I just want to be clear about that first. Okay, now, I also understand that nowadays most people invite other people on, you know, Facebook messenger or whatever. After you use right, you don't actually call somebody on the phone very often and ask them to go somewhere with you, probably. But it's still a basic skill, and you can use the same thing in person. And in fact, you can use the same thing in a text message as well. Maybe it's a little different, but the basic ideas are the same. We're gonna talk about how, at the beginning of a call, you need to have small talk, and then we'll go into making sure the person at the other end is actually available right now to talk to you and how we actually handle that situation. Then we'll actually ask the other person if they would like to do something, we'll do it in a way that's realistic, not in a very fake way, like I would like you to go with me, or I would like to invite you to blah, blah, blah. Actually, not very common. Well, we'll use, um, riel, natural words and phrases to invite someone to eat. And then we'll talk about how we can say no without being really rude and how we can say yes and show different levels of excitement and then finally will talk about how we can talk about where we're going to eat and confirm where we're going to go. 13. Inviting Friends - Small Talk on the Phone: Now, if you call your friend and you just say, Hey, do you want to eat now? It's not a terrible thing, but usually when you call your friend, you don't just say directly what you want. You need to have a little bit of free chat, a little bit of small talk, especially if you haven't talked to your friend in a little while. So there are some common questions that we ask in this sort of situation and many, many other situations that we can use to catch up, which means to talk about things you haven't talked about since you last saw each other or just have a bit of what we would call small talk. So here are the common questions that we use, and there are more. But here are some really common ones. What's up? Okay, what's up now? What does what's up really mean? What's up actually means not how are you, but what are you doing? How are you? Is different than what's up. Let's just be clear about that, okay? You say What's up? It means either What are you doing right now? What's wrong If there's a problem? What's up What's up? What happened right? There's a problem, or sometimes it means nothing. Often, what's up is used as a phrase. In situations like this, you're in the office and you pass your coworker and your coworker goes, Hey, and you go, Hey, what's up? And in that case, sometimes it's just like saying hi or hello. You can answer it. But usually when people answer it in that kind of situation, it's like nothing. Not much nothing. Nothing, Not much. These are common answers to what's up and then usually people will say you. But in the phone call situation, you could actually say what you're doing. So if I call you and say, Oh, hey, hey, what's up? I'm just sitting at home watching TV, Or actually, I'm doing some homework or I'm about to go toe work. You can say what you're doing, Okay, now that's different than how are you? If someone says, How are you? Obviously you can say I'm good, I'm OK, I'm great, I'm fine, right? But we don't even need to go into that one because it's it's so basic. However, we can look at this one. How is it going? How Is it going? How is it going? That means how are you? It's exactly the same as how are you? Except we say, How's it going? What is it? It's like you're your situation, right? So when you answer, we often then use its toe Answer. It's going all right, it's going fine. It's going great. Instead of saying I'm great, I'm all right. I'm fine. But again, basically, it's the same thing. How have you been? Now we've learned. Have you been right? We've learned that this means including now and also recently, right, including now and also recently. So let's say I haven't seen you in two weeks and I say, How have you been when you answer me? You might talk about some of the things that have happened in the last two weeks because I haven't talked to you since then. So if I say, how have you been? You can say, Yeah, I've been same. Same grammar. Usually the answer matches the question. I've been pretty well, although I've been quite busy recently with work or I've been okay. Last week I got a cold and I'm still obsessed ill recovering for bud code. Okay, So here have you been is not just now. It's over time until now. We often then we'll add something after it. First you answer. I've been pretty well. And then you can add something else. I just bought a new car. I've been sick recently. Um, going to Florida next week. Whatever. Okay. How about how have things been? How have things been again? This is pretty much the same. Except again, the answer. The answer usually matches the question. So how have things been? Things have been OK, things have been great. Things have been fantastic. Things have been all right. It's the same thing. It just looks different, Sort of like this one. How's it going is the same as how are you, right? Actually, there are only a couple questions, but they take different forms and the answer usually matches the question, which is important to keep in mind Sometimes instead of what's up? You here. What's going on? It's the same thing. Basically. What are you up to? Sometimes we're here up to up to going on. What's going on? What are you doing? What are you up to? What are you doing? What's up What are you doing? Pretty much all the same. And to answer this after you say, for example, what's up? Oh, not much. Just watching some YouTube videos. Then you'll say. You, How about you? You asked. Same question back you. That means I'm asking you the same question. You don't have to. You could say another question. How have you been? I've been pretty well. I was sick last week, but I'm doing pretty well now, although next week I have a big exam. This is small talk. Just talk about things that have been going on and things you're doing now for maybe a minute. And it's not really strict. It should be very casual. And you should have some things to talk about because your friends. So then, once you've done a little bit of small talk, one thing that people will often do, especially on a phone call, is toe ask. Are you busy now? This are you Busy? Can often mean and usually means right now in this moment, or are you in the middle of anything or are you free to talk? Am I interrupting anything? So I'm trying to get a feeling for whether or not my phone call he's bothering you is my phone call causing you to have to stop doing something. And actually, you're very busy, and you don't really want to talk to me now. Okay? Are you busy? No, I'm not busy. I'm free. Are you busy? Yeah, I'm a little bit busy now. Okay. Are you in the middle of anything? That should be middle. Sorry. That's an l. Are you in the middle of anything? No, I'm not. I'm free in the middle of something. I'm in the middle of something. Means I'm kind of busy. Are you in the middle of something? Are you in the middle of anything? No, I'm free. Okay. Are you free to talk? Yeah, I'm free. No, not right now. I'm a little bit busy. I'm kind of in the middle of something to make things sound softer. We often add kind of and a bit so we can say, for example, I'm kind of in the middle of something. I'm kind of busy right now, or I'm a bit busy right now. I'm a bit busy right now. I'm a bit tied up right now. Tied up means like you're tied up. You can't do anything because you're busy, OK? I'm a bit tied up right now. I'm kind of tied up right now. I'm a bit busy at the moment. Am I interrupting anything? Interrupt means to stop somebody from doing something. No, you're not interrupting anything. I'm free. I can talk. No, I can talk. Am I interrupting anything? I am a little bit busy right now. So if you are busy, what can you do? Should you just say bye? No, of course not. You could say, Can I call you back? But if you want to be really polite and you want to do it, well, then you should instead of just saying Can I call you back, give a specific time, Say when you will call them back. But don't state it as a positive thing. Like I will do this. Make sure to confirm it. Because if I say I will call you back in five minutes, maybe you're not free in five minutes. So it's better to confirm with a question. So I'm we could say I'm a bit tied up at the moment now to be very polite. Could I or Can I call you back? Call you back in 10 minutes. Could I call you back in 10 minutes? This is a very polite way in a very common way to make sure the other person will be free at that time. If you just say, Can I call you back? And you don't say when. That makes the other person feel like you never will Call them back if you say I will call you back in 10 minutes than the other person feels like. You don't care about their time. You don't respect their time. So do it this way. Could I call you back in 10 minutes or is is it okay if I call you back in 15? Sometimes we just say 15. We don't even say minutes because it can't be seconds and it can't be hours. Right? We know it's minutes. Can I go back in 15? Yeah, sure. And I could just say sure sure means Yes, of course. OK, so that's a very common way to make sure the other person is free before you actually do the invitation. It's sort of like step two, Step one small talk step to make sure the other person is able to spend the couple minutes talking with you on the phone. It's pretty polite then when they want to know what you're calling about. If you don't say it, you should say it. You should say why you're calling. Yeah, Yeah, I'm free. Then you should say it. But they might also say What's up now? This whats up means why are you calling me? So you could say, uh, are you free to talk now? Um, yeah. I'm afraid to talk or Yeah, I can talk. What's up? What's up? Why are you calling me? It would be weird to say, Why are you calling me? So we'll say instead what's up? Then we get to the actual invitation. 14. Inviting Friends - Inviting Informally: So now that we've done the 1st 2 steps of our phone call situation where we're going to invite a friend, we can actually get to the phrases that we can use to invite. Now I want to avoid using very fake sounding phrases like I would like to invite you to go out to dinner with me. Don't don't do that unless you're talking to the Queen of England. Nobody actually speaks that way. It's way too formal, so we need to look at some informal ways to do an invitation in formal invitations. Okay, so how can we do it naturally? Remember, we're inviting someone to go and eat something with us, So let's do this. Let's let's let's look at a couple of phrases. I was thinking This is very common. I was thinking. I was thinking, Now this is a very common phrase to use invitations because it makes it feel like there's not too much pressure on you. It feels like I'm planning to do this, and if you decide not to go, it's no big deal. I don't want to put too much pressure on you if I say please, please have lunch with me. But what we What's wrong with you? It's a little too too much pressure. So we wanna we wanna be kind of relaxed and this is the right. This is the right phrase I was thinking of of going to grab a bite to eat, too. Grab, which is a very common word in English used, which actually means this grab. But actually, it can often mean get it can often mean get and it can often mean by grab a bite. This is a common phrase. A bite to eat. I eat Okay. I was thinking of going to grab a bite to eat. Going to grab a sandwich. Going to grab a cup of coffee. Going to grab a hamburger doesn't mean you're gonna grab it and run. It just means you're going to get that. It's a It's a very relaxed and casual way to say it. Okay, that's a common phrase. Probably. I don't know if it's number one, but up there with one of the most common. Or maybe it's a group. Me and some friends. This is another way to say this is happening, so if you decide not to go, it's not a big deal in American culture. It's important not to pressure people too much. If you say I really, really, really need you to be there, that will only be in a few situations. It's pretty rare. Generally, we want to give people the feeling of freedom. If you decide not to go, it's OK. I'd like you to be there, but its OK if you don't If you don't go, me and some friends. Maybe you've learned some friends and I, but we can also say me and some friends many people use it. Are are going out tonight now, usually going out this phrase going out, that's a no. You'll get used to my handwriting going out tonight. That means having drinks, probably maybe going to a bar or a nightclub. It generally means we're gonna have a beer or alcohol or what we call drinks. If somebody says, Would you like to get a drink? It doesn't mean let's go have some milk It means would be funny. It means let's get some alcohol. So me and some friends are going out tonight. Would you? Would you? Now this is This is very polite but still natural Would you care care or like to come along ? Would you care to come along? Would you like to come along? Do you want to come along? Is also OK. Do you want to come along? Would you like to come along? Would you care to come along? Very common. All of them again. This is a way to invite someone to do something that you're already going to do anyway. Okay. Let's look at some other phrases. I'm starving. I'm starving. That means dying from hunger. Often when we speak in English, we we exaggerate a little. We say it a little bit more than we actually mean. So if someone says I'm starving, are they actually starving? Are actually dying from hunger? New new. But we say it as a way to make what we're saying a little bit stronger. It's a common way to do it. Somebody says I'm dying or it's killing me. My head is killing me. They're not actually dying. Their head is not actually killing them. It's a way to express something is very strong. It's very painful. It's killing me. I'm so hungry. I'm starving. It's common. Very common. I'm starving. I'm starving. Want to want to go get something to eat? Want to go get something to eat? And instead of saying I want to go get something to eat, we often use took or duh to make it sound more natural, more smooth. Wanna go get something to eat? And instead of saying Want to we might say one, uh, wanna want to is the same as saying Wanna when we're speaking naturally will often say Wanna wanna go get now You might have heard that go and get shouldn't be together Actually , in some cases it's common We're gonna go there and then we're going to get it We could say Go get We could say go grab. You want to go grab something to eat? You want to go grab a coffee? You want to go grab a sandwich or a burger? Very common. Want to go get something to eat? I'm starving. I'm starving. I'm starving. Let's go get something to eat. Want to go get something to eat? Okay, All very common. Now I want to just mention one thing. We can't say. Want to join me after this? I'm starving. Want to join me because you didn't say what thing you're going to do in the 1st 1 We said, I'm gonna go grab something. I'm going to go grab lunch. I'm gonna go grab something to eat. Want to join me? Want to join me or wanna join me Because I said what I'm going to do then I can say join me . But if I say I'm starving, then it doesn't make sense to say, Do you want to come along? Do you want to join me? Because I didn't say what I'm doing. I just said how I feel. So now I should say, Wanna go get something to eat? Now I have to make the request. First I say what I feel and then I ask you, if you want to do what I would like to do with me now here's another one that's really common when we want to make somebody feel that they can say yes or no. And it's OK because I'm going to do it anyway. So if I say I'm about two, if somebody says I'm about to, that means it's going to happen very soon. This is a way of saying something will be soon You wouldn't say about two If it's maybe in a year, I'm about to get a job. That doesn't mean in a year That means maybe this week it's very soon. Okay, I'm about to. I'm about to have dinner. And we could of course, we could also say we could add Go. If you want to say go have dinner about to have dinner. I'm about to go have dinner. Fine. I'm about to have dinner then hungry? Hungry? It means Are you hungry? But often native English speakers instead of saying are you will cancel. Are you or is it in many situations and just say one word. But you have to say it with the right tone. For example, we might say, Are you ready? Now? Notice My voice goes dente. Don't Dan dente. Are you ready? But often will just cancel Are you? Instead, we'll say ready. Ready? But if you say ready, that means I am ready because of the tone. Are you ready? I am ready. Ready? Ready. But for hungry We don't usually say hungry. Sounds a little weird. Hungry? Yes. Is the right answer? Yeah, yeah. Starving. Not so much hungry Yes, is very common. Hungry? Yes. Now this means Do you want to eat with me? Even though I didn't exactly say Do you want to eat with me? It suggested by me being here, asking you if I just say hungry and you say yes. Then I said, OK, let's go right now and you say, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I don't want to eat with you. I'm hungry. I have my food right here. That would be so, so rude. And very, very bad If you say yes to hungry. What you're really saying yes to is going with me to eat. If I say I'm starving, I'm about to go have dinner hungry, and you say, Yeah, it means yes. And I would like to go eat with you. It doesn't mean yes, I'm hungry, but I'm going to eat by myself. Nunu saying you're hungry is, although you're not saying it directly is saying yes to going with me. So that's important to keep in mind. Sometimes when we say something, what we really mean is underneath, right? It's suggested based on the situation based on what's happening. Care four. Uh cup of coffee care for What does that mean here? Well, actually, we're not saying it, but really, there is a would you would you care for? Is the same as saying, Would you like if I have some chocolate here? And I say, Would you like a piece of chocolate? And you can say Yes, please, I would like a piece of chocolate. That's a common thing to say, but I could just say care for a piece of chocolate care for a piece of chocolate and you have to know in your mind that what I'm saying is, would you care for a piece of chocolate? I can't say like a piece of chocolate. I can say, Would you like a piece of chocolate? Cannot say like a piece of chocolate. Care for a piece of chocolate? Yes, I can say that That's very common means I would like to know if you would like that, but because it's spoken English, we often cancel. Would you and just say care for very common Now it could mean that I have a cup of coffee right here, and I give it to you. Probably not, though, What does it probably mean. It probably means I would like you to go with me to get some coffee together. So you'll stand up from your desk if we're maybe we're coworkers. Hey. Hey. Um, care for a cup of coffee? Yeah, sure. Stand up. Go. That's a way of saying Would you like to go with me to get a cup of coffee again? It can be used if it's something that I have right here. And I want to know if you want that thing, then I can also say care for ah, care for a Whatever this is you can say. Oh, yeah, sure. Yeah, sure. Yeah, sure. If you want to agree right away. Just say yeah. Great. Yes, sure sounds good. Sounds great. Sometimes, of course, it's like I can't believe you didn't ask me before. Of course. Means absolutely Yes. In fact, we can say absolutely, absolutely, absolutely means Absolutely. Yes. Very strong. Yes, right? Definitely. We can say definitely as well. There are lots of different ways to agree and say yes. Sounds good. Yeah, sure. These are all very, very common in this sort of situation and lots of other situations. Very common ways to agree to things and say yes to questions. Absolutely. Yes, of course. Definitely. Sure. 15. Inviting Friends - Refusing and Accepting: When people ask you to do things, they wanna hang out with you. By the way, hang out. Just means to do something together often in a very casual way. Go over to someone's house and just be there, maybe play video games together or whatever talk. If people ask you to do things and you can't or you don't want to and you need to say no, you have to know how to do that politely, because if you just say no, that's rude. It's rude. You can't just say no. You have to say it in a certain way. So we're gonna go over a couple of expressions we can use to say no. Okay, if I offer you a piece of candy and you want to say no to that Fine. Hey, you want a piece of candy? Care for a piece of candy? Yeah. No, thanks. No. Thanks or no, they're fine. You can also say I'm good. I'm good means no. Do you need anything? I'm going out to the supermarket. I'm good. I'm good. Very polite. But when it comes to refusing an invitation, that's kind of a bigger thing. Right? So we can't just say no thanks. And we can't just say no. We should say a little bit more and it depends on the situation. So let's go through these phrases. I'd love to, but so if you're being honest, this is a good one. Maybe you really want to. And maybe you really can't. You're so busy. This week is just crazy. Hectic. It's hectic. Hectic means really busy. I'd love to, but this week is just totally hectic. My whole week is booked. I don't think I can go. I'd love to, but I can't. All right. I just can't. I'm too busy. Then you can say next time. I wish I could. I wish I could, but I really wish I could. But I have to be in the office until 10 p.m. Tonight, so I really can't. I wish I could, but I can't. I wish I could. I wish I could have dinner tonight, but I'm actually leaving to drive to my home town. And it's a seven hour drive, so I have to leave earlier. I wish I could. I wish I could, but I need to I need to leave at 3 p.m. Now, of course, in many situations, people will tell a little a tiny little what we would call White lie. And this is where we really don't have something to do. Or maybe we're just going to go home and hang out. I just don't want to go right so we could say I'd love to, But I really can't then and this happens. And if you want to do this, you can. You could say I've got other plans I would love to, but I can't. I've got plans or I've got other plans. I've got other things going on now. Those plans could be sitting at home and watching a movie, sitting at hoping, just watching Netflix or whatever. So you do have plans, but they're not plans with other people. That's OK, right? Saying I've got plans. It's better than saying No, no, if you just don't feel like it, you can say that directly, but we often make it softer by saying Not really. I'm not really up to it. I'm not really up to it or I'm not really in the mood. If we say I'm not in the mood, it sounds a little bit Moody. It sounds a little bit. Kind of grumpy. Grumpy means a bit angry, The big grumpy till we say I'm not really in the mood, it softens it. Saying not really is a way to make it sound a little less direct. Or we could say, I don't really feel like it. I don't really don't really feel really don't really feel like it. I don't really feel like it. Unfortunately, maybe it's a time thing. Maybe it's just because you really don't have time. Hey, um, I'm gonna go grab some dinner at about seven o'clock. Um, do you want to go along? Yeah. Yeah. Sounds great. Sounds great. I'd love to. What time? Seven. Who? Seven. Doesn't really work for me. I'm going to be in the office until eight. Could we push it back? 28 Or could we push it to eight? Or how about eight? So when you want to check the time we often use work for Yeah. We use work for to ask whether a time is okay for another person. Does seven work for you? Does Does seven work for you? It sounds weird, right? We say it to seven. Work for you now. Seven doesn't really work for me. How about eight? Or could we push it to eight? Could we move it to nine, or could we move it to tomorrow? Also very, very common. So those were the common ways that we refuse. If somebody asks us to do something, it's actually harder to refuse, then to agree. Because if you want to agree again, you just say Yeah, great. Sounds good. Absolutely fantastic. Yeah. Okay, right. That's easy. Now, I did mention before ways to agree, so we know those. But I wanted to just review them and have them clearly written down so that they're easier to remember. And also talk about how we can show a little bit less excitement if we need to. So, as I mentioned before, someone invites you to do something. Want to go grab a cup of coffee? Sounds great. Me and some friends are going out later tonight. Would you care to come along? Sure. What time to get the time, right? Absolutely. Absolutely. I'm thinking about going to get a sandwich for lunch. You wanna go with me? Absolutely. I'd love to. I'll be there. I'll be there is usually for more of a party. Hey, I'm having ah party this weekend on Friday, and I'm wondering if you'd like to go. I'm wondering if is, by the way, also very common. I'm wondering if you'd you would you'd you'd like to come. You'd like to join us? I'm wondering if is a very common way as well to sound like it's It's great if you do, but no pressure, Right? Wondering if you'd like to. I'll be there, I'll be there. I'll be there. You can use to express that you're excited about going, but only for party situations. If if I want to eat dinner with you and it's just you and me and you say, I'll be there Maybe that's a little bit weird because it's just you and I, right? So usually I'll be There is for more of, ah social thing where there are more people, a group of people together, three or four people or 20 or 30 people, I'll be there all right is often a little bit less excited, but it depends on how you say it if you say all right. All right. You sound very excited. If you say. All right, If you're gonna do this, you roll your eyes. Roll your eyes. All right? That means maybe you don't really want to go, But you're agreeing anyway. Okay? Why not? Okay. Why not? Okay, why not? This doesn't mean you're excited. It just means you're agreeing. Okay? Is like, Yeah, yes, it's positive, but it's not excited. And then why not? Means you can't think of another reason or another thing you have to do. You can't think of a reason to say no. So this does not sound excited. Sure, I've got nothing else. Going on is a little weird, but people do say it quite often. It means I can't think of anything else I should do. So yeah, I guess I will. And people will say, I guess so. I guess so. Really expresses that you're not excited? You wouldn't say. I guess so. People say I guess so. I will. But I'm not super excited about it. These are all extremely common ways to say yes at different levels of excitement or enthusiasm. 16. Inviting Friends - Confirming Details: So let's just run through it really quick. Up to the point where we decide what to eat. All right? Hello? Hey. Hey, Luke. Hey. How's it going? It's going all right. You? Yeah. Going pretty well. Just sitting around at home, eating some snacks. Okay. Cool. Hey, are you, uh, you free to talk? Yeah. Yeah, I'm free to talk. What's up? I was thinking of going to grab some dinner tonight. Would you like to come along? Yeah. Sounds great. What time? How about how about seven? The seven work for you, Actually, at seven. I need to go pick up my friend from the airport. Could remove it to eight. Yeah, sure. Eight works. Eight works. All right, eight. Sounds great. What did you have in mind? Or we could say, What were you thinking of having? What were you thinking of eating? What kind of thing would you like to eat? Basically, these expressions. What did you have in mind? Did you can say, Do you have in mind? But we often say did because it makes it sound a little softer or we say, What were you thinking off eating or having? It's a very strange have. I know, but you'll get used to it. What were you thinking of having these air? Very, very, very common. Or what are you in the mood for? If you invite me and then I say to you. Okay? Yeah. Sounds great. I'd love to go. What were you thinking of having? And you go? I don't know. You haven't thought about where to eat, right? So then maybe you need to say to me, What are you in the mood for? You're inviting me. Why are you asking me what I'm in the mood for? That means what do I feel like eating? What do I want to eat? All right, that's fine. Then I say you're inviting me, but I'm deciding where we eat. Okay, then I say, How about so? The way we suggest things often is to use. How about okay? How about Thai food? I know a great Thai restaurant. But you the person inviting me you had Thai food for lunch. Just to be clear. That's Ty. Ty is the adjective for Thailand. The adjective is shorter than the name of the country. So Thai food? How about how about Thai food? I know a great Thai restaurant. Actually, it's near your house. Actually, I'm not really in the mood. We often start sentences this way. Actually, I'm not really in the mood for Ty. We don't have to say food after every type of food, every type of cuisine. I'm not really in the mood for Ty because actually, I had it for lunch. I just had it for lunch. Just means very recently. Oh, okay. Well, what are you in the mood for now? I'm asking you, your the person who's asking me first where I'd like to go. Now I'm asking you. What are you in the mood for? What do you feel like eating now? Maybe you have a friend who knows a good place. My friend told me about a really good sushi restaurant. I've never been there. That's us. H I My friend told me about a really good sushi restaurant. I've never been there. How about that? Yeah, Sounds great. That's great. You should have said that the first time, right? Because you're inviting me. And you asked me what I felt like eating. I told you and you said no because you had it for lunch. So now it's back to you. And now you tell me about a place your friend told you about. Okay. Or have you ever been to and then maybe places called sushi? Sushi? That's a good name for a a sushi restaurant I've ever been to. Sushi. Sushi. I've never been there. It's good. Yeah, it's great. It's fantastic. It's the best. The best sushi in the city. All right. Sounds good. Sounds good. Sounds great. Again. We can use that same expression to say yes. Right? So when we want to say no, we say I don't really feel like it. I'm not in the mood for it. We're going to say yes. We say Sounds great. Sounds great. Okay. Have you ever been to have you ever been to Have you ever had just to be clear, these air separate. Have you ever had? If you say, have you ever had, then maybe we won't say the name of the restaurant. Maybe I will say the type of food. Have you ever had Ethiopian food? Oh, it's amazing. No, I haven't. I know a really good Ethiopian restaurant. How about that? Sounds great. Yeah. Lets go So in this lesson, we've talked about everything you need to know when you want to invite people to do things . We're using food. In this case, we talked about how to do small talk, how to make sure other people are free, how to ask people why they're calling us how to actually invite in a casual and natural way . Lots of phrases for that. How to say no politely, how to say yes politely and show different levels of excitement and also how to decide where to eat, how to get other people suggestions and how to give our own suggestions. Even if we haven't been there now, at the end of the call, all you have to do is confirm the person who is inviting the person who's asking the other person to go out for dinner. That person is the one who should confirm at the end of the call to do that, all they have to do is start with, so any time you want to confirm information just to make sure you say so. So it's pretty simple. All you do is say everything that you talked about until now, so I'll see you I'll see you at sushi. Sushi at 8 p.m. I'll I'll text you. The address text can be a verb here. That means send it as a text message. I'll see you. So I'll see you at sushi Sushi at 8 p.m. I'll text you the address. Then I say all I have to say is great. Great. Can't wait. Can't wait. Can't wait. See? Then See you then. Great. Can't wait. See then. All right. So this is how we invite people. This is how we say things politely. In this kind of situation, it's important to remember that the phrases we learned today are not the only phrases. There are many more and you can do variations of these kind of mix them together. In many cases, there are many, many possibilities more than we could ever cover in even a whole course. All right, so to practice this recorded dialogue, get your phone out and turn on the record function. Right? Record yourself. Recording is a great way to actually practice because you have to listen to it and you hear some mistakes and you'll catch yourself and get used to self correcting. So record yourself recorded dialogue between two friends. You need to play both people, right? Don't be embarrassed because you're in a room by yourself. Just try it and you might have fun with it. And if you do, try it again, try to do it two or three different ways. Try to use as many of the expressions that we learned in this lesson as you can and again have fun with it. This is basically all of the general stuff you need to know in the invitation situation, So good luck. 17. Comparing Things - Basics for Comparison: So in the last lesson, we talked about how we can invite friends to do things with us in a very natural and informal way, like most situations. But in this video, I want to talk about how we talk about the differences between things or the similarities between things differences. I think you probably know this word and similarities what is kind of the same or almost the same and what is very different. Okay, now we're going to talk about what we call comparatives, how we compare things, this thing and this thing, and we can compare all kinds of things. We can compare objects, actually physical things, or we can compare ideas. We can compare things in time. We can compare amounts of things. There are all sorts of things that we need to compare in everyday life. So if you know how to do this and you can do it very easily and naturally, then you're able to very specifically explain, for example, No, I don't want that one. I want that one. Which one? The one which is a little bit more bubble block. So we're gonna learn that in today's lesson. So let's just get started with some of the basics you probably have said and have heard people say bigger than smaller than or mawr interesting, then less interesting then. So why is it that sometimes we use her and sometimes we use mawr or less So I want to go through some examples so that this is clear and then will. Then we'll go on and do some more complicated some more detailed comparisons. But first we have to start with the basics. So why is it that we might say this apple is mawr? Is the basic structure delicious, then that apple OK, this apple is mawr delicious than that apple. And over here, we might say, Over here we might say, this is easier E r. Right. This is easier than I thought it would be. OK, so here we have 21 uses E. R. And one is using mawr, and then this one is also using. Then they all use. Then Well, at least when we're talking about the differences between things one and another and how they're different. It's pretty simple, actually, why this one E. R. Is usually when there are one or two syllables now if you don't know a syllable, a syllable is a beat in a word, so let's look at the word just very quickly. Let's work. Look at the word basketball. If I look at the word basketball, it's very difficult to tell. How many syllables are Beats are in the word, but if we actually say it out loud, we can hear the number of bump bump bump beats in the word basketball. Now, that's easy for me to hear, but sometimes when you're learning English, it could be a little bit difficult to hear How many that is. My name is Luke. How many syllables does my name have? One or two? Actually, it's one. But to make sure you can hear it correctly, say the word with your mouth closed. Luke, I'm saying it, but my mouth is closed. There's only one beat. Okay, basketball, three syllables. So when you're looking at how many syllables don't look? Don't look at the letters in the word, because you can have a long word with not many syllables and a short word with many syllables, it's more about the sound. And to get a feeling for it, close your mouth and then you can hear it. What's the rule? Then? Why are we talking about syllables? We'll generally if you have one or two syllables, then you're going to use her, for example. Faster. Easier. All right, easy, easy. Two syllables. Fast, fast, bigger, smaller. And then, if you have three syllables orm or like delicious. How many syllables are in the word? Delicious, delicious, delicious three syllables. Okay, so mawr delicious. That's got all of them there. Don't worry, then. Mawr delicious, then. Okay, Mawr. Interesting. Then more beautiful than Mawr appealing then. Okay, so three or more syllables Now there are sometimes when you'll see Ah, two syllable word Also using Mawr then. So, for example, if you say funny, if you say funnier, funnier, he is funnier than him. Thomas. Funnier than Jerry. That's that's right. That's totally correct. But also, you'll see Tom is Mawr Funny Thani, Jerry, and that is correct as well. So for two syllable words, I would say generally speaking, use her. But there are some cases where Mawr is much more common, and it's just because of the way that language is in language. You never really know why something is more popular than another. Why, why This word is more common than this word, or this way of saying it is more common. So you really just have to pay attention and look out for cases where two syllable adjectives used mawr instead of her. Here's a perfect example. Mawr Mawr Common then you really don't see commoner than more common. That is pretty much the only way it's done. Okay, so you have to look out for these when it comes to the two syllable words for the one syllable words on the three syllable words. Pretty much always you can say this is E. R. And this is more or less, in fact, same rule. But for the two syllable ones, you really have to pay attention again. As a general rule, go for E. R. Sometimes it depends on the sound. For example, the word tender already has e. R. At the end, so if you say 10 Durer, 10 Durer, 10 Durer sounds a bit strange, right? So it will be more common to say mawr tender just because of the er sound of the adjective wicked is also another good example. Wicked means someone is really bad, really bad or cruel to others, right? Very wicked. Actually. It has a more modern meaning as well. Something is really cool. People say, Oh, then that's wicked. But I don't know if that's popular anymore. Anyway. Wicked would be one where you would say mawr wicked vent. Just because it sounds a little bit weird to say, wicked er wicked. Er, it's kind of hard to say so sometimes because it's hard to say or because it sounds weird. People prefer mawr, even though it's a two syllable word. 18. Comparing Things - Useful Rules and Examples: So let's just go through some examples, and I'm going to include less than here. We've been talking about MAWR than and her right. We can include less adjective than is well, and it follows the same basic rules. If you wanted to say mawr beautiful, then you could also say less beautiful then. But what if we want to then say the opposite with ER? Well, then you have to change the adjective. If you want to say less beautiful than it might be better. If you just say uglier than ugly, ugly, her uglier, then right? It's the same thing, less beautiful, then maybe the same as uglier then. So it follows the same basic rules. Same basic rules. We just use less instead of more, or choose an opposite adjective on opposite adjective and had e. R. Let's go through some basic examples. Is there anything more beautiful than a sunset? Is there anything more beautiful than a sunset? Sunset is when the sun goes down. This is a rhetorical question. That means you don't need to answer the question. I'm just saying it. Is there anything more beautiful than than a sunset? Learning English is more interesting than I thought. So here We're not comparing two things exactly right. More interesting than I thought were comparing sort of an opinion about something. Now to an opinion about something in the past, like me now and me in the past. This as I sort of see it. And as I experience it is much more interesting than me back then and how I felt about it then learning English. So this is sort of like the now learning English is more interesting than I thought. This is an R. This doesn't say Mose. My ours sometimes look like s is this hospital is much less professional than my usual one . We could say usual hospital, but it's not necessary because the last thing that we said, well, at least the topic the thing we're talking about is hospital. And so when we say one, we know it's about hospital than my usual hospital that my usual one, so one can often replace a noun. Okay, now, here's an interesting exception where we have a special word that we can use, which is the opposite of better. All right, if this hospital is better, this hospital is better than my usual one. That's easy, right? E r. We have a special word. We don't say mawr Good. We don't say mawr better. We just say better. It's a My usual hospital is better than this one. So one simple way to express the opposite is to just reverse the order of the things instead of saying this hospital is less professional, right? We could just say my usual hospital is much better then this one okay or much more professional. Of course, that's also something we could do. But what if we want to say the same thing and instead we want to use E R. Well, here is where we have a special exception. We have this special word. Worse, it worse is a special one. This hospital is much worse is much worse than my usual one is much worse than my usual one . So that's the opposite word to use. And it's a special case. We don't add e r. We don't say worser A couple more examples. You're cooler than you were last year. You're cooler than you were last year. So again, this is not to things, but it kind of is, except it's two people, but it's not really two people, although it kind of is because it's about two different times. This is person A maybe in 2000 and nine, and this is person A in 2000 and 10. I don't know why those years, it's not this year. So we could say you're cooler than you were last year. That means now is Mawr Cool, then 2009. If we wanted to switch that around, then we could say in 2009 you weren't as cool as you are this year, and we'll talk about that. Not as cool as in a moment. You're better than me at Ping Pong. You're better than me at Ping Pong. Okay, I'm worse than you at Ping Pong. I'm worse than you at Ping Pong. Okay, now, if we wanted to make it another word and we wanted to use more or less, we could use skilled, for example, your mawr skilled than me at Ping Pong. So let's go into a couple other types of comparison before we get into some deeper examples 19. Comparing Things - 'As - As' and 'Not As - As': now when we're doing comparatives thes air called comparatives, comparing things we can also use as and when we use as we don't use then we also don't use e. R. We also don't use mawr or less. So for using this or this, you can say the same things often. But again, you're not using MAWR not using less and not using her and you're not using, then this one means that two things are the same. Okay, so this is basically the best way to say that two things are the same same size, the same quality. Whatever you want to say on the cool thing about it is it doesn't matter how many syllables there are. There are two syllables or three syllables. If there's one syllable 100 syphilis. No, no, 100 syllable words Doesn't matter, Okay, not as same. It doesn't matter. The difficulty here is that this as as means they're equal. But this means that one is less than another. So they're not exactly opposites, okay? Just means one is actually less. It's the same as saying less then. Okay, so let's look at some examples. Shaman is as warm as Hong Kong warm we could put. In other words, here we could say humid, humid. Okay, we could say longer words. We could say, Um, shelling is as interesting as Hong Kong. Doesn't matter how many syllables we have, and it means again in my mind they're the same course. It's my opinion. It's my opinion. I am, or I'm as smart as my brother. We could say other words here. Longer words as intellectual as my brother. As may be interesting or whatever we want to say, it doesn't matter. It means we're equal. Okay, But when we use not as something as it means, the first thing we say is less than the second thing we say. So it's sort of like saying my house is less expensive than his house. My house is not as expensive as his house, so those two are the same. It's almost the same. It is the same as using less, then less expensive, then not as expensive as it's the same same meeting. So let's look at some examples. This coffee is not quite as good as Starbucks. This coffee is not quite as good as Starbucks Now, why would we sometimes say not as good as instead of using less well remember less is only used when we have two or three or more syllables. So if you want to use words like good, it's often very useful to use as instead because we can't say less good than we would have to change the whole sentence. And we would say we would have to say this coffee is worse than Starbucks, But maybe that doesn't give us the right feeling because worse makes this coffee look really, really bad. Maybe people will judge it too much. But what we really want to say is Starbucks is here, and this coffee is a little bit less just here, and so we can use not as good as because it it doesn't mean much less. It can just be a little bit. This coffee is not quite as good as Starbucks. By adding quite here, I focus on the fact that they're nearby. They're nearby. There close. It's almost as good as almost as good as Starbucks, but not quite as good. So again, this is a very useful way to be able to express. Not that something is negative or completely opposite but that it's just less and we can use the same adjective. Doesn't matter how many syllables, so it's a great way to do it. And we can add words like quite to say that it's very close and nearly to say that it's very far. So this is like this coffee and there's Starbucks, this one. I'm not nearly as old as him. This means the distance is very far. It's like saying I'm much younger than him. I am much younger, younger than him. So this one is like Maybe he's I don't know, 50. And I'm 24 much younger, not as old as same. Okay, Same. So we don't have to change the adjective. And from our example that will look at in a minute. You'll see how this is a really useful way to express that something is less 20. Comparing Things - Superlatives: we've been talking about comparatives how we can in detail describe the differences between things. But I feel like before we really look at some examples of how to put all these things together, we can very quickly talk about superlatives. Superlatives? Okay, a superlative is when you have something that is either all the way at the top or all the way at the bottom. Okay, it's not just mawr or less. It's all the way up here or all the way down here. So they're used kind of to compare. You might compare something and then say that one is thief, for example. Most beautiful. This one is more beautiful. It's talking about these two things. A is more beautiful than B, and then a is the most beautiful. That means not only is it more beautiful than be, it's more beautiful than all other things going to be in that category. Okay, so it follows the same rules that we learn before when we have one or two syllables. Then we'll add E s T est instead of her right for superlatives. Fastest, funniest, coolest, bald ist quietest. Right? But you could also here, for example, say most quiet. It's OK if you said most funny, it's OK. It's also okay. So in these cases you can do you can do both. And again, you just need to pay attention to how these air used and which ones are more common. So then, for these, it's the same rule again. Three syllables orm or and sometimes to like these so least experienced. Nothing is less than that. It's the least experienced. Okay, we don't need to use then because we're not comparing. We don't have to add van. My brother is the least experienced, maybe doctor I've ever met, which would be very scary. Least fortunate. Again, it's the lowest. Okay, we're just using adjectives here. Fortunate, experienced again. These are three syllables orm or and sometimes two syllables like this one, for example, we wouldn't say. Usually we wouldn't say bizarre ist, but we would often say most bizarre. So the rule is the same for least, and most at least, is here. Most is here most bizarre, most excited, most fortunate, most experienced, least experienced, least fortunate, least excited, least bazaar. So pay attention when you're listening to movies or talking with people to whether or not. For two syllable words, people are using Mawr or they're using her or they're using EST, or they're using most, or at least have to pay attention to that. And now let's look at some real examples of how we can sort of put all this together. 21. Comparing Things - In-depth Comparisons: So we've looked at how we can compare everything and how we can talk about superlatives as well. Now let's put everything together and look at some examples of what people might actually say if they're trying to describe, for example, transportation. So let's look at two cities. Let's look at Shanghai and Beijing. Okay, have to cities, Shanghai, Beijing that we have cost how much money and we have time. We'll look at cost and time, and then we have three what we would call modes, modes of transportation, bus train on a plane. So let's just try to use the things we've learned and compare these three modes of transportation when we're talking about cost time and we'll talk about these two locations as our destination and point of origin flying that would be taking it. Taking a plane flying to Beijing from Shanghai is mawr expensive again, expensive, more syllables more expensive than taking a train for a bus, taking a train or a bus. It's the most costly way to travel. We could say most expensive if we want to. But changing the adjective, sometimes using a synonym, costly and expensive are the same allows us to have a little variation. Okay, so we have the superlative here. Most costly are comparative here. And we just put these two together because this one flying is more than both of them. Okay, lets try another one. Taking a train from Shanghai to Beijing, ISMM or expensive? More expensive than taking a bus, but not as expensive as not as expensive as Remember how we said If we use less, sometimes we have to change the adjective, and that can make it a little bit awkward sometimes. Now, remember, we talked about how this means the same as less so we could put less in here is well so but less expensive, then less expensive than flying. Okay, Going to Beijing from Shanghai by bus takes longer, then longer er, because long is one syllable. So we have her going to Beijing from Shanghai by bus takes longer than flying or taking a train again. This is both, but this one is about time takes longer. We say her because Long is one syllable. It's the slowest again. We use EST here because slow is one syllable. It's the slowest way to get there. It's the slowest way to get their last example. Flying to Beijing from Shanghai is faster than taking a bus or a train train or a bus. One thing to keep in mind is how we actually change adjectives. Sometimes if we're talking about something that is maybe not as as that sometimes is better and sometimes not as good as sometimes better and sometimes not as good as using her. So let's look at this one. Going to Beijing from Shanghai by bus is not as fast as or we could say is slower, then flying or taking a train. It's the slowest way to get there so we could choose which one we want, depending on what kind of feeling we want to give or what kind of mood we want to create. If we want to have the same adjective slow, then we should say probably going to Beijing from Shanghai is slower than flying or taking a train. It's the slowest way to get there, but I like to if I can have some variation and use a different word. So if I want to use a different word, then maybe this one is actually better, because I'm saying not as fast as which is the same meaning as slower. Then going to Beijing from Shanghai by bus is not as fast as flying or taking a train. It's the slowest way to get there. I prefer that one because I like to have some variation in what I say. I like to be able to describe something and use different adjectives so that I don't sound like I'm limited to only saying the word slow. So keep that in mind when you're comparing things, keep in mind that you can use sometimes either one on the one that you choose can change the impression people have about what you say, even though both of them are correct. To practice this, what I'd like you to do is choose to restaurants that you like and compare them. Just because you like both, doesn't mean they're exactly the same. Okay, try to use the phrase is as many as you can the phrases or the structures we learned in this lesson try to use not as and as as try to use. Then try to use mawr less her best. Try to use them all if you can compare the price and also compare the atmosphere. That means the feeling that you have about the place. Maybe one places mawr casual or mawr lively. Or maybe the price. Maybe one place is, ah, high end, high end place, which means it's more expensive. Or maybe fence here. Whatever you want to say, not as maybe not as casual as whatever you want to say. Try to be as detailed as you can. Try to be a specific as you can and really practice thes expressions. Then try to do it again, recording yourself and then listen to it. Don't write it down the second time. Do it about something else. For example, maybe two parks that you like or or whatever. Record yourself speaking naturally using these expressions, and that will force you to have to use these in the moment on your feet. And that will challenge you to actually get better, to improve yourself so that when you have a conversation, it's easy to use comparatives and superlatives. Even though you probably know them, it's easy to use them in conversations, which is the goal, right? All right, good luck 22. Making Inquiries - Overview: in the last lesson, we talked about how to compare things, which is very important. If you want to describe the difference between that and that, maybe you're making a recommendation. Or maybe you're talking about a past experience. In this lesson. We're going to talk about inquiry, how to make an inquiry or sometimes it's pronounced inquiry. Basically, inquiry an inquiry means asking someone who knows something a question so that you can get information about what they know. That's what it means. When we do that, we say we are enquiring So we're making an inquiry or an inquiry or we are enquiring weaken sometimes. Say I would like to inquire about Okay, so in this lesson, we're going to be talking about a couple of key words and phrases at the start. Then we're going to go into a really life situation. We're going to talk about a new apartment situation. If you want to rent an apartment, you may need to call the landlord to get information about the apartment. So we're going to do that situation so that we can go over how to use some of these words and phrases, and then we'll look at a couple of different ways to say you're welcome in English as well as talk a little bit about how to bargain just some simple ways to talk about Price to negotiate a little bit. Negotiate means we maybe don't like the price. Something is a little too much. How can we push a little bit to get a lower price? So we'll talk about a lot of things in this lesson, and right now we'll start with vocabulary and phrases. 23. Making Inquiries - Being Tactful: so usually when we're trying to get information from somebody, whether it's calling the airport because you lost your phone. Or maybe you're calling the owner of an apartment because maybe you'd like to take a look. Or maybe you need to call about some tickets that you booked and you have a question. Whatever. You probably never talked with that person before the person you're calling. And so it's very important to be tactful. Being tactful is doing things in a way which is respectful of others or or polite. So let's look at a couple of really common phrases we can use when we want to ask for information in a tactful way or ask for information tactfully. So we could say, I'm wondering instead of saying I want to know or tell me now you can sometimes say, Could you please tell me that's fine? Could you please tell me if that's totally okay? But sometimes if we say yes, I want to know it can be a bit too to direct, right? Do you think you could tell me? So instead of saying please tell me which is again OK? Do you think you could tell me. It's very This is very soft. Soft. So this one I'm wondering. I'm wondering if you could give me some information about the tickets. The prices for the tickets for tomorrow's concert at your venue. A venue is Ah, where ah, concert is held. I'm wondering. Ok, Do you think you could tell me the prices for section C for the venue tomorrow and whether or not you have any tickets still available? Do you think you could tell me that's very, very polite. So you have to keep in mind that one might be, in some cases, too polite. Okay, I'm trying to find out now. This is maybe when you would have asked several people before and not been successful, you might use this one. Yeah. I'm trying to find out whether there are still any tickets available for the concert tomorrow. But the last person I called didn't know, so they gave me your number. I'm trying to find out if there are any tickets still available. Okay. I'd like to know. I'd like to know. Yeah, I'd like to know if there are any tickets still available for the concert tomorrow night, especially in section C. Okay, this is a way to ask, Even though you're saying I'd like to know, you're not really asking a question. But after you say what it is you'd like to know, that means please tell me. So by using, I'd like to know, even though it isn't a question, they're going to tell you what you'd like to know if they know. So it's kind of suggested there. It doesn't have to be a question, and it's the same for it's the same for this one, right? This is a question, Do you think? OK, but these 3123 are all statements that are ways to say what we want in a polite way. And then we get the information back I'm enquiring about I'm enquiring about this one actually uses the word for today's topic. Yeah, I'm enquiring about whether or not whether or not there are still tickets available for tomorrow's for tomorrow's concert. Ah, yes, there are. Oh, that's great. Now I'm wondering if you have any tickets available still in section C in section C. Oh, yes, we do, actually. Oh, well, that's great. That's great. I like to know I'd like to know the price of the tickets, if that's possible, so you can use these even if it's within one phone call within one situation. You can use several of these as a way to get that information in a very polite way. And when you show others respect when you are tactful, when you express things in a way which is a little less direct than usually people want to help you and they may even go out of their way. Have room to write this out of their way to help you. That means they might doom or than they would normally do because you're being so, so polite, so respectful of their time, right? Sometimes we can use a couple other phrases. We could say someone goes above and beyond, above and beyond for you or above and beyond What you you expect them to do right? Or they they go the extra mile. These two both mean that someone or you are willing to doom or than what normally you or they would do. And for whatever reason, you're very helpful person. So if someone remembers that person later, let's say they worked and called five people to get me my tickets, and it was not easy for them. They didn't have to do that. I could say, Well, thank you for going the extra mile. For me to get these tickets really means a lot to me. I really appreciate that it means a lot to me or thank you for going above and beyond, or she really went above and beyond to get me those tickets. I was really grateful all of these air common and basically the idea is when we have or need to make an inquiry, we should be tactful. 24. Making Inquiries - Apartment Inquiry: So now let's try to use some of these phrases in a real situation, and I'm going to try to make it as realistic as possible. Let's say, for example, you move to America, okay? Or let's say you already live here and you want to move to another place. I use America because I'm American, so I know kind of how it works. I've had many apartments before. An apartment is a place. People live in a larger building. Usually it's not a stand alone building. A standalone building is probably called house, and maybe only one family lives there. An apartment is usually in a larger building. It's usually smaller. Okay, so we're going to do an apartment inquiry or inquiry, and we're gonna be calling. The landlord can also say Land Lady. Now this is the owner of the apartment, the owner of the apartment. If it's not the owner than it's probably a broker or agent in America and, for example, in New York on agent will take a fee, and I guess that's probably true anywhere in the world. So if you go through an agent, you probably need to pay more if you can call the landlord or land lady or owner directly. That's usually better. In this situation, we're going to actually call the We're going to get the number of the landlord and we're gonna call, and we're gonna get some information because we're interested in the apartment. Now there are many ways to find an apartment in America. There are a lot of websites you can. You can, of course, go to, uh on agency. You can look in the maybe the newspaper. But there are some popular Web Web sites that you can use, like craigslist dot com. And there are some other ones, like Zillow dot com. And who knows? Maybe when you're watching this, it's 50 years from now for when this is being filmed and there's a completely different way of doing this. But, um, we use generally a website. Then we'll find a a listing. Find a listing. A listing is basically a post that someone has put up on one of these websites and we usually search based on some certain criteria. We have some criteria. This is what we're searching. Maybe I'm looking for a one bedroom, and this is often abbreviated as BR one bedroom, one bathroom. So if you see one br one, be our that means one bedroom, one bathroom bedroom is usually first, so if you see two br one, be our that means two bedrooms, one bathroom, if you see to be, are to be our it means two bedrooms, two bathrooms. You get the idea. You also often see how many square feet in America we usually use feet, feet to measure. So it'll say often F T r sq ft. Like that square feet, square feet. If you're in another country, then maybe it's square meter, square meter, right? And then, of course, you'll see the asking price asking price or the the price per month, the rent. We often call this just the rent and let's say it's 1000. Let's say we're looking for something that's $1500 Okay, $1500. The poster. The listing will also have probably the neighborhood s. So let's say it's in Brooklyn. Brooklyn isn't a neighborhood. Brooklyn is, Ah, Borough in New York. Let's say the neighborhood is greenpoint. Okay, so we see a post we see listing it says one bedroom, one br one be our and it's Ah, one bedroom, one bathroom. It's in Greenpoint, and the rent is 1500 which maybe is too expensive. We think it's too much. Actually, that's pretty cheap. 1500 for Greenpoint. That's pretty cheap. And maybe there are some extra details here. Let's say it says its newly renovated. That means there was some old things and ah, those things were taken out. And maybe there's a new kitchen. They completely redid the apartment. And maybe it also says it's Ah, fully furnished now furnished or unfurnished furnished means that there's so far There's a bed. All of that stuff is already there. Unfurnished means there's nothing except for appliances. Appliances are maybe the microwave, the sometimes the TV dishwasher, the oven. Perhaps these are air conditioning. These are appliances. Furnishings are bed, sofa, tables, chairs, that sort of thing. So let's say it's Furley flu before it's fully furnished and newly renovated. And these are the other details here, and there's a phone number. Hey, so we're gonna call the phone number and we're going to talk directly to the landlord 25. Making Inquiries - Inquiry Dialogue: So we're looking for this apartment. We see the post, we call the phone number within the listing within the post, and somebody picks up and says Hello. Well, the first thing you need to do is confirm that this is the right person, right? So you might start by saying yes. Is is this the owner of? Is this the owner of the or is this? The landlord could also say, landlord of the apartment in Greenpoint that's listed on Zillow dot com. Or you could say I'm calling about the and then you can say what you're calling about. I'm calling about the one bedroom apartment in Greenpoint that's on Zillow dot com. Is this the? Is this the owner? Is this the landlord? You could say the newly renovated one bedroom Greenpoint apartment. Hello? I'm calling about the renovated one bedroom apartment in Greenpoint that's posted on Zillow dot com. Is this the owner? Not Are you the owner? If we're on the phone, we should say, Is this the owner? Okay, this is when you say your own name. And is this when you're on the phone? This is how we say it. Basically, we usually don't say I am. I am okay. Yes. This is the owner. Yes. This is the owner. Okay, great. Well, I'm just wondering first. That's the first thing I want to say if the apartment is still available because I'm very interested in taking a look at it. If so, if we use. If so, when? We want to say if this thing is true, right? You look tired. Are you tired? If so, you should take a nap. If so, if you're tired, it's a way to say if this thing is true and it's pretty common actually now it's important not to say I really, really, really want to live here. I want to rent this apartment because then later, you can't talk about the price. Probably. Maybe it will be harder for you to negotiate, which means to get maybe get a better price. So it's better to just say that you're interested in the apartment. Okay, Great. I'm just wondering if just wondering if the apartment is still available because I'm very interested in taking a look. If so, we're taking a look at it. If so, a few people have come by for showings, but it's still available. So if somebody comes by, that means you go to a place for a short time. My friend came by yesterday and we talked for an hour, or I'm going to stop by the bookstore for a few minutes before I go home. We often use come by, stop by and we talk about going to a place usually for a short period of time for showings , showings. It's when you actually show an apartment to somebody who might live there. But it's still available, so people saw it, but they haven't yet decided to rent the place. Okay, so maybe that gives me a feeling of pressure. Maybe I need to hurry up a little bit. Okay, that's great. That means it's still available. So the first thing you should do when you call is make sure that from the time that you saw or the time that the listing was posted and the time you're calling from that time to this time, nobody has actually rented the apartment. You need to make sure about that first. Usually that's the first thing. Then you can get into some of the details. Okay, that's great. Do you think I could ask a few questions. Could I ask a few questions? I'd like to ask a few questions. Do you think I could ask a few questions? Is really, really polite. Maybe it's too polite. Maybe it's very polite. You can also. It's just fine to say. I'd like to ask a few questions Or can I ask a couple questions? I'd like to to ask a few questions. Then they might say, Go ahead, Go ahead, Go ahead. That means please do. Please do. If we ask a question, Do you think I could ask a few questions? Yeah, absolutely. Or maybe sure or okay. And then that means you need to say what your questions are. Well, I'd like to know more about the neighborhood. I'd like to know more about the neighborhood and also whether or not pets are allowed. I have a cat now notice. It's not a question, really. But it kind of is a question. Even though it's not said as a question, because you are making an inquiry or an inquiry, you're getting more information. We could easily say this as a question. Do you think you could tell me or could you tell me if the neighborhood is safe or not? Or could you tell me a little bit about the neighborhood? And also do you allow cats in the apartment? Are our cats allowed our cats allowed? I have one. I have one. So it's still kind of a question, even though it isn't really a question, because it doesn't have a question mark. But we could very easily ask this as a question. We would just use some of the phrases that we learned at the very beginning of this lesson . So now we have our answer from the landlord. As for the neighborhood, as for the neighborhood when we use as for something as for you, Well, as for the report you wrote yesterday means this is the the topic I'm going to talk about. That's for the neighborhood. It's relatively quiet. It's pretty quiet. It's pretty quiet. It's It's kind of quiet. OK, which is a good thing, usually, but there are a lot of great places to eat nearby. Why would the landlords say? But he could say end, I guess. But maybe that landlord is thinking a quiet place maybe suggests that it's not very interesting and there aren't a lot of things to do. I'm saying it's quiet, it's peaceful and at the same time there are lots of things to do, lots of places to eat. OK, but there are lots of great places to eat nearby. The school is within walking distance. Walking distance is kind of a subjective word That means maybe different people have a different idea about what that means, but that we can say it's probably less than 10 minutes. Okay, on the subway is just a five minute walk away. A five minute walk here. It's quite interesting. We can make our own adjectives a five minute walk. Ah, 32 page book. The short book. Ah, three hour bus ride. Ah, 15 year old, maybe a 15 year old movie. Okay, so we can make our own adjectives by adding Ah, hyphen, hyphen, hyphen is this one that goes between the number and the noun. Take away the s, and then it makes an adjective. Okay, so it's a five minute walk away. Albert Park, a made up park name is right across the street, right. Gives us a feeling of it being very close right across the street doesn't mean this right doesn't mean that, right? It just means directly. So it's a great location and totally safe. Oh, so I've just remembered your other question. Your other thing was about if your cat is allowed, right? Oh, and cats are allowed, but no big dogs, no big dogs, no big dogs allowed. So when you remember something, you go Oh, yeah, and about cats. As for cats, as for your cat we use as for when we want to mention a topic. So the landlord has answered my initial enquiries about whether or not the apartment is available about whether or not I can bring my cats and about the neighborhood. The landlord has told me about how nice the neighborhood is. Okay, But I still have a few more things I'd like to know. Once we get into the conversation a little bit, then we can start using MAWR direct language. If you use too many of the polite phrases that we learned at the beginning of the lesson, then sometimes the conversation won't flow. So it's OK once you get into it to start using some or direct questions. But now I'm going to get a little bit more information and we're going to start talking about the rent. And when we talk about the rent, we need to do a little bit of negotiation. So to negotiate means to discuss price. Often you can negotiate about lots of different things. But often in America, when you negotiate, you need to give up something so that you can get something you need to make an offer. You need to make an offer. Rarely in America do people just say, Can you give me a lower price? Can you please give me a discount? There has to be a reason, so we'll look at that. Well, look at that in the rest of this inquiry situation. That's great. That's great. Okay, Thank you for the information and about the rent. So now I'm changing topics to talk about. Talk about money. How much I will need to pay. Okay. Are the utilities included Are the utilities included? So utilities are things you need to pay that your apartment runs on. So electricity, maybe. Gas, water, Internet. These things are utilities. If they're included, that means you don't need to pay any extra if the rent is $1500 or $1500 I don't need to pay mawr than 1500. They're part of that. Ok? Ah, heating and water are included. This is pretty common. Heating and water are included, but electricity and WiFi are not so. That means you don't need to worry about heating and water. But you do need to pay for the electricity, depending on how much you use. And of course, WiFi. You would have to pay for those yourself. Okay, No problem. Now we get into the negotiation. 1500 is a little over my budget over my budget. Okay, Over my budget means it's more than I really want to to spend. It's more than I planned to spend. We can also say out of my price range, but out of my price range a bit over my budget. Okay, so we're sort of expressing a bit of pain. This is common in on English negotiation. First you say, Oh, I don't know. I can't. Then, okay. And it looks a little high for the area as well. So that means in this neighborhood Maybe I saw some other apartments that were cheaper. Or maybe I saw one that was a little bigger and it was the same price. I think it's too expensive. This high means too expensive, a little high for the area as well. So I'm sort of trying to get to some point. I'm trying to say, Can you give me a lower rent? But I don't want to just say, Can you give me a lower rent? Okay. Would you consider 1300 if I sign a two year lease? So, at least is ah, rental contract. When you rent an apartment, we call it often in America. We call it at lease. We say, Would you consider when we want to offer something when we want to offer Maybe what we will do and we're suggesting that we pay a little bit less. Would you consider 1300 if I sign a two year lease? If I sign a two year lease, then you don't have to worry about finding another person to live in this apartment. Another tenant tenant is a person who lives in usually in an apartment. My tenants, my tenants, the people who live in my in the houses I own or the apartments I own. So would you consider is really common, but the landlord doesn't really want to talk about it on the phone. The landlord wants to show the apartment first and then talk about price stuff. We could talk about that once you've come by for a look. We could talk about that once you've come by for a look. So the landlord is putting it off. Put it off. That means to push that back for for a later discussion, maybe. Okay, I might be willing to be flexible on that. I might be willing to be flexible on that. I know that sounds a little bit weird, but flexible means that my my position on something or what I think about something might change a little bit. We can negotiate mawr. I'm really trying to get you to come to look at the place, to look at the apartment, and then we can negotiate about the rent about the price. Right. So I'm okay with the idea of talking about it later. When do you think I could stop by? When do you think I could stop bike and this is pretty polite. When do you think I could stop by Would tomorrow afternoon work? Remember from our class our lesson about inviting We use work in this way to suggest a time . Does that time work for you? Would tomorrow afternoon work for you? Yeah. Yeah, that would be perfect. That would be perfect. Would be perfect. Three. PM Now you could say is three. PM OK is three PM OK, but to make it shorter sometimes we'll just say three PM three PM or five PM four PM Whatever. Great. Right? Could you text me the address text? Here is a verb. That means give me exactly where I need to go. Send it to me in a message to this number, maybe. Could you text me the address? Yes. See you tomorrow. Yes. See you tomorrow. So this is a very common, very normal situation. This kind of thing happens all the time. And if you find yourself in a situation where you need to ask for information, remember, start with some of the phrases that we learned early on at the beginning of the lesson on. Then once you get into the discussion into the conversation. Don't worry too much about using them. You can ask direct questions like Are the blah, blah, blah, blah, blah? Does the apartment have furniture? Does the electricity work? It's OK to use those questions once you get in it, and then maybe when you're going to say goodbye, then you can start using some more polite language again. Like when do you think I could stop by right? That's very polite. Very, very respectful. Beginning and end pretty polite, pretty respectful. The middle. Just go through the details and ask what you want to ask. 26. Making Inquiries - Ways to Say 'You're Welcome': So we know the polite phrases when we're asking for information when we're making an inquiry or an inquiry, and we now know how to if we need to call the landlord and make an inquiry, or ask the landlord for more information about the apartment before we go to look at it. Hopefully you feel very comfortable with that and you can actually do it now. What I'd like to do is just quickly talk about some different ways. You can say you're welcome after you thank somebody who has maybe given you information, you need to say Thank you. And then they might say, You're welcome. You can say thanks. You can say I appreciate it, but let's look at different ways that people can say You're welcome. He's the first ones are pretty informal. So these are things you would say to your friends? If you say Sure, sure, sure. Thanks a lot. Sure. Can I borrow a pen? Yes Or sure, Thanks. Sure you can say it again. Sure can be used in many ways sometimes. Yet if it's very quick, if you hold the door for somebody, you hold the door, they go in. They say. Oh, thanks. You go. Yep. Yep. Very quick. Very informal. Not formal, not formal. Okay, how bout? Of course, this is a little bit more, and you can use this in lots of different situations. Okay, So, Hey, do you think you could do you think you could maybe help me with my homework? Of course. That means yes or sure, that means yes. And then Oh, thank you so much. Then you can again say off course. So sometimes these mean both. Yes. And of course, these three All mean Yes. And they mean you're welcome. Thank you very much. Of course. Sure. Yep. No worries. No worries. Again, This is one that is usually informal, informal. And when you're helping out a good friend, they say, Oh, thanks, man. Or thanks a lot. And no worries. No worries. Thanks for helping me move my sofa today. I know that it was inconvenient. No worries. Don't worry about it. Sometimes people will say Don't worry about it. That's this one down here. Okay, Sometimes if it's very quick and you're not even paying attention. Oh, hey, Thanks. By the way, thanks for sending out that email for me. Uh huh. No problem. That's a very quick one. And you would use it on Lee when Maybe you're in a rush or you're focused on something else . Okay. Now, the more formal ones a little bit more formal. Obviously. You're welcome. Happy to help. This is something that somebody may be in customer service. Might say, Oh, happy to help. Happy to help. Or if maybe I help one of my students. And my student says, Thank you for helping me correct this. I might say. Happy to help. Happy to help. I won't say. Happy to help. I'll say, Happy toe. Happy toe. Happy to help. Okay, this one, I think, is very formal, and I don't use it very often. My pleasure. My pleasure. In customer service, you do hear it. So if you call somebody, my computer is broken, and then they help you fix your computer or whatever. And then you say, Oh, thank you so much for helping me. They might say That's my pleasure. It's my pleasure. I use it once in a while, but it's pretty formal, so I don't use it that much. Okay. No sweat. This one, this one sometimes is used in customer service, but it could also go up here in the ones that are not so formal. These two are similar to no sweat, but can be used in many different situations. Not at all. And no big deal. No big deal again. Thank you so much for helping me do my homework yesterday. No big deal. No big deal. May not at all. Not at all. Don't worry about it. Same thing. OK, so these are all really, really common, and they can be used in lots of different situations that sometimes forget it. Forget it. Forget it. That means you don't even need to talk about it. Forget it. Forget it. Right. So those are some of the different ways that we can say. You're welcome in different situations. You gotta listen out for where they're used and how they're used. Because again, sometimes they're used formally and sometimes not. Formally, you really have to pay attention to the situation they're used in. But hopefully now you know more ways that you can say you're welcome. So to practice this, what you can do is go onto the Internet, maybe go to Craigslist or Zillow or any other site and find an English apartment listing or English apartment post something that you're may be interested in and read it and then do a phone call a role play. Record yourself between both people, the landlord and yourself. And if you can get a friend involved, if you can get a friend to do it with you, that's great. You can do it together. Could be really fun. Do it several different times. Make sure to record it so that you can listen to it again and pick out where you might actually improve things that you said. That might be strange. Make sure to try to use some of the words and the phrases that we talked about in this lesson. All right, good luck. 27. Daily Routine - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked very importantly about how to enquire how to get information from people that we don't know, especially on the phone. In this lesson, we're going to talk about something that's also very important, but more personal, more about what we do. We're going to talk about your routine now. Your routine is what you usually do every day. That's your routine, okay? And your routine maybe includes going to work. What you do when you get up and maybe what you do on the weekend, you can have a routine for different kinds of things. For example, you can say my workout routine. You can say my travel routine. You can say my weekend routine. So in general, routine means just what you usually do unless you say something Mawr specific in front of it, like workout, routine travel, routine work routine. In general, routine means what we do on a normal day. Okay, we're going to talk about some useful phrases that we can use, as well as some important words that we need to know when we're describing what we do, our routine and we're going to talk about the things that we have to do, for example, at work, our responsibilities. How do we introduce our responsibilities? When people ask you about yourself, you need to be able to explain what it is that you do every day, right? What is your job exactly? What do you have to do in your job? And then, finally, we're going to look at a real example. We're going to look at a routine. It's gonna be a little bit long, kind of like a story. But hopefully it can give you a feeling for how people will describe the things they have to do on a normal day, because it's very important to be able to do that, and it often comes up in conversation. What did you do yesterday? Oh, yesterday I blah blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then you say your routine. So let's start with some phrases 28. Daily Routine - Phrases for Routine: so we know what a routine is. Now we need to know how to introduce it. Okay, so let's talk about how we can do that. To start, we need to say when things happen so very simple here we can just say and we often use the present tense, by the way, because these are things that didn't only happen before because it's part of your routine. It's stuff that you do often right so we can use the present tense, which makes it a lot easier to describe your routine, because when you're doing it in the past, it can be difficult to remember the past tense, right, so we can just use the present tense you don't need to use will either just use the present tense, but we often use words of frequency words a frequency like usually sometimes often regularly. I think you probably know most of these words, so let's let's start with time at 10 at 10 at 10 that's probably going to be 10 a.m. If you don't say P M or A M, and the situation makes it pretty clear that you're talking about either morning or evening . It's OK to leave that out. I could say I usually go to bed around 10 so that's going to be PM I usually get up around 10 or go to work around 10. Probably that's going to be a M. And if it's not, then you will say I have a very weird job where I go to work at 10 p.m. At night, right? You'll say that you'll say PM if it's different, but otherwise we can often leave that out. OK, so at 10 I, usually I usually have a snack. And then within that usually maybe there's a Sometimes you could say sometimes I have. Ah, sometimes sometimes I have Ah, cookie. As a treat, you could say, but more often more often. I have some fruit but a cup of fruit. You have a very good diet. Good eating habits, right? We can use sometimes, even though it's inside. Usually. Usually you have the snack, but when you have this knack, sometimes it's a cookie mawr. Often it's fruit. If you're healthy, healthy person, I don't want to eat too many cookies. You'll get fat. Don't want to do that. That is no good. OK, we could also say when we do things in order to help keep things in order, right? A routine is usually this followed by this followed by this. This this, this, this this this this we don't always want to use the time because that can start to feel repetitive can start to feel like it's repeating too much. We can instead use after that after that. After that. So you could say, for example, after that, I often I often check you check my email or I often respond to some emails. That would be a pretty typical thing to do after a snack. You don't need to say after my snack, because we just said that we had a snack. I have a snack, usually at 10. After that. After the snack is over, I usually check my emails, and then you can say maybe where you check them. If you want to mention where it happens, you could say at at my my desk. But you don't have to say at my desk, because that might be maybe obvious. Maybe it's kind of obvious that you check emails at your desk so you can add details or not . sometimes in the routine. There's something that happens if this happens. But maybe this doesn't happen. So then we can introduce it like this. If if I don't take the bus if I don't take the bus, I usually remember the pronunciation of usually is you Usually usually I usually walk. So instead of driving right, this kind of suggests that you do usually take the bus. But there are times when you don't. And when you don't, you usually walk. Don't let that confuse you. Just because I say I usually walk. That doesn't mean I usually walk. I usually walk when I don't take the bus. So maybe I take the bus this often, like 90% of the time. This is the bus. But maybe maybe these are the times. When I missed the bus, right, the bus left. I missed it. And so what do I do in these times? Now, forget about the first. Usually forget about how often that happens. Now, we're only talking about this period of time. I usually walk where I usually drive my car or I usually take a taxi. So that's okay to do the in fact, that's a very common thing to do. But to be clear, sometimes our actions depend on whether or not things happen that are completely out of our control. If if it rains. Okay, so what do you do when it rains? If it rains, I take a taxi and you can do this for everything. When you're describing what you're doing usually or on a regular basis on a regular on a regular basis, then you can use this basic structure. If this I do this and it can be a choice that you make if I and then what happens after that? Or it could be something out of your control, something that just happens if it rains. There are times when maybe if isn't the best phrase to use because we want to focus on the fact that every single time this happens, I do this or we do this. So there we can use whenever, whenever focuses on every time before we said, If it rains right, Maybe I do this. Maybe I do this whenever means every time whenever my boss is out of the office, Maybe he's on a business trip, right? Whenever my boss is out of the office. Everyone in my department, what's something silly brings beer to work, brings beer, brings beer whatever you want to say. But the point is that it happens every time this happens. That doesn't mean your boss is always gone. Every time your boss is gone, you bring beer to the office. One of the things that's part of a normal professional day. If you're a student, then maybe would just say lunch or sometimes your lunch period, Right? Lunch is the time when you eat lunch right, Or if you're an office worker or you have a job where you need to have or keep regular hours, you might say my lunch break. This is the special time during the day when you can stop working and take lunch or eat lunch. It doesn't mean that you actually eat something, although probably you do. The point is, it's this specific time set aside for you to do that. So maybe you have a one hour lunch break or, ah, 30 minute lunch break. I'm on my lunch break. People will say, I'm on my lunch break. Hey, look, can you, um would you please talk to this client were Ah, you know, we really need We really need your help. Oh, I can't. I'm on my lunch break. I would be a terrible office worker. I would be an awful co worker, I think. Typically after my lunch break, I have a few meetings. Typically after my lunch break. I have a few meetings. Okay, That means it doesn't happen every time, but most of the time it does. In fact, you can say most of the time can say, most of the time something's air. Not really strict in time. Maybe your lunch break is always at 12 from 12 toe 1 12 toe one. But often when we get off of work or get out of school, we can use around to say that it happens near that time. So maybe you have to do some extra work after school every day, and you don't leave school until around 4:30 p.m. It's OK. You can say that most of the time I get out of school around around 4 30 and, of course, that 4 30 means PM. We don't have to say PM because nobody gets out of school. At 4:30 a.m. That is crazy. I get off work. OK, get off work, you could say by around by around five. I'm usually ready to go home or by around five. I'm usually done with my work or by around five. I usually leave the office by around five I, usually by around five. I usually leave the office or again, get off work, get off of work. This is a way to say something happens near a time, but it's not fixed. If something is very fixed, well, then you should just use at. I have lunch at 12 or I have lunch from 12 to 1. Or if you're a student, you could say I get out of school at 3 30 That means it's the same every single day and it happens exactly at 3 30 Exactly. Then okay, there's no flexibility around is near about, is near by around, is also okay. I usually get off around 3 30 I usually leave by around 3 30 That means before 3 30 on up to 3 30 or if it's specific use at or if it happens between this time and this time we can say from two from 12 toe one 29. Daily Routine - Personal Details: I just want to mention one thing. That's part of ah, routine. That's a little bit more personal about our sleeping habits. So if we say that we get up where we wake up, are these the same? Not exactly. No. So if you say that you get up, that means you get out of bed and maybe you get dressed for the day. You get dressed. That means you put your clothes on. You get dressed or you get ready, get ready for the day. Right. But if you say you wake up, that does not mean that you get up getting up. Is this action getting out of bed? Getting ready? Waking up is just opening your eyes. So some people say I usually wake up around 8 30 but I don't get up until nine. So maybe from 8 30 until nine. You're just I don't know, checking your instagram or whatever you're doing, right? You wake up. That means you're not sleeping anymore on. Then you play around on your phone and then you get up and get ready for the day. So those air different sleeping in, Does this mean that we go to sleep late. Or does it mean we sleep for a long time? Okay, So sleeping in means we get up very late, not go to bed late, Get up late. So maybe you usually get up at eight o'clock seven o'clock. But today you slept in. You decided to sleep in until 10:30 a.m. 10. 30 in the morning. I really slapped in today. I don't know why I was so sleepy. I slept in. I got up late. Go to bed. Go to sleep. Are these the same again? It's kind of like Get up. Wake up. You could go to bed at 10 on, then not go to sleep until 12. Maybe for two hours. You're playing with your phone again? I don't know, but you don't go to sleep until a certain time. You don't close your eyes and maybe until 12. So just to be clear, go to bed does not mean go to sleep. But people often say them as the same thing. I'm gonna go to bed. That suggests that you're going to go to sleep, right? But I just want to be clear that you can use them separately if you want to, cause they're not exactly the same 30. Daily Routine - Explaining Responsibilities: in life. We have responsibilities, things that we need to take care of. If you do all of your responsibilities very well, then people may say that you're very responsible. That's the kind of person you are. You're a responsible person. OK, but what phrases or words can we use to explain our responsibilities to others? Well, there are a couple that are very common, and I want to go through those because when you're talking about your routine or when you're describing to others what you do, Or maybe you're telling others what they need to dio, you may need to use these phrases. Okay, so 1st 1 I'm in charge of and then we could say either a noun or in action, and we can use i N g after it. So you could say I'm in charge of interviews upset. So tonight, the I eat the US interviews in the H R department H R stands for, by the way, human resources R. C s human resources. Okay, I'm responsible for interviews in human resources or I'm in charge of interviews in the human resources or HR department. Okay, You could also say I'm in charge off making sure that we deliver everything on time. Whatever you're doing, you can say making sure I'm in charge of making sure that something happens, whatever it is. So it's a very useful phrase to explain the thing that you need to do. It's your responsibility you're in charge of doing I n g that thing. But we could also say Need. I'm sure you probably know this one, but I need to make sure So it's sort of like making sure same thing. I need to make sure I need to make sure that we follow all the regulations, regulations, air like rules, regulations, air like sometimes laws, whatever I need to make sure it's the same as saying, I'm in charge of making sure you can use either one, it doesn't really matter. I need to make sure that we follow all the regulations. I'm in terms of making sure we follow all the regulations when problems happen. If you're responsible for the action that needs to be taken, when that problem happens, we can go back to that word that we mentioned before. Whenever again. That means every time, so we could say whenever there are delays delays means something is not on time. Something is a little a little late. Whenever there are delays, it's my it's that's an s. Can you imagine? That's an S. It's my job. It's my job to maybe push the team, push the team to hit the deadline. L I N e hit the deadline. OK, so here's a team. This team has to do some work. Maybe the team is making a video, okay, and there are delays because maybe one person is sick, so the whole team is a little bit late. Okay, Whenever there are delays, whenever that thing happens, for whatever reason, whose job is it to deal with this problem? It's my job, my job. I'm responsible for it. I'm responsible for making sure we hit the deadline. I need to make sure we hit the deadline. It's my job to push the team to hit the deadline. Or we could say to make the deadline said this is the one that you would use when you want to explain what you're responsible for whenever X happens, whatever it is, when we're talking about our responsibilities, we also need to talk about consequences. Consequences? What happens if something bad happens. What happens? Maybe if something good happens, these are consequences the result of something else. OK, so let's say if I don't finish, don't finish my part. Maybe everybody has a part. Let's say it's this video project. We're trying to make a video for advertising or whatever. If I don't finish my part, the rest of the team maybe can't go home or the rest of the team has to work overtime or the rest of the team will have to do my work for me. Whatever it is we're talking about, what happens if this thing happens and it could be a good thing or a bad thing? Okay, Whenever we get an award, the whole team gets to go up on stage. Not just me, not just the leader. So consequences are the results, and we can use this type of sentence, this expression to explain the consequences of a specific thing That happens if I don't finish my part, my job, my responsibility, everybody needs to work overtime and then we have to pay everybody over time. And maybe we can't afford that. I cant afford something. Means you don't have enough money to pay for it or you're just not able to pay for it. Maybe it's too much for you. We could have used that in the last lesson when we were talking about the apartment. I can't afford 1500. I can't afford it. It's out of my price range. It's over my budget, Okay, so let's now look at a really life example of a routine and how we can put all of these things together in a really natural way. 31. Daily Routine - Routine Example: So now that we know the phrases to use to describe a routine, we can actually get into it. We can actually look at it in real life. Okay, this is not my daily routine. Just so you know, it's not riel, but it's like a real one. Okay, I usually get up at 6 30 a. M. We don't have to say am Wash my face and brush my teeth. Brush my teeth. Okay. My workplace is far away from from my home, so it takes me about an hour. Takes me about an hour to get there by subway. Could say an hour to get there on foot an hour to get there by bicycle. Whatever. I don't have time to make breakfast myself. I don't have time to actually sit down and make it to make breakfast myself, typically, but luckily sounds a little weird typically and luckily, but they're used very differently, so it's OK, but luckily, there is a really good convenience store. On the way to the subway to convenience store is a little shop that maybe sells snacks, sandwiches, drinks, coffee on the way to the subway so I can grab a sandwich or something. Maybe it's a sandwich or something else. That means probably it's usually a sandwich. Okay, I get to my office by around 7 30 So again we have by around here, that means probably before or up to and then 7 30 Maybe it's 7 20 Maybe it's 7 25 which is before the rest of the staff. The staff is everybody in the company, right? It's called the staff. A staff member, staff member, one of the staff. So the staff is this whole group of people who work at the company because work doesn't actually start until eight. I've got free time to relax. So what does work mean here? Well, this place must have some sort of rule that says everybody has to begin at eight. Okay, maybe there's a punch in clock. Puncheon means that you actually need to push a button or scan a card or tap your finger on something to begin your work hours. Maybe you're paid by the hour an hourly wage. So that's when work starts. So I've got 30 minutes. I've got free time to relax, have a cup of tea on watch videos or read this is a pretty normal routine of somebody who's getting ready for the day, getting dressed, washing their face and then going to work pretty normal. It helps me center myself before the busy day ahead. What has center myself mean? So to center yourself means to calm down, to keep your mind quiet, to relax a little bit so that you're able to deal with maybe stress pressure. Stress is usually something that's inside a feeling that we have inside. I have so much stress. Pressure is usually from the outside, giving me a lot of pressure. Everybody around me is giving me so much pressure. So I feel a lot of stress. I feel stressed. Okay, so centering myself, watching some videos. Relax, T OK, so then I need to start my daily responsibilities. Okay. I am in charge of making sure that everyone in the office has a checklist. We know the phrase I'm in charge of making sure everybody who works here needs to have a list. You need to do this. This, this, this this and when you finish it, you need t check it off. That's why it's called a check list. A checklist of things to finish by the end of the day before the end of the day. If the day means, for example, from eight, if it starts exactly at eight, if it's a very strict office and everybody has to punching at eight and then finish it maybe five or six or whatever that is when work finishes, that is the end of the day. Okay, so that means before or up to that time. Okay, I also need to I also need to send out emails to different departments to remind them of monthly events and various deadlines. Okay, So to remind somebody is to help them, remember, I'm just reminding you. I'm reminding you that we have an appointment tomorrow. I'm reminding you that we have a meeting tomorrow, so please don't forget. Oh, that reminds me. I need to buy some chocolate at the store. Thank you for reminding me. Thank you for reminding me. It's different than remember guy to remind us something outside another thing makes you remember something that reminds you or a person reminds you. Okay. Also need to send out emails to different departments. Departments are the different groups within a company. I mentioned HR before a normal company may have HR Human Resources. They might have administration. They might have, maybe a purchasing department, many different types of departments. Nowadays, a lot of companies have maybe a social media department or, of course, a marketing department to advertise to customers or clients. So there are a lot of different types of departments of monthly events and various deadlines. Remember, deadlines are things we need to finish, and the deadline is the time the deadline is tomorrow. Tomorrow is the deadline we have to finish before tomorrow. Various means It doesn't matter which ones were not really focusing on which deadlines we use. The word various right. Various articles just read some some various articles on the Internet. Various deadlines, right? Various ideas were not really focused on which ones. And the idea is that there all a bit different. That's what various means I'm usually done with that. That means the stuff. I just mentioned all of my responsibilities by 11 which is about lunchtime. It's about lunchtime, since there's no cafeteria in the building. Cafeteria is the place where everybody eats at a school or at an office, since there's no cafeteria in the building, I go out to a restaurant near or nearby the office. OK, everybody gets a one hour lunch break. Remember, one hyphen, our we can make an adjective gets out one hour lunch break. Honestly, I prefer eating alone my personal feeling. We often begin this kind of sentence with, honestly, Honestly, I prefer eating alone. But sometimes I eat with some of my colleagues, colleagues, colleagues. What's the difference between colleagues and coworkers? Isn't really a difference. Sometimes colleagues might be a little bit higher level, right? So maybe business people will talk about their their associates or people they work with as colleagues. And maybe co workers are just people in your office, right? People who work in the same office as you so colleagues. This word is a bit more general, but sometimes I eat with some of my colleagues. If I'm really busy and don't have time for lunch, I may just get a snack. Snack is, Ah, small amount of food chips, an apple candy bar, something very small, a snack. Usually we eat that between meals. It's not a full meal. Ah, full meal or a snack, full meal snack OK. May just get a snack from the vending machine vending machine. The machine where you would buy the snacks, push the button, take the snack. I know it's not healthy, but you got to do what you gotta do. You gotta do what you got to do. This is a really common phrase. You've got to do what you gotta do. You gotta do what you gotta do. It basically means that sometimes you can't really choose what you'd really like. What I'd really like is a nice lunch in a restaurant. Mexican food by myself, listening to maybe a podcast. Sounds great, but I don't have time. I'm too busy today, so you got to do what you gotta do. I don't really have a choice. You got to do what you gotta do Means what we do, what we have to do when we don't really have a choice or when somebody is limiting us or when we don't have enough time. What? We don't have enough money. Basically, we have no other option. So we use this phrase. So we've talked about the phrases and the words you can use to describe your routine things . You need to do how we can explain time and our actions related to time, as well as how we describe our responsibilities. Then we looked at an example, and now I want you to actually try it yourself. You should feel pretty comfortable with these words and phrases by now, and hopefully you've listened to or gone through the example a couple times. Try it. Describe your routine in as much detail as you can. Record yourself doing it. Don't just write it down. In fact, don't write it down It all. Just record yourself. Describing your routine. Try to use the words and phrases from this lesson. Don't copy my example, but draw inspiration from it. Follow the basic structure. Start with your the beginning of your day, right. Start with the breakfast, maybe and your morning routine. Then get into work or school and describe some of your responsibilities in work or school. That's a pretty good structure to use. Record yourself and then listen to it again. And if you're not happy with it, record yourself doing it again until you're happy with it. Pick out some of the things that you're saying that maybe sound a little odd until it sounds natural and smooth. Do it again and again and you'll get used to it. You'll get comfortable with it, and that's how you gain confidence. Go for it. 32. Starting Conversations - Conversation Techniques: in the last lesson, we talked about how to describe your routine, how to talk about what you do, usually on a normal day and also how to talk about your responsibilities. In this lesson, we're going to be talking about how to start a conversation. You're probably taking this course because you want to learn how to have conversations with other people, maybe native English speakers in work situations, or maybe in your daily life. So this class will focus on how we begin those conversations. Naturally, it's actually not as hard as you may think. Once you get started in a conversation, it's pretty easy to keep it going. But getting started in a conversation can be difficult if you don't know what you're doing or how to do it. So that's what this class is all about. We're going to talk about some techniques for doing it, and then, as we always do, we're going to look at a couple of real life examples so that you can deeply get the feeling for it, so that when you go out there to have conversations, it'll be easy. Tip number one for having conversations is whenever you find yourself in a situation with other people, and you'd like to start a conversation, you first have to realize what situation you're in. You may have learned that talking about the weather is always a good way to begin talking with somebody, right? It's pretty hot these days, isn't it? This is the traditional way that many English language learners are taught to begin conversations. Oh, it's Ah, it's pretty hot today, but this is a little bit awkward and doesn't work in every situation. How about this weather? Thes air, sort of the traditional things. What you can do instead is pay careful attention to what the situation is on. When you do that, you will see what you share with the other person, the person you want to talk with. And when you realize what you share with that person, you'll be able to pick out a good question that is natural that can make that person want to say something, or pick out a good comment to say to the other person that will make them want to talk with you, right, So focus on where you are. Are you at a doctor's office? Are you in the park. Are you in a class? Are you in your workplace? What things do you have in common with that person? Then how can you make a comment or a question based on that Now? Sometimes the thing that you have in common is not the whole situation itself, but something the other person is doing or wearing right? For example, if you like skateboarding and you see another person skateboarding, obviously that's the thing that you should use to begin a conversation. But it could also be what somebody's wearing. Maybe a watch, and you know something about watches and you can use that will look at examples of how to do that later on. So these are the two questions I ask myself before I start a conversation with somebody, and I'm thinking about how to begin, what to say, right, that first difficult thing. Whether it's a comment or question, what situation are we in? What do we have in common? Whatever you come up with, then after you ask yourself, these questions can then be the basic idea that you use to make a comment or ask a question to the person you want to start a conversation with, If you ask a question, that comes out of nowhere and it's just a shot in the dark. Do you like basketball? Then it's likely probable that the person you asked that question, too, will feel uncomfortable. Awkward, awkward. But if it is really an interesting question that focuses on what is shared between you, then that person will feel interested in what you asked and we'll want to talk. Make it your goal. To say something that makes the other person wants to say something back. If you're doing all the hard work, then it's not really a conversation. So, for example, a lot of people send me messages on wechat, right? I'm always on on we chat, which had is Ah, it's like Facebook messenger. If you don't know it and they often say, for example, how long have you been using? We chat Well, that's it. That's a pretty good question, because that's the first time they've connected with me on Wechat, and it's something we both have in common. Hey, we both use, we chat. So it's an interesting question. It makes me want to answer it. So maybe if somebody has seen one of my other courses or video and messages. Me, we can use the fact that we don't know each other toe ask interesting questions like, Which city do you live in? And then we can ask more questions about that. The thing we have in common is that we don't know physically where the other person is, because maybe we're contacting on we chap sometimes email because we don't know that that could be the thing that we share. So that could be the interesting question. Which city do you live in? Which country do you live in? Where you from? And we use the same basic idea to make comments again. If somebody messages me who I've never talked to before, maybe because they saw a video or maybe saw one of my courses, they might say, for example, you've probably seen so many different kinds of incorrect English, which is absolutely right. And then I'll say yes, absolutely. And then maybe I'll want to share. Ah, funny story. That one is not based on where we are. It's based on something that we share, which is that maybe I've taught languages and you're learning languages so messaging me, using that thing that we share, and making a comment about what may be true about my life and about me, even if it's wrong is a good start, because if it's not right, at least I can correct you. And that can be. That could be an interesting beginning point as well. When you're starting a conversation, it's very important to judge body language. There are times when you're going to maybe start a conversation and the other person doesn't want to talk to you. You need to be able to notice that and let it go on, except that maybe this time it's not working, okay, and it's the same. If somebody's trying to talk with you and your you know not in the mood or you're thinking about something else or you're busy on your phone, you'll show that with your body language, what you do with your body, what you do with your face. Your facial expression may be so if people show impatience or if they seem like there may be a bit distracted. Or if they give very short answers, it's probably best to move on and maybe talk to somebody else because they're probably trying to show you or signal Hey, not really in the mood for a conversation now, or I just I don't really want want to talk. It's not always rude, right? But sometimes people just I don't really want to have a conversation, and that's okay. You have to be able to pay attention to people's reactions to their faces and see if they're interested genuinely in talking with you or not. If not, don't try to force it. Not a good idea. 33. Starting Conversations - First Day of Class: So now we've looked at three basic techniques that you need to pay careful attention to the situation you're in or find what you have in common. Then you need to ask interesting, insightful questions or make interesting, insightful comments said that the other person wants to speak with you, and you also need to pay careful attention to body language. Now let's actually look at some examples first, the first day of class. Let's say Let's imagine if I say Let's say it means for example. Okay, so let's say your first aid class. Your university student. You're a freshman freshman, by the way, the other three years of university. If you don't know freshman and then you're, too, is sophomore, junior and senior. Sure, many of you already already know that. Let's say there's another student sitting beside me. I feel nervous. My first lecture in college in university. What's the shared situation here? Well, everybody in this lecture hall, we're all students, right where all students and this is probably all of our first lecture, probably. So we have a lot in common. We share a lot, right? So that's great. We have many things that we could talk about. Here are a couple a couple of examples, and these are by no means the only things that you could say. But I turned to the students sitting next to me. I don't know this person. Okay, I'm going to try to begin a conversation. How much homework do you think we're going to get on the first day? How much homework do you think we're going to get on the first day? I could say, going to get, But I'll probably say gonna get gonna get gonna now. They might just say I don't know, body language. That means probably they don't want to talk to me. And maybe they say I don't think that he's going to give us any homework on the first of the first lecture. Because what could there be homework on? We're probably just going to go over the course. The course syllabus, syllabus, the overview for the whole course. Yeah, I hope so. Okay, so we've started something, right? Okay. That's one way we could say, um, are you a chemistry major too? So if we're in maybe a basic biology class, maybe a basic chemistry class, whatever, but there are a lot of chemistry students here. Chemistry majors. Me, right? Be right. That again. That's really messy. C h e m. I asked T r y. Okay. So are you a chemistry major too? I'm a chemistry major. That's what that means. Okay. And it doesn't matter if I'm right or wrong. If he says I know that I could say, Oh, what Major are you? I'm a biology major. Okay, Now we've started something. So why have you decided to take this professors biology class instead of Professor Jones? Because I heard that this professor is actually really good and kind of relaxed about exams . Yeah, I heard the same thing. We've started a conversation. Okay. Are you a chemistry major? Ah, yes, I am. Cool. Me too. All right, now we really have something in common. Why are you studying chemistry? I'm studying chemistry because someday I'd like to be pharmacists. Whatever conversation. Okay, The beginning part. All we have to do is get that beginning question. If it's interesting enough that person shows that they're willing to talk with us, they would like to talk with us by saying a little bit mawr that we can then grab on to and add to or if they say, Hey, I don't know, Then we can see Hey, they don't want to talk to me and that's just fine, Right? Okay, I heard this professor speaks really fast. Maybe it's before the professor even came into the lecture hall. Heard this professor speaks really fast. I hope that I'll be able to take enough notes because I don't want to fail my exams. You could just say this. I heard this professor speaks really fast. Then the other students says, actually, actually, he does speak really fast. But if you look back there, they're recording all of the lectures so you can actually download the lectures after class . Wow, that's great. So if I need to, I can download it and listen again. If I missed something, Yeah, that's awesome, right? Once again, we've started a conversation. It has to be on. Okay, question. It doesn't have to be an amazing question, But if you turn to that person and say, How about this weather? It's sound very silly, right? It sounds stupid. It's not related to the situation, you say. Do you like movies? Awkward, Strange, connected to the situation. Let's look at another 34. Starting Conversations - At an Event: So let's say now we're at a speaking event. We've gone to an event where there will be a speaker talking about some topic. Or maybe there will be several speakers. Or perhaps it's a conference. Several days, several speakers, a lot of different meetings, things like that. Okay, so someone's going to give a talk, and it's a well known person. Let's say his name is Francis Cane. I'm making this up. All right. So, Friends, Kane is going to give a talk. If your name is Francis Cane. That is insane. You must have communicated to me in the past. So how do you know the speaker? That this we're hanging out? Maybe before the talk, hanging out before this person's presentation. Maybe I have a beer. Maybe it's this kind of relaxed event. I've got a beer. This could be called a mixer. Sometimes there are mixtures where you have a presentation and also the opportunity to mix with other people. Well, that's the perfect opportunity to start conversations. That's kind of what mixers are for. Right? Okay, So how do you know the speaker? Actually, I worked with him several years ago. He was my boss. So the speaker maybe is ah, fairly well known person. Now, we have a lot to talk about. Or actually, I watched a couple of his lectures on YouTube, so I wanted to come to see him speak. How do you know the speaker? Actually, I'm not familiar with the speaker. What's he going to talk about? I'm just here for the mixer. So doesn't matter what the answer is. Even if they don't know the speaker, then they can say something else that you can grab onto. I'm just here for the mixer than I can say. Oh, actually, the speaker is going to be talking about or I could maybe ask some other question about why they wanted to come here for the mixer. I could say, Oh, so what company are you with, Right, My follow up question. What company are you with? Then? People can talk about the company that they represent. Or if they don't represent a company and they're they're by themselves. Well, that's also interesting. So again, it's not too important what question it is, as long as it's related to the situation or contextual and hopefully a little bit interesting again. The goal of the question should be to get the other person to want to say something. They shouldn't have to struggle to say something. Now. We could also make comments. I like your hat. Did you make that? This is a question and a comment. Maybe someone is wearing, Ah, I don't know, a really cool fedora. Maybe they're wearing a fedora, and, um, you don't usually see a person wearing a fedora at conference. They say I like your hat. Very simple. Did you make it? Maybe it looks kind of messy. Then they probably want to talk about it. If somebody is going toe, wear something that's a little different than everybody else wearing a hat at a conference , they might want to talk about it. I realized that question seems, ah, little silly, but it's something, and at least I can see if that person wants to have a conversation or not, and it is showing interest in them. It's showing that Hey, I noticed something about you and could even be somebody's shoes or the way that somebody is standing. Maybe they're standing by themselves. Andi, I could say, Hey, why are you standing by yourself? This is a mixer, right? And then they could say all well, you know, just not really in a good mood or whatever again noticed something. Notice something about them. Don't make it all about you. Make it about them, make it comment about them. Make a comment about the situation that you share, and then you can judge to see if they would like to talk to you or not. This one is just a regular comment that we could make about the situation. Not about you, not about me. I'm surprised so many people showed up here on a Tuesday. Maybe it's Tuesday afternoon and you expect people to be at work or at school. And so it's kind of unexpected that this place would be so busy, so full, this event. But maybe the speaker is very popular, so the other person could say, Well, you know, the speaker is very popular. He's got a lot of fans on YouTube, so makes sense to me. Yeah, I didn't actually know he had so many fans on YouTube actually haven't seen any of his YouTube videos. Really. You should really watch them because he's got some really great videos. Whatever you want to say conversation that can continue from there, you may notice that at no point have I said, My name is Luke. Hello, nice to meet you. My name is Luke. Usually you shouldn't begin a conversation this way. If you walk up to someone who you don't know and you say hello there. My name is Luke. It's odd. It's awkward, it's strange. So when should you say it? When should you say your name? When should you introduce yourself? That can be very quick, and it's not really a big deal. Maybe you make a comment or ask a simple question as we've been talking about. And then, at some point after a minute or two into the conversation, you say. By the way, by the way, I'm Luke. And if you just say that, they'll probably say, Oh, and I'm Kathy. Whatever the other person's name is, you could say, um, what's your name? But if you start with that, it's quite awkward, and then it's hard to get a conversation going from there. Now. You could use very general questions like, what company do you represent? But my recommendation is to first think what you have in common and then come up with the good comment. A good question, then everything else should be pretty easy. The conversation should flow, and after a while, you can say, By the way, my name is Luke. So that's pretty easy, right? So we've learned the techniques for getting conversation started with people that we don't know. We need to look at the situation itself. Think about what we share with others. Ask good questions, make interesting comments. Pay attention to body language to practice this. What I'd like you to do is look at this situation the first day of work, kind of similar to the first day of school one and come up with 3 to 5 questions. That would be good to ask somebody in this situation. Maybe it's not their first day of work. It's just your first day of work, so you might be talking to somebody who has been working here for a while. It would be a new person in the office, OK, 3 to 5 questions and then ask yourself the questions or ask somebody else the questions. A friend on practice it see if these questions help get the conversation started again. The questions should be contextual. Should be interesting and should make the other person want to say something back. Want to explain themselves? Want to talk about something? Okay, this is the key to having natural conversations with people. You just Matt. Good luck. 35. Having Discussions - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about how you can start conversations in situations where you maybe don't know other people. But you have something in common, and it's just a casual conversation, perhaps free talk. In this lesson, it's related in this lesson. We're going to talk about how you can have discussions, but what's the difference? Well, starting a conversation is how to get it going. What's the first thing you say? Right. But how to have discussions is for many more situations when you're with friends, when you're with someone who you really want to talk to and maybe you'll sit down with a cup of coffee and talk to them for a while for an hour. How do you have a good conversation? There are good discussions and bad discussions, and I'm sure that you know what a good discussion feels like and what a bad discussion feels like. Ah, good discussion means there's back and forth, right? It's not only one person talking. Both people are talking. Both people are listening. Both people are giving opinions. Ideally, both people are asking questions. So in this lesson we're going to talk about how you can keep a discussion going and how you confined the interesting points around the topic related to a topic within a topic. How you confined those things and use them to explore deeply a topic. To do this, we need to be able to think abstract Lee. That means we need to be able to think about a topic in a very general sort of way, so that we can then pick out those interesting things that can then be used to make questions that can then make the other person think, Wow, that's a good question. I have a lot to say, so let's actually get started with how we can do this in English. 36. Having Discussions - How to Ask Interesting Questions: so there are really two things that you need to keep in mind when you're doing this. One is you need to think around the topic, and two is you need to be able to ask open questions. Not every question is a good question. You have to know that first. Not every question is a good question if your goal is a good conversation and you could test that by asking those questions and seeing if other people have a lot to say. So let's first talk about what some bad questions might be for a discussion. So let's say we're talking about smoking in public, okay? This is something people talk about in America. There are a lot of rules about smoking in public, where it can be done where it can't be done on these conversations happen. Let's look at a bad question. If we're having a good discussion, there are good questions and bad questions. A bad question might be When did smoking first become band in your city? So this is a when question and the answer to this, when questioned by the way band means it became illegal. The answer to this band question doesn't really matter to the conversation. Let's say it's 1998. What can you say after that? When did smoking become band in your city? Well, either the answer is, I don't know, or I know it's 1998 with either answer. Do you really feel like Okay, now I have something to say? No, this is not a very good question at all, because it doesn't make the other person think of anything. It doesn't make them want to share an opinion. Instead, we should focus on saying something that makes the other person wants to give their opinion , because when someone asked for your opinion, you probably have a lot to say. Another example of a bad question is a very basic yes, no question like is, Is smoking allowed at the airport? It's either yes or it's no. So we have to be very careful about yes, no questions because sometimes, yes, no questions are just conversation enders. They sort of end the conversation, or they make it hard to continue. Now. Sometimes, yes, no questions work. If you said, for example, do you think smoking should be allowed at airports? Then someone could say No, I don't. And then you could say Why so asking a Do you think question can be really good as long as you follow up with why and then you get there thinking the other person's thinking behind the issue. OK, so I think we've made it clear that asking for basic information, a fact asking someone to tell you a fact about something that they may or may not know or asking them to answer a very, very basic. Yes, no question that these air bad ideas when it comes to actually communicating with another person and having a good discussion, okay, nothing wrong with those questions if you're looking for the answers. But when you have a discussion, you're not looking for the answers. Really. You're looking to engage with another person to connect with another person. Okay, so we want to keep our questions open, asking how questions asking why questions will look at some more examples of the types of questions that we can ask. But these air more open questions. But we also have to think around the topic. So I want to talk about what that really means to think around a topic think about a topic as something at the center. So this is at the center. Okay, here's Here's this thing at the center and this is our topic, which is smoking in public. Okay. What are the things that are related to this? Connected to this in some way, we have to now be able to think in the abstract to think abstract Lee. Well, we could directly ask questions about smoking in public. Okay, We could also ask questions about addiction of a D. D addiction, right? We could talk about how people are addicted to smoking. We could talk about. We could talk about peer pressure. Peer pressure is the idea that because all of my friends do something I do something on that might be related to. Why is it that more men smoke than women? Why is it that in some countries, smoking is very popular, but in others, it isn't OK we could talk about. Maybe we could talk about hypotheticals, and this is where we just sort of imagine a situation that may or may not be true. Let's say, for example, that in future medicine is so good that it's impossible for you to die from heart disease or cancer. Does that mean that we should no longer think about smoking? What do you think the future would be like in regards to smoking? If we didn't have to worry about heart disease or cancer, would smoking still be popular or not? And then you could ask, Why is that OK? So this is maybe an interesting question. We could ask lots of these sorts of hypothetical, interesting imaginary questions in imaginary situations related to the topic of smoking or health, or even addiction or peer pressure. Maybe another related topic connected to this is about public spaces. How much control should the government have over public spaces? Should the government be able to control everything about what is done in a public space? We could, of course, we could talk about health risks. Now this one. You have to be a little bit careful about, because if you just say to the other person, could you please tell me the risks involved with maybe smoking? Well, it's a little bit obvious, right? If you ask someone to tell you what risks are involved with smoking, it's kind of just a list of things. Well, you could get cancer. Well, you could get heart disease. Well, you could get this. Well, you could get this and then you're just asking people to know something, and then they're just basically telling you the list of things that they know. Is that really a discussion again? Focus more on on opinions, focus more on getting somebody's idea, focus more on getting solutions to problems. Right? So if we're talking about the health risks, maybe their obvious. But maybe we focus on one specific thing. Maybe we focus on the health risks related to, uh, mothers, right? Pregnant women. And how could we have a space for people to smoke? And at the same time, make sure that pregnant women are not exposed to what we call second hand second hand smoke ? I know we're looking for solutions when you ask somebody to give you a good idea about how to solve something. Ah, lot of the time, people will be very interested to share their idea. So all of these things air kind of connected to this idea of smoking in public. But they're not exactly on Lee the topic of smoking in public. So I just want to give you this thought before we really look at some examples. When you want to have a discussion, keep the questions open and your main focus should be to get the other person thinking about something, to give an opinion, to give a solution, to give an idea, to consider something that's hypothetical, which means not riel. Okay. And also don't just stay on that one thing. Look directly around it in the abstract and think about what ideas are related to that topic or that discussion point or whatever it is, and then use those related ideas or the topic itself. Ask those really interesting questions. If you get good at this, everyone will want tohave conversations with you. If you get good at asking good questions, then other people will really want to communicate with you and share their ideas with you and will respect you when you're having a discussion. It's not about I'll say my opinion. You say your opinion. It's about listening to what other people say and thinking about how to ask them a great question that opens up a completely new idea. Whenever I have discussions with people, I always try to focus on the questions instead of just giving my opinions, because I find the questions and the answers to those questions. If they're good questions, allows me to understand another person, mawr, and maybe maybe get a new idea that I never thought about before. 37. Having Discussions - Phrases to Start Discussions: so far in this lesson, we've been talking about the techniques that we need to have really good discussions. Now we need to look at actually some phrases that we can use to ask these questions. So let's let's look at these. This is a basic one. But we could just say What do you think are the basic reasons? What do you think are the most important reasons? What do you think are the best ways? All of these things are ways to get somebody's mind moving. Why do you think the Internet data, whatever the topic, is Okay? You're just getting their idea. So what do you think are? What do you think is and why do you think, How could people or how could we? You could use other things there. You don't have to use people. This one. How could people? How could you? How could I? How could we? Is a way to get somebody to give you a possible solution, a possible answer to a problem. And how could people get a really good education without needing to borrow $80,000 a year to go to a great university? Okay, so what do you think about that? Give me an idea. How could we do this? And I'm not going to go into that. It's just a question that we could ask if we want to discuss that. And I've had that conversation many times. I've asked that question many times. Okay, if you were that the what would you do to if you were the president of your country? What would you do to solve the issue of hunger in poor areas? Now we're thinking about a hypothetical. Remember, we talked about a hypothetical question, which is where we imagine it, right? If you were the president, we're not the president. But if you were, what would you do if people who smoked didn't need to worry about getting cancer? What would be the result? Would they still smoke or not? What, what, smoking Be really popular? Would everybody do it or not? Right. We can think about these questions. What would you do is even more open than the smoking one, because it's asking someone to describe an action. Okay, so then they're talking about steps. First I would do this, and then I would do this and it's fun. It's really fun to explore. Hypothetical. So, using this, what would you do if is a really powerful way to get somebody's brain moving? Okay. What do you think about now? Of course, this is the most basic type of question. What do you think about A And you can just say the topic. What do you think about smoking in public? Now? People are going to give a very open answer, a very wide answer. So you can use that in any conversation at the beginning. Just be careful with that one. What do you think about smoking in public? What do you think about poverty in your country? But you have to know that when you ask that question, some people might not have a great thing to say about it because maybe they haven't thought about it before. Because of that, maybe the topic will go that way. Maybe the topic will go that way. Maybe the topic will go on and die. Do you do have to be careful, but it can also be a way to really get a conversation going and not push the person you ask in this direction or that direction. Give them total freedom first and then follow them. Go with them based on where they want to go. That's also a good way Teoh, to keep a conversation going to follow another person's interests. 38. Having Discussions - Example Discussion: So on this topic of how toe have discussions, we've talked about some techniques. Then we looked at some phrases we can use to actually start these questions. And again, those air, not the Onley phrases we can use their just some examples. There are many variations, different ways of asking these questions. Now let's actually look at some real examples so that we can get a feeling about how to do this. Our topic is something I care very much about. Street food vendors, street food being not so clean sometimes. But the problem is, it's very delicious. So I always want to eat it. But I think maybe I can't. It's not very clean. So, uh, we could ask some questions if we're going to have a discussion about this. I'm always having discussions about this with friends. Okay, what do you think? What do you think could be done to ensure ensure Means? Make sure. What do you think could be done to ensure that street food vendors again these air people selling food on the street that street food vendors are selling clean food and following food safety rules? What do you think could be done sort of like saying What could we do? What could people do? That basic question that I mentioned before. Now we're getting somebody's idea about how to solve this problem. Give me some solutions, Give me some ideas. Well, we could have an app, or we could make sure that people have a yelp sticker or something like that with the QR code that people could scan. Or we need to keep street food vendors in certain areas so that the, uh whatever blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. People can give their ideas. Okay, let's look at another one. What are the best local snacks and street foods in your city? OK, so this is related to street food vendors in a very direct way. Just talking about your favorite things. Everybody likes to talk about their favorite things. So what are your favorite street foods? If you don't have any in your city, maybe you've been to a city, and you could talk about that. Oh, well, there's a blah, blah, blah, And in this city, I could talk for an hour about this one if you are going to open a falafel stand. Falafel is a halal food falafel. Maybe maybe Middle Eastern food. I like falafel. I'm not sure if there any stands that sell, just feel awful. Maybe I just like falafel so much that I call them falafel stance, even though they actually sell other stuff, too. If you were going to open up a falafel stand in New York City, N. Y. C is New York City. That's where I live. So I use this example and wanted to stand out. That means you want people to notice you. You want people to go. Oh, what's that? How would you market your stand stand? Is your where you sell, right? Sometimes it's called a cart. Sometimes it's called a stand. Sometimes in New York, it's called a truck. Okay, how would you market it? How would you promote? How would you get others to know? How would you advertise so you would use? Maybe you talk about social media. Talk about videos, talk about how you would spend money, talk about discounts and coupons. I don't know whatever you would do to get people to come to your falafel truck or your falafel stand, and it's just an example, right? But it's an interesting question. What do you think about the idea of making food carts illegal? Now? Someone could just say, I don't like the idea. Bad idea. That's a simple answer, right? But then you have to say, Well, why? Why do you think it's a bad idea? Then they have to explain. So it's okay to answer this question in a simple way and then follow with Why? So hopefully this has given you a pretty clear idea about how we can explore or talk about a main topic and then ideas related to it, and use different ways to ask questions that are interesting about interesting ideas that make the other person feel. I have something to say. This is an interesting question because you're asking me for my opinion. You're asking me to explain something about my life. You're asking me to talk, not just asking me for information. Okay, keep that in mind and let's ah, let's look at an assignment you can do to practice this. So you should have now a very good idea about how to ask these questions from the last lesson. How to start a conversation. And now here's how to ask Good questions that could make other people want to talk with you . So I'd like you to practice it. What I'd like you to do is look at this topic famous people who have dropped out of college . That means they've quit college or they quit college, for example, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. All of these three very famous people left university. They quit. Okay, Come up with three interesting questions around this topic. Using some of the phrases that we learned in this lesson. And then to test it, I would like you to ask yourself the questions and answer the questions, give the answer to the question and record yourself doing that. Or have the discussion with a friend. Ask a friend the questions If they go, Um, I don't know. Or if they say, Oh, yeah, the answer is blah, blah, blah. And then it feels like it's hard to move the conversation forward and keep going. Probably a problem with your questions. So to do this well, remember, your goal is to get the other person's brain to turn, move, get the juices flowing. We say, get the juices flowing. All right. Good luck 39. Progress and Stories - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about how toe have a discussion very, very important in everyday English, especially if you wanna have better friendships. Right? In this lesson, though, we're going to talk about how you explain things not only how we describe things in detail , but how we connect our memories to those things, how we connect our emotions to those things. Remember earlier in the course we talked about descriptions. This will be connected to that. But we're going to also connect our feelings to the descriptions that we give. And when we do that, what we basically, if it's about an event or if it's about things that happened to us in the past, we call that a story. And stories are a very deep part of human culture, a very deep part of how humans how people talk to each other. So I believe this is just my opinion. I believe that stories are everywhere around us, even in our daily lives. I believe that you tell stories much more than you think you actually do. That's what I believe. I think that when we when we talk about what happened to us today and we say what terrible thing our boss did when we talk about the great thing that happened last week on our vacation. And we share the unexpected thing where the unexpected, maybe the unexpected person we met, that's a story. And if you're able to lay out not only the details of the story but also express your emotions and your feelings and the things that happened in a way that a really interesting people are going to want to focus on you, right? So in this class, we're going to be talking about progress, and we're going to try to make it more like more like a story. Okay, progress means something usually is moving forward and getting better. When we talk about progress, we don't talk about things getting worse. We talk about things getting better. Whether it's our culture. Maybe it's our culture. Maybe it's education. We're gonna focus on progress as a way to as a way to focus ourselves around these skills related to telling stories, and I'm gonna share some important vocabulary words we need to know. Then we're gonna talk about a couple of tips and then we'll look at on example so that you can get a feeling about how to do that so that you can actually see the tips and the words that we're going to learn in action. 40. Progress and Stories - Key Vocabulary: So now let's just look at a couple of key vocabulary words and a few phrases that we can use for what we're going to talk about in this lesson. So let's start with development. Well, we talked about progress. That means things are getting better with time. Moving forward development can be very similar to progress. It's often used in the same way, but development can also be related to something just getting maybe more mature. For example, when we when we went to explain our personalities, when we want to talk about getting older, we're talking about maturity, and sometimes we're talking about physically getting bigger, so we often call that development. But we usually don't call that progress. Development doesn't always have to be in the direction of it's getting better and better and better not necessarily develop. Maybe just means it's getting a little bit Mawr, sometimes complicated, sometimes more mature. Sometimes it's just getting a bit more advanced, and it's not always a good thing, but it's very similar. Development has other meanings as well, but that's the one we're going to focus on. Functionality is often used to talk about technology. We could be talking about gadgets that's a G could be talking about gadgets. We could be talking about bigger things, like satellites. Gadgets are usually smaller, but it's often Elektronik stuff. Okay, and functionality is what those things do. So if we're talking about our devices like our cell phones, for example, or smartphones, smart phone is a phone that can use the Internet. Maybe has APS. We're gonna talk about that. Usually when people review a smartphone or B by one, they ask questions about its functionality. What can it do is basically the meaning of functionality. What can this thing do? And again, it's often used for technology. If something is very simple, very basic. Maybe, um, it was useful a long time ago, but now there are many, many things which are better than it. Then we will use the word primitive. Sometimes primitive can be related to ideas that could be related to people. It could be related to traditions, primitive traditions. It could be related to technology. You could have a technology like a ah phone from when you were a kid, right, and that technology seems now very primitive. Our smartphones now are very advanced. They seem very modern compared to the primitive phones that we used to carry around, maybe in the 19 nineties. Now old school is, I think, a really interesting one old school is related to the idea of something being kind of classic, and so it's often used in a good way. Well, that phone is old school. If somebody pulls out what's called a flip phone that you flip open, it's got a flip phone. If somebody takes out a flip phone and says, Yeah, you go, Whoa, that phone is old school. That's not to be too critical. It's often to say that's kind of interesting that you have really old flip phone, old school, old school. It's used in sports used for technology to use for ideas it's used for. Sometimes fashion. Old school got nothing to do with school. Now there are a few phrases we can also use when we're talking about things that happened in the past, which is what we're going to do in this. In this lesson, we're going to be focusing on past telling. A story back then is used when you already have said another time. So, for example, in 1999 When I was in sixth grade, right. I had a math teacher who was always very critical of me. Back then, there was no way for students to give feedback to their teachers, so back then is used once. You've already said the time to reference it so that you don't need to say that year again or that time again. It's often used for a time long ago. It's not used for usually 20 minutes ago, our hours ago or even months ago. It's usually used for years ago. Way back then, we can also say way back then way back then when I waas. So this is a very simple one, and we use this one to either talk about our age in a certain time in the past or our status at a certain time. In the past, when I was 10 years old, you could also say, when I was in middle school in middle school. This is a way to again give the person listening to your story ah, clear idea about the time so that they're able to picture that very well. Before you say what happened as we talked about in our earlier lesson about description. It's very important to give a clear picture to the other person before you actually get into more details or more complicated things. Now I could on Lee, and I could. Even These two are very common when we want to talk about limitations and things that are so good that they have some big advantage that basically the same structure. But they have almost opposite meanings. If I say I could on Lee, then we're talking about limitation. Limitation means something. You cannot do something something cannot do. So, for example, when I was a kid about 12 years old, I remember I got a, uh, at the time it was called a flash drive. A little card. A little USB actually was a USB thumb drive that could Onley could Onley store about 50 pictures. Now, that's unbelievable to think about something that only stores 50 pictures back then, I could only store 50 pictures or songs in my USB drive. Today, the U. S. B drive I have can store whole you Timmy courses can store much more. It could only do that back then it was limited. Okay, it could even is pretty much the opposite here. If you say it could even do this, it's like saying this is good, This is good And, wow, there's one more, which is even better. So let's look at an example for how we could use that and were often going to be talking about functionality, for example, of technology when we use it. Could only or it could. Even I had a slider phone in high school. I was gonna put HS slider. Phone is a phone that you would slide up and slide down. Not really a smartphone. Okay, now there are many limitations with a smartphone like that are sorry, a phone like that, a phone like that. So then I could say it was it Waas really advanced at the time, so maybe it compared to phones now it can't do much, but at that time, wow, it was really advanced. It could do a lot of things. Should we say it was really progressed? No. Just to be clear, when we talk about that thing, the adjective of that thing, we say it's very advanced. Sometimes we say it's very developed, although often for a phone for technology we don't use developed. We use developed maybe for language we use. It developed for a person we use developed for a topic or a maybe a subject, right? Very developed country. Even we could say developed. Advanced is often for technology, So I had a slider phone in high school. It was really advanced at the time. Was really advanced at the time. It could even or I could. Even if I say it could even I'll say what it can do. If I say I could even I'll say what I could do with it. I could even listen to music on it. I could even listen to music on it, what? At that time, you could listen to music using headphones on a phone. Yeah, it could even connect to the Internet What it could connect to the Internet. Yes, yes, pretty advanced for that time or pretty advanced at the time, so these words and phrases can be used in many ways, but the reason I share them is because they are very common as ways to talk about things that happened in the past, which improved over time things which developed over time things which progressed over time , and since we're really talking about technology and its progress over time, it's important to know these words and phrases. So let's now move on and talk about an example a real example of how we can do this, how it can tell a story about the past. 41. Progress and Stories - Storytelling Tips: Now that we have a few useful words and phrases for telling stories, let's tell a story we're gonna talk about. I'm going to talk about my memory of computers throughout my life. Okay, I'm gonna talk about not only the functionality of the computers, but I'm also going to talk about some of my memories connected with them. And hopefully, when you hear my story, you'll think, Oh, it's a really interesting story And it might remind you of some things from when you were younger. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe we have different different experiences. There are two very important tips that you need to keep in mind before I do tell this story about the progress of computers in my life through my own experience. Number one. And it seems very simple to say this, But do not forget the past tense. One of the most common problems for non native English speakers English learners is that they forget the past tense when they should actually use it. This is a huge one. It seems so basic. And maybe you think, ah, doesn't matter. It's so small. It matters because when you're not careful about this, you sound like where? You're clearly saying to other people, I'm not a native English speaker, not very fluent in English. It's so basic and yet often very hard because there are so many times to remember to do it . So it's got to become a deep habit. Now, how can you build that deep habit to remember to use the past tense when you know you should? Well, one of the problems that many people have is that they forget because they're speaking too fast. So what you can do is slow down when you learn the piano. Do you start playing the piano that it a little bit? No. You start playing very slowly thing right? Very slow. Then you master it and increase your speed. Slow down. Listen to what you're saying. Did you just say and then I go to the store? Did I just say and then I go to the store? Oh, I did you need to say, And then I went to the store or as I was going to the store. The point is you need to be able to hear what you just said, what is coming out of your mouth because that is the first step to being able to catch mistakes, and the reason I always ask you to record after each lesson is that you can begin to listen to those and here where you're making mistakes and self correct. The next step is to be able to hear them as you're speaking, and if you speak slowly, you can do that and then you're able to actually self correct. Maybe before it even comes out of your mouth, and then that sounds natural, and that then will become a habit. And once it becomes a habit, then you won't need to think about it anymore. I don't think about grammar when I speak English. I don't think about the past tense. When I speak English, it just comes out of my mouth. It's such a deep habit, so I want you to keep this in mind when you're telling your story that you don't need to do it quickly. There's no pressure to speak quickly. OK, that's the first thing. The second thing, the second tip you need to keep in mind is that no story is interesting. If it's all details, so make sure you connect emotion and memory to it. What was your life like at that time, what other things were going on? How did you feel about that thing? It's very important to connect those things to the details, because if you don't, then it's just a description of a thing, which is very boring. People like to hear about how you felt at the time or people right where humans so keep those two things in mind. Let's actually look at my story. 42. Progress and Stories - A Story of Progress: when I was really little. Back in the early nineties, my dad had an old word processor. An old word processor word processor is what Microsoft Word is. It's basically something that you would use just for writing. Okay, but it was a whole computer only for that. My dad had an old word processor and it could only do one thing. Process words. It had no games. And so I wasn't interested at all. Okay, that trust sharing my emotions, trying to share my feeling about this thing Back then, most computers were similar to that. Very simple. No games, no fun. A few years later, though, our family got a brand new computer with Windows 95 Windows 95 that had way more functionality that could do much more. It could. It could do many, many more things. It had a color screen, games M s paint and it could even play videos. It could even play videos, but no Internet. It could also say it had no Internet. There was no Internet. It totally blew. My mind at first means something so amazing or so crazy You can't believe it. It totally blew my mind at first, and I was so excited to use it. Okay, so I'm talking about what it had some of the functionality and also trying to connect my emotion in that time back then, too, to getting that computer. I played some of those games for hours on end and still feel nostalgic about ski free An M s paint ski free was a game where you were a skier and you'd ski down a mountain And then at the end of the game, the this this monster would come out and eat You would always eat you always And it was very frustrating and very scary. But the game was super fun. Nostalgia is this feeling of, ah, warm emotion A happy memory connected to something In the past I never had a smell come into your nose on Suddenly it brings you back to when you were in high school your first girlfriend where you hear a song and it does the same When I think of M s paint or I see or I see the ski free monster I'm transported back. So I feel nostalgic. When I was 10 we got a Dell and that computer could connect to the Internet, but it was really, really slow. Web pages would take 20 seconds to load, and I'd have to use the phone line to connect. You couldn't be on. And when I say you couldn't be on this is called the impersonal you. It just means anybody who's doing that, Anybody who's using the Internet, you when you want to succeed in life, you have to work hard. Maybe I'm just saying that in general, to anybody who wants to be successful or may want to be successful, the impersonal you you couldn't be on the phone and using the Internet at the same time. So if I was chatting with my friends on A I M, which is a very popular chat or messenger at the time, if I was chatting with my friends on a I am, sometimes my mom would shout upstairs, Hey, get off the Internet. I need to call Grandma because I was using the Internet. The phone line was blocked because it went over the phone. So when my mom needed to make a call, she had asked me to stop looking at my email or whatever, so that she could make a phone call. Very primitive, right? Very, very primitive. Now, if I were telling this story more casually with friends, I would probably go into even more detail on each point. I wanted to give you a simple example so that you could get a feeling and see how I would connect my emotions nostalgic about this. Or I was so excited about this, how I would connect my emotions to the thing that was happening. Or the actual object, the actual computer, the actual technology, right? So I hope that gives you a clear idea about how we can use some of these words and phrases and also how we can tell a story. That's interesting keeping in mind that if I were telling the story more casually, I would say probably much, much more, and I would be much more casual. I would just speak freely. I'm writing this down for you so that you can see it. So now it's time to practice this, but I'd like you to do is tell me about the phones that you've owned in your lifetime. The phones that you remember throughout your life may be starting with a landline phone on , then moving to the phone that you own now, maybe a smartphone. Talk about the differences between the phones, the functionality, but also talk about what was going on in your life at the time. Some of your memories that are connected to that thing. How did you use it, Right? And that again. Try to connect emotion to events and description. Try to use some of the words and phrases that we learned earlier in the class. You don't have to use all of them. Certainly I didn't try to use some of them right like back then, which is an easy one to use. Try to use these when you do it and you record it and then you listen back to it. If it's a good story at some point, you should smile if you smile, or maybe your mom smiles or your friends miles with a listen to it that at least you know that you've made something. You've done something that eyes able to move people, and that's what stories are all about, whether it's a happy story, a sad story or just one that is connected to you're really emotions in some way 43. Ordering in a Restaurant - Overview: in the last lesson, we talked about how to tell a story, and we talked about progress connecting details in time in the past with our emotions and also what we were doing at that time in a linear way, linear, by the way, means in order this and this and then this and then this linear, linear, linear means in order. Okay, well, we're going to do something that's also in order. In this lesson, we're going to be talking about how we order food in order. That means you do this and then you do this. It's linear. Okay, we're going to talk about when you go to a restaurant, how you ask for what you want, how you explain what you want. And we're also going to talk about some of the other kinds of things you may need to say in the restaurant. Some of the other things that may happen in the restaurant when you want to get your food. That's what we're going to do in this lesson. Now we're going to talk first about a couple of phrases that are important, that you need to know when you're going to ask for things and then we're going to actually look at how to talk with the waiter. Some things you may need to say before you actually order your food. Then we'll look at an example of an order. How you would say what you want. We'll look at a similar to real life example, and then we'll talk about payment. We'll talk a bit about how to ask for the check, which is very simple, and then we'll have, ah, practices well, so let's get started. 44. Ordering in a Restaurant - Ordering Phrases: so whether you're in a restaurant or not, there are some common ways to ask for things, and we've looked at a couple of these phrases before, so some of this will be review. Okay, but we do want to talk about a couple of key phrases, especially for being in a restaurant. We can say, Of course, I'd like you can say this on an airplane. You can say this in a restaurant. You can say this to your friend. Do you need anything? I'd like a glass of water that's a little bit too polite in some situations, but especially if you're on an airplane. If you're at a restaurant, very, very common, I'll have. If you go to Starbucks and you want to order a coffee, you could say, I'll have cappuccino. I'll have a lot. I'll have an Americano, whatever you want to have, or you could make it a question. Could I please have the question? Could I please have in Americana, or could I please have a menu? Could I please have a Diet Coke? Whatever you want to say, very common as well. Sometimes we may want to express a little bit less certainty. And so we might say, I guess I guess I'll take This is just a way to make it sound a little bit more casual, perhaps. Ah, I guess I'll take chicken burrito. Chicken burrito? Yeah. Sometimes it also shows that you're not totally confident about your choice. Can I get Ken? Can I get Can I get a glass of red wine, please? And this is also a question. Can I get a glass of red wine, please? Okay. And then finally, I think I'll order, I think I'll order the chocolate cake for dessert. I think I'll order the chocolate cake. So these are basically, if you know how to use these. Well, these are the most common phrases for asking for what you want. If you stop this lesson right now, stop watching. At least you have this. These are the basics. But we are going to go into how they're used in context. Remember, we do things in context on the reason that we do everything in context in the situation with real examples is because just knowing one sentence makes it hard to actually then use because you're not sure if that one sentence exactly fits, right. So when we look at examples, you can get a better feeling for how these phrases air used. So we'll go through a real situation ordering in a restaurant and leading up to ordering. So let's let's do that. 45. Ordering in a Restaurant - Arriving at the Restaurant: So let's say that we're not going to McDonalds or a fast food place at a place like that. You don't need a waiter. Let's say we're going to a place where there is a waiter and you're going to sit down. Sometimes we call this a sit down restaurant, okay? Or we sometimes say that we're dining in. But we often say it's a sit down restaurant, which means it's a little bit mawr formal. When you walk into the restaurant, the person at the door is actually not the waiter. Probably that person may be called Ah, host or hostess Host is a man, and the hostess is a woman. Waiter is a man. Waitresses, a woman host, hostess, waiter, waitress. Okay, now this person, the host or hostess is the person who greets you at the door, takes you to your table, or maybe checks your reservation reservation. A reservation means that you have called beforehand to to actually get a table right, and that's very simple. You would just say you would call the restaurant and say, I'd I'd like to book or reserve a table for six under on then your family name. Maybe Jones under Jones, or I'd like to book a table for a six. Then they'll say what time? And you say, 07 30. Okay. And what's the name? Jones. If you want to say it all together, you can. But the person on the phone will probably miss some details. If you say I'd like to book were reserve a table for six under Jones at 7 30 They're writing all that down, so just say a little bit. First. You could even start with the very beginning. Ah, Hello. I'd like to book a table for six. Okay, Short. What time? 7 30 Okay. A table for six at 7 30 And what's the name? It's Jones. Okay, great. So it's a table for six at 7 30 under. Jones. Yep. That's correct. Okay. Thank you very much. That's very simple. OK, when you walk into the restaurant, then if you have that reservation one common question that the host or hostess may ask you , this person may ask you is Do you have a reservation? Do you have a reservation? And the answer? If it's Yes, it's a yes. I have a table for six. And you'd say the same information they might say. OK, what's the name? Yes, I have a reservation at 7 30 What's the name? It's Jones. Okay, great. Now if they don't ask this question or if you don't have a reservation and you go in and they say, Do you have have a reservation? You say no or they ask you directly. How many? How many people or how many? How many or how many people? Then you just say how many people we have? Six, six people or we need or I need. It's OK. We need a table. 46 A table for six. Okay, we're at the restaurant. Maybe you have to wait a few minutes. They might say, Oh, well, unfortunately, we don't have a table right now. There is a 10 minute wait. Is that OK? Yeah, that's all right. That's fine. There's a 10 minute wait. Well, let's just start the situation fresh and make it simpler by saying we just have to people. I want to do it a little bit simpler. We've done the reservation thing, so let's just say we walk into the restaurant. There's a hostess and she just says How many and it's me and another person. And I say I'm a table for two. Please. Table, table for two, please. That I should actually have a common there. A table for two, please. And she could ask me and brought a reservation, but we've set a table for two. We know how to do that. All right, Now I want to make a specific request. I say she says Okay. And I say, Do you do you, uh, have any seats or tables by the window by the window? Do you have any seats or tables by the window? Don't say seats or tables. Say, do you have any seats by the window? Do you have any tables? By a window or whatever you want to say? Okay. Um, yeah, we do. We do Or let me check. Let me check. Maybe she doesn't know. She might say, Let me check. Let me check. Let me see. Yes, we do. Right this way. Right this way, please. Follow me. And then I usually say, Oh, great. Great. Then I follow her or him if it's a host. OK, so that's the first part. We know how to do a reservation When they ask how many we say A table for two, we could just say to And then if we need to make a specific request, we say, Oh, and could we get a table by the window? Could we get a table next to the bar or far away from the bar or whatever you want to say? 46. Ordering in a Restaurant - At the Table: So we sit down at the table and probably the hostess will give us some menus. If not, maybe our waiter or our waitress will come over and introduce themselves and they'll say, I'll be I'll be your waitress, your waitress this evening. I'll be your waitress this evening. And then she'll probably Or he will. Probably if it's a waiter, give you a menu or some menus. OK, if for some reason they don't get menus, you could say you could say, Could we look at some menus, please? Could we look at some menus, please? Now I think you probably know what a menu is. But a menu is the book that you look at, which has all the food. There are a lot of vocabulary words related to a menu. Untraceable desserts, appetizers. All of these are very common words, but really, I want to make sure you're comfortable with how to interact. In this situation, the words themselves are pretty easy to learn. Could we have some menus, please? Or she gives us the menus and she says, Can I? And this is a very common way to say it. It's almost always exactly the same Can I start you off with anything to drink? Can I start you off with anything to drink? It always starts with a drink. Right? So maybe we just want water. And if we do, we'll just say that, uh, just water for me now, You you might not want to order for the other person you are with, So you could just say for me just just water for me. Thanks. Now I can say just water instead of I'd like to have a glass of water here because I'm directly responding to the question. Can I get you something to drink? If someone says, Can I get you something to drink? And I say, I would like, Ah, glass of water. That's fine. But because I'm responding directly, if I say just water, we'll just have water. That's also OK. That's also OK. So this is a common way to respond to this sort of this sort of question. And if we want to add something we could say for now, Thanks. Just water for now. Thanks. What that means is right now I want to drink water, as I may be looking at the menu and then once I've decided what food I'm going to get, what food I'm going to order maybe what dishes I want. Then I can maybe order something else to drink. Maybe a Coca Cola, some sort of soda, or perhaps some wine, whatever else I might want. So for now suggests that I probably I will get something else, but it doesn't mean I have to, but I probably will get something else to drink. So if I do want something else, I'll say, Can I Can I get, uh, Coke, please? Okay. And then you can add, um and, um, with no ice with no ice for extra eyes. Whatever. Okay. She says okay, I'll be right back with those. I'll be right back with your drink. Okay? Maybe though you want alcohol, you'd like to drink some alcohol, and you're not sure what alcohol they have. So you might say something like, could we could we Same sentence as we did with the menus. Could we look at the wine list? Could we look at the wine list? Could we look at the wine list? And then once we decide we look at the wine list if we want to order. Why now for alcohol now? Alcohol. Alcohol is maybe red wine, white wine, beer, maybe whiskey, maybe vodka or cocktail, perhaps. Maybe a cocktail. All of these things Air called alcohol. Alcohol wine is usually just red and white, red and white, made from grapes. Just to be clear, that's what wine is. Alcohol is a broad category, which includes every kind of drink like this on the wine list. At the top, there's often something that says House red and house white. This doesn't mean that this is the best wine at the restaurant. The house is the restaurant. If you ever hear the phrase on the house on the house, that means that you don't need to pay. It's free, for example, of your food is an hour late and you waited in your starving. They say, Oh, I'm so sorry for, you know, waiting. Everything is on the house. They'll pay for your meal. It's on the house. So if you see house Red House white, basically, what that means is this is our basic wine. This is the wine that we recommend. It's usually not super expensive. Maybe not the cheapest but close to the bottom. It's sort of like their standard. It's sort of like their standard one. So here comes the waitress with the drinks. Here's your wine. Here's your Coca Cola. Here's your water. Whatever. Oh, thank you so much. Of course you can just say thank you. Say thanks. Thank you. And then she'll usually ask you, Are you ready to order? Are you ready to order? Have you decided what you'd like? Sometimes she'll say, Have you decided? Have you decided? And then if you haven't decided, what should you say? You are still thinking, right? You're still thinking. So that's what you should say. That's the common phrase, actually, Actually Ah, we're still thinking we're still thinking we're still thinking Please, could you please Could you please give us another minute? Could you please give us another minute? Could you please give us another minute? We need a minute. We need a minute. The one that I usually use is not quite not quite severe. Lower case Cube? Not quite. We or I are still thinking I am still I'm still thinking I'm still thinking and then you could add Could you please give me another minute? That's OK if you put both of those together, that's not a problem. Still thinking, Could you please give us or give me another minute? No problem. Then she'll say, Okay, sure, I'll check on you in a couple of minutes or sure, no problem. 47. Ordering in a Restaurant - Asking for Suggestions: Of course, there will be times when you really just don't know what you want. The best person to ask is your waiter or your waitress right there. The first person that you should ask because they've seen so many people order. They know what people like, and they've probably tried everything on the menu. Probably right, So they're the first person you should go to. How can you ask them for their advice? You really have no idea. Everything looks so good. You can say that everything on the menu looks so good. I'm having trouble deciding. I'm having trouble deciding what to get. Everything looks so great. Now. They might ask you a specific question. Do you like fish? Are you looking for something vegetarian? Do you prefer chicken or beef? Chicken or beef? Do you prefer chicken or beef? And then, based on that, maybe she can make a recommendation or you really have no idea. Just tell me, what would you suggest? What would you suggest or what's popular here? What's popular on the menu? What's hot on the menu? Sometimes what's popular here? What do people often order? What do people people often order who the ah, he tuna is really popular here. The ah, he I think it's h I. It could be wrong. The ahi tuna. The ahi tuna is really popular here. That's a very popular item on the menu item Popular item on the menu. That sounds really good. I love tuna. I'll have that. So the waitress has recommended something, and I have taken her recommendation because one I love tuna and two, I have no idea. So she must know what's really good in this restaurant. Sometimes I even say that What's your favorite thing? What do you like? Sometimes I will ask that question to We could also say, What do you recommend? What are the specials today? The spot specials. Today, many restaurants have something that they call a special each day. That could be a certain type of fish or maybe a specific dish, right, a dish. And, um, it depends on the day Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. Maybe they have different specials, and the waiter or waitress might tell you about those. Oh, today we're doing a special on we're doing a special on tacos type of Mexican food Are special tuna tacos, tuna tacos. OK, sounds good. Sounds good. I'll try that. Those are the specials. So don't worry. If you can't decide at a restaurant, you can ask for advice. You can use these expressions thes ways to ask, and there are others. Of course, you can mix these around as well. 48. Ordering in a Restaurant - Restaurant Vocabulary: Now, before we go on to our actual example here, let's just make sure we're clear on all the words. You can write these down again. You can look these up very easily. These are not the only words you need to know. But entree is often the main dish and will include, for example, of some meat and then a couple of other things on the plate, like a vegetable. And then maybe another thing, like mashed potatoes and vegetables or, um, corn and bread or some other small dish. Usually that's called an untrained that's on that on a plate. Then you have an appetizer, which is something that comes before, and that's meant to give you something to eat before you get your main course. Your main course now Main course, is not something that's only used in a restaurant that's used for eating in general. And English is the main food that you eat. But it's the idea of relieving your hunger right at the beginning, and you'll see that usually those air a little bit cheaper, and they say appetizer. The menu is the thing you order from. The wine list is also a type of menu, but it's It's usually for just wine. And sometimes they have a drinks menu as well, which is another separate menu where they have alcohol. So other types of alcohol might be on yet another menu. Okay, just to be clear, this is red wine and white wine, and this might include whiskey, bourbon, gin, G I n vodka cocktails and cocktails are mixed drinks. Right? These air straight, straight alcohol, bourbon, whiskey, gin, vodka cocktails are a mix. Maybe they're sweeter. They have other things inside. And they include whiskey, bourbon, gin, vodka of rum as well. There are lots of different types of alcohol. Okay, A desert, actually. What? Wait a second. Where's my second s? Here's an interesting mistake that can teach us something. One way to remember the correct spelling of the word desert is that you always want mawr desert because it's sweet. So you have to s is because you always want more. That's how you spell desert. If there's one s, that's desert, which is a very, very dry place. So this is an accident, but I'm trying to use it as as a teaching point. So desert is a dry place. It's very dry and a dessert D E S S E r T v cake or pie or something sweet after you eat, which is what I meant to write host and hostess as we talked about the person who greets you and then waiter, waitress, the person who brings you your food, the person who will get your tips directly on a Western restaurant. Especially in America, especially in America. Tips are very important. That's extra money that the waiter or waitress and also the host or hostess we'll get at the end of the day. And they get that from money that the customers in the restaurant give. They choose how much we'll talk about that later. Sides. Basically, these things might include a small salad or another little thing that you order. Maybe it's not an appetizer, but like an appetizer that comes with your entree. Okay, catch of the day. Sometimes you'll see this catch. It's for fishing, So this is going to be a fish. Whatever fish they have, this is going to be the catch of the day. This is what they have today. Dressing dressing is a kind of sauce. There are many different types of dressing. It goes on salad. Put it on your salad, so the order a salad, you might get 1000 Island. You might get Italian, you might get vinaigrette. Vinaigrette is my favorite, and then toppings might be for a salad. These air things that you add to the top of the salad, maybe extra, like cheese, like onions, like other vegetables. And also, for example, if you order a pizza, you also maybe add toppings so the cheese is usually not considered a topping on a pizza, because that's an important part of pizza, green peppers and onions and black olives or sausage or whatever else you like to put on that that is called a topping toppings. OK, as we talked about a reservation or booking, but it a restaurant. It's usually called a reservation when you call before and you get a time. And pasta is a very popular thing at Western restaurants, especially in America, they might often have some kind of pasta. This is basically noodles, but it's Italian style noodles, and there are many different forms of that, and it's not only noodles, actually many different forms. It's a special thing That's basically only Italian. And noodles are always long and thin. Pasta is not always long and thin. All right, so those are some words. I just want to make sure, you know, And I'm sure you know many of those, but I just want to make sure you know, those before we go on to our example. 49. Ordering in a Restaurant - Example Order: So now we've talked about in our restaurant situation how to order food. We've talked about how to make a reservation, how to tell the host or hostess, how many people are going to sit at your table and how to ask for a menu, how to get a wine list, how to do all that stuff before you order, including, uh, getting a suggestion. Talked about a couple of important words we need to know, and now we need to actually go through an order. It's actually pretty simple. When we went through the phrases at the beginning of the class, we we talked about a few things that you can use to request something, and we'll see those in this example. So let's go through this example. This is me ordering a pizza from a waitress. Okay, I guess I'll have a small garden pizza without onions. That means there's this pizza is called the Garden Pizza, and it has onions, but I don't want the onions, all the small garden pizza. The other sizes are probably medium and large of a small garden. Pizza without onions, and I'd like extra cheese and extra cheese. I'd like remember I'd like ab cheese, please. Mawr cheese. There's already cheese. I want more. Give me more cheese. OK? Oh, uh, could you also please add sun dried tomatoes toe half sun dried tomatoes are their sun dried tomatoes. They're tomatoes that sit in the sun. They're delicious. If you haven't had those on pizza, you got to try it. If you don't get anything else from this course, hopefully the recommendation about sun dried tomatoes will be something that you try. I'd like to add sun dried tomatoes to half. Okay, so I only wanted on this part this part, not the whole thing. And then I'll have I'll have a side salad as well aside, Saleh, that's a smaller salad. If it's just a salad, maybe that's my whole meal. That's my main food, right? My main course side salad comes with the pizza. Okay, then the waitress says, What kind of dressing on the salad? What kind of dressing on the salad? Remember, I mentioned dressing comes with the salad. It's on a salad. I'll have 1000 Island 1000 Island and I also don't want onions on my salad, so usually a salad will come with red onions maybe I don't want onions. In fact, I actually like onions and I would never order extra cheese and I would never order 1000 Island. I just made this example on. When I made this example, I was I became someone else. Okay, I'll have 1000 Island. It's Orange. 1000. Island is orange. It's a kind of dressing. Very popular. I'll have 1000 island and I also don't want onions on my salad. Sure, no problem. That's a way to recognize what I said. That lets me know that she heard what I said. She's writing it down on her little book. Okay, Turno problem. Anything else? Whenever you want to know if somebody wants mawr stuff after they've already told you two or three or four or five things. The best phrase you can use is anything else. Um, can I have a Coca? Cole? Anything else? Uh, could I have some chocolate? Sure. Anything else? I have a coffee. Okay. Anything else? You can say it forever. Forever. It's a It's a pretty polite phrase as well. It's just a way to say I'm ready. If you want to tell me you want more stuff, okay. Sure. No problem. Anything else will that be all means the same thing, but it's a little bit more formal. Will that be all? It's kind of expecting me to say yes, I'm finished. Anything else is kind of open, like I have no idea. Maybe you do want more, right? So they're kind of the same in this situation, but they feel different. Will that be all expects me to be finished. Anything else makes me feel like when I also have the catch of the day. Catch of the day, fish and pizza together. That's very strange. Okay, that's all for now. Again, We use this to let the waiter or waitress know that we might order something else later. In this case, probably dessert. Okay, we might order dessert later. So that's it? That's how you order. We use some of the phrases we learned at the beginning of class as well as a few of the words we went over. And it's pretty simple, but if you do it enough times, you get the feeling for how many different ways you can put these phrases together, and I want to show you at least one so that you can. You can really kind of feel it. I think that's an important part of learning a language. It's not only about learning, grammar and rules and words. You also have to kind of feel it because language, especially using spoken language, very cultural. It's really related to the culture. The culture happens sort of within situations at a restaurant. So it got to try to feel how these air used. Naturally. I'm trying to get these across, but I hope you can actually try to use them. So go to, ah, you know, go to a restaurant, order something in English and try them out. Try it out, play with it. 50. Ordering in a Restaurant - Paying and Tipping: So you've ordered you've gone through all that stuff. You've eaten your food. It's delicious, right? It's been a great meal. Now you need to pay. Why did they make you pay at the end? They should make you pay at the beginning. When you're excited to eat, right, you You've eaten it all. Now you need to pay at the end. Okay? You see your waitress over there to get your waiter or waitress is attention. Watch them moving around the restaurant when you see them looking in your direction. Could do this just like that. Whether you want something or if you're ready to pay to ask for the check. Do this. And when they ripped that when they recognize you, when they acknowledge you they look at you, Do you go like this and mouth death? They will bring over the check or the bill to you because they're far away, right? You don't want to shout Jack bites like that across the restaurant. You want to do it in a quiet way because usually the restaurant will have a nice A nice quiet What? Quite atmosphere important, Right. Okay, So check, please. Is the most common I think. And this hand gesture goes with it catching the eye of your waiter or waitress. We also say if they're right here, could we get the check? Could we get the check? Could I get the check? Will have. The bill will have the bill. I'll have the bill. Okay, I'm ready for the bill. Ready for the check. Excuse me. Yes, I'm ready for the check. I'm ready for the bill. I think we're ready for the bill. Sometimes we can add that to There are lots of different ways to say it, but these are These are the basic ones. Okay. And then she says, Sure, I'll be right back with that. So she brings it now. Maybe maybe I've invited my friend out and I really want to treat my friend. I really want to treat my friend cause I haven't seen him or her in a while. So I say I'll get it, I'll get it or it's on me in American culture saying it's on me. If you don't say something like that, it will be assumed that you will pay for yours and I will pay for mine. Probably. We will split the bill so usually will say. Shall we split it? Shall we split it right? Don't assume that I will pay for you. And I'm not going to assume that you're going to pay for me. In fact, in American culture it's very common for people to split the bill. But we usually still will say this. Shall we split it? Shall we split it? If I want to treat you, I can say I'll get it. It's on me. Or sometimes just my treat. My treat, my treat. Are you sure? Are you sure? That's very nice of you, I'm sure. I'm sure. It's my treat. My treat. Thank you so much. I'll get the next one. I'll get the next one so you don't have to treat people. You can definitely split it. You might have heard the phrase going Dutch. Actually, it's not that common now. This is an American thing, but I said we would come back to tipping. We have to talk about that for waiters and waitresses and often hosts and hostesses and also bartenders, um, people who work in the bar. Their salary might be very low, and they depend on tips. It's a very important part of a lot of services, especially in America. It's very important, for whatever reason. Okay, So if you go to a nice restaurant, you've got a tip. How do you leave the tip? You can leave the tip. Usually in the Czech, they'll give you a receipt. After they swipe your card, they'll swipe your card, and then they'll bring you the receipt, right? With the amount on it and a line under it. So this maybe you will say $34. Right? And then you would maybe tip. Let's say you want a tip. I don't know. $7. You want to tip $7? Okay, so now you're gonna pay 41. So there's a blank space and the blank space you write seven and then you add it up and right the total. And then you sign your name at the bottom and you leave that in the restaurant. It's called the Merchant. Copy the signed one with the tip and the final amount. It's called the Merchant. Copy. Leave that at the restaurant and you take the customer. Copy the customer. Copy. Okay, so there are two copies of the receipt after they swipe your card, leave the merchant copy. Take the customer copy. You don't have to feel in the customer copy because it's yours, but you can if you want to. So how much is polite to tip? Well, I have. Here between 10 and 2010 is considered pretty low for most restaurants. It's usually 15 to 2020 is kind of the standard. If you tip 15 it's OK. It's kind of considered getting a little low, but it's okay. So if they did an OK job as your waiter or waitress than 15 10% if they really didn't do very well, maybe they weren't very polite. Okay, so you can tip 10%. Maybe, but that's not as common on Lee. If they did a terrible job, and maybe they called you bad, bad names or something, can you tip nothing? I've only not tipped maybe two times in my entire life, because I had a terrible, terrible experience. Um, and you want to talk to the manager after that happens? Listen, I need to talk to you. The waiter. She didn't come to our table for 30 minutes. Our food came and it was cold and she didn't mention it. All right, so we had a It was a terrible experience. Then maybe you could tip zero, but that's pretty rare. 51. Ordering in a Restaurant - Taking Home Leftovers: Sometimes you can't finish everything. And it was a great meal. And you still have what are called leftovers. Leftovers from your meal. You want to take them home, put them in the refrigerator. So you ask the waiter or waitress as you're leaving. Hey, could excuse me. Could we get a to go box for this? They'll bring you a box to go box or a box to take this away. Could we get a box to take this away? Could you wrap this up to go to go and then they will take your food back to the kitchen? Sometimes they'll do that for you. Could you wrap this up to go? So if you need a box, could we have a to go box for this? Or could we have a box? Ah, box to take this away. Very common, just in case you need to do that. So I wanted to mention those because there are many times when so good you don't wanna waste it. You can't leave it here. Take it home. Eat it for lunch tomorrow. That is a good idea. So we've gone through the whole restaurant situation. Common phrases for asking for things. How to interact with the waiter or waitress. How to interact with the hostess or host. How to sit down and ask for a menu, how to order, how to pay, how to do all that stuff. But to really get it, you need to do it. So find an online menu and record yourself, ordering different combinations of things from the menu. Practice it, do it a few times, and then, if you can really do it, go to a restaurant that's an English speaking restaurant as soon as you can. Whether you're traveling, you're on a trip. Be the one to order. You've got to really practice it. So first, record yourself doing it. Get comfortable with it. Then the next time you're in an English speaking restaurant, try these things out, see how easy it is. All right, good luck. 52. Movies and TV - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about how to order food, obviously very, very important. And in this lesson we're going to talk about something maybe a little more fun, but also something that comes up very, very often in daily conversations. We're going to talk about how to talk about movies and TV shows. First, we're going to just go through some basic genres of movies. Yes, genres of movies. I'll explain what that means if you don't know, and then we're going to talk about some useful phrases we can use when we're describing movies and TV shows or TV Siri's, then we're going to go over what exactly a review is. In fact, when we talk about movies and TV shows, we are giving reviews when we recommend movies and TV shows. Two friends were kind of giving a review off that movie, making a comment about it good or bad. And then we're going to actually look at some examples. How can we describe a movie? Basically, this is called a synopsis, and then how can we connect a review to that? All right, so let's get started and talked first about some basic movie genres 53. Movies and TV - Genres: So what is a genre? Well, a genre is a type or a kind of something. That's what it is. We use it not for everything. We don't say a genre of fruit, for example. We don't use it for objects. We use it usually for movies. We use it for TV, similar entertainment videos, online literature, books, other types of other types of literature. And we use it for music. Now, the ones that we use for literature and movies or literature and TV Siri's. They're often the same. Not in every case, but they're often the same or similar music. Of course, the genres are very, very different. You do not have, for example, rock and roll literature. That would be very silly. That would be a genre of music. OK, so let's talk about some of the common movie genres, and we can. We can use them in different ways. Let's just go through what they mean and what kind of movie they represent. Okay, so let's first talk about action. One of the interesting things about genres is sometimes one part of a genre can stand by itself, but you often see them put together for example, if we look at action and adventure, you can have an action movie, a movie with a lot of car chases. For example, maybe a car chase. Ah, movie with maybe explosions or war. This would be an action movie. Maybe a lot of kung fu are fighting, but an action adventure movie is a little bit a little bit more than that. It may be has, ah, maybe a story where the characters go somewhere far away and do something crazy. So there's action. But there's also adventure hot action adventure, so we mix these up. In fact. Now romantic comedy is similar. So we said a romantic film, a romantic film that could go by itself, sometimes romance, but that's usually used for literature than a romantic comedy is also very common, Which is funny. Comedy means means it's funny and you can have comedy by itself. So if it's just supposed to make you laugh and that's the point of the movie, it's a comedy, Okay, but if it has a love story as well and it's funny, then it's a romantic comedy. Now if it's just a love story and it's a very serious and it's not funny at all. Well, maybe maybe it's a drama, so we often hear TV drama. A drama is usually more serious. It's not supposed to be funny. Maybe there are some funny things in it. But that's not what it's about, right? Alright, thriller and horror. So what's the difference between these? These air two types of what we would call scary scary movies, a movie that makes you feel scared might make you feel scared in different ways. If there's a lot of blood and violence and torture and terrible things, horrible things, then we call it a horror film. Ah, horror film, These air often a bit more. Maybe disgusting. Sergey, they're a bit more disgusting. Maybe there's a lot more blood. Ah, thriller may just be exciting. So if you are watching a thriller movie, maybe something suddenly huh jumps out and you go. That's very exciting, but it's not horror. Exactly, so they're both scary movies, but they're kind of different in the style, right? Sometimes maybe they they're mixed, but a movie is usually either called Thriller or ah, horror movie. So what's the difference between SciFi or science fiction? This is also called science fiction and fantasy. What's the difference? Well, science fiction or SciFi, and it usually is called SciFi for movies, although for maybe a novel, it's often called science fiction. The full name. If it's a sci fi movie or SciFi, maybe novel. It's about something that may be possible, but it's either in the future or it doesn't exist now. And it's some amazing technology, or it involves space travel, which again may be possible. But we just don't see it around us now. So crazy technology technology like laser guns and all that stuff aliens, space travel. This is usually Saifi. Fantasy is different because fantasy has magic in it. Maybe fantasy is about a very old world, but it involves something magical. For example, Harry Potter would be considered fantasy. Or maybe it's action adventure fantasy. You could put all those together because it has magic. It's not about technology. So that's the difference between SciFi and fantasy. Although they sometimes are mixed and it's difficult to tell which one it is. Usually it'll be called either a sci fi movie or a fantasy movie, even though sometimes they might be close to the line. Then a documentary is anything that's about riel life. That doesn't mean there can't be anything, not riel in it. So, for example, if you watch a documentary, maybe it's about a historical event, something that happened in history. Maybe it's about a historical event, and in the documentary there are some scenes that are done by actors, right? So, uh, we say it's dramatized, but it's about a real event. Or maybe it's about animals. If it's a story about animals who speak that, OK, it's not. But if it's about riel animals and they're saying all of the animals this time of year, they eat the grass. And that kind of movie that is a documentary documentary TV, Siri's documentary movie. I personally like documentaries very much because I think it's a good way to learn about interesting topics that I can't really see every day. I can always go to Africa and look at lions hunting other animals in the wild, right? So a documentary is a good way to kind of experience that and learn about it. Thes air. Not all the genres that you'll see. You'll see others as well, and you'll see them mixed around in other ways, too. But I want you to just be aware of some of the very common genres and how we talk about them. Next, we'll talk about some specific phrases we can use when we're describing movies and the people who are in the movies. 54. Movies and TV - Phrases for Talking About Movies: So let's first just go through a couple of really useful words that we can use when we're talking about movies and TV and also how we can actually put some of them together to explain what we want to explain. Okay, so first, very quickly. Let's just go through these. The plot. The plot of a movie is basically what happens in the story. The line that the story follows the points along the way in the story. This is this is the plot doesn't have to be a movie doesn't have to be a TV series, but when you're if you need to when you're explaining what happens in a movie or a video game or whatever to your friends, you're actually explaining the plot to them. Okay, the characters are the people who are in the video game or the movie or the TV series. Not really people. They're not the actual person that they are. They're playing a character. The actor or actress plays the character, have actors. I need to put also actresses here. The actor or actress plays the character. The character is the one in the story. The trailer is what you see before the movie comes out. So when you talk about a movie, we say blah, blah, blah is coming out soon. It's coming out soon. I can't wait until whatever movie comes out. I can't wait until comes out because because I saw the trailer on the trailer is so good. Can you say preview? Yes. If you want to say preview, that's okay. So some people would say that the trailer is different than the preview. People often just use trailer and preview to mean both. There is often a difference in how long they are, but it's not really that important. People use these pretty much to mean the same thing. I can't I can't wait to see, not going to say name here because if you're watching this 30 years from when it's recorded , then this whole Siri's will look ridiculous. I can't wait to see blah, blah, blah movie name because the trailer looks great or awesome. Great or awesome or whatever you want to say. OK, can't wait. It means you're very excited for that. Yeah, OK, so that's how you would describe that. So what about Syria's? Can we use it for movies and TV. The answer is yes. You can say my favorite TV, Siri's is You can say my favorite series of movies is, but it has to be more than one movie. And usually it's many movies, for example, the Harry Potter movie. Siri's people often call it a series of movies. I love the Harry Potter series, in fact, that can also be used for the Harry Potter books. Okay, now for TV, we often call the show itself a Siri's. Sometimes people use show. Sometimes they use Siri's. Many people use the word show when each one is completely unrelated to the others. Every single one is completely different. Maybe it's a game show. Or maybe it's a show where you just have a different sort of topic for each episode, which we'll talk about next. But for a TV series, it's usually a continuous story, one story that has multiple seasons and the season is one year for that show, or that Siri's. So if we're talking about a TV series where maybe every episode, the next thing is happening based on the previous one, and we have some characters who are all the same, and there's one story. There's there's one kind of line or plot that's moving along, and then in this season you'll have, ah, very exciting ending. And then you say, Well, I can't wait until next season. I can't I can't wait. I can't wait until season nine to come out to your waiting in your waiting and you're waiting because you've seen Seasons one through eight and the story is really interesting and you've fallen in love with all the characters. That means you just really like the characters on each little story. Within each one of those is called an episode. That's what an episode is. Usually, episodes are used for TV not used for movies. But there are some examples where episodes are actually used for movies to like. Star Wars. Episode one episode to Episode three An episode is each piece of that so we could say an episode. Each little contained stories this big season is this big and the whole Siri's is this big . This is the whole thing. So now let's talk about how we can actually use actors and actresses their names and connect them to the TV shows or movies that they're in. So we could say stars in or plays as I mentioned before, we can use plays. So let's say Let's choose a person here. Let's say, um, Hugh Jackman. Hugh Jackman is an actor. That's a real person stars in a movie or the movie called Wolverine. So I'm just gonna fill this in here. Hugh Jackman stars in a movie called I was gonna write here. Wolverine. That's the name of the movie, Okay. Didn't really like the movie by the way. Anyway, it was okay. No, it wasn't. It wasn't that good. Okay, Hugh Jackman stars in a movie called Wolverine, which is set in. And then you can say where it takes place or when it takes place. Or you could just say Hugh Jackman stars in, and then you could cancel all this and just say Wolverine on. Then instead of saying which is set in saying where it takes place, you could say, which is about a mutant who lives for a very long time and blah, blah, blah. You can talk about the story. Now. Let's use a classic example. Let's use Kate Winslet. Okay, so, Kate Winslet, very good. Very good actress. Okay, let's use Kate Winslet plays. Uh, okay, then we could say something about the character. So this one, the plays ah allows us to describe a little bit the character in the movie or TV. Siri's plays a young rich girl will bring abbreviate that as young rich girl Why are g if anyone ever asked you what is Why RG me now you know plays a young rich girl named Do you know the name classic movie Rose? Okay, Rose Who, Uh, what does she dio falls in love with a young man named Jack in the classic film Titanic. So this is the structure that we can use. And again, you can say this whole thing or you can cancel it, which is also very common. This person stars in this which is about or this person plays a data character details named character name who then? Something the character does in the movie. Then you could say in the film Titanic or in Titanic, you can just say in Titanic. So this is very simply how you can describe characters and the actors or actresses who play those characters in films and TV series. Very, very common. There's a word here that I didn't mention before because I forgot. So let me just tell you what that one means. That is sequel. Okay. Sequel. A sequel is one a movie. Usually that comes after another the original. So you have the original and let's say we're talking about the movie Bad boys. I've never actually seen it. It's a pretty old movie. I've never seen it. Okay, so the original is just called bad boys because they don't know if they're going to make another movie, but then it's very successful, Has huge box office success. Actually, I don't know if this movie had huge box office success just choosing this example. That means that it was very successful and made a lot of money. Okay, was, Ah, very big movie that made a lot of money. This is sometimes called a blockbuster. A very big movie. Maybe a superhero movie makes a lot of money. Huge movie toe blockbuster. Okay, so this is the original. And then Oh, it did very well. Very successful. Everybody likes it. So we're gonna come out with another one. We're going to come out with a sequel, a sequel? What will it be called? How about Bad Boys? Two. Notice that it's often written like this instead of writing bad boys. Two. Sometimes it's written like this, and if you want to do your own research about this, I don't want to teach you all these because it's not that useful. These air called Roman numerals and U M E. R. A. L s research Roman numerals and learn it. So when you maybe are in America and you see the Super Bowl is going on and it shows one of these big numbers, it's a Roman numeral. You'll know what it means. Pretty simple, actually, Pretty easy to learn. Takes 10 minutes. So the sequel of Bad Boys two was just as good as the original. The sequel of Bad Boys two was not nearly as good as the original was just as good as the original. Not nearly as good. What? The sequel, the sequel. The sequel. If it comes before, sometimes we have what we call a prequel to the prequel. A prequel is made after, but it's about what happens before it's made after. But it's about what happens earlier, maybe to the characters when they were young. Star Wars would be a good example of that 55. Movies and TV - Good and Bad Reviews: when we talk about movies with friends were really recommending whether or not a friend should see a movie that we've seen and they have not right. We're giving reviews. That's what we're doing actually, so you need to know how to. Even if you're not a professional movie reviewer, you need to know how to review a movie, because again, that's how you recommend movies. You say what you like. You say what you didn't like and sometimes it's Mawr bad stuff in good stuff. Sometimes it's more good stuff and bad stuff, more positive or more negative Mawr pros or more cons. This the same thing we can say often pros and cons. Very common. Okay, so let's talk about some different phrases we can use when we're talking about movies we like or things about movies. We like things about movies we don't like. Notice that this is all mixed up. The thing I liked about the movie is my favorite part is the most memorable thing is, can we say waas? Yeah, that we can Look, Look at this one was terrible. Didn't make sense. It was stupid. I mixed these up because often when people talk about movies they can use either the present tense or the past tense. So in the story, the main character is very, very selfish, very, very greedy. He is that way. Or if you wanted to say it, you could say he was really greedy in the movie. Actually, more often people will use is the use the present tense, and then when they're talking about, they're memory of it. Whether or not it was good or bad, they'll use the past tense so you can kind of mix it up. It's all kind of OK, but usually when you're when you're talking about the story, you kind of have to pick one and stay with it, so you should be consistent. But it usually doesn't matter which one you choose. And often again often when we describe the story, the plot basically what happened? We use the present tense, very common. Okay, The thing I liked about the movie is the action so realistic, so fast paced, so cool. Whatever you want to say, The thing I liked about the movie is maybe how rial it felt. That means it feels like real life. The thing I liked about the movie is how Rio it felt or how really it feels. My favorite part is, my favorite part is probably the acting, the acting. Or we could say the performances, the performances, you could say acting or performances. That means the actors or actresses did a very good job playing their characters. Or my favorite part is maybe a specific person. Let's let's use Kate Winslet. Kate Winslet's Height, Kate Winslet's Performance. My favorite part is Kate Winslet's performance. You can choose a specific person if you want to. Okay, maybe my favorite part is for my favorite part was the music. The soundtrack is amazing or was amazing. The soundtrack is amazing. This is the music that plays over it. Okay, probably the most memorable thing. Memorable means the thing you remember most. So this isn't always a positive thing, but usually if something is memorable, we're using it. To describe a thing that we think is is good is positive. The most memorable thing is maybe the dialogue just so you could read that. All right, up here d I a l o g u E, which is what people are saying. People talking in the story. The dialogue is probably the most memorable thing in this movie or was probably the most memorable thing in this movie. Whatever it was about the dialogue very well written. It's stuck in your brain. It's memorable. Let's look at some negative things, Okay? I thought the acting was terrible. So we used acting here. I thought the performances were terrible. Now, if you use performances because it's E. S, then we have to say were terrible. I thought the performances were terrible. Really not good. Very. All the characters were very two dimensional, two dimensional characters, two dimensional. That means not realistic. So if we said Oh so riel, so realistic. OK, but it's not very realistic than it's very two dimensional D I am e n s I o N A l The story didn't make sense. The story didn't or doesn't make sense. That means if something doesn't make sense, you can't really understand everything that happened because all the pieces don't really fit together. Wait a minute. The main character was at the school, but at the same time, there was another scene when he was at the shopping center. Uh huh. I don't understand It doesn't make sense if something confuses you like that, because either you don't understand it. Or maybe the writing was bad. Then you can say it doesn't make sense if I'm speaking to you and what I'm saying is difficult to understand either because I'm not saying it clearly or because maybe you're very sleepy and you're not really paying attention. Wake up, You can say, Uh uh, it doesn't make sense. Does it make sense? This is hard to understand. It doesn't make sense. The ending was stupid. I don't think I really need to explain this one. But you can talk about different parts of the movie the middle, the ending, the part where so we can use the part where the part where and then describe something that happened. The part where they went to the planet and saved the Children was stupid. That part was stupid. The rest of the movie I liked it was a good movie. But the part where they where they and then say the action, describe it a little bit. The part where they went to the planet to save the Children. That was kind of stupid, so you can talk about specific parts or you can talk about something like the end. You could say it was a stupid movie. The whole thing was stupid. That's okay, too. That's okay, too. It wasn't realistic. It wasn't realistic. It's a realistic is similar to riel. Riel is actually usually used as a noun. No, sometimes not. You can say the sauce. So riel, so rials. Like really? So sometimes we use it that way, but we often use this one instead. Which means, like, really realistic. This wasn't realistic. Stupid bad movie. So these air some common ways we can express things we like don't like about movies, and you can use these for TV Siris. In fact, you can use these four books that you read as well. You can use these for a lot of different things when you're explaining them to your friends to help them understand why they should or shouldn't watch that or read that or whatever 56. Movies and TV - Synopsis Example: So now let's actually practice this a little bit. I'm going to give you part of a synopsis. Synopsis is a basic overview basic outline of what happened in a movie or a TV series. OK, we're just going to do that for a little bit, a short one, and then I'm going to also include some of my opinions about it. We're going to use some of the words and phrases that we've learned in this lesson, and we're also going Teoh describe how we feel about different parts of this particular TV . Siri's. So here's the example Simon X plays so Simon X is the actor, right? Simon X plays a heartbroken doctor named Kyle Ah, heartbroken doctor named Kyle in the new Siri's blah, blah, blah, blah. Have you ever heard of love about what? It's good at the start of the Siri's. He is struggling to cope with the death of his wife. Cope with means deal with right. If somebody dies, that's very painful. It's very sad, right? If you cope with it, you're dealing with that loss. He's struggling to cope with the death of his wife. Anyway, he gets a new job at a good hospital, so we're just giving some details. What happens? Basically, this is what we would call a synopsis. Okay, he gets a new job at a good hospital and gets a reputation for being very fair minded and caring. So now we can say something about his character. Now we're talking about who he is. Now we go into a bit of a review because the best part about this Siri's is him, right? And so we can talk about why we like him. He's a really likable main character, and even though his story is quite tragic, tragic means very sad, very sad story. Even though his story is quite tragic. He's got a great sense of humor. That means he's funny. That doesn't mean it's a comedy. It just means he's funny. Maybe it's a drama, but he is funny. Okay, He's got a great sense of humor. He's always quick to use a sarcastic remark with his colleagues. Ah, sarcastic remark. Sarcasm is or sarcasm is a very important part of American humor and other humor, I guess in in English speaking culture. So basically it means something bad happened and I see Oh, great So you kind of say the opposite thing to what you really mean. Okay, so ah, sarcastic remark with his colleagues, the people he works with. So we've kind of mixed here the synopsis or a little bit of a synopsis. What happens with the reason we like the Siri's, which is the main character? He's a likable main character, and then we talk about why that is, maybe because of his own loss, he's able to sympathize with people who are struggling and console them. So to sympathize means you understand how other people feel. You show them that you care about them. You sympathize with them. You feel there may be pain, their suffering, their sorrow and console them. If you console someone, you make them feel better or you try to make them feel better. It's OK. You can consult people in many different ways, but that's what it means to try to make them feel better. So my favorite part of the whole Siri's is his character. That's what I like about it. My favorite part of the whole Siri's is his character. The only thing I don't really like is that many of the episode plots are a bit repetitive and predictable, so that means maybe everyone every story is different. Same characters. But sometimes what happens in each episode is too similar to what happened in a previous episode. So I feel like, Okay, I've already seen this kind of story. It's getting a bit repetitive. That means something happens again and again. It repeats. It's very predictable. If you can predict something, it means you know what's going to happen next. It is a bit predictable, predictable. I would still recommend it, though I would still recommend it, though that means even though there is something I don't like about it and like it enough to say that you should watch it, I would still recommend it. Okay, so this is just a simple example of a basic synopsis and a review of why we like the Siri's and something about why we don't like it. All right, so to really get a feeling for this, you can talk with your friends about it, but first you should practice it so you can do it. Maybe as a recording or if you have a friend, you can talk with movies about try it with them. I want you to talk about a TV series or movie that you've seen recently. Okay explained that premise or the basic story, what it's about without giving away every detail. So just do a basic synopsis of the story. Okay? And then also described the main character and some of the good things and the bad thing. Some of the positives and the negatives about the story practice this, And when you get used to describing movies and saying what you like and what you don't like , you'll find it a lot easier. Toe. Have discussions with friends about movies and TV on. That's one of the most common topics there is, which people like to talk about, correct. All right, good luck. 57. Giving Advice - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about movies and TV very important. In this lesson, we're going to talk about how to give advice. This is different than what we would usually call recommending, because sometimes recommending is more about what should I order? What movie should I watch? Advice is often more serious. Advice is usually about, ah, problem that we're having in our lives or our friends air having in their lives. And so when we need help with this kind of thing, we ask for advice. In this lesson, we're going to talk about how we can ask for advice. We're also going to talk about ways we can give advice, some different phrases we can use for giving advice. Then we're going to look at a specific example. We're going to talk about some words and phrases we can use to talk about fitness being overweight, because that's the example that we're going to actually look at how someone would give a friend advice, using the words and phrases that we've learned. So let's get started 58. Giving Advice - Asking for Advice: when we have an issue and we ask for advice, sometimes we can just come right out and say, Could you give me some advice? Then, after our friend says, Yeah, sure, we can say what we need advice about. Sometimes we say this after. Listen, I'm having a problem with blah, blah, blah, blah. Could you give me some advice, please? Could you please give me some advice and then our friend can give us advice? Now again, usually, advice is something a little more serious. It can be used for very simple things. Should I wear the blue one or the red one? Give me some advice. OK, it's OK. Sure, sure, we can do that. But advice is a great word to describe somewhat mawr. Serious situations, problems that we're facing in our lives. Could you give me some advice, please? Or I could. That's an L. I could really use some or your advice. I could really use some advice. I could really use your advice. I need some help. I need some help. Can be used in lots of other situations. I need some help. Could be about, I don't know, carrying a sofa, but I need some help. Could be asking for advice. Listen, my boyfriend broke up with me and said something really terrible. I don't know what I should do. I need help. I need advice. So there it's the same. Although help can be about many other things to now. To b'more casual about it. We could say I wonder if you could tell me what you think about. So maybe we're looking for a new job. I wonder if you could tell me what you think about working at Google. Do you think it would be? Do you think it would be cool? I wonder if you could tell me what you think about or you could just say this part. What do what do you think about me working at Google? What do you think about me working? That's hole. That's a riff. It's my worst one so far working that Google. Okay, so we can ask for advice in this way. That's a little bit mawr a little bit more casual now, as I mentioned, advice can be kind of the same as a suggestion or a recommendation. So we could say Could could you recommend some or you could say suggest here. You could also say suggest maybe could you suggest some ideas for how our company can maybe deal with our financial problems? Could you suggest some of this one again? Is it advice? Is it a suggestion? Okay, maybe they're kind of very similar. So it's OK if we use the word recommend or suggest when we're asking for advice. That's totally okay. 59. Giving Advice - Ways to Give Advice: Now there are lots of different ways to give advice. We've talked about some ways to ask for advice. There are many, many more ways to give advice, so let's go over some of the common phrases we can use to do it. And we'll start with the really, really basic stuff. And I'm guessing that you probably already know most of these. So you can. You can is soft, so we'll talk about different levels of strength if you say you could or you can. Sometimes we use could to recommend what people do. It's like we're putting it up there. But if the other person doesn't follow it, it's OK. It's okay so you can try and maybe running three days a week. If you want to lose weight, you could try running four or five days a week. If you want to lose weight, Okay, that is a suggestion for what to do. That's advice, but it's very soft. That means it's not too pushy, not too pushy, whereas if you say you should, that is much more pushy, much push easier. Okay, you should. It's almost as though if you don't do that, I will be personally disappointed. This is how should is often used. So these two basically are the same. It's just that the feeling is different. The the level of pushiness is different. The strength is different now. We can also recommend using questions, and these are both pretty common. Why don't you? Why don't you just quit? Why don't you just quit? It's a question, though. So if you're having a difficult time at your job, my bad boss, whatever. Why don't you just quit and get a new job? That's very common advice. And maybe that's the best advice. I'm not recommending you do that. If you don't like your job, I don't know the whole situation. Okay? Or we could say, How about how about you just quit? How about you just quit? How about how about just breaking up with him or her? If you're with a girlfriend or a boyfriend who is not the right fit for you and your depressed or unhappy for whatever reason, then your friend might give you that advice. How about or why don't you? Pretty much the same. How about why don't you just break up with him, just break up with her and not the right match. That's OK. Move on, Move on. Move on. You can use that for the job situation or the girlfriend boyfriend situation. Maybe it's time to move on. That means to take the next step in your life, either for work or for personal stuff. It could be used in lots of different lots of different situations. OK, so these are all really common, using questions to give advice or using these simple phrases you can. You should. I left out. You ought to. So you've probably seen you ought to in American English. It's just not that common anymore. People don't use it that often, so you could use. That ought to, but I think it's more common to say you can. You could and you should much more common Now we get into some ways to give advice, which are a little bit mawr complicated than the ones we just talked about. So let's go through them one by one, and I'll explain how we can use each of them. OK, now this is a very common style of expression in English, anyway were and would always remember that were and would usually go together to create something that's not really and we've talked about that before. It's a hypothetical hypothetical is very small. Hypothetical is something that we imagine. Okay, if I were you, I would is a very useful way to give advice because we're putting ourselves in the shoes off the person we're giving advice to, to show them that we empathize with them. So when we empathize, when we empathize, we show the other person that we understand their situation. We can say Put yourself in my shoes or I will put myself in your shoes or in her shoes in his shoes. Try to understand their situation. So this is a really useful one, because it shows that if I were you, I would just move on. Maybe it's time to quit and find a new job. If I were you, I would just move on. This is probably my favorite way in one of the most common ways to give advice. Okay, we can also use would in this way I would would just to make it softer. You couldn't just say I suggest that you could say I would suggest that you just find a new job. Take your career to the next level. Move on. I would suggest that you move on and we use wood to make it a little softer. Just doesn't really have a very, very clear meaning or use in the sentence. But it does make it a little bit Maurin direct, and it kind of takes some of the focus off what we're saying. We often use just in that way. Oh, just three miles. How far did you run just five miles to try to take some focus off of how many miles that is to try to make it seem like it's not a big deal. Okay, this is also very common. Another way we can show empathy or empathize with the person who's asking us for advice is to use whenever I and then share a story about something that you experienced in the past, which is very similar or exactly the same. So let's say someone is asking for advice because they feel homesick. You know, you're in college and your roommate is always talking about Oh, I miss my mom. I miss my dad. It's terrible. I'm so homesick they miss their home. That's what homesick means. Whenever I feel homesick, I just go out with some friends, have a cup of coffee, have a great conversation, and it helps to distract me from how I feel. Try that whenever I feel homesick, I always So then we say what we do whenever I feel homesick, I usually give my parents a call called him on the phone. Talk to them for a while. Whenever I feel homesick, I may just take a quick trip home for the weekend and then come back, always feeling much, much better. So we're trying to use our own experience to help other people, which is a very, obviously good way to share advice because you can show them that it works. Hey, it worked for me. It's probably going to work for you to It works. It works. Something works. That means it's successful. It's effective. It's effective. It's effective on because you're sharing that real example. You're showing that it's effective. You're not just throwing out some idea using your own life experience. Okay, now, sometimes we want to give two pieces of advice or two bits of advice at the same time, and that's a really good thing, because sometimes there's obvious advice. There's obvious advice, and we'll talk more about that word in a second. If something is obvious, you probably already know that, right? Probably already know you can call your parents probably. Okay, that's pretty obvious. So you can give two different bits in a row, and that might help you move the conversation forward a little more quickly. First, you can give your parents a call. And if that doesn't work, that means if giving your parents a call is not successful, not successful, the next step would be for you to, for example, face time them are. Do a video call or hang out with friends more or go home for a visit. Okay, first, you can call your parents, and if that doesn't work, drive home or take the bus home, visit them for a weekend and then come back. You will feel better to bits. That's very good. The next one is also to get rid of the obvious, the obvious bit of advice, the obvious piece of advice so that you can go to the rial stuff because it's so obvious that you should call your parents if You haven't tried that yet. Maybe you're not the smartest tool in the shed. So have you ever wait? I can take this out. Sorry. Not Have you ever tried? We can use this in some situations, but for the home sickness one, it doesn't quite work. I feel so homesick. What should I do? I really need some advice. Could you give me some advice? Have you tried calling your parents? Have you tried calling your parents? Yeah, I tried that. Okay, well, now you can, and then you can give mawr advice. Oh, if you already tried that, we already did that. Go home for the weekend visit or maybe get on Facebook and check some old photos or chat with them online. Whatever advice you want to give. Now, when can we use I had ever here before? When can we use ever? Have you ever tried that? That this would be for a much larger thing that we're giving advice about. So I've maybe tried to quit smoking many, many times and failed. I'm trying again. What have you ever have? You ever tried using one of those patches? Little patch people put on their arms to quit smoking. Have you ever tried using one of those patches? Ok, to ever kind of focuses on something that is ah, larger scale in your whole life. Have you tried this? That's when we usually use ever. Have you ever done that? Have you ever been to Canada? Have you ever tried using those patches? So would be for that kind of advice, which is something that maybe happens over a lifetime or over several years. The home sick example is kind of Ah, right now, type of advice. Okay, so these are all really common ways these air a little bit more complicated, but they're also a little bit more specific, and I think they're very, very effective ways to give advice. And if you're using the 1st 2 whenever I and I would suggest And if I were you able to show the other person that you actually care about them 60. Giving Advice - Fitness Words and Phrases: so there are a couple of really useful phrases that we can use to talk about fitness. We're going to talk about fitness because in a moment I'm going to give you an example of how we can ask for advice about losing weight, right? We don't want to be so fat. How one friend might ask another friend and then how we can give advice about that. Before we do, we have to go over a couple of useful words and phrases. Okay, so get in shape is when we're not in shape. So being in shape means maybe you are fit, which means maybe you have some muscle. Maybe you don't have so much fat. Maybe you can run without getting out of breath. Maybe your heart is in a good condition, right? Maybe you can exercise without getting tired. You are fit, you are fit, you are in shape. It's not only about being thin, it's not only about being fat, it's more than that. You can be very, very thin and very, very out of shape. So I want to make it clear that thinness being slender is not the same as being in shape, being in shape. Includes strength. Includes some muscle. Okay. Same with same with fitness getting fit. Same thing. These are the same. Okay, now lose weight. What we really mean here is lose fat. That's what it means. We often say lose weight. I want to lose weight. It's just a convenient way to say lose fat. We don't say lose fat. Usually this is a little different than these two. Because you could lose weight, because maybe you got really, really ill. Ah, he's lost so much weight because of maybe the illness. That would be a terrible thing. But are you fit? Probably not. Probably not. No, you're not fat, but you're also not fit. Okay, so losing weight is more general, and this one is just about fat. Basically. Okay, put on weight or put on a few, and sometimes we can say a few pounds a few pounds put on a few pounds over Christmas. I really put on a few pounds over Christmas. I really put on some weight. Maybe you can see from the previous courses. I've done that. Now I put on a few. I've put on a few. Maybe you can tell from my my face compared to the previous courses, the English brain ones and the pronunciation ones that I did before. Okay, so these air very common ways to talk about our condition, and we have a few other specific words as well. So let's look at those really quickly. In America, being very direct about somebody's weight is not always a good thing, and someone might be a little offended if you say she's fat. He's fat, even if they are what you might describe as fat. Just something about the culture. And it's good to know, because if you say it too much, people might feel a little offended. So we can say some other words A little bit. Is chubby. Someone is chubby. They have some fat. Not so much. Not very, very fat. But we can describe them as chubby or a bit chubby. We can also describe someone as overweight. You're overweight, you're a bit overweight. I think you need to go on a diet. OK, so overweight means there they have too much fat. They're too heavy there, more heavy than they should be there heavier than they should be overweight. This one's pretty common but this is mawr than this one. This one is usually fatter than this one. Now someone might describe someone who's fat as heavy. It's actually a more polite way to say it. So if you said, Oh yeah, your your uncle's he's a bit heavy, right? He's a bit heavy, isn't he? Yeah, he's He's a bit heavy. Sometimes we say heavyset, heavy set. She's She's quite a lot heavier than she used to be. Wow, she's much heavier than she used to be. It's more polite than saying she's fatter than she used to be. Your uncle's very fat, right? So saying fat, This kind of like hitting somebody in the head with maybe truth, maybe riel information, but in a way that makes them feel maybe not so good. So often use heavy, sometimes overweight, sometimes chubby. And it's interesting how, in different cultures, what is fat is described differently. I've noticed, for example, that someone who might be considered normal in America in a lot of Asian countries like China, for example, that person might be considered fat. And even if you've got a little fat, someone in China might say all your fat it's a different culture was quite interesting 61. Giving Advice - In-depth Example: So now let's actually look at a really example of someone asking for advice about how to get in shape or get fit and how we can actually give advice to that person. So two friends talking. Okay, I'm having a hard time losing weight, and now we know they're trying. I'm having a hard time. Hard time means it's difficult. It's difficult having hard time losing weight. Even though I don't overeat, we use, even though to say that something is kind of against something else. I feel thirsty, even though I just had a glass of water. Okay, I feel happy, Even though today was actually a pretty terrible day. I feel happy, even though it was a bad day. Okay, so I'm having a hard time losing weight. Even though I don't overeat, I don't overeat. That means I think you can guess, eat too much. Could you give me some advice? So that's one of the simple ways to get advice. Very direct way to get advice that we talked about at the very beginning of this lesson. Now we give the answer. We give the advice to our friend and pay attention to some of the phrases that we learned earlier in the class Have you tried actually counting calories? Calories are things that we have in food things that we eat which give us energy. But also if we eat too many calories can make us because fat Okay. Have you tried counting calories? OK, that means you actually pay attention to how many calories you eat. If so, that means if the answer is yes. If so, that's a great way to make sure you aren't over doing it. So to overdo something means to do too much of that thing. What is over doing it here over doing it means eating too much overeating. If you want to know if you're overeating, maybe you think you're not overeating. Maybe you think that you don't overeat, but maybe really, you are. Maybe you're not eating very often, but maybe the foods you're eating are very high in calories. OK, so count calories whenever I need to lose a few pounds. So now we use the one that shows that we are sharing our experience and also shows empathy . Okay. Whenever I need to lose a few pounds, I keep track of all my meals in a diet journal. Okay, so this diet means what we eat. What we eat is our diet. Our diet is the food that we eat usually. Okay, keep track of something. Means you pay attention to it. You follow it carefully. Anyway, you should definitely try. That definitely makes it sound a little stronger. You should remember you should means it's a bit more forceful. You're not saying you could. You can, you should. It's a little stronger. If that doesn't work, you might try fasting. This is the same as you could try. OK, so you might try. You could try is the same. You might try fasting, which I've been reading about lately, So fasting means you don't eat for a long period of time. Someone says I'm fasting. That means maybe for this whole day, or maybe for a week or whatever they're not eating. You don't eat for a period of time. It's called fasting. Fasting. People do it for many different reasons, so let's continue with the advice again. Pay attention to the phrases that we learned earlier in the lesson. As far as exercise goes, as far as what does that mean? so sometimes when we want to change the topic and talk about something else, we talked about diet. Now I want to change and talk about a new thing on. We want to say what that new topic is. We can use as far as or we can also use when it comes to whatever that is when it comes to exercise. As faras exercise goes, these are basically the same used to change. The topic used to mention what topic we're going to say As far as exercise goes, you should definitely be doing some exercise every day, every day. Okay, First, you can try going for a 30 minute run every morning. And if that doesn't seem to be working after a few weeks, we learned if that doesn't work, but because it's kind of a continuous thing because it's kind of ongoing, then we can say if that doesn't seem to be working, Okay, if that doesn't seem to be working after a few weeks, go to the gym at least 3 to 4 times when we say when we see this and we read it, we say 3 to 4 times 3 to 4 times a week notice that this doesn't say one week. We usually just say a week, 3 to 4 times a week and because this is three or four we can actually use or if we want to . If it's three toe six, then we have to say 3 to 6. But because thes two are side by side, we can say three or 45 or 6647 But we can't say three or six because that means you can't go four or five times, which is very weird. Okay, if that doesn't seem to be working after a few weeks, go to the gym at least 3 to 4 times a week and do both cardio and strength training. Any time you see the word cardio, it's going to be related to your heart or the system in your body where the blood moves is pumped by your heart. It's usually about heart health, so if you run, if you jump, if you go on a treadmill. If you ride a bicycle, this is cardio and strength training is lifting weights, lifting weights, weight lifting, every you have some dumbbells or barbells or whatever you're trying to build muscle build muscle. Okay, so this is how we can give advice about getting fit, getting in shape. There are many different ways we can do it. Of course, this is just one example, but hopefully you have a pretty clear idea for how we can use some of these different phrases to help our friend. So as we usually do when we learn something, the best way to make it stick is toe. Actually practice it. If you don't have somebody to practice with, I always recommend that you record yourself. Get your phone out. Record record Writing is good. Okay, you can write. That's fine. But if you right, are you really going to be a better English speaker? Well, they are very different skills. You could be a great writer and not a great speaker, so I recommend that you get out your phone, you turn on the record function and you try to use some of the words and phrases that we learned in this lesson for giving advice. The assignment is to imagine that you have a friend who wants to quit smoking a big problem addicted to smoking. Your friend is addicted to smoking so he or she has tried many things and everything has been unsuccessful. Nothing is working. So what advice would you give? What advice would you give? Try to use the words and phrases we learned. Good luck. 62. The Future - Overview: and the last lesson we talked about how to give advice to a friend, which is a very important part of a relationship because friends help each other in this lesson. We're going to talk about the future, how we can talk about the future, how we can explain what were going to do in the future or what we may do in the future, because some things are very certain. Some things they're not very certain. So we're going to talk about different phrases that we can use to describe how sure or how certain we are about things that are goingto happen in the future. And then we're going to talk about the causes of our actions and the results, how we explain cause and result, and we'll look at some useful ways to express cause and result as well as what that means. If you don't know, then we'll talk about hypotheticals, and I think you know what that means, because we've talked about it before. But then we need to do that because we have to talk about possibilities, things that may happen in the future because we use very, very similar grammar. Sometimes exactly the same grammar to explain that, then finally, we're going to actually do a real example in a job interview because in a job interview, you need to talk about your future, so let's get started. 63. The Future - Asking About the Future: when we're talking with friends. Or maybe in a more formal situation, like a job interview, we need to ask what other people are going to do what other people might do. So let's just go over very quickly. Four common questions that we can use to ask about the future. The 1st 3 are more casual, and then the last one is a bit more formal. Okay, so the 1st 1 What have you got going on today? Very common. You talk to your friend. It's morning, maybe, Or it's early afternoon. What have you got going on today? This is about the future. It means basically what are your plans today? Now you could say that we could say, What are your plans today? What are your plans this weekend? What are your plans next week? What are your plans for your vacation? Okay. What are your plans this afternoon? This one is really useful because we can talk about any time, but it's about the future. Okay, but what have you got going on is usually going to be today or maybe this week. Very near term, very near near term future. But it's pretty common. Do you have anything going on later. This one is something we might use in the invitation situation. We did the class about inviting, right? If we're going to invite someone, do you have anything going on later? This is maybe when we're preparing to ask them if they want to do something. OK, probably We want toe hang out or do something fun. Okay, what are your plans? Sometimes weaken. Just say this by itself. But usually it does have a time on it. So these air, these three common very common, casual. Pretty casual. Okay, where do you see yourself in three years? Now, this is something that you would hear in Ah, serious conversation with a friend about their life goals. Right. Okay, So you're thinking about quitting your job, all right? No problem. Where do you see yourself in three years? That means what do you imagine about yourself in three years? It's also a very, very common job interview question. They will often ask you, where do you see yourself in five years? So then we can maybe explained something about our goals. And if it's a job interview, maybe that should be related to this job. Probably. Well, look at on example of how we can answer that question later in this lesson. 64. The Future - Levels of Certainty: So now you know some ways to ask about what's going to happen in the future. We need to actually know how to talk about the future. But to do that, we have to put them. I think the different phrases into levels of certainty and the reason I think it makes sense to break up the phrases into levels of certainty is because when we describe what may or will happen in the future, we use phrases that show that either it must be in the future or we wanted to be in the future or we think it will happen in the future. But we're not sure or we just have no idea. Okay, so let's look at some of these. The 1st 1 is the most certain okay? We use, I'm going to and I will to be very clear about the future. We say, For example, I'm going to buy my bus ticket tomorrow. I'm going to buy my plane ticket tomorrow. Now notice that I'm not saying I'm going to the supermarket. That's a different I'm going to. That I'm going to the supermarket means you're actually driving or walking. Okay, that's a different one. that's a different meaning. This going to means will. It's the same thing and then we say the action after going to we say I'm going to go, I'm going to do so We use the simple verb after it. I'm going to buy, I'm going to eat. I'm going to meet my friend tomorrow at three PM I'm going to meet my friend tomorrow at three PM I'm going to do my homework until about 10. We're very sure about these things. It's certain we often connect times to it at three at five PM at 10 p.m. If we say I will, it's the same thing. I will be home by 10. I will be home by 10. I will buy you an iPad for Christmas, although you shouldn't tell people what you're going to get them for Christmas. But it should be something you're certain about then, when we have a little less certainty, we just add probably to will. So by putting this year, that means it's a little less clear. I will probably get you a good birthday gift, or I will probably go downtown tomorrow. I'm not sure something might happen to stop me from doing that. Okay. I plan to again means that we really think that we will. But maybe something will happen. So this one is pretty certain if we plan to do something. But there are often when we have plans, things that happen which are unexpected. And what can we do about those things? Right. So I plan to take a vacation next summer to Japan. Next summer is maybe pretty far from now. It's pretty long way off. So we plan to. But something could happen, right? It could even be something that happens today. For example, I plan to go shopping later this afternoon. I plan to go shopping later this afternoon. But we might say that when someone else has mentioned that they would like to do something with us, that's different than that. We might say I had planned to go shopping, which means maybe I'm about to change my plan. Okay, We can also use I'm planning to. That's pretty common to I'm planning to. And often planning is for longer term things. Not so much near term. You can, but it's often for long term. Okay, now we go down to the next level. Less certain I'd like to. This means that we just want it. It really has no connection to how sure we are about whether or not it will happen. I'd like to go to Seattle next week. I'd like to I'd like to go on vacation next year to Europe. I'd like to We have no idea it might happen. It might not. I might I might. I might quit my job next year. Now that means we're just thinking about it. I might quit my job next year. Will it happen? There's a chance. Because if I'm thinking about it, that means that could lead to my action. My quitting the job. Right? So Okay, it could happen. I might I might I might buy Ah, house. I might buy a house this year. I might OK, it's possible. It's hard to put a percentage on that, though I'm thinking about thinking about this is very similar to I might very similar almost exactly the same I'm thinking about. The only difference here is that we will use I n g. I'm thinking about buying a house. I'm thinking about asking my boss if I can come into work late on Tuesdays because of my Pilates class. I'm thinking about that. Will I do it? Maybe. Maybe not. Okay, it's the same as I might, but the grammar is a little different now. If we say I hope we just have no idea the result could be this or this could be a could be be Just have no clue. So you could just say I hope I can get a good job. I hope I can get a good job. I hope I can go on vacation, but you just have no clue. It's totally uncertain. The future is a mystery to you. OK. Oh, I hope it doesn't rain tomorrow. I hope it doesn't rain tomorrow. If you hope it doesn't rain tomorrow, you really don't know And you definitely don't have any control over that. Okay, so we go this way when we decrease our certainty. These this one, this one and this one are often used to express what we would like. We're thinking about it. Our desire. These two are a little less certain than the 1st 2 but arm or like the 1st 2 Because we do have the intention to do that. Or at least we think it's likely these air absolutely clear. And this one is just yes, no could be either one. We could say a 50 50 chance 50 50 chance. So these are the common phrases we use to discuss the future. There are more. But these air probably the most common and the most useful phrases that we can use when we want to explain our feelings, our intentions about the future. 65. The Future - Causes and Results: Now that we know the basic phrases for talking about the future, let's just explore a little bit some phrases that we can use to talk about the relationship between cause and result and also our actions and our intentions right. The cause of our actions is often our intentions are intentions is what we really want to do, what comes up in our mind that makes us act right. So let's look at some ways that we can do that. If you want to be successful, you need to work hard so we can use if to express intentions or express desire and then an action related to that desire. If you want this, do this or you need to do this. If you want to quit smoking, you need to have a lot of will. Power will power. If you want to be successful, you need to work hard. You can switch this around. You could say you need to work hard if you want to be successful. If you do it that way, you need to work hard. If you want to be successful, cancel this comma. Don't use that, so if you switch it around and it starts with you. Don't use the comma if it starts with if used the comma. Okay. So that Why do we do things? Why do you do what you do? You have a reason on intention. There's a cause for your actions. I work out. Work out means exercise. I work out so that this is our intention. I work out so that I can stay in shape. Remember, we learn to stay in shape or get in shape. Okay. So when we want to stay why we say this okay could save the same thing here. I work hard so that someday I can be successful. Same basic idea. I read to broaden my horizons. I read to broaden my horizons. Now this too is not used in the same way as to connected to a verb like Go. I'm going to the supermarket. It's not that to this too is about our intentions are reasons for doing things I read. Why do you read? To broaden my horizons. That means to expand what I can think about to expand what I know to expand what I'm aware of to broaden my horizons. By the way, a very useful phrase. Okay, We could say the same thing here. I work out to stay in shape, Okay? If we use so that I can stay in shape to stay in shape or get in shape. 66. The Future - Hypotheticals: Now, this is mostly review. I just want to make sure we're very clear on hypotheticals so that we understand the basic grammar structure so that you're able to use it for the next part when we talk about possibilities. So just as a review hypothetical is something that we imagine that is not true and may never be true. If monkeys could fly, if monkeys could fly, they would rule the earth. Okay, so we can just imagine anything that way. If people lived on Mars, then I would go there. We can talk about our actions. If another thing happens, that's what you would do. But it may never happen. Okay. If Wood if Wood if I lived in Beijing, notice that we use the past tense here They were using past tense, even though it's not really in the past, is it? No. If I lived in Beijing, I would never take the subway. Could we say I would never take the subway if I lived in Beijing? The answer is yes. But just as before, we would take out that comma. Okay? Same thing. If I were a doctor, I would charge less, so maybe I think doctors charged too much money. If I were a doctor, I would charge less. I can say that because I'm not a doctor and I probably never will be. Fact, I'm pretty sure I won't be. But if I were now notice we use were here if you were If she waas if he waas If we were, we use this to create hypothetical use. If then we say I would she would they would would is very important here. It tells us that it isn't Riel, okay, tells us that we're just imagining it. These are a little bit different because lived is in the past tense. But actually they're very similar because I don't live in Beijing and may never I'm not a doctor and may never be so. This has to be very, very clear because this is so common in English. It's very important that you really understand how to use this type of sentence. So we know how to talk about our intentions and our actions, the cause of the result, which is what we do. And we know how to talk about hypotheticals, things we imagine. So let's kind of bring all this together and talk about back to our topic. Future possibilities. Things that may or may not happen. Often these air things that are out of our control. Or we could also often say out of our hands, it's out of your hands. That means you have no control over some part of it. But if you have no control over something that may or may not happen in the future, you can talk about actions that you will do If this happens, or if this happens, you can talk about actions that will happen, whether or not this happens. So that might be a little bit difficult to understand. But let me explain. Okay. Okay. It may rain tomorrow. It may not. If it doesn't rain tomorrow, I guess we can go to the zoo. So maybe a father is speaking to his Children. Children say, Can we go to the zoo tomorrow? Well, if it doesn't rain tomorrow, I guess means that's okay. I guess we can go to the zoo. If it does rain tomorrow, will we go to the zoo? No, no, we will not. OK, if I go to Canada next year, I will stay in Toronto. Now, maybe I have some control over whether or not I go to Canada. We don't know all of the details in that situation. If I go, where will I stay? Toronto. If I don't go, I won't go to Toronto. But I have the next action. Sort of ready. I have the next plan ready for if this thing does happen and it may or may not. If my English improves, I should be able to get that accounting job. So maybe this course is helping you improve your English. And there are many other things you can do to improve your English. If you're English improves, what will happen if my English improves? I can get that accounting job. You have this job. You really, really want to be an accountant. Maybe in an international company. Okay. And the result that thing that you want, it depends on whether or not you're English gets better. If it doesn't, Will you get the job? No. If my English doesn't improve, well, then I guess I'll just stay at my current job. So again, we have two possibilities because we really don't know what's going to happen here. We can plan for the future. This way. This is how we talk about alternatives. Alternatives? An alternative is another choice. You could do this or this or this or this. And this is the grammar that we used to do that this is how we express it. 67. The Future - Explaining Your Future: so far in this lesson, we've talked about phrases we can use to express different levels of certainty about the future. We've talked about how we can ask questions about the future express hypotheticals, talk about our intentions and how we can explain different possibilities. Alternatives for the future. Whether or not something happens now, we need to actually put it together in a really life situation in a job interview. So let's imagine you're applying for a job in a big company and the job is related to finance finances, money related stuff. Okay, and you're at the job interview, you're sitting there. The other person, maybe from HR is sitting across from you to ask you a really common question. The question is, so where do you see yourself in five years and how will you get there? What that means is, what do you imagine you will be like in five years? What do you imagine you'll be doing in terms of your career and maybe also your life and how will you get there? That means what actions do you need to take in order to achieve that idea that you have about yourself in five years, you need to be able to clearly express your ideas about the future in this sort of answer. So let's practice an example. I think it's really likely that I'll be working in a management capacity. Management capacity here just means some role related to management or managing people a management role. You could also say that OK, some management capacity at some firm related to my field of finance. Be careful not to use. Major. Major is on Lee when you're in school. When you leave school, you have a field. What's your field? Architecture, Finance, accounting. Maybe you're doing something in arts. Maybe you're a designer. Maybe your field is manufacturing. If I'm hired here, I will work toward that goal. We have a very clear expression of the future. I will work toward that. Go very certain, very confident. Okay? And I think it would be a win win. A win win means you get a benefit and I get a benefit. I think it would be a win win because my attention to detail and knack for picking up new skills makes me I think, an asset. So a knack for something means you have a natural skill for that. A natural ability to do that, a knack for maybe understanding how people feel. Learning languages. Okay, this person saying I will do this. This is my next action. I'm very certain about it. And then on expression about the future, that's a little less certain, but still pretty clear and expressing a desire. I think it would be a win win. It would be a win win. I'm hoping I'm hoping, hoping. I hope it's the same thing that I can move to an upper management position, although I obviously have a lot to learn. Using hope here means that you really don't know, but that's your desire. Remember, it's completely uncertain what will happen, but you can say you hope to express a desire. If I do, that means if I get a high level position on upper management position, if I do means we're talking about possibilities alternatives. If I do, I'm a work on getting an MBA. If we want to be more certain here, we could say If I do, I will work on getting an M B A. An MBA is an advanced degree related to business and often people will get an MBA as they continue their career so they don't just quit their job and work on the MBA. They may do them at the same time so that they can constantly increase their skill level and their knowledge regardless, regardless means if it happens or not. If it happens or not, that means if I get my MBA or not, okay, regardless, I'm going to constantly work to expand my knowledge of the field and continue working on my English skills. Expand Mies gets bigger, expand my knowledge of the field, finances the field and continue working on my English skills. As I realized, my accent can sometimes be an issue for people. So if English is your second language and you speak English often at work. But maybe you have a heavy accent to your pronunciation is not so clear. You can say that you're aware of that and then use that to express a desire to improve. To acknowledge that, yes, I realized this is something that's not perfect, but I am working on it. So if you say as I realize my accent can sometimes be an issue for people, that doesn't mean that people don't like me because of my accent. It means that maybe sometimes my accent can be a little bit heavy or thick th i ck, and that might make it a little difficult for people to understand that sometimes if you have a thick or heavy accent, I'm hoping this role will be the next big step in my career again just expressing a desire . And it's good to say, I hope I hope it. Sometimes you don't have a lot of control over the situation. They will decide if you get the job or not. All you can do is talk about what you will do if good things happen. If you get the job and you can express your desire that this you feel, is a good fit. This company is really where you want to be, OK, so hopefully you can see how these phrases come together in a natural way. In a really situation as usual, we need to practice what we learn. So here is your assignment, with all of the words and phrases and different sentence structures that we practiced in this lesson. Put it together, talk about what your future goals are. Explain them in detail and then explain the things you can do in the near term to reach those goals. This is a good one because you have to talk about the near future, which may be more certain mawr clear. I'm going to I will and talk about things that are farther in the future that you have less control over. I'd like to, I hope, and be sure to use some of the other expressions as well. For example, the alternatives using if to express what you might do. If this happens or this happens. Okay, try your best. You can record yourself when you listen back to the recording. Try to catch small mistakes, write them down and then try it again. In fact, once you become more aware of your English speaking, you can begin to pick out things that you can improve. Notice things that you can improve and over time, get better. Even if you're not actually speaking with another person, it is a good way to practice by yourself. All right, good luck 68. English Exercises Part 1 - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about the future, how to talk about things we would like to do things that will happen. Different levels of certainty. And in this course we've been really focused on different situations and different topics, different specific skills. But I want to in this lesson and the next lesson. Focus on some things you can do on a daily basis to practice so that your mind can develop habits that it needs to develop so that you can build the right habits to become a good English speaker. I think this course wouldn't be complete unless you had the correct habits, not only the knowledge that you need, but the correct habits to be able to speak clearly. So we're going to go over some exercises, some things that you can do on a regular basis on a daily basis to practice all of the things that we're learning in this course. Some things you can do to build the correct habits. Habits are so important when it comes to speaking a language. If you know everything, but you don't have the right habits than the things that you know won't help you. A lot when it comes to speaking, saying what you want to say. So I want to make it very clear that you need to learn all that stuff. You need to know all that stuff. But then you've gotta have the right way of thinking and you've gotta have the right habits . And the right way of thinking is the first step toward becoming a better speaker and having those good speaking habits. Okay, so doing a little bit of practice every day. Little exercises can help develop your your mind so that you feel comfortable when you want to say something when you want to use the things that we're learning in this course. So we're gonna go over for some basic words. A few things you need to know. Then we'll get into some specific exercises that weaken Dio. We're gonna talk about one called that I call stitching, and I'll show you what that means in a second. But basically stitching is linking things together creatively, and then we're going to go into something called simplification. So we need to understand what we've seen, what we've read so that we can simplify it in a way which is really natural and find out where the things that are unnatural or maybe redundant are we'll go into that when we get into each exercise, so let's get started. 69. English Exercises Part 1 - Key Vocabulary: So let's just go over a few words that you will need to know in order to really understand the basic ideas behind what we're going to try to accomplish or achieve in this in this lesson, first simplification. So if you hear somebody say something or you read a book or you watch a movie whenever you talk about that thing often you're simplifying what you heard reducing it so that you can communicate it clearly to others. So simplification means to take something and make it simpler. This is a simplification. If you know something about science that most people don't know, and you need to explain it to someone, you have to be able to simplify it or make a simplification in order to explain it. If you read a book and you want to express it, you need to be able to simplify maybe some of the ideas to explain it to a good friend who might not know much about that topic. So we're going to try to do this in the second exercise, but I just want to make sure you're familiar with the word simplification. It's connected to the word simplify, which is a verb. Simplification isn't now, and it comes from also simple and simple is an adjective, of course, hoops. A deejay. I usually write it as a D. J. Okay, now clarity is also something we have to think about when we're expressing ideas or simplifying something or explaining something. So if you have an idea which is very complicated and you want to communicate it, it's very easy to say it in a way which makes other people feel more confused because it's a complicated idea. Or if you're telling a story that's easy to mix up the details. And when you actually say all of the things you want to say, it comes out all sort of messi and mixed up. So we have to focus on clarity. Clarity means that when we speak, when we write whatever we dio communication wise, we have to try to say things in a way that cannot be misunderstood. The purpose of language is communication and clarity means that things are very clear, very easy to understand. Now, the verb for this is clarify. So if you have a bunch of people on everybody's arguing and fighting, and the reason is because they don't really understand what they're talking about. And you really do. You could say, Excuse me, Let me let me clarify this issue for you. Let me try to make it simple and clear and easy to understand. So we also have to try to bring some clarity to what we're saying. Always focus on trying to be simple, trying to clarify things. Good English is not necessarily very complicated. Often natural English is very simple, in fact, and good communicators know how to speak clearly. Next is syntax, so syntax is an interesting idea. We often think of syntax as related to writing, but actually syntax is basically the different kinds of sentences that we choose. So if you always begin sentences in the same way, or you always maintain or keep the same basic sentence structure and you get into the habit of using, maybe it was too much. That's just an example. Whatever it is, people will begin to sort of lose interest. So it's also important to understand how to say things in different ways. Use different types of sentence structures, begin sentences in different ways so that when you speak, people are interested and they don't get bored. It's actually very important to have some variation on when we say good syntax were usually looking at writing and saying, Oh, there isn't longer sentences, shorter sentences, some different types of sentences to say the same type of thing. So this shows that you understand English and know how to use it well enough so that when people read what you write or listen to what you say, they are fully interested because it's always kind of different and changing its dynamic. This is a good word to use, like this word dynamic, dynamic, dynamic. OK, the last word is merged. So one thing we're going to do today is we're going to take some some words and we're going to try to bring them together into a single sentence. We're going to try to merge them into full sentences. Merge means to bring them together. If two big companies come together, you merge them. If there's a big highway in a road that comes up to the highway and you enter onto the highway, you merge onto the highway, so it basically means to bring together or to become part of something else So we're going to be doing an exercise where we stitch or merge. Merge different things together into single sentences and you'll see what I mean in a moment. So help these four words are clear and I hope you can keep them in mind. 70. English Exercises Part 1 - The Stitching Exercise: Now this is an exercise that I call stitching. Stitching means again to bring things together like you're sewing like your sewing clothes . So when we stitch things together, we're trying to combine them. We're trying to merge them together. The reason we do this exercise is to understand ideas and then link them together in a way that is coherent. That means it all makes sense now. This might seem a little bit like be sort of fill in the blank exercises or exams that you did in middle school or high school, and I guess it kind of is accept. You don't know where the blanks are, and so it's kind of a more advanced version of feeling the blanks. We've got a continuous story here. The rules are that you can't really change the order you can Onley, insert or put in other words, that's the only thing you can dio. So what you can do to practice this on your own is basically maybe look at an article or a book and pick out some of the key words. Write them down in order A. Like I've done here. This is one that I've I've written myself and then write down or speak. If you want to speak, that's okay. The whole thing. Don't look at the original. Do it in your own way, fitted together in a way that makes sense to you. But force yourself to keep everything in order and you can make is many sentences as you want. So now we're going back to the idea of syntax. We can put things together in creative ways, depending on what makes the most sense. Or maybe what's the most interesting. So let's actually try this one. Let's do this together again. We're going to be basically just building sentences. Ah, and putting them together as we like. So I've written them like this just because it's, I think, easier to see each separate word I've capitalized. Each word doesn't have to be capitalized. I put a period put a period after each, each word again. That doesn't have to be there. It's just a way to organize this. So let's let's start. How do we begin this? So we're starting with the time we're starting with a month, so let's just begin he in in August and you can do this along with me. And there's not only one right answer, but we're gonna try to make it fit together. We're gonna make it make sense. In August. I'm going, Going on case we could just say going on a trip, but I'd like to make it a little more interesting. So I'm gonna I'm gonna change it up a little bit. Going on a solo at an additive. Their solo trip solo means by yourself. Okay. Solo trip to to Australia. Okay, Simple enough. First sentence. Very simple, but we fit it together. We could do it in a different way, though. Okay? We could say next August we could start. We probably couldn't put it in the past tense because of what's going to be there later. But we could change it around a lot. And you can play with it to get a feeling for how to link these these different words together. Okay, then we start. Let's see next week buy tickets. That's an easy one. Next week, I need to make my gonna add Make my itinerary, make my itinerary. Itinerary is your travel. Ah, travel plan. Make my itinerary on. Gotta have buying tickets there too. So we can add a lot of things if we want between words and by by my we just say tickets. Then it could be trained tickets. So I want to make sure it's clear. So my plane tickets Now we have here my very close to my Is it Is it okay that we do that? Yeah. So it's OK that we do that. We could also probably make our own sentence here if we wanted to. With the last part, we could say I will also buy my plane tickets. That would be another small sentence. That's okay too. Both of these are Okay. Okay. So let's keep going with this. I I plan to visit Sydney first and then head to Melbourne so we could say that at many, many different ways. Go to Melbourne, travel to Melbourne. I plan to visit Sydney and then Melbourne many, many different ways. We could say this one as well. All right, let's keep going. Let's keep going again. I hope you're doing this as we go along with me. And if you're doing it differently from me, that is fine. That is fine, right? Let's see what's next. As soon as that means exactly when? As soon as I arrive at my hotel and check in all I want to Dio is find a place to relax by the ocean. Okay, Very simple. But we made this all one sentence and we've added some interesting stuff between the words we have to use. We have to use hotel, right? We have to use arrive. We have to use Relax. We have to use ocean. But between that, we can do really what we want we can, ADM. Or we can add less again. You could make it a much longer story if you want to. Let's keep going. I'm gonna have something that's not here at all. That's what that's That's what vacations are all about. That's what vacations are all about. Who add an exclamation there. It's called an exclamation. Okay, I really hope Ad. Really? Why not? We have to use hope ad. Really? I really hope I can meet a lot of Well, that's a weird Oh Ah, lot of interesting people. While I'm there again, we could say in Australia we could say there we could say while I'm on my trip, we could say all of these things. But the most important is that we are working within our rules. We have our clear rules, right? We've got Do we have interesting people? Yes. Interesting people is here. We have hope first. Yes, Hope is right there. And because those are the only two we're going to include here. We have a lot more freedom can express something very interesting. Now, the last part the last part. Here we go. Last part at here. We kind of have to say at you could say around the beginning of September, but probably at at the beginning. Could say in the beginning as well at the beginning. Off September. Hope you don't mind if I just write S e p T At the beginning of September. I need to fly back home and return to work. We could also say get back to work. I need to fly back home and get back to work. If we say back two times in a row, it can sound a little bit weird. So I think returned to work would be better. If we took out back then Maybe it would be okay. And we could say I need to fly home and get back to work. That would be just fine. So you gotta play around with this. If you want to do it on your own, all you do is find a text, an article, whatever. Pick out some of the key words from their write them down on a piece of paper in the correct order. You can write it just like this with the single word, followed by a period just to make it simple, then at the bottom. Underneath that, write your own little story and fill in the spaces, and you want to try to make sure that it all makes sense. You wanna have different types of sentences, different lengths, different types of grammar that you're using in the sentences. And very importantly, you want to make it interesting. It's gotta be interesting. Okay, let's go on and look at the next exercise that we can do, which is similar to this. But we're going to be actually simplifying and removing some things that are unnecessary 71. English Exercises Part 1 - Simplification: So we've talked about now, an exercise that can help us think about syntax, how we organize our sentences, how we can fit words that we know together into a coherent story. Now this exercise, the simplification exercise is all about forcing ourselves to find the simple way to explain something. In fact, much of natural English, especially natural spoken English, is quite simple. People often speak very simply so when you look at something that's written down and you say, Wow, it's very long and complicated, it is certainly possible and even likely that that can be actually said in a much simpler way. We're going to do that now. Okay, now the one we're going to look at is not actually very good. But you could also do this for literature. For example, if you read a page of ah book, that's kind of complicated. You can take that paragraph from that book and simplify it. Boil it down. We often when we talk about simplifying things, we talk about boiling it down to its simplest form. So let's play around with this and this is really play. I consider this to be play, the more you can play with English. Play with language, the more comfortable that you'll be, and then you're going to be more creative. When you want to express your ideas and speak, you're gonna be able to express yourself creatively simply and clearly. OK, so it was Christmas. I spent the day with my family. We opened presents together and ate a big meal. The meal was delicious. We had a great day together. Christmas is my favorite holiday, so this is filled with a lot of redundant language. Something is redundant. That means it's really doesn't need to be said. OK, so we ate a big meal. It the meal was delicious. Okay, we said Meal twice. That's not so good. Christmas is my favorite holiday. Well, if we're talking about how great Christmases do, we need to say that it's our favorite. Okay? I spent the day with my family. We opened presents together and had a big meal. It just sounds a little weird, because the sentences are maybe to short syntax is not great. And there's a bit of repetition, inwards, a bit of redundancy. So stop the lesson here. Try your own. Try to try three different ones and see what you can come up with. I'm going to try to variations to simplifications of the original text and see how close yours are to mind. If they're not like mine. That's totally okay. There are many ways to do this. Just see how well you can do it and then come back. All right, Here we go. My 1st 1 on. Let's see my family, my family and I had a great time opening presence together on Christmas after a big, delicious meal. Wow, we've said pretty much everything there. My family and I had a great time opening presents together on Christmas after a big delicious meal. One sentence and we've said pretty much everything that's been said here. And so we've removed a lot of the redundancy, and it's very clear, even though it's a lot simpler, I would say this is way better than the original way, way better. Okay, then we could add, maybe for syntax, we can add one sentence. It's my favorite holiday. Christmas is my favorite holiday, so you have this very long sentence that says everything we want to say and then, but it's my favorite holiday, a very simple sentence to give us some variation in our sentence style. And if it's not there, I think it's OK because we can kind of get a feeling that it's It's your favorite holiday. It's actually not my favorite holiday. By the way, my favorite holiday is a very silly holiday that my family and I invented, which we call Hanks giving. Just write that down. It's a ridiculous thing. We invented it. That's called Hanks, giving, not Thanksgiving. So there's an American holiday called Thanksgiving while we celebrate one called Thanksgiving. And if you know there's a famous actor, his name is Tom Hanks. So on Hank's giving, we get our friends together, my family and I and we watched Tom Hanks movies. We played games. Tom Hanks related games. We have trivia. It's very weird. It's very strange, but we have a lot of fun. It's quite interesting. It's quite interesting. Hanks giving something that only my family does. It's not normal for sure. Okay, so let's try one more of these and see if we can do another interesting variation. Variation. Okay, here we go. Um, I spent I spent I spent this Christmas with my family and we'll just make that a simple sentence. I don't want to say that long sentence equals good sentence. That's not true. OK, so you can have short sentences, long sentences. They can all be good sentences. After a huge, tasty meal, we all had a great time opening presence together. So now this one is a bit different because the sentences are about the same length. But I would say it's no better or worse than the other one. The 1st 1 we did. Now where could we put? It's my favorite holiday if we want to put that in so we could put my favorite holiday at the end. But we could also use which I spent this Christmas comma, which is my favorite holiday comma. With my family, we could do that. That is something that you can do to add information to a sentence, and it's really, really useful. You can do it with people. You can do it with things. If it's a thing, then usually you use, which, if it's a person, you'll use who I'll just give you a very quick example of how to do that. Just so you know, so that you can use it in the future. Let's make two short sentences. My uncle is a doctor. My uncle lives in Canada. Okay, to have two sentences. This and this. These two are the same. So we don't want to say both of those. We can replace this with who or which. It's a person. My uncle. So we should say who? Not which. Okay, so here's what we do. We take this one and we put it right there. And then we add comma Who? Comma or comma? Which comma? Very simple. We could do it the other way too. My uncle Khama, who is a doctor comma again. If it's a thing, we would just say which there, which is my favorite holiday lives in Canada. We change nothing about this sentence or this sentence. We just take this sentence and into the other sentence using who or which. If it's a thing, we could go the other way. We could say My uncle who lives in Canada is a doctor. This is so easy. So whenever you want to add information, you can use this general grammar structure. It allows you to put in things about a person or a thing in a way, which really you don't have to think much about and went. When should we put lives in Canada? Inside is a doctor. When should we do that instead of the other way? Well, I would say the main sentence is probably more important. So my uncle lives in Canada is probably the most important thing we want to say. My uncle, who is a doctor. That's just extra information, so usually put the extra information inside the two commas. Call it comma, by the way, and and a do you put the extra information there, and then the main sentence is usually the Mawr important thing. So these two exercises completing sentences by taking out key words from an article and then making a story, stitching them together and then simplifying a paragraph from an article or a novel or whatever and doing several simplified variations of that. These air too powerful ways to get you to think more creatively in English. And the more you do it, the more powerful you're going to feel. When you get into a situation you need to express yourself. You're going to be able to put your words together a little bit more easily, and that's going to allow you to come across or speak mawr. Naturally, you'll find your words more easily, and you'll be able to stick them together without really thinking about it. If you practice this, enough practice is extremely important. You've got knowledge, but you also need to practice it. You've got to build the right habits. Got to get comfortable in English. You've got to do exercises. So foreign assignment here, a couple of examples of very, very short words that you can fit together into a sentence or a couple sentences. Very simple. OK, now, once you've done these and you feel like it's pretty easy, go a step further. Get an article from the newspaper or a book or whatever and do the exercises that we learned in this lesson. Do them several times when you choose one to do for a simplification, try 10 variations if you can. I want to emphasize it's very important to play play and having fun with it, making it funny, right doing it a little differently. Changing the style, especially for the 2nd 1 is really, really important. English can be actually a lot of fun if you jump in and swim around, so go practice. Good luck 72. English Exercises Part 2 - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about some exercises you can do to improve your spoken English and also improve your habits when you're speaking English and this lesson, we're going to do more of the same. We're going to look at a couple of exercises, and I should mention that a couple of these have been covered in my other course called Building Your English Brain. So if you want to see more things like this, then make sure to sign up for that course as well. But these are just things that you can do to improve habits, and it's less about actually learning words and phrases and learning about how to handle situations, which is what most of this course is about. So let's actually go through what we're going to talk about in this lesson. We're gonna talk about some basic vocabulary. I'm going to teach you a few words. Then we're going to do some exercises about rephrasing. Now we've done something similar in the last lesson. It's a bit different, and then we're going to do an exercise called the foreword Exercise. We're gonna practice that I'm gonna show you how you can do it any time you like, and then we're also going to do something called improvisation, which I will explain when we get to that part, So let's get started. 73. English Exercises Part 2 - Key Vocabulary: now, before we get started with the actual practice for this lesson, let's just go over some basic vocabulary. I think you probably know one or two of these words before we've talked certainly a little bit about variation. But if variation is basically a another version of the same thing, if you do a variation of something that means you do it again in a slightly different way, whether it's a painting or maybe a dish, your cooking, whatever it happens to be, Ah, variation means you've taken that thing and you're going to try to do that same thing but make a couple of small changes. So you've made a variation of that. And if we have many of those, we can say many variations that will make more sense a little bit later in this lesson with what we're going to do next. Okay, now, liberties. You might know the word liberty means freedom. Okay, liberties can mean the plural form of freedom, but when I say in this case, take liberties, we often hear, I say, Take liberties. That means don't restrict yourself too much to one specific thing. So if you take some creative liberties For example, when you're doing a variation of a painting, maybe you're trying to paint a painting similar to ah famous painting. OK, you might add, I don't know an extra flour. Or you might add some different colors that would be taking liberties. That means just following your following your heart, I guess taking some freedom to do what you want to do to do what feels right. Okay, so that's OK. That's what we call taking liberties. And when we do today's lesson and the exercises that we're going to talk about today, we need to remember that it's okay to take liberties sometimes taking liberties air doing what we feel might be interesting is a good way to explore new types of grammar or explore how we use words. It might be also a good way to maybe find new uses of, for example, vocabulary. So it actually could be really useful. All right now, improvisation, and we'll talk a little bit more about this at the end or toward the end of the lesson. The short version of this is often improv. I M P R O V. Improv and Improv is often related to comedy so you might see improv comedy, which means that nothing is planned. Maybe there's a situation. Maybe there's a scene, but nobody knows what's going to happen. There's no script. There's no dialogue, COC, maybe an improv comedy show. It's very funny because nobody knows what's going to happen, and it's kind of crazy. Okay, improvisation Is this ability to be able to speak naturally and continuously without really thinking carefully about what you're saying? We're going to practice that later on in the lesson, so I hope these three words are clear and let's go on to our first exercise. 74. English Exercises Part 2 - Full Variations: so our first exercise will be something similar to what we did in the previous lesson, but a bit different because this is a full variation. We looked before it how we could say things a little bit differently and also reduce the redundancy and any repetition that we could cut out to make it simpler. Well, we can do the same thing, but just go for a full variation. In other words, we can take some creative liberties. We can do what we want, but it has to stay in the general area, and the events pretty much have to be the same, although maybe we can do it from a different a different perspective. But basically what we're going to do is rewrite the whole thing, and you can do this with a maybe two paragraphs from a book that you're reading. You might try to do it with a big paragraph from an article that you're reading. Whatever Aziz long is, it's something that's long enough and has enough detail so that you can really explore it and do a really good variation or rephrase. It can also say that we're rephrasing it, and now we're going to look at a short story, very short story and see if we can rephrase it. So let's just read through this. Something unusual happened as Alex made his way home from class. He had been walking through campus when suddenly a stranger wearing a black mask holding a small knife, stepped out from behind a tree and demanded that Alex hand over his wallet. Of course, Alex valued his life more than his money, and it seemed like the mugger meant business. But as he was taking out his wallet, the stranger lowered the knife and said, You're a coward before running away into the darkness. Okay, now, I think you can probably get the idea the meaning of that story. While it is where you keep your money, The mugger is the person who may steal your money on the street. They'll say, Hey, give me your wallet. That is a mugger. And to mean business means that you're not joking around. It's serious. Okay? You really intend to? If you don't give me your wallet, I will stab you with this knife. All right, Now, I've written a variation of this. I've basically taken this story which I also wrote on Guy wrote it again in a different way , and I have written it from the perspective of the mugger. So that is a creative liberty that I have taken. So what you can do is try to write it from different perspectives in different ways and really explore the event. It's a very good creative exercise. OK, now let's look at my variation of this and notice that it's from the perspective of Alex's friend, who I've decided is the one who was mugging Alex. It was fake. He was just playing a joke on his friend, his roommate. Okay, he wanted to scare him. That's why he said, You're a coward in my mind. Okay, so I'm writing it from his perspective. Alex's roommate played a horrible prank on him last night. He put on a ski mask and hid behind a tree until dark. Then, when he spotted Alex walking back to the dorm, he jumped out. He realized he might be taking things a little far with the pocket knife in his hand, but Alex's petrified face made it all worthwhile just to see what would happen. He demanded Alex's wallet, feeling the joke had gone far enough, he said, You're a coward. Before disappearing into the shadows, he laughed all the way back to the dorm. Okay, so basically it's the same story, two different perspectives. You get the idea. The point is exploring within the constraints or the limits of the original story and the events that happen. So keep the events the same. Keep the basic story the same. Explore what's possible within that play with the language. Tell a couple of versions of it doesn't have to be from another perspective, but it's a great exercise if you want to be a better writer, and it's a great exercise to help you think in English a little bit differently and develop your basic habits and and your skills in how you put sentences together. Have you practiced this a lot? You're going to get really good at that, and you're gonna become a much better writer as well, because each version should be better than the last. And then you can go back and look at it and see how can I improve? Okay, so that is the sentence variation or the rephrasing exercise. Now let's go on and do another one, which is also really, really useful 75. English Exercises Part 2 - 4 Words: All right, so we've done variations, and you can use that exercise any time to improve your English skills. Now we're going to go on to an exercise that I designed specifically to improve your ability to think in English. Now, if you've already seen this in my other course about learning to think in English, the English brain course, then I'm sorry. I want to cover it in this course because I think it's so important. And a lot of students have told me how useful it is to them. So I want to make sure that we included in this course so that you can use it to actually start thinking in English. Thinking in English is very important. If you can start thinking in English than you can start speaking in English more naturally , you don't have to translate in your head. All right, so this is very simple. Let me explain how we do it. All right. So the foreword exercise is going to force us to use English very flexibly, very creatively. We have no choice but to think in English to do this. Choose forwards, and once you get good, you can use five maybe six, and I recommend using different forms of words. So don't use on. Leave herbs. Maybe use a verb. He's an adjective. Use another verb using now different types, and it's good if you choose words that can have many different forms, right? Like cooler. Coolest cool, right, Because cool has different meanings to that's good. Don't put each word into its own sentence. They all have to be in one sentence. You can move them around in any order you like. Doesn't matter what order they're in. That's fine. In fact, you should be moving them around and trying them in different ways. You can explore that different meanings of each word. As I mentioned cool means like you're awesome person, and it also means kind of cold. Okay, But also, you can change the forms. So, for example, thank we could say thankful. Thanks. There are lots of different forms of words as well. So one sentence not to sentence is very important that you make it fit in one sentence that forces you to be very creative. Okay, any order, any form. Now I've decided to use for this one. We're going to use communicate and turn and fool and cost. And honestly, when I was working on this class plan, I just chose four words. I chose the 1st 4 words I thought of. There's nothing special about these words. If you want to change them and choose different words, you should, and all you have to do to do this exercise is sit down, right forwards down and then see how many different sentences you can come up with and how many different meanings you can come up with. Let's look at two ways that we can use communicate, turn full and cost. I'm going to give two examples, but there are many, many other ways we can use these words to make a sentence just before we do. Let me go over a couple of the different forms so we could have communicate. We could have communication. We could have communicator, right? We could have a couple different forms of communicate turn turning turns. Okay, Those air. Okay. Um full foolish fuller fools. Okay, We can use those cost costs sometimes costing. Okay. So let's let's look at a couple of example. Sentences number one, the cost of a failure to communicate whose turn it is to speak Might result in someone looking foolish. Okay, so we have communicated its original form that when we have here, this turn doesn't mean turn left or right. But in order, Whose turn is it? It's my turn. Ok, then we have foolish foolish, which is one form of the word full. And we have cost in its original form. Okay, let's see if we can come up with one, which is very different. Okay, Next one, I foolishly turned onto the wrong road because of ah, miscommunication. And it cost me a job. So do we have cost? Yes, this one. We've used the verb form miscommunication. Well, okay, That's a form of communicate. Miscommunication is a noun. Okay, we've used it as a noun full. We've used foolishly, foolishly. This is an adverb used an advert for foolishly turned and turn In the past tense past past tense we used turned So we've got all four of our words full cost, turn and communicate. But we've used them very differently than the previous one and we could keep going. I don't want to bore you with many, many examples, but I hope this gets the idea across. Nothing special about the words. You have to force yourself to stick with the rules. Follow the rules. No more than one sentence. Once you get good at it, try five words. Try six words, and it's very important that it it actually makes sense. It can't just fit together grammatically and you say, Oh, the the grammar is right. It also has to make sense. It has to be logical. It has to be something that you could hear in a story. If it's grammatically correct and you've just got a bunch of and then and then and then and then on the sentences this long you failed. It's got to be a nice, neat, clean sentence. Okay, you gotta follow the rules. 76. English Exercises Part 2 - Improvisation: we've done the variation. Exercise the forward exercise. Now we're going to do improvisation. Remember I told you improvisation means that you speak without thinking. This is very important. If you want to get used to that feeling off, speaking freely in conversation without feeling like where are my words? I can't find my words. Well, you probably can't find your words because you're not used to finding them in conversation . And it's as simple as that. You have to do something in order to be good at it. So in the improvisation exercise, you need to speak continuously. Cannot write this one. Speak continuously right down a word, and then whatever that reminds you of, start talking about it and then go and go for about a minute, maybe two minutes, if you can. Just talk, doesn't have to be perfect. It's not going to be perfect. I'm going to do it in a moment. It's not going to be perfect. Are probably going to say some things that sound a little I don't know. Silly. Maybe, I don't know. I don't know what I'm going to say. It's going to be improvisation. Okay, so this is an extremely important exercise. Always record. It pushed the record button on your phone. Whatever. Just make sure it's recorded so that you can listen back to it and see how you did. OK, so choose a word that has some meaning in your life. Don't choose a word like off or in doesn't have much meaning inside of it. Choose a word like wildlife. And I'm just going to start speaking. I promise you, I have not planned this, OK? And I'm going to use the first take of this. That means I'm not going to cut this and try many, many tries. I want you to get a feeling for the rial one. This is my first attempt. I'm only going to record this one time, and I'm going to talk about wildlife. If you could do the same thing, use wildlife or use another word. Choose a word like marriage or word like literature or dentistry. I like to use subjects because you can talk about those things and connect it to your life . So here we go. So when I grew up, I was basically raised to know how to make things, and that's because I was raised in the countryside, so I would often go out into the woods and I would make forts and I would make tree houses and I would like to find things in the river and it gave me a real appreciation for nature and for wildlife. And I think that's one of the reasons why I really care so much about making sure that human activities don't have a negative effect on nature and on wildlife. So take, for example, the animals in Africa which are endangered because of poaching there. There are many people who who want, for whatever reason, certain things, certain products that can be made from animals like elephant tusks. And because there are people who will pay money for that because there are people who will buy that. They then are supporting an economy where a poacher is a person who hunts or kills animals like elephants illegally. Will will kill an elephant to get its tusks, and it's causing these animals to be endangered. So I think because of my childhood in nature and studying animals, watching animals and playing outside, I think I have a deep appreciation and I think a lot of other people do too. And I think that really have to do something and take action in order to actually protect animals, especially animals and plants, to be honest, which are endangered. So let's take elephants mean elephants are being killed very often in Africa and there are some people who actually do do things to protect them sharks as well. There are things that can be done to protect these animals. One of the things that I think is probably good for anybody to do is donate to organisations who are actually fighting illegal poaching. And just by donating to those organizations, they can then bring on more people and get to know the maybe local culture so that they can try to have a real impact. Because if the elephants are gone like the rhino is gone now one of the rhino species is gone. Then what's the point of being alive if we don't have animals to appreciate? Okay, I'm gonna stop there. So that was me just going. I didn't have anything in mind. I didn't have anything planned up just talking and baby, I repeated myself a few times when you don't have a clear structure When you don't have an outline, it tends to happen when you're in conversation with friends. It's very easy to I don't kind of repeat yourself or focus on something too much or whatever. That's not the point of this exercise. The point of this exercise is for you to get used to the feeling of speaking freely without stopping, so that when you need to have those conversations when you need to explain yourself, you feel comfortable and confident to do so. So try the exercise where you do variations. Try the forward exercise and try the improvisation exercise. And for that one, make sure you speak. Make sure you record so that you can listen to it again. So to practice this number one for the foreword exercise, start with these four and then once you've done these for a few times, try your own. Write down your own four words. Go to five, go to six, then for the improv exercise. You can try these two fake products and parenting. Okay, just two topics you can use. But then, after that, pick your own topics. It's not hard. Just choose anything and talk about it for the other one. The variation. All you have to do is find a paragraph from a story, find a paragraph from an article, for example, and make variations of that. See how many different ways you can say it. All right, good luck. And I hope that these exercises help to improve your ability to think in English and also improve your speaking habits. Good luck. 77. Time Words - Overview: in the last lesson, we worked on some of the things that we can do. Some of the exercises weaken due to practice, to improve our ability to think in English and to improve our speaking and writing habits. In this lesson, we're going to be focused on time words. That means words that we can use that are related to time that we need to use when we talk about time, things in the past, things in the future. Now I know that you're familiar with a lot of these words, like in and ago and after later propositions like apt and by and around phrases like maybe back then. But I want to make sure we go over them in this course, so that to you, they're crystal clear. That means you completely understand them. You know that differences between them, You know exactly how to use them. If you completely understand all of these and you know exactly how to use them. Okay, perhaps you can skip over this lesson. I would recommend going through it because we're going to cover lots of examples lots and lots of great examples for how to tell the difference how to know the difference between these words and phrases. Very importantly, how to use them 78. Time Words - In and Ago: So let's get started within and ago. One of the most common issues that I've seen with English learners is mixing up in and ago with after and before and later. We can't get these mixed up we use in and ago in one type of situation and the others in a different one. So let's just be very clear about how we use in and to go. So this is our timeline. It's called. It's our timeline and this is now the present. This moment, if we're talking about something from now, then we should use in if it's in the future and to go for the past. So this way the future will use in again. This is from now from now we can't say, For example, we can't say after 10 minutes, and that means from now 10 minutes we need to say in 10 minutes. In the past, we use ago from now we can't say 10 minutes before now. We can't say that we have to say 10 minutes ago. It doesn't matter how much time it is. It could be 100 years, 50 years, a week, a month, 10 months a minute. A second doesn't matter from now, OK? Some examples, Some examples. The plane plane will land in 10. I'm just gonna right the abbreviation M i n s 10 minutes. Okay. My plane. My claim left 10 minutes ago. Okay, so the 1st 1 the plane will leave in 10 minutes or with Landon's 10 minutes. Sorry. The plane will land in 10 minutes. Means I'm sitting here waiting. The plane is going to in the future from now. 10 minutes. My plane left 10 minutes ago. That means I'm late. I ran to the airport and it didn't make it. I'm late for my plane. I'm late for my flight because it left 10 minutes ago. Okay, again, that's from now. That's from now. In 15 years, I hope to be living in Sweden. Okay, Sweet. And I don't know why Sweden, who knows in 15 years, I hope to be living in Sweden. Okay, so that's in the future. Maybe this is 2015 on this is 2030 From now, if it's 2015 actually, it's not from now 30 15 years to 2030. It's very important that it's from now. Doesn't matter. how much time it is? Doesn't matter. Okay? I Waas living in Ohio four years ago. I was living in Ohio four years ago. So from now, if we go back 1234 years. Where was I? Ohio. I was living there. Okay? Actually, that's also not true. Just examples. So I hope that's clear in for the future from now. A go to the past from now. 79. Time Words - After, Later, and Before: So now we can get into after later and before we can't use it from now. So let's just cross that out. We're not going to use that after later and before can be used to talk about a time that happened after or before a point that's in the future or the past, future or past. So here's the point. Here's the point. And we're going to talk about something that happened over here or something that happened over here or something that happened over here, something that happened over here. Not now. We're not going to focus on now. Okay, so let's say future or past, future or past point. It works basically the same way as in and ago, except the now point is moved into the future or moved into the past, and we don't talk about now. Some examples. Okay, let's go. Simple at first. Okay. A week before my vacation next June. I need to get my visa. If I wanted to be very specific about the time I could say in six months I'm going on vacation. Okay? Ah. Week before my vacation, which is in six months, which is next June. Whatever I need to get my visa. Okay, so this is June in the future, okay? And this is a week before that One week before. Here's now we don't worry about that. A week before that, I need to get my visa, which is what we need to travel. Obviously, when we travel, we need a visa. Okay, So that makes sense. We could say there's another past point. Let's say this is my 11th birthday. B day. We often right? Be day. Okay. Three months after my 11th birthday. Well, it's not my 11th birthday now, So my 11th birthday was 0 70 years ago, three months after my 11th birthday, I broke my leg. Three months after my 11th birthday, I broke my leg. Three months before my 11th birthday, three months before my 11th birthday, I moved to a new city. I moved to a new city with my family. Okay, But again, it's from this point from this point. Or I could say I turned 11 on June 14th 6 months later, something happened, Okay? Pretty simple. I had moved to a new city a month before, so that's how we can use before before what before I turned 11 a month before I turned 11 which was on June 14th for example. Okay, a few more examples. After after getting married, I became Mawr responsible. Now that one is not connected to a specific date. But I was married in the past. And then after that time, probably until now, maybe, maybe not. After that time I changed. So we can use this way to express it. So the point there is we can use events instead of dates. For example, in the future, after I move to New York City and why, See, we also call that the Big Apple. After I moved to New York City, I plan to start, Ah, small business. So this one is not about when it happens exactly. But there's a thing that's going to happen in the future. Not now and then another thing that will happen after that. You could say something that will happen before that. We don't need to say that dates. We don't need to say exactly when we're just trying to relate events in time. Basically, I arrived in Beijing in 2012. Ah, year later I met my wife, a year later, I met my wife. Okay, so this is when it happened. Could I use, for example, before here? Well, yeah. Could say Ah. Year before I met my wife, I moved to Beijing. Basically, it's the same idea, The same idea. If you're hungry before five. PM yo have to cook by yourself before you have to cook by yourself. So Okay, maybe a mother is talking to her son. Usually she cooks for her son today. She can't. Maybe she's very busy if you feel hungry. This is in the future. Maybe now it's 2 p.m. Son. If you feel hungry before five, you'll have to cook for yourself. Okay, so? So that means if it's after, she will cook for him. If this is 5 p.m. after it, OK, she will cook for him before she cannot. She cannot. She will be busy so he will have to cook for himself before that. This is in the future. One more thing very quickly. I have so much to prepare before my exam. I have so much to prepare before my exams. I'm really stressed out. I'm stressed out out of dress out. Okay, so Hopefully that's clear now when we use in, when we use a go, when we use after later and before, I hope it's very clear. 80. Time Words - Common Time Prepositions: So if we're clear on those basics, let's go on to some other basics before we get into some slightly more difficult stuff. Some phrases I want to just make sure you're absolutely clear on these basic propositions at by around about and within their basic their basic. But we need to make sure we're clear on how to use them. Let's just burn through some examples. That means we're going to go really fast. Here we go. At is for exactly when something happens on the clock. Usually so at seven. At 7 p.m. Am. Whatever. I have a meeting. I have a meeting. Okay. Pretty simple at seven. Could be another time. Could be It's seven, 7 23 Whatever. Why would you do something at 7 23 anyway? At seven. I have a meeting. Okay. Please give it to me by Friday. This one's interesting. What does by me by is like before? Plus on. If you say give it to me on Friday. It means Thursday. Wednesday. These air not OK. If you say give it to meet before Friday. It means Friday is not OK any time before. Okay. Not Friday. If you say Give it to me by Friday. It means Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. They're all OK, including Friday. So by is really useful. If you say I'll be there by six, it means no later than six. No later than six could be 5 30 Could be 5 20 Could be 5 58 Could be six, including six. Okay, so if we say then around, if I If I say I'll be there, I'll be there around 6 30 This is very then mysterious. 6 30 is like this. So when is it exactly? Is it? 6 20 is at 6 15 is at 6 25 Is it? 6 30 is at 6 40 all around that so around and about are very similar. They're often used in this way to be less clear. It's not as clear is at, and it's not as clear as by because at least bye bye. We know what the latest time is. So we can say around when we want to be general. We want to be general, and we often use around and about when we're talking about our memory, for example, I could say, uh, at at about five, we went out to eat. Okay, That was maybe yesterday about five. We went out to eat about. We could also say we could also use around five as well. That's fine. We could say about we could say around. That means that my memory is not so clear. I wasn't checking my watch when we left to go out to eat. Maybe I and some of my co workers we went out to eat. When did we go? Food. Eyes around. I was around five, maybe about five. OK, so that's how we use that. Either we're going to be late. We don't know when we're going toe arrive or we don't remember very clearly about around. Okay, now what about within here? We have within within 20 minutes, everyone waas asleep. Okay, so if we say everyone was asleep by 6 20 we arrived home at six and everyone was asleep by 6 20 That means the last person to fall asleep maybe fell asleep at 6 19 anyway, 6 20 Everyone was sleeping. Okay, so before or at 6 20 But if we say within 20 minutes, then we're talking about this duration this period. Do you are a t i o n all right that more clearly because that's not very clear. D u r A T I o n. This duration of time is not a time on the clock. Usually it's often how many minutes How many hours? 20 minutes. Within 20 minutes, everyone waas asleep. That means may be the first person fell asleep at 605 The second person fell asleep at maybe 6 10 The third person fell asleep at 6 12 The fourth person fell asleep at 6 17 and the last person fell asleep at 6 20 So within 20 minutes, so we can use it like that. Talk about durations, time periods. I hope it's clear how we use at by, around about and within to talk about time. This is pretty easy stuff I know. I just want to make sure it's very, very clear in your mind so that you have no doubt when you want to actually use, put them 81. Time Words - At, On, and In: So now we're pretty clear on how we use those basic propositions to talk about times. Now we can talk about days, months, weeks, dates, years, decades, using often these three at on an in Okay, Now at is for a specific time, just like when we say 6 30 But at is often used for a point within a year or a month or a week, for example, at the beginning of June, at the beginning of next month. Okay, at the end of the week we can use at for that, it's sort of a time point within a within a larger thing. A larger unit. Okay, about on then on is actually more common when we're talking about days and dates. If it's an exact date, we won't say At June 13th we say on June 13th. On June 13th I flew home. That's it. I am there on June 13th. I flew home on February 27th on July 6th, on August 24th. What ever we say a specific date we use on Okay. We also use on when we say, for example, the actual day of the week on Friday of last week or this week. On Friday, I have a match. Maybe you're a tennis player. When is your match eyes on Friday. Oh, okay. What do you usually do on the weekend? Do you usually do on the weekend? What do you usually do on weekends? So for a weekend, even though it's two days, some people consider it three days we used on as well, but we don't use at for the weekends. We don't use in for the weekends. We don't say in the weekends, we can say in the week we can say during the week for the whole thing you could say during the weekend. But usually we say on the weekend and then in is used for much larger things will say, For example, in April we need to book our hotel. That's when we need to do it in April. So we're talking about the whole month of April whenever it happens. Okay, if it's a larger thing in 2014 I moved to Austria. You know why? Why not? Why not? We're not moved to Austria in 2014. I moved to Austria in the nineties. Now we're talking about a decade which is a 10 year period in the nineties, in the eighties, in the seventies, in the sixties. Well, if we go back 100 years, then we start and we need to start saying 18 seventies, 18 nineties, 14 twenties. But if we're talking about the the previous century, then we just use nineties in the nineties. In the nineties. Fashion waas Weird. It's true, I guess fashion is always weird when you look back, though, right? What I'm wearing now. My hair probably will be weird very soon. Maybe it's weird now, I don't know. All right, so that's how we use at on and in when we're talking about days, dates, months, years, decades, things like that. Hope that's pretty easy to understand should be. 82. Time Words - Since, Ever Since, and Until: moving quickly along. We've talked about a lot of basic words and propositions. Let's just be clear about since ever since and until because they're kind of the same idea when we use since. And ever since. We have this beginning point in the past and it's going until probably now and will continue in the future, likely on until means something was continuing before, and it ends at some point. Doesn't have to be now. Doesn't have to be. The future doesn't have to be the past, but it could be any one of those now since and ever since can often be used in the same way , especially if it's at the beginning of a sentence. We would say, for example, since since I was a little boy, I've I've been interested in the moon and I could then say, Ever since I was a little boy, I've been interested in the moon we often use ever since when we're talking about events, things that happen in time in the past that have continued until the present. That's often how it's used, another example of ever since and ever since ever since my grandmother passed away. That means died but passed away is often more polite. I haven't been the same now, could we say Since my grandma passed away, I haven't been the same. Yeah, yeah, you could say that. But they're both events. They're both things that happened in the past. And, um, they're focusing on some event, not specifically sometime. We often then use since Onley for time things and wouldn't use ever since. So often for specific time things, for example, you wouldn't say. Ever since 2000 and 11 we would more often say, since 2000 and 11. But again, it's Ah, it's a small distinction there. Very, very similar. Let's look at a couple of examples of just since let us do that. Since June. Since June, things have been very strange. May be in a family or whatever. Since June, things have been very strange. We probably won't use ever since. They're probably just used since June since June. Or we could say, for example, I haven't eaten since 4 a.m. Okay. We definitely won't use ever since Here cannot work here. Cannot use. Ever since I haven't eaten ever since 4 a.m. That is incorrect. We can use just since when we have this sentence structure. And we mentioned a specific time like this. Okay, so if we have a time of day, then we won't use ever since again ever since can be used to to focus on usually distant events in the past and to talk about some current condition and when it began, whereas since is used for simpler things, let's look at one more example of since since Tuesday, the office has been very quiet since Tuesday. The office has been very quiet. Now it could use ever since there it really could. But yeah, again, usually since will be used there because it's about ah, specific time. It's just a bit more common. So there is some overlap with since and ever since. But just to be clear, this sort of thing when we're talking about a time of day, especially in this sentence structure we cannot use ever since until I will stay until you asked me to leave. Okay, Pretty simple. That means when you say it's time for you to go, I will. I will go. If you don't say it, I won't go. OK, I will stay until you asked me to leave. We could take this out and we could just put a time here. I will stay until 10. PM Very simple. Very simple. So this is easy. This is just the ending time. Okay. Breakfast isn't served until 7 a.m. Until 7 a.m. Noticed that sometimes we use time. Sometimes we can use days dates. We can say months until June. It's not going to be ready until June. I can't wait that long. That's three months from now. So that's the time in the future when it will happen. But time of day also works and events also work until you asked me to leave. Okay? She was very happy until John brought up her dead dog. Then she started crying again. Or he was very sad until Cheryl came over and gave him a hug. You can talk about events, too. Okay, Pretty simple. Pretty easy. I think. I think you can probably understand as well, and I hope that you feel comfortable and confident to use since ever since and until end. Let's go on 83. Time Words - From and Between: Now we should feel very comfortable with a lot of words and phrases related to time and duration propositions that are very common. Let's not get into a little bit more complexity, although still pretty easy. Still pretty basic on how we can talk about a range, a range of times, and you've probably seen this before. When should we use from two? When should we use between? And they mean the same thing. It's just about how you use them from. Goes with two between, goes with an Just remember that and you're pretty much OK. You can use it to talk about both of these to talk about months, years times. So it's extremely useful as long as you feel comfortable using these. We're talking about a range beginning here. A lot of ending here. Okay, so let's try it. From June 8, 2014 to july 17th 2014 the website will be down okay. From June 8 2014 to july 17th 2014 the website will be down. One thing we can do here when we're talking about this range this range when the website will be down or not working is that we can notice the year here and here. These two are the same. If they're different, we have to say both. In fact, we can probably leave out the 2nd 1 and we usually do that when we're reading a list of things which has the same noun for each one. I want to eat Italian food, Spanish food, French food and Indian food. Or we could just say one of those. I want to eat Italian, French, Indian and Spanish food. Okay, now for this one, we could go From June 8th to July 17th 2014 the website will be down from June 8th, 2014th to July 17th. The website will be down. That's okay, too. That's OK to, um for for things like food, it would be the 2nd 1 or the last one. And for the dates or the times can be, I can be either one. Honestly, now, how can we do this with between and end? Well, it's It's pretty easy, I would say between between june 8th 2014 and July 17th that's it. Everything else is the same, so it's exactly the same. The only difference is this one has to, and this one has an They're both talking about a period off time. Now, let's let's just do a quick example with actual times we are on Lee open from four PM to seven PM And if someone is speaking this, they probably won't say PM The probably just say we are only open from 4 to 7 because no place is open from 4 a.m. to 7 a.m. Well, maybe some fast food restaurants. We could also then say we are only open between four and seven. You get the idea. You get the idea Pretty simple, pretty basic. Same thing for years. From 2013 to 2018. Then you can say something that happened. Mary was living in Canada. Whatever you want to say there. Okay, so this is pretty simple. Exactly the same. Just need to remember which one goes with and which one goes with two 84. Time Words - While and During: while and during these have again very similar meanings. One thing is happening, and another thing is happening at the same time. Okay, but the thing is happening at the same time. But there are some differences in the way that they're used. So while is often used when we're talking about two actions action. One. Eating action to watching a movie. Okay, so that's the second action. I usually eat something while I'm watching a movie or watching movies, a movie, movies, TV shows, whatever. Okay, so there's an action going on there and usually while is used when we want to talk about two actions happening at the same time. Two simultaneous actions Simultaneous is a very useful word. It means two things happening at the same time could also say simultaneously they were eating simultaneously. It is a little bit formal, though, to be honest with you now, for during during is a little different, and it's usually used for things that happen at the same time as ah thing instead of another action. So for while you have usually to actions happening at the same time to things going on, whereas during is for a thing like a movie. Like a war Like a, um, meeting. So we could say, for example, don't use your phone during the meeting. Don't use your phone during the meeting. So it's a thing here. It's a thing here. We don't have to say to actions that happened. Ah, thing is going on. A lot of people suffered during the war. War is no fun, right? A lot of people suffered during the war. No fund. But it's a thing. It's a thing. I fell asleep during the movie. I fell asleep during the movie. Okay. This one is also a very common thing that people say. Just a couple more examples. One of these is a little bit different for a while, So I just want to show you how while can be used slightly differently. Okay, You can have a seat while you wait, because that's two actions happening at the same time, I should study while I have time. Okay, so now that that's a little bit different while I have time. Then the examples that we did earlier, but it still works here, So this is a common while I have time while you can. This is another common phrase that uses while Okay. And during the nineties, a lot of Internet companies died. Died. You could also say they went under. They went under Okay during that period of time. The nineties, The nineties is a noun. It's a thing the 19 nineties. 85. Time Words - Time in the Past: all right, so we're moving right along on our phrases and words that we use to talk about time. I know a lot of this stuff is simple, but I hope the examples helped to make it super clear for you so that you don't have to think twice when you're using them. Now let's look at back then and at that time, which are basically the same. And we use these two phrases when we want to reference a time that happened before in the past, usually usually long ago, long ago. OK, so for example, I mentioned the 18 forties on. Then I say something after that about that time, I would say back then is more common. One thing that's important to notice and pay attention to about back then is that you've already mentioned the time. First, you can't start with back then because people will then say back when. What are you talking about? What you have to first say that time you have to first mention the time or the time period , and then and then you can use back then. And that's also how, at that time is typically used. Although at that time can be used to talk about the future, and we'll do an example of that, too. Okay, so let's let's get into an example then. My my great grandfather was born in 1904 1904 Long time ago Back then, back then, comma cars were not popular. Notice, I've said, when I'm talking about first, I've now made a new sentence and said back then, this is usually how it's done. This is not for something that happened last week. It's usually years ago, years ago, not even months ago, years ago, many, many years ago, often so we can use it to talk about our childhood, for example. I grew up in the nineties. Back then, we didn't really have the Internet back then. We didn't really have the Internet. I grew up in the nineties back then, back then, we didn't have the Internet. Now, if you're the person watching this thinking, wait a second. We had the Internet in the nineties. OK, that's true. But when I was a kid in the nineties, it wasn't a popular thing like it is now. Yeah, it's true. It was there, but not many people used it Common people used it for everyday things to buy whatever buy stuff, watch movies like we do now in the 19 thirties, the U. S. A experienced, tough economic times, tough economic times All right at that time. And we could also say back then here at that time, getting a job notice I have a common here getting a job. Waas not easy. Okay, back then, getting a job was not easy. All right, so pretty simple thes two back then. At that time, I just want to be clear that we can use at that time in mawr places. But I also want to be clear that when we're talking about the past, I would say back then ISMM or common, I feel like I hear it much more often than saying at that time, but you can use at that time in the future. For example, the speaker will talk until 7 30 At that time, people can ask questions. Okay, so here at that time is about the future. So it's a bit more general. It could be used in more places, but that doesn't mean it's more common. I feel like back then is much more common. I hear it more often 86. Time Words - Whenever and Every Time: Okay, So in this lesson, we've been talking about lots of different time words and phrases. And now we're down to the very last one whenever and every time. Okay, basically, this means there's an event here, An event here, an event here, an event here. And each one of these events has a thing that happens in all cases. It's not like there's an event event, event event and this one this one and this one have something happen. But not this one. Okay, No. Then we can't use whenever or every time if we want to use whenever or every time it has to be all of them. For example, whenever I teach a class, I make a plan. Whenever I teach a class, I make a plant. That means there are no times when I don't make a plan. I always have a plan. I always have an outline. I know what I'm going to talk about. I don't just come out and go blah, blah, blah, and start talking. Okay, let's look at some examples of this. It's a pretty easy concept. Whenever and every time are basically the same. Whenever I feel is more common But every time is okay, too. Whenever, whenever I visit New York City, I go to Dani's Pizza in Queens, Danny's Pizza and Queens. Very good, Very tasty. Here. Welcome Danny's Pizza for the free advertisement. Seriously, it's a place in Queens. It has amazing pizza, the best pizza in the world, in my opinion. Okay, So that means there are no times that I go to New York and don't visit Danni's pizza. Okay, I could also say, every time I visit New York City, I go to Dani's Pizza in Queens. Another example. Every time we have class, I see you improving. We could say whenever we have class, I see you improving every time. Okay, so in these cases we can see that every time and whenever are the same. But are they ever different? The answer is yes. We can use whenever also to mean any time or I don't care. Just choose a time. And that's okay with me. For example. One friend says to another, What time? What time should we should we leave? What time should we leave? One friend is asking to another friend. The other friend says, Whenever That means I don't care when any time it's up to you. We can't use every time here. We can't say every time it doesn't work, it doesn't work. So this is a place where whenever has a meaning or a use that doesn't include every time. That doesn't include every time. There's also a situation when we would use every time, but not whenever, and it's usually at the end of a sentence. For example, I'm not looking forward to ah, going to New York. So why can you imagine? I get lost every time? So here is where we can use every time, but not whenever I'm not looking forward to going to New York. I get lost every time. That means every time I go, but we can end the sentence with every time. And we couldn't just replace that with whenever I get lost. Whenever it doesn't doesn't make sense, we can say every time, but not whenever there we could say I get lost when ever I go there. But then it's kind of a weird sentence and we're saying too much. I get lost every time that we could add every time I do is well every time I do every time I go there. But the nice thing about every time at the end of the sentence is that we can end that way . I'm not looking forward to going to New York. I get lost every time. It can also be used to answer a question that somebody asks and we can't use Whenever do you throw up when you I drink rum answer every time? Not whenever. We can't say whenever, Whenever Congar oh into a whole sentence. Whenever I drink rum, I throw up. That works. But if we want to just answer the question with this every time we can, that's the answer. Every time. Yes, every time. Which means every time I drink rum, I put throw up OK, so hopefully that's clear. The difference between whenever and every time. All right, so we've gone through lots of words and phrases related to time. I hope that you found it very useful again. These are all very common to really remember all the words and phrases that we've learned in this lesson. You've gotta practice, so write down all of the examples that we went through in this lesson. I know there are many because we went through lots of different time words and phrases. Write them down and then make two sentences of your own. This will help to get them deeply ingrained in your mind so that when you need to speak and use them because they're very common, they need to come out on a regular basis. When you need to use them, they will pop out of your mouth like nothing. We very easy. Okay, good luck. 87. Writing Emails - Overview: in the last lesson, We talked about words and phrases related to time, how we can use those words and phrases to express, say, different things in time. In this lesson, we're going to talk about writing good e mails. If you can write emails well, even simple emails. Well, then you make a good impression on others, and that's very, very important. And actually learning how to write good emails is not as hard as you may think. We're gonna go over some basic tips and tricks that you can use things to remember when you're writing emails. And then we're going to look at two specific examples. We're going to talk about how to write more casual e mails to maybe friends or family members. And then we're also going to talk about how to write more professional emails, especially to people that we know who we may work with on a regular basis. So let's get started with some tips for writing good emails 88. Writing Emails - Email Tips: Okay, The first thing that you need to know when you're writing an email, the first thing you need to think about is that the style you use should not always be the same. You don't want to use the same style for your friend that you do with, for example, a coworker or a colleague. So I always think about before you get started writing an email. Why am I writing this email? What's my purpose? What's the reason? And then the style should follow that purpose. If you're trying to accomplish something, for example, by getting information, you shouldn't ask a lot of questions about unrelated things. OK, but you might do that. If you're writing a personal email, you might ask some more general questions, and the email might be longer. If it's more personal, you might describe Mawr things, but if you're writing um, or professional email, if you add a lot of words that are unnecessary, or you make a lot of extra points or say a lot, that it's possible that what you're trying to get, or maybe the question you're trying to get answered, maybe missed. So it's important to keep in mind that generally ah, more casual email will be or can be more relaxed on longer, and then a professional one should be shorter, unless it needs to be longer for some specific reason. But the goal should be to try to keep it as short and clean and efficient as possible. So when you write a professional email, try your best to be efficient. Don't waste space. Keep it simple. Keep it really simple. When you're writing a personal email or maybe one that's more casual, you can have a bit more. Let's call it flowery language. Sometimes it's called flowery language. You can use extra. You can say what you want to say. You can tell a story whatever you want to dio, so they're very different. So the 2nd 1 is to separate the purpose from the body. In other words, the body of the email is may be the largest section. Maybe you're answering someone else's question, and the body is your reply, basically what you're saying, but you want to know some things as well, or you want to ask some questions in return. You shouldn't mix those questions in with the body. If you're writing as a way to get something from somebody. Make sure that separate from the main chunk of the email, make sure that's on its own. So you have the you know you're answering their email here, then go down to lines and write your own question. That's what you want to know. Don't mix it in over here. If there are three or four questions mixed in with this, then they feel the other person who receives your email feels exhausted. Which question do I need to answer? And they might just say, uh, I can't find all those questions, so it's very important to separate those. And that's a general email tip. Now, when you're writing a professional email, you want to probably if you need something. If you're asking for something, use a list we often say. For example, I would like the following, so it's clearly separate from everything else. 123 or dash, dash, dash. And those don't even need to be full sentences. That's fine. So whatever you want to get from the other side, the person you're writing to make sure that that is clearly separated from everything else , Otherwise it may be missed. So number one. Make sure the style fits your purpose. Number two. Make sure what you would like the other person to reply to you about is separate from everything else in the email. If you have other stuff in the email, maybe it's just that if it's a very quick email, that's okay. All right, Tip number three If you're writing an email to someone you want to be careful about when you use dear, you probably know that some emails can begin with dear. I want to say, Be careful with that. When would you use dear? Well, you might use dear if you're writing to someone you don't know for the very first time, and that person has, ah, higher status. Or maybe you have absolutely no idea who they are. You just have a name you say. Dear Dr Stevens. Okay, The first communication. It's very formal, or it's very close. If you're writing a letter, for example, or a card to your grandmother. Then again, you would use dear for that. Dear grandma, so dear can be used affectionately for, for example, relatives who were very, very close to and deer can also be used for very formal situations in which we don't really know the other person we're talking to. However, if you have an ongoing relationship with them, you email back and forth regularly. Don't use dear. Just use high and then the name. Hi, Dr Stevens. Or just begin with Dr Stevens. Or you could say hello, Dr Stevens. Hello, Dr Stevens. Okay, so those air common those air common now we could use hey, but not probably not for Dr Stevens. Hey, is much more casual, Much more relaxed, very casual. So I just want you to be aware of deer and that it's actually not as common as many people who are learning English. May think it is. Our last tip is perfect punctuation. What does that mean? So these marks we use this is called a period. This is called a comma. These marks that we use when were writing these are these are called punctuation. We use them to mark our sentences. And I just want to say, if you're going to write an email, make sure it's grammatically correct. English speakers tend to be very sensitive to things that are not perfect. If it's easy to make them perfect writing. That isn't absolutely clear. All right, it's okay. But if you, for example, right in fact, and then you have a space here comma space here, I'd like to whatever blah, blah, blah. Okay, it's wrong. It's wrong. And it's obviously written by probably a non native English speaker. So all you have to do is learn the simple rules of punctuation and make sure that your email is perfect Before you send it out, there should be no space here. There should be one space here. Okay, So it should be, in fact, comma. No space. I'd like to and it's the same for a period. If we end a sentence at all with coach. Imagine this is the end of a sentence. However, comma space, I OK, so we have the end of sentence. No space here. One space here. Okay. And then, however, capital letter at the beginning of the sentence. Very important. If this is a small h, it looks like a text message. Very unprofessional. No space here. One space here and then I and I again should always be capitalized. We can't write it like that. So this kind of basic stuff. If you're writing mawr professional emails and you're communicating with people by email with incorrect basic punctuation and maybe, for example, not capitalizing. I called capitalize, not capitalizing I or the beginning of a sentence like that they might not read it. I often get e mails from people, and sometimes if I see that someone has not taken the time to carefully read, read through what they wrote and correct small things. I go, I think, to myself with this person doesn't really care about communicating with me or else they would have taken the time to fix these very basic, these very basic things. And they are very simple. All you need to know, basically, is what I just said. Capitalize the beginning of a sentence I and have no spaces before comma or period or an exclamation or any other mark and one space after. So make sure toe. Make sure to read through your e mails before you send them. Download a plug in called Graham early. I'm not being paid by Graham early to say it. It's a good plug in. It's a good app. You can you can download it. I think for your computer, but you can also have it as a plug in, For example, Safari or Google Chrome and G r A M M A R L Y. It's awesome. It can pick out the things that are incorrect and make your emails come across much more professionally. Okay, so those are four tips to keep in mind when you are writing emails. Now let's go through a couple of examples. 89. Writing Emails - A Personal Email: Okay, so let's now go through a real example of a personal email. We could also say a more casual email. We could say an informal email between two friends. We've got Kate here, and Sarah here in the situation is Kate is going to visit Sarah. Okay, Kate is going to visit Sarah, and now Sarah is going to write an email. Her purpose is to figure out when actually Kate is going to arrive specifically, she wants to get this detail. She wants to know that. But she also wants to show her excitement. So remember, as we talked about earlier in this lesson, the form of the email, the style should follow the purpose. Our purpose is to show excitement and also to figure out this one bit of information went right. Pretty simple. We can then be a little bit more friendly. And as I mentioned earlier, I use the word flowery, which basically means we can be a little bit more relaxed about using words. We can maybe use words we wouldn't use in a professional email, and and we don't have to worry too much about being super, super concise. All right, so we have a chunk here. This is Let's call the main body and then the question here. Remember, we should separate out the main question. That's what We're trying to get this information. So we need to make sure it's not part of this. Let's just read through it and see if we can get the feeling for why this is ah, good way to write an email to a friend. Okay, Dear Kate, by the way, we can also take dear out of there if we want to. If we want to just say, Hey, Kate or Hello, Kate or Hi, Kate or just Kate. I'm really looking forward to your visit next week. We can see a lot of interesting places, and I can show you some restaurants to eat local food. Okay, maybe they're old friends, and they haven't seen each other in a while, Who knows? Okay, So just in example, Justin example. She's just saying some of the things that they might do when Kate visits. What's the purpose of that? Why would she say that she is not giving any names? She's not asking any questions. It's a waste of time. Well, this is really just to be polite. It's also to show her excitement, but also to be polite if she just starts the email. Hi, Kate. Which day do you think you will arrive? It sounds like I have no other purpose or interest other than knowing exactly when you will be here. And it feels very business. Like if we just say Kate, which day do you think you will arrive? So by saying this first, we we make it feel more comfortable. We can show a bit of emotion. She feels, Oh, wow. My friend Sarah can't wait to see me. She's very excited. And now I can't wait to maybe see some local restaurants or hang out or do interesting things in interesting places. So this is good and it's actually important. Toe. Have something there. You could ask a few questions. Instead, you could say, How are your kids doing? You can. You can use things that you know about your friend. How are things going with the kids or how's your job in these days? I heard that you got a promotion so you can use information that you know to get information from them. But you may just be doing that to be friendly so that you're not saying Onley exactly what your question is. Because again, if you do, that sounds a bit unfriendly. Sounds a bit cold, and it sounds a bit too business, like, Okay, so something has to be there. I like to use usually some questions, some questions. I heard that you're going to be moving to Seattle in a few months. Is that true? If so, let me know. Because I have some friends there who might be able to help you. That would be a very simple thing to put at the beginning of an email. And then maybe I have a couple of questions I'd like you to answer again. This is someone I know someone who I'm friends with. Maybe I have a long relationship with this person. If it's a stranger than I have nothingto ask like this, we could still do an introduction or something. But we wouldn't be able to say anything like that. Then we say the purpose Which day do you think you will arrive? Sounds a little bit softer than when will you arrive? That sounds a little too direct. It sounds a little too direct. When are you coming to straight? When do you think you will arrive? When do you think? Sounds much more gentle? Okay, now she she uses. See you at the end of the class will go over some or of thes and different ones we can use . See you is actually pretty good. It's very friendly. It's very casual. And then she writes her name at the bottom. So in the personal style, there can be many different ways to do it. But it is important tohave usually something at the beginning of the email to give it its friendly tone. And we need to be clear that sometimes we can use dear, but we don't have to. And also the purpose what we're trying to get from the other person should be separate from the main body. You can remember these things. You should be able to write really clear personal emails any time you need 90. Writing Emails - A professional Email: so far in this email class, we've looked at some tips that we need to keep in mind when we're writing emails. We've also looked at a personal email from Sarah to Kate and that we're going to look at a professional email and how we can do one of these. Well, some of the basics. The first thing you might notice here is that there is very little extra unnecessary stuff here. There's no fluff. Fluff is sort of stuff that's there but doesn't have much content. It's called fluff. It can be used in lots of different lots of different situations. We also said flowery language, no flowery language here at all. It's very concise, very concise. That means there's no fat, no fluff. It's very succinct, very succinct. Know, Morris said, then needs to be said. OK, so let's read through the email, then we'll talk about it a bit. Steve, we got an order this week from a client in Canada. I need price estimates on materials for the following quantities. 10,000 medium sized balloons, 300 hand pumps. Get back to me ASAP. With these estimates. Thanks, Alan. Very, very succinct. Very, very clear. okay. There's no way to misunderstand this. There's no long introduction paragraph like Hey, Steve, how you doing? Hope the kids air. Well, it's not usually necessary. When you have two people who work together or know each other professionally, it's not necessary. Get down to business, Get down to business. Don't waste time. Okay? Now, what is the relationship between Steve and Alan? Well, they know each other very well. How do we know that? Well, he just says his name. He doesn't say dear Steve doesn't use Mr He doesn't say. Ah. Hello there, Steve. That would be okay. But just saying Steve gives it a feeling off. Wow. These two probably communicate every day. Or at least very, very often. Maybe a couple times per week. We got an order this week from a client in Canada. So that means that Steve knows everything about what an order means. So they have a previous history of working together, and I need estimates on materials, so they obviously they obviously have some previous history. Probably a lot and a pretty close working relationship. Okay, uh, client is someone who maybe you're doing business with. It's similar to a customer estimates This is a close guess. Basically, if someone says, can you give me an estimate on how much it would cost to fix my car? That means you're not telling me exactly how much it would cost to fix my car, but you're trying to give me a close number. About $900. Well, it might be more than 900. It might be less than 900 but you're giving me an estimate. That's a noun, but estimate could be a verb is a verb. Estimate estimate, different pronunciation, same spelling on materials for the following quantity, so we can often use this structure. The following something. I need the following. Please give me details on the following. Then you use this two dots on top of each other. This is called a colon, a colon, and a colon is used when we're going to usually say some information in order. Here, we've made a list of two things. This is a very good way of asking for something because it's not mixed in with the rest of the email with the body of the email. The first paragraph here it's separated. That's very important because it can no longer be missed. He cannot misunderstand. He needs these two things. This and this and they're not even sentences. Please give me 10,000 medium size balloons. It's not even a sentence. Just says 10,000 medium size balloons, 300 hand pumps. If you make sentences, it's mawr possible for there to be confusion. So by keeping it very concise, making lists for what we want using the following and then a colon were able to reduce the possibility of misunderstandings, which often happens. And so the better our e mails are, the more clear they are, the more likely we are to be efficient and communicate well with our our colleagues. Okay, if you don't know what these things are, it's not that important. These air just basically things that he needs. We're not going to worry too much about that, then is giving him a little push. Okay, he could just stop there and say Thanks, Allen, But he's giving him a bit of push, and he's trying to give him a feeling of urgency. It hurry up a little bit, OK, Don't go slowly on this. Get back to me ASAP. As soon as possible with these estimates as soon as possible. This is very common as well. Okay. And often, at the end of an email like this, you'll have one sentence that is just pushing a little bit. Please let me know as soon as you can, or I'm really looking forward to hearing from you. There are a lot of sentences you can use like that. We're going to go through a couple in just a minute. Okay? So you can use this structure basically, this format when you're writing emails to your colleagues, your co workers and they will probably appreciate you for being so clear. The structure is introduction to what I need or the situation specifically the things I need in a list set off by Colon. Then a little push, one sentence, and then the name. Okay. Thanks. Is enough. Thanks. Is enough. Could have said regards. I guess thanks is probably better in this situation. 91. Writing Emails - Closing and Email: just like in the email we saw between Allen and Steve. The sentence at the very end can serve as a little push, and I want to go through just a couple more of sentences like that. There are many, many more possible Sentence is something you can put at the end to just offer a tiny nudge or maybe add a little extra information sometimes can be used to make a comment like, I hope your parents are doing OK. That's fine, too. Okay, but this is for a professional email looking forward to hearing from you looking forward to hearing from you. Please let me know ASAP as soon as possible. Let me know if you have any questions. Let me know if you have any questions. Send me these by Friday. If you can send me these by Friday, if you can. Or please send me these by Friday. If you can. I'll follow up next week. I'll follow up next week. That means I will contact you next week to make sure that what we discussed in this email is happening. I'm going to make sure that everything is on track. Keep me up to speed That means if something changes, let me know. That basically means keep me updated. Keep me updated. Keep me up to date. Keep me up to speed. Same thing. Sometimes we say keep me also in the loop in the loop is very common. Make sure to keep me in the loop. Keep me up to speed. Keep me up to date these air all very, very common. Okay, that really means send me updates when things change. When things happen, I need to know. Okay. Thes arm or professional ones? Thes air for more professional emails than for more friendly ones. We might say things like, I hope everything is really good with your family, A comment or a small question, But I want to make sure you feel comfortable using these because they're very common for professional emails. So we've gone through our tips for emails. We've gone through examples of formal and informal emails. The last thing I want to do very quickly is just go over some things that are said at the end of an email right before you write your name, followed by a comma followed by a comma. Okay, these aren't all of them. There are many, many more. I just want to give you a feeling for which ones are neutral. Which ones are very professional. Formal? Which ones are very friendly. Okay, take care. Well, I should start with these two regards. Best regards. Okay. This is pretty general use. Very. Let's say general or neutral, you could use it in a professional situation. You could use it with a friend could use it with a teacher. Very useful. Take care. This is probably more personal. Sincerely. Ah, could be Could be neutral, but it's often more personal. So it depends on the situation. Yours truly is definitely personal. Very personal. Cheers could be pretty neutral. Could be pretty neutral. So cheers is often for maybe a colleague coworker. Or if you're writing a quick email to somebody, you maybe are in touch with regularly. Thanks. Is pretty general pretty general Pretty neutral. You could use that one. This is very personal. Love is very personal. Take it easy is, let's say, very friendly. But you could use it in a professional situation if you need to. Its very friendly but very relaxed. It's not too formal, but you could use it professionally have a good one is the same as Take it easy. It's Ah, pretty friendly, but could be used neutrally for a friend or for a colleague or a coworker later is definitely very casual, very casual, very relaxed. You wouldn't probably use that with a colleague unless you knew them really, really well. And see you is not really used that often in email. It might be used just as a text message or a message to a friend. But see, you is often pretty personal, pretty personal. I just wanted to give you a quick feeling for them and some examples. There are many, many more I would recommend just looking them up on the Internet, finding a list and looking at some examples, maybe of e mails to see how they're used. Of course, the best way to get good at something is to practice it. So what I'd like you to do is practise writing either a business or formal email. Review it carefully to ensure the tone and style fit your purpose. Make sure it fits the purpose and also make sure that your punctuation is perfect. It's got to be perfect. Try a few. Write a personal one and a professional one. If you have time, get feedback from people you know. Send it to a friend. Have them look at it for you. And as I mentioned, use something like Graham early to check your punctuation, check your spelling and check your basic grammar. Okay. Good luck. 92. Daily Tasks - Overview: in the last lesson, we talked about emails, writing emails and how we can write different types of emails for different purposes. In this lesson, we're going to talk about daily tasks, things we need to do on a daily basis, for example, running errands or doing chores. And we'll talk about both of those later on in the lesson. So in this class, we're going to cover some keywords first. Then I'm going to talk about some tips to keep in mind when you're describing tasks that you need to do on a daily basis on a daily basis and they will go into errands and I'll explain what that means exactly and will give an example. We'll do a couple of examples of running errands, which is also a very, very important part of many of our lives. Probably everyone watching this has done errands at some point, unless you're a king or something queen. But Erin is something that all of us do, and we need to know how to describe the errands that we run. And if you don't know what that means now that's okay. You will soon let's begin 93. Daily Tasks - Key Vocabulary: So first, some basic vocabulary. Things that will need to know for this lesson. Number one Chores. Chores of things we usually do around the house could be in the house. Could be outside of the house. This might include mowing the lawn. It might include dusting. It might include taking out the garbage, we say garbage in America instead of rubbish, which is what people in the UK will say and many other parts of the world. So these kinds of things around the house we call chores. When I was a little boy every Sunday, I had to dust the house. That was my job. I had to dust the house. I had to go around with a rag and some ah, special cleaner and clean all the surfaces in the house to make sure everything looked shiny and nice and knew that was my Sunday chore. And I had other chores as well, like feeding my cat and taking out the cat litter, sometimes taking out the garbage, this kind of thing. It's chores. Okay, Errands, then are little different. What's an errand? Well, and Aaron is a little bit more difficult to explain, but it's kind of similar to chores. It's something we have to do. It's something we have to do. Usually. It's not something we do for fun. We don't dust the house for fun. We go out to do it. That means we don't stay home. It's kind of like a chore, but outside. And we're usually doing it pretty quickly pretty quickly. It's not something that takes two or three hours. The best way to really get a feel for this would be some very quick examples And what errands are not. Okay. Well, um, going to the dentist is something we have to do. But that might take an hour or two hours. Is that a an errand? No. Usually, going to the dentist is not an errand, not an errand. Okay, what about going shopping? I might need to buy something. I don't know what I need to buy, but I need to buy something. Maybe a jacket. I go to a shop and look around. No, Usually when we run an errand and we often put run in front of it errand, we could also say, doing errand. We have it in our mind what we're going to do before we leave home. So it's in mind. I'm going to go to the supermarket to buy some tomatoes. So we go out, we go to the supermarket, we buy some tomatoes and we come back. If we just say, Oh, I'm gonna go hang out at the shopping center and maybe out by something I need probably not an errand. What about staying at home and paying your phone bill? Something you need to do? Well, no, because that is not going out. You have to go out to run an errand. Okay, How about having a quick lunch with maybe a colleague? I have to meet them. Have to have a quick lunch. Only 30 minutes? No, because it's It's a social thing. It's still a social thing. And social things are not usually considered errands. So things like maybe dropping off books, get something repaired by maybe food, like groceries and maybe make an appointment at the at the dentist office, make an appointment, go to the dentist's and you say I'd like to make an appointment. That kind of thing can be considered an errand. Okay, we'll talk about that more later in the class house work is often the same as chores. Housework is Onley in the home. Usually chores can be a little bit more. General strewn is when things are all over the place and we often use strewn. When we're talking about clothes, we have clothes strewn around the house. They're all over the house. They're all messed up, and we need to probably clean them up. So we used room to describe this sort of messy or chaotic, chaotic feeling detergent. Now we're going to talk a little about laundry Detergent is the main soap that we use for usually laundry for this one, which is washing clothes. When you wash clothes, you say you're doing laundry. What do you doing? Laundry. I need to do laundry today. We don't usually say I need to wash my clothes. We usually say I need to do laundry. It's a chore. It's a kind of housework. Is it an errand? No. Buying detergent at the supermarket would be an errand, because you say to yourself, I need detergent. Go out, you buy. Come back. That's an Aaron doing the laundry at home. That is a chore, that is house work. Okay, and then softener is something that you put in to the washing machine with the detergent to make the clothes softer so they usually go together. They worked together. When you do laundry, you use detergent and fabric softener. So these are just some key words. I want you to keep in mind and again we'll go through some specific examples later on in the lesson. 94. Daily Tasks - Tips: before we get into some specific examples of house work, a couple of tips to keep in mind. And this is something that I always have to remind myself. Aziz. Well, when I'm describing a process, maybe I'm giving instructions to someone for how to do something, maybe over the phone, or I'm explaining the kind of things I regularly have to do, kind of like a routine. I always remember to tell a story, so that doesn't mean I need to add a bunch of fake stuff. But what it means is I want to connect it together and make it personal. If I just say and then do this and then do this and then do this and then do this, it's very dry. I do try to think about using different types of sentences to keep the syntax interesting. I also think about making sure to sometimes maybe add a little bit of emotion. Sometimes I will add a description of something maybe I'm doing in a little bit more detail , but I try to make it feel as much like I can like a simple story, and when I think about it in this way, it helps me, I think explain what I want to explain clearly so that the other person, the person listening to me, gets it immediately and doesn't miss out on the details. If it's kind of interesting, if it's kind of interesting than people will probably like to listen to what you have to say, so make it personal, make it a story. Number two Use the present tense just like when we're giving a routine. We're talking about activities that usually happen, so use the present tense because that makes it a lot easier. You can focus on your sentence structure. You can focus on using the right words you can focus on, maybe making it a little bit interesting what you're describing, what you have to do regularly because you're not thinking about it. I need to make that in the past. I don't know. That makes it a lot easier, so just use the present tense. Just use the present tense. Okay, those are two things I want you to remember. Now let's look at an example off chores, specifically laundry 95. Daily Tasks - Doing Laundry: So let's actually go through a real example of how someone might describe doing laundry. One very, very common household chore. I'm sure we've all done laundry. At some point, we have to be clear. But again, we're going to try to make it. Ah, little bit more interesting and not totally boring. Okay, my clothes are always strewn around my room. Remember? Strewn means strewn means all over on the floor on the chair. Okay. So when I need to do laundry, I have to get them all in a pile and then sort them into two smaller piles. Colors and whites, colors and whites. These air the two piles that I make. OK, I'm a bit picky. Like that. What does that mean? Picky? I don't like to just get everything all together and throw it in. I am a little bit picky. And that means I like to have this this way and this. This way. I like to have this thing in this pile. The whites over here, the colors over here maybe even blew their and yellow. There may be probably not, but this is a way to make it a little more interesting. I'm adding something about myself. I'm a bit picky like that. I have to separate laundry baskets and I always wash colors separately. Okay, so not everybody has to laundry baskets. This person has to laundry baskets, which kind of shows how picky he or she is. Okay, let's go on. My family's washing machine is in the bathroom, and it has a dial with settings for different temperatures, times and load sizes. Okay, so if there's another machine, it's probably the dryer. That's the one that's usually the same size. They often come in a set in America. They come in a set usually, and after you take things out of the washer or washing machine, you put them in the dryer. Um, it's not as common to hang clothes up, although some people do. Okay, My family's washing machine is in the bathroom, and it has a dial with settings for different temperatures. Dial is a circle, and there's another circle in the middle that maybe is called a knob, a knob. And then it has different things around the outside, and you can turn this knob and get the right settings. The settings settings are the things you change, usually for something that has electron ICS in it and electronic device. For example, your cell phone. You have a settings menu, and you can change different things on your phone or about your phone in settings. So a dial with settings for different temperatures, times and load sizes. Temperatures would probably be cold water, warm water and hot water. By the way, sometimes people use Luke, which mine is my name lukewarm. Anyway, um, then we have Then we have temperatures times, which would be maybe 30 minutes. So I guess you could say one group of close is called a load. We use the word load, one load of laundry. Ah, a load of laundry. Okay. And load sizes would probably be, I don't know, small and maybe medium large. And what that probably means, but it usually means is how much water is going to be added. Okay, if you only have a few things and you put that in there, it's a small load size. Maybe the machine only needs to use a little water. If you have a huge load of laundry, put that and it needs to add more water, so you would choose something like that, a large load or sometimes a heavy, heavy load. Sometimes it depends on the machine. Okay, temperatures, times and load sizes. I do the colors first and then do whites in the second load in the second load. OK, so first colors and then whites. These are the two groups of clothes. Although we don't usually use groups here, I actually hand wash a lot of my linens or anything. Delicate. Okay, so linens are usually very light clothes. That means they're not very heavy, and if you put them in with other other clothes, they might be broken or damaged or anything delicate. So, for example, underwear, maybe underwear would be considered delicate and weaken. Sometimes. Call those delicates, my mom yells at me If I put delicates in the machine, my mom yells at me if I put delicates in the machine. So if I put maybe underwear in the machine, she yells at me again, I'm trying to make the story a little more interesting. I'm describing a process, but I'm trying to add a little bit of interesting, hopefully personal detail. Que last piece of this laundry story. I add detergent, according to the measurement line. So if there's a cup that we use to measure, remember that detergent is the soap that we use. There's a line here, maybe for small and align here for a heavier load. So maybe I will fill up the cup to the measurement line. Okay, um, I add detergent according to the measurement line on the cap of the bottle. Okay, so this little cup actually goes onto the detergent. The detergent bottle. It's used as the measuring cup or measuring cap. Then set the machine for colors and turn the dial. Remember that dial to 35 minutes after the final spin cycle finishes, So the spin cycle is the last thing that happens when you put your laundry in. It fills up with water. It gets all soapy. There are lots of weaken, say suds, mixing around with your clothes, and then it goes back and forth. Juju trick, and it goes through many cycles. At the very end. You want to rinse out your clothes, right? You want to get them rinsed so there's no soap in them, and you want to try to get them as dry as possible. So usually the machine will spin them very quickly to try to get all that water out. Okay? And get all maybe the soap out if there's any there. This is usually called the spin cycle spin cycle spin cycle. Okay, After the final spin cycle finishes, I take everything out and air dry my clothes on a clothes line hanger drying rack. All of these air. Okay, clothes line hanger drying rack. In the summer, it takes forever for things to dry. So again, I'm trying to add something interesting, not just specific details. I'm trying to fit it all together in to something continuous. Give all of the key words I need to give. Make sure the process is clear, but also add a little bit of interesting detail. There's no need to say in the summer it takes forever to dry, but I add it just to make it a little bit more interesting. And you can do that when you're describing instructions or any kind of process that you may need to describe 96. Daily Tasks - Running Errands: so we've talked about a common household chore doing laundry. Now let's talk about an errand I mentioned we would talk about errands, things that we have to do, things that we plan to do usually before we go out. And these air, usually things that are fairly quick. They don't last a long time, and we have to go out to do that. We don't do them at home. They're not chores, although they're similar to chores in the sense that they're kind of daily things, things we usually need to do. There are a couple of common or a few common phrases that we can use when we're describing errands. When we're talking about errands, I want to make sure they're clear. Number one pick up Pick up means to get same as get. Sometimes it means by sometimes it means take something away from so we might pick up some bread from the supermarket. Of course, you're picking it up, but we often use pickup for a lot of different things to mean get, which could include buying. Or maybe not, because you could say, I need to pick up my friend from the train station does that mean? You need to pick them up? No. You're going to drive to the train station. Wait. And then there may be going to get in the car with you. Pick up my friend at the airport, pick up some groceries, pick up a few books at the library. Books you're not buying at the library. You are renting them, renting books at the library. So it doesn't mean by although it can suggest by This is very common. Very, very common. Okay. And actually, it's used much more often than by and grab is used these. Actually, these three are used very much the same way. Hey, I'm going to go to the supermarket. Oh, really? Could you could you grab me a coke? Could you please grab me? A Coke grab is probably more for buying stuff. And getting stuff pick up is a little bit more common for people. I think so. You you wouldn't as often say I need to grab my friend from the train station. You'd probably say I need to pick up my friend from the train station. Could you say get my friend from the train station or get my friend at the airport. Yeah, you definitely can. Could you get me a candy bar at the supermarket? Yes, that's OK. I need to get some books at the library. Yes. Okay. So, generally speaking, these three are very much the same. So now buy looks a little bit silly because it's so specific. And of course, you can use it. I need to go buy some hairspray. I need to go buy some fruit. That's fine. That's fine. But I really like to use these three because that can be used in so many other ways. We can't buy our friend at the airport. That would be weird. We can't. We can't. Generally by our kids from school. That would be very weird. Or buy some books from the library. No way. So, yeah, this is fine, but it's just more specific. Okay. Now, should we use pay for Well, we use pay for not to get stuff usually. But if we have, for example, a bill a bill that we need to go out to pay, I need to go to maybe the computer repair shop to pay for the repair job that they did for me last week. or I need to go to the maybe auto body shop to pay for the work that they're doing on my car or to pay a bill. Okay, whatever. But this is just to give people money, and it's usually not focused on getting something. If we're getting something like like, uh, candy or groceries or fruit, we'll probably use these four. Okay, stop by means to go to a place for a short time. I'm going to stop by my grandma's house and just say hi. Now sometimes that could mean we're going to stay for a while. Could be an hour or two. Sometimes we do use it that way. Please. Please stop by any time. That means come over any time. Visit any time, right? Maybe your friend says that. Hey, stop By any time we can watch a movie, Whatever. Stop by any time. Okay? It's often used to describe something that happens in a short time, but it can be used for something that happens longer. The more typical way to use this and the way I usually use it is when I am running errands . I use stopped by to say where I need to go. I need to stop by the library to pick up a few books. Okay. I need to stop by the library to pick up a few books. Now, what about run to that mean We need to run to a place? No, but it does give it a feeling of kind of being in a hurry, going somewhere in a hurry, But it doesn't have to be. We often just use it to mean I need to go there. I need to go there. But usually we use it when we're talking about the errands that we need to run. Listen to that running errands. Are we running errands? No, but there is a feeling of not going to a place in hanging out, not going to a shopping center and saying, Oh, I don't know. Maybe I'll just walk around for three hours. When we talk about an errand, we usually have a clear purpose, a direction, a goal, and usually time is a little bit tight again. It doesn't really mean we're running, but it does have a feeling of Okay, let's go, let's do it. And then let's leave. We don't need to waste time For example, I need to run to the coffee shop nearby to get some coffee beans because we're out. It's a very common phrase, by the way we're out for we're running low. That means we're almost out. We have none were running low on coffee beans. I need to stop by the coffee shop. I need to run to the coffee shop to grab some of those because we're almost out. So these phrases are all really common, and we're going to see them in the example that we're going to look at now for running an errand. And I'd like you to make sure next time you're describing your own errands that you use thes phrases because they're all super duper common. 97. Daily Tasks - Errands Example: Okay, now let's go through our real example of errands we should be very comfortable with how to describe household chores and the words related to doing laundry. We should be pretty comfortable with some of the phrases that we use to describe errands, but let's actually look at how we can put them into practice with a real example. Okay, yesterday I had to run to Yo Mart. I just made up that name. I don't think there's a real yo mart to pick up a few things we need. I bought vegetables and eggs for a dish. I'm planning to cook tonight. A dishes, One sort of thing. I want to cook a dish. I'm planning to cook tonight. I also grabbed some milk and eggs because we're running low on. Both were running low on both milk and eggs. My wife asked me to get some chocolate, so I bought her a few dove chocolate bars, and I also got several big cartons of almond milk for the week. That means we probably drink several cartons of almond milk in one week in one week. Maybe it's Monday. Okay, A cartoon is something usually made of cardboard or paper, and it has a liquid inside orange juice. Milk. On the way home, I stopped by the UPS store, stopped by the UPS door to drop off a package I need to send to my friend in Colorado. So to drop something off is to go to a place to stop by a place, usually for a short time, maybe only a couple minutes, and leaves something there to drop off a package at the UPS store. I'll be there tomorrow. I'll drop it off. I can only stay for a minute and then I need to go. Okay, sure, sure, drop it off. Could you drop it off later? Yeah, no problem. So it's usually something that happens quickly, and it's the opposite of pick up. We can use it also, when we're talking about the train station situation, I need to go to the train station to drop off my friend. I have to drop off my kids at school, Drop off my kids at school. Okay, so I stopped by the UPS Store to drop off a package I need to send to my friend in Colorado , my friend in Colorado. So we've used most of the phrases that we learned just before this again. They're very, very common. I hope that you can pay attention to how they're used and try using them yourself next time you describe your routine. Okay, So to practice this, try using the phrases that we learned to describe errands to describe or explain the errands that you need to run today or tomorrow or sometime. Maybe this week. Be very detailed. If you want to explain it to a friend, record yourself. Record yourself, doing it and speaking naturally, trying to use thes phrases on. Then listen to the recording again so that you can catch small mistakes and work on improve your speaking habits. Recording is a great way, as I've said several times before, to help yourself get in the habit off, catching small mistakes and fixing those things. It's a great way to improve your awareness awareness. All right, good luck. See you in the next lesson. 98. Quantifiers - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about everyday tasks, things we need to do on a regular basis and how we can describe those things clearly in this lesson. We're going to talk about quantify IRS. Basically, a quantify air is an expression and you know many of them, which can give us a feeling for how many or how much of something we have without using the specific number. So we don't say 123 but basically, do we have a large amount of something? A small amount of something? What? So we're looking at quantity, and if I say a few oranges, a few oranges, you probably have a picture in your mind for what that means. Maybe you're picturing three or maybe four oranges on the table, so that's a really good way to be able to communicate the size of the amount of something clearly or fairly clearly. But there's a lot of confusion around quantify IRS. I know that you probably know most of them, but we got to make sure we use them correctly so that we don't give the wrong impression so that we don't miss communicate. So in this lesson we're going to first make sure we're very clear on countable versus uncountable noun is we need to be very clear about that, and then we'll get into some actual quantify IRS and we'll go through a lot of examples so that and I'm sure you know most of them already so that you're clear on exactly when they should be used and when they should not be used. Let's get started. 99. Quantifiers - Countable and Uncountable Nouns: first countable and uncountable announced. Let's just be very clear on these. A noun can be a physical thing, an object or something more abstract, something we cannot touch. It is in many cases, the uncountable things that we cannot touch, and the things we can touch are accountable. But let's not say that's a rule, because there are lots of examples in which that's not true and we'll just look at a couple . So, for example, chairs, Well, we can say one chair, two chairs, three chairs. Okay, one chair because there's one we say chair. And then because there's more than one we say Chairs. We had an escape, this 11 person to people we can count. 123 Okay, cops, one cop, two cups ideas. Cookies, eyes IIs Push one. Push to pushes. Okay, Builders, discoveries stories. A story. Two stories. Fish. One fish, two fish. Sometimes it doesn't change Children. One child to Children. Eggs and egg to eggs. Grains. One grain, two grains. Very, very small boats, boats, guy, A boat. Two boats. But I should be very, very clear. Sometimes things that are often countable can be uncountable. That means you cannot count them. For example, Discovery can be a more general idea when something is a more general idea. It's often uncountable, so we can have a discovery to discoveries. But we can just say, for example, discovery is the very beginning of a new trend. Discovery is the beginning of a new trend that is not accountable. Discovery. That is an uncountable discovery. That's a general idea. Okay, now I want to just mention one thing very quickly when we're talking about something, generally speaking and it's accountable thing, let's use the plural form. Let's use the plural form. The reason we used the plural form is because we could be talking about any one of those things. For example, you should say I like dogs, not I like dog. Children are wonderful. Children are wonderful. We're using the plural form not one child, but Children, Children. So we just have to be careful about that, and again, it could be a little bit more complicated. For example, we would say I like pizza. I like pizza, But then if we say pizza in that way were actually saying an uncountable thing, an uncountable thing, So sometimes now is that we can count one pizza. Two pizzas also become uncountable if we're talking about a general idea that thing, for example, pizza. We often use that for different kinds of food. Okay, So uncountable things are things we generally cannot count. And again, there are examples when it can be both. For example, you could say one time, two times one time I went to Canada the second time I went to Germany. Okay, but the idea of time is uncountable Hope. Can you say one hope? Oh, I suppose. But it's yeah. Generally uncountable ambition, ambition. Milk. You can't count a liquid. Okay, liquids are another one Experience. Okay. Experience very similar to discovery. If we make this discovery, we can say many experiences. But we're then talking about each one. But if we're talking about the general idea of experience, then we can't make it a plural. We can't count it. Orange juice is another liquid teamwork. Love. Love is an idea. Okay. Generally not countable sadness and emotion generally not countable joy beauty. So we're talking about a lot of a lot of concepts. A lot of concepts over here, general ideas. So when we have these general ideas were putting them in the uncountable former, considering them uncountable. And just to be very, very clear, you can often make thes countable as well. Because you could say, I'd like to have and orange juice okay for talking about a specific one. That's OK, it's OK. But most often, if we say I like orange juice, we're using the uncountable version or form of orange juice. Okay, we say experience is very important. We're not talking about specific experiences that we can count. We're talking about the idea, the concept of experience, in which case we should use the uncountable form uncountable. Alright, I hope that's clear. I wanted to just make that very, very clear before we get started with examples of each different quantify air. 100. Quantifiers - 'Little' and 'A Little': All right. So let's get started with some quantify IRS. I'm going to use count and non non for uncountable to mark these just so you know which ones they should be connected to, which now owns They should be connected. Teoh. So a little and little Are these countable or uncountable? Actually non. Okay, so these air both uncountable, not none. It's a different thing. Non non. Okay, uncountable. So we wouldn't say, For example, a little cups. We wouldn't say Little cups, although that does have a different meaning if we're talking about little in this sense. But if we use little in this sense, then it's not a quantify air. It's an adjective. Okay, so let's let's get started. A little is positive, and little is often negative. That means when it's good news that we have a little of something right. It's good news. It's good, not zero. Then we use a little. If it's bad news, we should have many, maybe. Or I guess I should say a lot of something, and we don't. We use little little, so we usually focus on the negative for this one and the positive for this one for example . Let's do a couple examples of each. Okay, there's, Ah, there's a little coffee left. If you want some, it's not gone. That's great. That means I can have some. Good. There's a little coffee left to positive statement. Okay, I've got a little time. What's up to? Someone asks for your time. Hey, do you think you could help me with something? Yeah, I've got a little time. What's up? It means how can I help you? So this is a positive statement Means I have some time to give you. Now, a lot is often used for things that air a little larger than we say. And that's usually a good thing, but we don't want to express it to confidently. We want to be a little bit understated. This is quite common in British English in particular. So, for example, let's say you post a video and you suddenly become a famous Internet celebrity and someone asks you about how things were going for you, right? You could say, Well, it's Ah, it's Ah, little little hectic right now. Little hectic right now. Hectic means very busy, so probably very busier. Probably totally swamped. Okay. And you're wanting to express it in an understated way. So you use a little very common to use a little and also ah, bit, which we'll talk about in a bit very soon. Okay, so I'm a little Ah, a little tired. Maybe I'm exhausted. Maybe I'm very tired and I want to go home. But you don't say to the host of the party, hon. Exhausted. I want to go home. You say I'm a little tired. I think I'll go home now. I should probably go. Okay. Instead of saying I'm exhausted, all right, How about little? Well, we focus more on the negative. The fact that we're almost close to zero. And that's not a good thing. For example, there's too little time to finish the project. Its terrible. That means we don't have enough. It's not enough. Not enough time. This is bad. This is bad. There's too little time. We don't have enough time. We won't finish. Look, that's not good. That's not good. Get it all. We don't want that. Okay, lets try another one. You have very little to do with the investigation. You can go. Okay, so there's an investigation. Maybe someone's in trouble. Maybe you're a witness. You saw something happen and you're at the police station and they were asking you some questions. But really, you were far away. You weren't really involved. Maybe this is something we'd see on a TV show. You weren't really involved. You just saw something happening. And finally, it's late and they say, Well, you had very little to do with the investigation, which means almost nothing on. We're focusing on the fact that it's almost nothing. Okay, you can go. You can go. So we're getting closer and closer to zero. And it's not to say it's a bad thing, but the emphasis is on the fact that it's close to zero as opposed to a little, which is focusing on the fact that it's not zero. I hope that makes sense. I hope that difference is clear. Okay, there's so little food again. We have almost no food. There's so little food. But if we say I have a little food, that means probably you asked me for some, and I'm willing to give you some. Here you are, so it's usually a little more positive. Let's move on 101. Quantifiers - 'A Bit' and 'Not Much': All right, let's go on and talk about a bit and much, but actually, we generally don't use much by itself. Weaken. Say how much. But when we're making ah statement, we always put it with something else, like knocked or two or so, and we'll look at some examples of how we can do that. So a bit now, as we did with the last one a little. It's often used to make things understated again. This one is for uncountable announce. So I wrote this year so people might use it to say, as we did last time. I'm a bit tired. I'm a bit tired. Maybe I should I should go home. But let's look at a couple more examples. You've got a bit you've God, a bit of sauce on your face. So you're eating something and nobody wants toe have sauce on their face. That's not good, right? But you have a little we could say a little. You have a little right there. You didn't notice it, and maybe other people saw it, but they were too afraid to mention it, So I'm not afraid to mention it because you probably want someone to mention it so that you can wipe it off right? Gonna wipe it off. You've got some sauce on your face here. You've got a bit of sauce on your face here. You've got a little sauce on your face here. Okay? Very common in this sort of situation. There's a bit of an issue with the server. So a server is where data is stored and maybe one company has one. It's having some problems. Instead of saying there's a major issue with server, there's a huge problem with the server. Someone who might like to be a little bit understated might say there's a bit of an issue with the server now. That can mean because a bit does mean a small amount, just like a little does could mean that the issue is very small, but it could also mean that the issue is not small. It could mean that the issue is very big, but we're being understated or trying to downplay it a bit and not make it so. Maybe frantic. We're done trying to make it sound, too, too serious. There's a bit of an issue with the server. Now. We often use a bit when we want to give feedback to somebody. If you tell somebody something about themselves that's not good, that's negative directly and you say you made a mistake. How will they feel the feel bad? They won't feel good about that. So if we say instead, I think I think you're being ah bit too critical with the students. If I say you're being too critical with the students, critical means that maybe you're criticizing them too much, saying they're wrong. Too often, if we say a bit too critical, we really make it softer. We really make it sound, not friendly. It's still direct, but it's a lot more polite and it feels like it's a little bit more gentle. And so the person who hears it will probably be more accepting of it. So we often use a little and a bit when we're giving feedback, and I like to call it a softener, not the softener that you put in your laundry with your laundry detergent, but a softener with language to make things sound a little less direct we can use, we can use a bit. We can also use a little okay, so let's go on and talk about much. So is this okay? How much money do you have? Much. No, it's not. It's incorrect. Much doesn't go by itself. It goes with other words, such as not. We can also often say so much, too much. And if it's a question, how much? Much? Mawr. Okay, there's there some ways that we can use much with other words. All right, so let's look at some specific specific examples. By the way, this is uncountable, just like the other one generally. Okay, so how much are these question? Answer. Not much. That's not a good answer because it's not specific, because not much for you may be different than not much for me. You should give me a number, but anyway, that is grammatically correct. I don't have much money left after my trip. I don't have much money left after my trip. Don't have much OK. Do not have much. This is not. This is the same as not much. OK, it's the same basic grammar, but instead we say do not have much. This is a whole piece that we put together, which is very common to much, is also a very common phrase when we are using much. So I think this is this whole sentences very common. I think I think you've I think you've got way too much time on your hands. So if somebody is doing something that maybe I feel is a waste of time and you're not being very productive and I think you're only doing something because you're lazy and you don't have anything else to do, So I could say, I think you've got way too much time on your hands. That means you should be busier, so that's usually a criticism. It's usually a bit critical, but this way too much is a very common way to phrase something in time, on your hands, way too much time on your hands. This whole piece is a very common expression, very common. So let's try so much if we can. There's there's so much so much work Teoh to do before the party, the party on Friday, so many things to do, many things to do, or so much to do so much to do before the party on Friday. Very common. Okay, so much, not much and too much are extremely, extremely common. Just one more example. Very quickly. I've got I've got much more experience than you have got much mawr experience than you. This one's also quite common. Much more, much more. I have much more. I've got much more, okay. 102. Quantifiers - 'Enough' and 'Lots': now I think enough and a lot are very interesting. We could say a lot or lots. Okay, Pretty much the same thing. Lots. Lots are very interesting because they can be used both with countable and uncountable. Now's. So if you're ever wondering, well, I want to say a huge amount, but I don't know which word to use. You should use a lot. You should use lots. If you want to say, Well, this is the right amount. You should say enough and it doesn't usually matter if it's countable or uncountable. They can be used with both. Let's look at some examples. OK, beer is beer countable or uncountable? Well, sometimes it's countable. Usually beer is uncountable. Okay, it's uncountable, you know, in. Okay. And so if I say there's there's enough beer for everyone, help yourself. It's enough beer for everyone. Help yourself take as much as you want, so enough means that it satisfies the need. There's a need here on whatever amount this is satisfies that need. It's the right amount for that need. Okay, so there's enough beer. This is for uncountable noun beer, and we can do the same thing if we're talking about food like cat food, which is also uncountable. But we can use not. Not enough. If we want to say that the requirement is this much and there is too little for that, we've We've learned little, right? So there's too little there should be more so if if there isn't, which means is not enough cat food go by mawr. If there isn't enough cat food, go buy more. Okay. This is a very, very common way to express that. We need to get something. We need to get something. There isn't enough. You didn't get enough? Please go buy more. You didn't get enough cat food? Can you please buy some more? Or if we wanted to say something countable we could say you didn't buy enough cups. You didn't buy enough cups countable Please go buy more, please go buy more. All right. So again, countable or uncountable, they work for both. Do you know Sesame Street? That TV show for kids? There's a blue monster on there. His name is Cookie Monster. He loves cookies. I love Cookie Monster! What cookies? Air countable. Okay, so Cookie monster on the non on them Cookie Monster gets very angry if he doesn't get enough cookies. If you watch Cookie Monster on Sesame Street, you will see he gets very unhappy if he does not get enough cookies. Very angry. Okay. Ah, lot Lots Also for countable uncountable. Very, very useful. And it's basically similar to many, but many is for countable things. So it's a large amount of something, a large amount of something. It's the opposite of saying, for example, little. It's the opposite of saying Phew! Phew is a small amount. Little is a small amount. Okay, it's the opposite. Here we go. I've got I've got lots of good ideas. I've got lots of good ideas, ideas, countable or uncountable. It is countable. One idea to ideas. Three ideas. Countable countable There's ah lot mawr snow coming tomorrow. It's a lot more snow coming tomorrow. Okay, snow countable or uncountable uncountable cannot count snow. You can say Ah snowflake, teeny, teeny tiny little thing A snowflake f l a k e. But usually snow is uncountable. Let's look at a couple more examples of this 10 by the way, can we say there's lots more snow? Is that the same? Yes, it's the same. It's exactly the same. There's a lot more. There's lots more. Those of the same. You're your asking, Ah, lot of questions today. You're asking a lot of questions today. That's great. That's great. Okay, One more example. One more example. A lot of people don't like classical music people countable or uncountable here countable one person, two people, three people accountable. Ah, lot of people don't like classical music. For some reason, I like it. I used to remember lots of my dreams, but now I don't Okay, dreams, countable or uncountable? Countable wondering to dreams accountable. Okay, so Thies to both really useful to express things that are both countable and uncountable. Okay, very useful. 103. Quantifiers - 'Many' and 'Some': all right, so we've talked about quite a few quantify air so far. We've got still some or to go thes air. All really, really common. I want to be clear that there are others. We're not talking about every single one that's out there. We're talking about the ones that are very common and how to use them. Now let's go on to many and some, and I realized that you probably know pretty much all of these, but it's got to be really, really clear when you should use them. So I just want to make sure we have this very important important lesson to brush up on the basics. So many. Many, as you probably know, is four things that are accountable, like people like dreams like Cups go, and some can be used for both. Very similar to ah lot. I would say that a lot and some are exact opposites. A general rule you can follow is if you want to say a large amount, and you're not sure which word to use because you are thinking about is accountable or or uncountable. Well, if it's a large amount, use a lot if it's a small amount. Use some. It's it's a great one because you don't have to think about which type of noun to use it with. So let's look at some examples of many first. Okay, I've I've got many awards in my office kind of person. Is this Who says this? I've got many awards in my office. Awards are things that you get If you do something well, this person is talking about their awards. I don't like this person bragging a little bit, maybe showing off, showing off a bit, showing off anyway. They've got many awards. Could we say many time? No. We cannot say many times if we're using time as accountable thing, like one time, two times, three times that I've been to Canada. Okay, but no, we could not say many time. The general idea time? It could not say many hope. Could not say many milk, for example, say bottles of milk, cups of milk, grains of rice, many grains of rice but cannot use many milk. Okay, there are so many buttons. There are so many buttons. I'm confused. Okay, Person is looking at a panel has a lot of buttons on it. Which one do I push? S o many buttons? We can count buttons so it works. So it works for the last two examples of many. Let's look at some common idioms. Idioms are expressions that pretty much everybody knows, and you have to say them as is okay. Too many cooks in the kitchen spoiled the broth, but the broth is, for example, a soup. And if you have a kitchen and there are many cooks working in that kitchen, the idea is, if there are five or six of them all working on the same thing, it's going to turn out bad. Maybe they didn't communicate well. One person puts in salt. Another person comes in, puts in more salt, but they didn't tell that person. So now it's too salty, so it's better if you have one person in control. Sometimes it's better to have fewer people, because then whatever you're doing is more focused, and there's great communication. There's a clear direction. Many people communicating. Too many cooks spoil the broth means you're gonna ruin whatever you're doing. If there are too many people involved, very common, there are many ways to skin a cat that means to remove the skin of a cat. Now that's pretty gross. That's a pretty disgusting idea, but it's a common expression, which basically means our goal is to do this. But there isn't only one way to get there. Were trying to get a 1,000,000 Users were trying to get a 1,000,000 users. Well, there are many different ways to get a 1,000,000 users. We could spend a lot of money. Or maybe we make some very viral videos on the Internet and make a lot of people who see our videos come to look at whatever we're selling and so we can get a 1,000,000 users. The idea is there isn't only one way to do something. There are many ways to skin a cat now. For some, as I mentioned, it could be countable or uncountable, and it's very similar to a bit in some ways because you can use it to be a little understated. So if you say I have, I have some suggestions on how to how to improve for how you can improve right, I am improve, improve, how to improve? Well, maybe I have many. Maybe I have quite a few things to say, Maybe I'm going to talk for 20 minutes about how to help you improve. My feedback will be very long, but I say some as a way to make it a little understated Now. It's, of course possible that it actually is some. It actually is a small amount, but I just want to be clear. Some can be used in the same way as a little and a bit to be understated when, actually, it's much, much more, even though the actual meeting of some is a small amount. Okay, you need some help with your makeup. You need some help with your makeup. Okay, so someone maybe has put makeup on maybe for, ah, video and there's too much. It's done incorrectly. It looks weird. So one person makes a comment you need some help is help countable or uncountable? Help is uncountable. Help is uncountable. It's a general concept. So while, for example, suggestions is countable, help is more of an idea more of an abstract thing uncountable, but some can be used for both. Now I'd like to give you two examples that get across this idea of how we can use a noun either as accountable thing or an uncountable thing. Let's get some pizza. Let's get some pizzas. What's different about these two? Well, you can see here that pizzas is now plural and it is countable because we could say up, heats up, Let's get off pizza or let's get some pizzas. That means more than one, maybe three, maybe four. And let's get some pizza Now. This is an uncountable It's not single. It's an uncountable noun. It's being used as a concept. Pizza can be uncountable as well. Now this some also works. It still works. If we say, for example, let's get Ah, few a few pizzas, then we can't say, Let's get a few pizza That doesn't work because a few can only be used for accountable things. But some works for both, because some works for both, So it's pretty great. We could say, Let's get let's get pizza. We can take this some out and then once again, if we say let's get pizza, it can still be uncountable. We could say, Let's get a lot of pizza. It's uncountable. Last example. Give it some time. It will work out just fine. Give it some time it will work out just fine time. Countable or uncountable, it is uncountable in this case again, it can be accountable. We could say I've been there a few times. Sometimes maybe we could say but here it's uncountable. It will all work out just fine. That means don't worry about it. Just wait a little while and everything will be OK. Everything will be okay. All right. So some is in particular A very, very useful quantify air. Just like a lot. Remember these two if you don't remember anything else about this lesson 104. Quantifiers - 'A Couple', 'A Few', and 'Several': all right, we're getting close to the end of our lesson on quantify ears, and we're going to look at now three, which are used on Lee for countable noun, a couple, a few and several. And actually they're very similar. Let's just talk very quickly about the differences between them. Ah couple is generally too, although sometimes people use it to, say, three. It's just something that kind of becomes a habit for some people. Ah, few is more than two, but not many. It's usually a small number off, and some people again might use it for two out of habit. But generally speaking, it just means not many, and then several is more than two, but not many more than two, but not many. And again, sometimes. Sometimes you might hear people use it for two, but definitely not one. Definitely not one. And this can be very, you know, wide range because, ah, a few could be 100 at the small end of a very large scale. If the scale is on this end, 10 billion and on this end ah, 100. Well, some people might say that 100 is a few, so there are some. There are some good interesting examples where a few is actually ah lot compared toa one. Generally, that's not the case. Generally, it's 345 maybe six. That's how it's usually used. But I just want to show you that it is possible, in some cases, to use it as a much larger number. Several. Several Okay, several is usually 34 sometimes five, usually around there. But it's not, too. It's not, too. Let's actually go through some examples of these simple words and phrases. It takes a couple weeks to process applications, so an application is something that you need to maybe fill in if you're going to get a bank account or maybe apply for a job or a visa, and it has steps. A process has steps. But process here is a verb to process something so it takes several weeks to process. That means they need to review it and check it before they give you a result. Okay, takes a couple weeks means it takes probably two weeks or around there. It doesn't mean exactly 14 days, maybe 13 maybe 15. If you want to put in usually here, you could It usually takes a couple weeks to process applications. Okay. I need a few minutes to calm down. A few minutes to calm down. Something crazy happens. I'm stressed. I've been fired. Whatever. And someone says hair you You okay? And I go, Oh, yeah. Skinny. A few minutes to calm down. So calming down is what we do after something exciting happens that makes us feel stressed . We feel stressed. Need to calm down. And it might take us 3456 minutes to do that. Take a few aspirin, take a few aspirin. Hey, aspirin is something that we take for pain relief. We're gonna relieve pain. And we would take two or three or four of those, depending on maybe our age. I'm not giving you medical advice. Here. Check the bottle. Okay. After several reminders, he was fired. Several three, maybe four. Okay, maybe five reminders are basically times when he did something bad. He was late on Monday, and then he was late. The next month, on Thursday and the next month. He was late on Wednesday and he was given to reminders and then given a final reminder. And then he was fired Don't be late. Don't be late. Don't be late. You're fired. Those three are reminders, and several is to give you a feeling for the number. Why don't we just say that number? Why don't we say he was given three reminders? Well, take three aspirin. We could we could, but I feel it makes the world very stiff when we give specific numbers. And in life, we don't always know exact numbers, right? We often I want to give a general idea, and we have no idea what the specific number is. So that's why I quantify IRS air so useful. That's why qualifiers help us to express quantities or amounts and not be locked into being wrong because we gave the wrong number, right? So it's actually extremely useful, and you need to know how to use them very naturally. 105. Quantifiers - 'Any', 'None', and 'No': Finally, we're going to talk about any none and know very, very common. And the best way to really learn these is by example to get a feeling for them. Any can be used for questions, and it can also be used as an answer to the same question. The most common question is, Do you have any? Plus the thing you could just say. Do you have any? I need some chocolate. Do you have any? I don't have any. We don't say I have any. We would say I have some so we would use any. If it's an answer on Lee, if it's when it zero, the amount to zero, we have none OK, we don't say I have any, Okay? We never say that, But when we asked the question, we can say, Do you have any? Do you have any? Do you have any chocolate? I don't have any says how it's used. None is usually at the end of the sentence. She gave me none. I got none. There was none. Usually it goes at the end of the sentence, and it means it means zero. That means zero. No, then is usually followed by something else. Unless it's a statement to answer a question. A. Yes. No question. Do you want to go? No. No. But if we're talking about an amount of something this class is about quantify IRS, the amount of zero. Then we would say no. Plus the thing. For example. We have no time. We have no time. We have very little time. Means way. Have some, but almost no time. If it zero, we can say no time. We have no time. We need to go. We have no time. So let's look at some examples and you can get a better feeling for this. I don't want any help. Do you need any help? Remember Could be used in a question. Do you need any help? We wouldn't say. I want any help. We would say I really I really need some help. I really need your help. But if it's no if it zero, I don't I don't want any help. I don't need any help. Did you find any quarters? Quarters are 25 cents, 25 cents that we use in America. Did you find any quarters? No. None. Or I could say I didn't find any quarters. I didn't find any. So as a question, did you find any as an answer? No. None. Notice that none goes by itself. And if I want to say I didn't find any, that is also totally okay. All right. I asked for help. I got none. Noticed that none is at the end of the sentence. There's nothing after it. We don't usually put anything after None. We already stated the thing we're talking about. We're talking about help, Okay? I asked for help. We know we're talking about help. Then the next thing we say is I got none. I got no help. I got no help. I could say I got no help. Or could we use any? Yes, we could. We could say I didn't get any help. So all of those are okay. They're the same thing. I got none. I got no help. I didn't get any help. Same thing I basically got no help. Basically got no help. I have no time left. I have no time left. Okay? I have little time left. Have no time left now. Can that be used toe? Understate something sometimes. If we're in a big hurry. We might have a few minutes, but we don't want to say we have a few minutes a little time. So we say I'm sorry. I have no time. I have no time. Okay? We're emphasizing that we don't want to give any of our time. Don't want to give any of our time. There are no more books. There are no mawr books that this is often used gnome or is used, followed by the thing that we're talking about. I got no help. We say help after. No, no more books, Books goes after. No, no time. Time goes after. No. Did you get any help? None. Are there any books? No, None. Nothing after that. So these examples, I hope, make any none and know very, very clear. And make sure you practice these and look out for them as you're reading or as you're speaking with others pay attention to when they're used, because the more examples you see, the better oven understanding you can get for these phrases and quantify IRS, although they're very simple, are extremely important. And you need to feel super duper comfortable with them in order to use them naturally when you speak. Okay, So if you didn't already, you should have a very clear picture of how different quantify IRS are used to express different quantities. Different amounts. The best way to really get a natural feeling for them because you can know them but not really know how to use them. When you're speaking, the best way to naturally get a feeling for them to really use them is to practice, practice, practice until they become habits. I can't express that enough. One part of learning is knowledge. One part of learning is habits. Habits come through practice and repetition. Practice makes perfect. So make two sentences for every quantify air that we learned in this lesson. Try to make too clear sentences of different types. OK, then, if you want to read through them and record them, that would be a good idea. You can listen to your pronunciation and see if you can make any corrections. And if you want to make more than two sentences, more than two examples, that is just fine. The more practice, the better. Okay, good luck. I'll see you in the next lesson. 106. Making a Presentation - Overview: in the last lesson, we went over some of the basics, quantify IRS to make sure that when we're speaking either casually or in a more formal situation, we don't make those basic mistakes. Now we're going to go on in this lesson to something a bit more difficult, something that a lot of people, even native English speakers, are really afraid of. Making a presentation, giving a presentation, talking in front of others about something. Basically, that's what a presentation is. This is not just about the basics of doing a presentation. We're actually going to build one together. I'm going to show you how to build a presentation, build an outline and then how to give it. We're also going to talk about some do's and don't basically things you should avoid and things you should make sure to remember when you're giving a presentation and we're going to focus on hooks, how to make your audience get interested in you and your topic right from the very beginning, also going to talk about how to interact with the audience when you need to the end of the lesson. I'm going to give a presentation based on the outline that we build in this lesson, so we have a lot to do. Let's begin 107. Making a Presentation - Dos and Don'ts: all right, so let's start with the do's and don't of giving a presentation. Now most presentations have what's called a It's actually called a slide show, but it's often called a power point, often abbreviated as PPT. Let's just call it a power point or a PPT in this lesson, even though that's actually not the rial name but anyway, the do's and dont's things we should do things we should avoid. Let's start with the Don't. Well, you don't want to write too much on the PPT. If you write a lot on the PPT, it's going to actually have less of an impact. Now I'm writing a lot here, but that's because you're coming along with me for each thing that I'm writing. You're sort of seeing me right, most of it down, so we're kind of exploring this space together. But when you write a lot on each slide, when you write a lot on each slide, it actually makes the audience go like that. But if you just have a few key things, very key. Important key means important things on the slide, and it's very easy to read and takes three seconds to read then it's going to have much more impact. And your ideas, which you're explaining can then focus on those points. And you can have a visual reference to the things you're talking about. That's actually what the PPT is usually for. The words coming out of your mouth, those air, the details. That's the explanation, then the thing on the slide. That's the reference point. That's the thing that keeps you focused on. What's the topic again? Okay, so remember the role of of that and also don't read it too much from the PPT. Maybe a little bit is okay, Sure, but if you just turn around and say, and in 1997 we had a blood, blah, blah, blah, blah and you read what it says. That is a mistake. Generally speaking, because you're disconnecting with the audience, the audience, the people you're talking to by turning around and because you're reading, it's now much less engaging. If, for example, I was reading a script for this course looking over there, you could tell and it would feel less engaging for you. You would be less interested, so be very careful about that. You want to avoid reading too much, and you certainly want to avoid turning around too much to actually face away from your audience. Okay, don't memorize every word. Do not memorize every word. For some reason, a lot of people who do presentations feel like they have to memorize every word. If you do that, it's not a presentation. It's called a speech. A speech is something that has to be so perfectly worded because you're the president or something or a king, that you can't make any mistakes. And so you read it or you memorize it and say it when you're talking to people, if you are memorizing every word, it's basically the same as sitting there in reading in front of everybody. In 1997 there was a terrible flood, and it's not quite that serious, but that's the idea people can tell. But if you have clear points in your mind, you know what you're talking about. But you don't have maybe all of the exact words, then it feels natural. It feels like real human communication, which hopefully this feels like I'm not planning every single word that I'm saying. I'm speaking about a topic that I know about. Okay, Watch. Ted talks if you haven't already. I'm sure you have, but but Ted is ted dot com. There are many, many great Ted talks, and 95% of the great ones are not memorized there. Speaking about some points. Okay, so avoid memorizing every word. Don't read unless you really have to. And don't write too much on your PPT. All right? Things you should do. Number one. Be yourself. Obviously, if you try to make a fake personality when you're standing up in front of people Hello, everyone. Or or whatever. People can feel it. Okay, just be yourself. Be natural. Speak as you speak. Okay? Speak to the audience. Now, this is kind of related to this one, but no. Who's listening to you? Speak if you're giving a presentation and there are, ah, 100,000 notes to Eddie, say 100,000 2000 people. 200 people. 10 people, four people. Your presentation is going to be different if it's four people. Are you going to come out and say hello, everyone? No, you wouldn't. You say OK, four people, You're glad you came. Why don't we sit at a table together and I'll talk through my points, and then we can discuss okay? Or maybe you come out and it's a bunch of teenagers in high school. Well, then you're going to speak differently, know who you're talking to, know your audience and speak to them. So every presentation will probably not be the same. Different sizes of audiences, different groups of people. Okay, so you have to think about that when you come out. When you start talking, you really dio speak to that specific group of people. Okay, Next, engage. Now, this is obvious. This means you need to connect with people. But if you just start talking and they have no reason the audience, the people watching you, they have no reason to care. You don't give them a reason to care at the beginning. Especially then you've lost them for 15 minutes. Or however long your presentation is engage. Use a hook at the beginning. Find a way to make them care about you and your topic right at the beginning, right when you start. And if you do that, then you're going to carry them along with you and again If you go to Ted and watch. Ted talks. You will see the good ones have something at the beginning that hooks you, grabs you like a fish and you want to listen? Why? This is so interesting. Why do I care about this? I don't usually care about this topic, but I care about it in this presentation. Why? Probably because there was a good hook at the beginning. 108. Making a Presentation - Hooks: So we've gone through the do's and dont's of giving a presentation. The last point I shared thing you should do is to engage the audience at the beginning with a hook. Why am I doing this with my finger? Because this is a hook. This is a hook this shape. We use it when we go fishing. We use it when we hang up our clothes. We can imagine grabbing the audience with that right at the beginning and making them focus on us. Use a hook to attract the attention of the audience at the beginning of a presentation. Pretty simple. But how do we do that? What kind of hooks are there? Well, there are many, but I want to talk about three. And these three are very easy to do. Very easy, and I will teach you how to do them now. Okay, start with a rhetorical question. What is a rhetorical question? A rhetorical question is a question that doesn't need to be answered doesn't need to be answered. That's a rhetorical question. Why would we use a rhetorical question? Ah, see, that's a rhetorical question, I asked. Why would we use a rhetorical question? did you watching this go? Oh, I know, I know you didn't. But you might have been thinking about the answer. That is why we use rhetorical questions. Have you ever wondered why people use rhetorical questions? There's another. A rhetorical question. Gets the audience to start thinking about the topic. It's a great way to start a presentation on one really, really simple honestly, very simple beginning that you can use for pretty much any topic is to start with. Have you ever have you ever Have you ever wondered? Then you could say something about your topic. That's a pretty generic one. Pretty generic. But it works. Have you ever wondered? Let's say my topic is about Mars. Have you ever wondered what it would would be like to live on Mars? Ever wondered what it would be like to live on Mars? Nobody in the audience needs to say, Oh, yes, yes, yes, I've wondered. Hello, me, me. Can I answer? No, it's to get the audience to start thinking, OK, so that is one way to begin a presentation, and we can do a couple others we could say, Have have you ever wished Have you ever wished you could live 500 years. Whatever the topic is, it's not so important what the question is. It's got to be pretty open. Generally make people think, but you can use. Have you ever wished Have you ever wondered it? Say, what's the most? What's the most imported thing? You know that nobody taught you what's the most important thing that you know or the most important thing you know, that nobody taught you? Now again, you don't have to answer that because you're in a room may be full of people. If that's an interview that maybe you have to answer it, maybe it's not rhetorical, but you don't have to go like this. You should just be thinking about it, and it's very effective. I'm making you consider this topic. Now I'm going to start talking about maybe something profound that I've learned through my life experience deep and meaningful. Maybe I'm going to talk about how our experiences teach us profound and meaningful things. So this is one type. This is one type of hook. Let's go on to the next. Okay, The next type of hook is what I call making it personal There's something about humanity called empathy, and this is a kind of ability to feel how others feel, especially for those who we have some real personal connection with for those who we actually meet face to face. To be honest, if you hear about something terrible happening to somebody you've never met or know nothing about, you probably think about that, said. But it might not completely ruin your day. But when you hear about something bad that's happened to somebody you've met before, he will naturally probably go. I can't believe that happened, and it might ruin your day. What's the difference? Whether is a connection there? There's a natural empathy that comes out mawr strongly. When we see people face to face. When we actually know people, we have a real connection with them. So if there's a person there in front of me giving a presentation, I naturally want to be connected with them. And the more they talk about themselves, maybe the MAWR empathy I will have with them. Okay, if they tell me why they care about a topic, it's almost like they're taking me with them because I'm interested in them, right, because of empathy, and they explain why they're interested in this topic now. I'm interested in the topic. Kind of threw them. It's it's a weird thing, but if you watch a lot of presentations, especially good presentations, you'll see that you'll see the person the presenter first share a little story, a tiny little story to explain, a little bit of background ou nd to talk a little bit about why they care about that thing , maybe, or talk about how they first got interested in that, why they're passionate about this topic that they're sharing. Basically, basically, here are some ways we can do that. When I was about seven when I was about seven, okay, and maybe we're talking about maybe my presentation is about Mars. Like I said before, when I was about seven, my father took me outside and I saw that he had brought a telescope home. Wow, telescope. The telescope is something you used to see far away, and he said, Son looked through this, and I did, and I saw a little orange disk. I couldn't believe that with my own eyes, I could see another planet like even see little little lines on the surface of the planet. And from that point I've been fascinated by Mars, have been fascinated by the idea of going there. Do you care already? Do you feel like, wow this? I could be interested in Mars now because it's kind of happening through me right now. One reason is because humans are naturally interested in stories. But the other is because because of empathy here, some other ways we could we could begin, Let me tell you, let me tell you about how I first I got involved with finance. Finance is a very boring field. So maybe I'm going to talk about finance. And I tell you a little story about how I first got interested in this on why it's important to me, this field about money. Some people, some people, think it's boring. Some people think it's interesting. I think it can be interesting. But if we first care about the story, then well, maybe start caring about finance. Maybe, maybe about three years ago I went, I went on a trip to Ethiopia and on that trip, blah, blah, blah. Something happened, and that's the thing that maybe got me started on this big project that I'm doing, whatever it happens to be. OK, so I start a little story. This is a great way to connect with your audience. This is type two when it comes to making hooks. Now let's go on and talk about the last type of hook. So the last type of hook is also a way to interact with the audience, and I want to sort of connect these two points together. I said I was going to talk about how you could interact with the audience, and one way to do that is also a way to do hook. This is to get a show of hands. This is a little bit of what we would call audience participation, audience participation. You want to get the audience to do something, and by doing that by getting them to do something, they're now part of your presentation there now with you there a piece of it before it was just you standing up there giving the presentation. Now it's you end them together in a way because they've done something to contribute to it , and they feel now a little bit, maybe a little bit responsible for it. Oh, I'm part of this thing. So how can we get people to put their hands up? What we can just say? Hands up after a question. For example, Who here doesn't own a smartphone? Hands up, hands! Hands up! Who here doesn't own a smartphone? Hands up! This is not rhetorical. This is a real question. But I want the person who doesn't have one to put their hand up. And so maybe I don't know if it's an audience of 200 people. One or two people might not have a smartphone. Maybe so two people put their hands up. And I say You should always say something about the result because you have the best perspective or view of the audience. I mean that physically I mean physically. From where you're standing, you can see the audience better than anyone else. So you have the best perspective. Okay, so we could say just by show of hands. Who here doesn't have a smartphone to people put their hands up? Oh, that's what I thought. That's what I thought two people about to. So my guess was about right. I guessed most people would not put their hands up because most people have a smartphone. Okay, so you should report the results. If it's about 50% you can say, OK, about about half of you half of you. About half of you don't. Okay, just by a show of hands. This is another expression just by a show of hands. Who here? I know that doesn't look like it, but that's an are there who here would like to live to be mawr than 100? Who here would like to live to be more than 100? Oh, wow. Okay, about 1/3 of U I would like to live to be more than 100. Okay, so we can judge the results a little bit, give everybody a feeling for their level of participation on, then go on and talk about the actual thing. Whatever it is we're going to talk about. Hey, so these air the three types of hooks that I think are the most useful and probably the most common, making it personal, asking for a show of hands and asking a rhetorical question. If you know how to use these well, you can always get your presentation started off the right way. 109. Making a Presentation - The Outline: please listen to this part really carefully. If you're good at organizing your thoughts, whether in your mind or on paper, it's going to be a lot easier for you to speak clearly. If you're trying very hard to think about what to say and how to say it and you know the pronunciation and all that stuff, it's going to be really hard for you to express yourself. Clearly. You're probably going to make a lot more mistakes because you're going to exceed your band with your ability to focus on everything. But if you're able to organize your thoughts, at the very least on paper, everything gets a lot easier when you're doing a presentation. The outline is so important. If if you make a clear outline and you really get the ideas, you really feel the ideas, you have your mind around. The ideas in the outline well, I have to do is go through it. 12345 It's easy. So in this part of the lesson, we're going to talk about how to make an outline. We're going to make one together, and then we're going to actually after this, do a presentation I'm going to do a presentation based on the outline. Just to be clear, the outline is the basic structure. The A doctor be done, the see that that tells you what to say next and then and then and then and then. Okay, it's nothing more than that. If you write down all of the words you want to say in your outline, it's not really an outline anymore. It's more like a script, and it's going to be really hard to read through, and you're going to get confused. It's really gonna be a mess, so keep it really simple. I try to keep outlines to just a couple words, really like a skeleton. Ah, basic basic structure that reminds me of what to talk about next. Then I let the words come out of my mouth, as they would like to pretty much I mean, I tried. I tried to say things clearly, but I'm not too focused on what What should I talk about next? And that makes things a lot easier. So keep it simple, and that will help you a lot, too. Let's actually do it. Our topic will be the value of travel the value of travel. Yes, that will be our topic. That's more than just, by the way, travel itself. But wise traveled something that's actually important. That's what I want to talk about. OK, now what's my hook kind of hook? Do I want to use? Let's let's just go with something very basic, by the way, go with. If I haven't explained that before, I often say that go with means choose. Let's go with something very basic. Very simple, very basic. Let's just ask for a show of hands for our hook. Keep it simple, OK? And I'm gonna write down the hook because it's so short. Who here who here sees travel as as Mawr than just Ah, vacation. Hands up. OK, so that's one of the hooks that we talked about earlier. Just one of the hooks, the hands up one. The interaction won. Of course, we could do a rhetorical question if we wanted to. Have you ever been on a trip and had a really profound experience? I'd like you to think about that experience as I begin my presentation. I didn't want that one time. Okay, so I'm going to use this one just because it's so simple and I am going to write it down on Lee because it's so short normally, as long as you have the basic idea of it in your mind, that is totally fine. Now, how about the introduction? What about the introduction? Do we always need an introduction? Well, I like to do something really simple. I usually just say today, Today I would or I'd like to share with you. I usually say something like this today I'd like to share with you. It's just a way to say, Hey, this is my topic after my hook. So I'll give my hook first and then I'll give my basic basic introduction. Doesn't have to be anything too long or too serious. Pretty simple. Then we get into the actual outline itself. So let's break down and build together the outline of our presentation on the value of travel. My basic structure for doing an outline is a I was going to be a point here, then. Example, example or detail detail be main point here. Second main point example here, detail here could be an example or a specific detail about it, depending on the topic, then sometimes not always see main point example. Example for example, detail or whatever and then so comma and of say, one last thing. And there are many ways to do that you don't have to use, so I generally like to use. So when I'm doing a presentation So this is our basic, our basic structure. And, of course, here we have our of course, our basic hook and our intro. So hook intro ABC. So, at the very end, a exposure to new ideas, exposure to new ideas. All right, that's a good one. Let's see example, Number one OK, trip to India. And then I'm gonna write shock here to remind myself to talk about the sort of culture shock of going to India for the first time. Very different than America. Good experience. Next. Let's see eating traditions, eating traditions. Okay, I'm just gonna writing traditions because I know what I want to share When I talk about eating traditions. Have something in my head. But this helps me remember what I'm going to talk about. I'm going to talk about how on my many trips I like to sample local food, especially street food Because then I feel like I can get a deep feeling for the history of each place. We're gonna talk about that, but I'm just going to use eating traditions to help me remember what I'm going to talk about. All right, So this is part a the main idea. Why is travel valuable? Well, because you get exposure. That means you get to see, uh, new ideas and that makes you reflect and think about who you are, where you come from, maybe get get. Oh, no. Let's not use get. I want to make it even shorter. Ah, break from routine. So for this one, I'm going to talk about why it's so important to not do the same thing every day and how travel can really break you out of doing the same thing and give you a lot of new fresh ideas and improve the quality off of your life. Explore inner self, who you are on the inside, and I'm going to give a detail on that. The next one. I want to really make it pretty short. I'm going to write normal life fresh eyes, and there I'm gonna talk about how when you come back from traveling for maybe two weeks or even a month. When you come back to your own life, you can appreciate it in a totally new way. You realize that it is maybe interesting. You can see the value in it, whereas before when you left, you are sick and tired and everything was dumb and boring. I'm going to talk about that now. See, let's do Global Network again. We're talking about the value of travel. We have three main ideas. One is about exposing yourself to new ideas and new ways of life and the value of that be Point B. Number two is about breaking away out of your normal routine. Why that's so important to do and then see is about your global network, who you know around the world, and I'm going to give an example staying in Japan. I know what that means. I have a little story for that. Your outline is for you. You don't have to show it to everybody else. I'm showing it to you because I'm showing you the process for making it. It's so easy, but it really it's for me. It reminds me of the story. I want to talk about my example of staying in Japan. Then I'm going to say unexpected adventures, unexpected adventures. And there I'm gonna talk about how, what I meet people when I am traveling. I think maybe I'm going to go to this place. I'm gonna visit this, this and this. But I end up meeting people and we do things together, and that makes the experience much more interesting. I have a deeper experience and a deeper appreciation for the place I'm visiting because I met people. And my growing network is making my travels more valuable all the time. So next time you're planning, that's my beginning. I'm going to say planning a trip just helps me remember. All right, so let's just review this A exposure to new ideas. Talk about my trip to India and culture shock be that I'm gonna talk about eating traditions. Okay, so those air new things that are adding value be get away from my normal life, get out of my routine and learn more about myself. But also, when I come back, see my own life with fresh eyes. See, my network around the world could stay with my friend in Japan, for example, and unexpected adventures valuable experiences that I never planned toe have. So next time you plan or you're planning a trip, I'm gonna talk about how if you stay in a hotel by yourself, it's probably not good. So next time you plan a trip, don't stay in a five star resort. A resort is a resort is a very nice place. Of course, it's good to do that if you really just want to relax. But if you really want to meet people, maybe go out and explore the local, uh, area. Alright, so I've got my ideas down. I'm going to do my presentation. This is a promise. I'm going to do my presentation one time. I have not prepared this presentation before. I have not given this presentation before. This is really okay. I might cut little pieces to make it shorter if if I need to, just to save you some time watching. But I'm only going to do this presentation one time I wanted to come across as natural. I want it to be natural because I want to show you that you can make an outline and then do the presentation five minutes later. It's not a big deal people get this big idea about. I gotta work on my presentation for weeks. And I guess if you have to prepare all of the slides and pictures in your PPT, that's true. But the basic ideas in your presentation you can get down in a simple outline and you could give the outline without a PPT with very few minutes of planning. What? We've done this in in just about I don't know how many minutes, 10 10 minutes, Right? So it's actually not a big deal. Here we go. 110. Making a Presentation - Full Presentation: All right. So just to set the scene very quickly, let's imagine there are 30 to 40 people in a relatively small place is a little stage I walk up on the stage, gonna give my presentation about the value of travel. No slides. I'm just gonna go through my outline. But I could have slides. I probably would. This were a real situation. Okay, so I walk up on stage just by show of hands. Who here thinks that travel is more than just a vacation? Who here? Okay, about half of you. About half of you think that when you go on a trip, you're getting mawr than Just relax, ation. Today I want to talk about what I feel is the actual value of traveling. Why traveling can really teach us new things, open our minds and give us genuinely meaningful experiences. And the first thing really is is about where we get ideas. Being exposed to new things is an extremely important part of travel seeing things that you've never seen before. But for example, when I first went abroad, I actually traveled to India. I had never travelled abroad before, and India is a very different country than the United States where I'm from. So I plan to study, study yoga. I went over to India and it was just so different. The smells, the sights, the sounds, the language. Everything was just so different that it shocked me. At first I was in a state of shock. But after a day or two, when it started to become comfortable, all those sights and smells and sounds began to get comfortable, and I became curious about each one, and by speaking to local people, I was able to learn about what people thought. And I learned that what people thought was different than what I thought. My opinions and their opinions were different. And that, I realized, is the beautiful thing about being human, that we're all different. We have our own viewpoints, and each viewpoint is unique and really interesting in its own way. Now, another important part for me about travel is experiencing food. And of course, when I was in India, I was able to explore a lot of different cuisines that I had never imagined before. But I cannot tell you how important it has been for me to be able to experience all of the different cuisines that I've tried in my life, whether it's in China, Thailand, India, other parts of Asia, Europe, Africa, even. And now that I'm back in the U. S. And not really traveling so much, it's become part of who I am because I've been opened up to the possibilities of cuisine and food. Now I feel like I need it. It's part of me, so I have to go out. But I live in New York. I have to go out every week and find Chinese food one day. Ethiopian food, the next Indian food, the next Mexican food, the next. It's part of me now it's in it. And it's an incredibly valuable part of myself now, beyond just gaining new insights into how other people think into other cultures, really broadening our minds, whether it's religion or, for example, how people eat food. Exploring cuisine. Travel also gives us the opportunity to step out of the grind, the daily routine. And when we do that, a couple things happen. One is that we start to see our own routine differently whenever I travel somewhere and I'm gone for a while and I come back. Everything that I thought was boring before I left is suddenly new and fresh, and I begin to appreciate the details of my normal life even more. For example, I often travel to China when I come back. I think how in New York, New York is cool, little the interesting food we have here. All my cats air here. My cats are wonderful. My wonderful wife is here. This is all great. But sometimes, sometimes before I leave, when I've been doing the same thing day after day, it can begin to lose appreciation for that. But also, when you actually go somewhere else, you're somewhere new your somewhere. You've never been that as I mentioned, culture shock can immediately put you into another state of mind. Another frame of mine. And that's where inspiration happens. I've found many of my best ideas when I've been thrown into unexpected situations. When something I didn't expect to happen happened. And when you're traveling, everything that happens is generally unexpected. You might encounter someone new, you might see a mountain, and it's so beautiful that you get an idea or you appreciate nature differently. It's getting out of the routine that often shocks us into new insights and new appreciation for the world around us, I think is a beautiful thing, and I think that's often where a lot of the value of travel is missed. People don't really think about it when they are on a very relaxing vacation and there, sitting by the pool, doing nothing. There's nothing wrong with that. But when you're when you're out of the routine and you're exploring, you can see things differently. But on top of both of those things, just traveling and meeting people is extremely valuable in itself. At the very least, travel is, ah, fantastic way to build a global network. I mean, think about it. If you meet people and make friends in countries around the world, even in your own country, different places around your own country, you're going to expand your network, and that doesn't mean you should take advantage of people. But it means more possibilities open up for you in the future. So, for example, I went to Japan with my friend, who I had met on another trip living in Japan, said to me, Hey, you're coming to Japan. Well, you could just stay with me. I'll take you around the city. So I stayed with that person for a week. He took me around the city. We had a lot of fun together, and then that same person came to visit me in my home, stayed with me in my home, and I took him around my city, and that kind of exchanges beautiful because you're deep in relationships. But you also then can get, for example, a deeper look into the local area because they know it better. If you're by yourself traveling well, you know you can read a tour book, but the person who lives there is is going to know much more about it. The best places to eat the best places to visit, best places to have fun. They're going to do a lot more about the local place now from personal experience. I would recommend when you travel, stay in places like bed and breakfasts or maybe even hostels, because you have the opportunity to meet other travelers, and you might then have experiences that you've never expected to have. I once was staying at a hostel and met a couple of girls and they were kind of afraid to go out because it was getting dark. And I said, Oh, I can I can go out with you Um and so they felt safe to go out with me. And because of that, we ended up having this crazy adventure the next day. Actually, we went to the zoo, and I would never have done that if I hadn't. That the very interesting experience, I would have never had that experience Had I not met them, I might have, I don't know, gone to a coffee shop and done some work. It would have been very boring, right? So the unexpected things often come when we meet new people. Those new people can get us out of our shell. So the next time you're planning a trip, don't book a five star hotel. Don't stay by yourself and sit by the pool and read. That's fine to do. Sometimes. Next time, why don't you try to have an adventure? Go somewhere crazy, stay at a weird bed and breakfast, make new friends, do something you've never done. Try new food. You're going to have experiences that are going to stick with you for the rest of your life . Thank you very much. All right, so we've covered how to give a presentation. The dues in the Don's talked about how to engage and how to make a hook. We've talked about how to make an outline very important. And I've given you an example presentation that I did not prepare. Before that, I I gave directly from my outline as a test to see how good my outline waas and you can do it too doesn't have to be perfect. Mine wasn't perfect. But if you do this more and more and you get used to it, it gets more and more comfortable. So when you need to give a real presentation and you have two weeks to prepare, it's going to be easy. You can spend your time looking for cool pictures for your PPT instead of worrying about what to talk about, because the outline part is not that hard. So to practice this, I'd like you to choose a topic like Travel Life Lesson. You've learned the value of choosing your major in university, then create an outline just like we did in this lesson, and then give your presentation record it or give your presentation to a friend and recorded. Listen to it again and get feedback from from your friend. If you can get a group of friends even better, practice this if you get good at this. Wow, If you can get good at giving presentations and making outlines, you are powerful. Good luck. 111. Expressions for Disagreement and Difficulty - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about how to give presentations, and I hope that you've actually tried to give your own presentation to practice all the things that we learned in this lesson. We're going to talk about difficulty, how we can handle or deal with difficulty or disagreements. We don't disagree with someone. How do we describe that for having a hard time? How do we describe that? We're going to learn quite a few new phrases in this lesson. We're also going to go through a couple of specific situations, so we'll look at an example of bargaining and how two people can talk back and forth to find a compromise. Also, way to talk about what a compromise is or when it learned a few phrases that we can use in compromised situations or when we want to compromise. Okay, finally, we're going to practice a few ways that we can give suggestions different than giving advice. We want to weigh in on someone's difficult choice. We have a difficult choice. Talk about how we can describe that difficulty choice, and then how other people can say, Well, it's better if you do this. It's better if you do that. We call that weighing in sometimes. All right, let's get started 112. Expressions for Disagreement and Difficulty - Ways to Disagree: So let's just get started and talk about some phrases we can use to disagree how we can actually express our disagreement, and there are a couple of simple ways we can do it. There are many, many possibilities, many possible ways, but we're going to go through a couple of common phrases. Common phrases. One is that we don't we don't see I to I if you think about it, the Phrase II does make sense. My eyes lined up with your eye. We kind of have the same view, so you can kind of understand the idea. It means if we say we don't see eye tie, that we have a different opinion. So let's say to parents disagree about how to raise their Children. I think our son should study after class many, many extracurricular activities. I think he should take a lot of extra classes. The other parent says. I disagree. I don't think so. We should give him more free time. Let him play more. We just don't see eye to eye. And maybe she's saying that maybe the wife is saying that to her friends. Maybe the husband is saying it to his friends later. We don't see eye to eye about this thing. We disagree Very common phrase. If you do agree, can you say we see I die as you can? I think we see eye to eye on this. I think we're pretty much eye to eye on this issue. Okay? My my opinion or view couldn't be mawr different. My opinion or view couldn't be more different, but this is really useful if we want to express that. Our opinion is so far away from the other person that it's like the opposite end of the spectrum. A spectrum is when you have one side all the way over here. And this is maybe plus in one side all the way over here. And this is minus and then some space in between. And the space in between is kind of fuzzy. You know, this is right in the middle. This is closer to Plus, this is closer to minus, but it's kind of a mix. Okay, So if I say my opinion or view couldn't be more different, that means I'm way over here On your way over here. Opposite ends of the spectrum of opinion. If you're here then it could be more different. In fact, should we say that it could, it could be more different. My opinion could be more different that no, we don't usually use that expression. We generally will say I couldn't disagree more, but we could also say I couldn't agree more. Sometimes if we're completely on the same page completely on the same page, that means we totally agree. Say, I couldn't agree more or it's the opposite. My opinion couldn't be more different now what if we want to make it softer? Because we don't always want to express that? We have a very different view from from other people, and we might want to show that we have some a differences, but it's not extreme. It's not very strong. Well, we could say this is very soft. I'm, uh I'm not sure I see it that way. You could also say I don't think I don't think I see it that way. I just don't see it that way. You want to make it very, very gentle, Very gentle, very soft. Very indirect. You could say I'm not sure. I'm just not sure I see it that way. Okay, So, for example, where colleagues and one person says, you know what? I think that we should never have to work overtime. We're here to work 40 hours a week, 40 hours a week, no more and another person who wants to maybe ADM or contribute more so that the maybe the company will be more successful. Maybe will say very politely. Not sure I see it that way. I think if we work overtime, the whole company will be more productive and we're getting paid and we're getting paid common expressions, See eye to eye or don't see eye to eye. I couldn't agree more or my opinion couldn't be mawr different. I'm not sure I see it that way. I'm not sure I see it that way. Okay, let's move on and actually look at a compromise. We'll talk about what that means and also some phrases that we can use to express compromise 113. Expressions for Disagreement and Difficulty - How to Compromise: Okay, So what is a compromise? Well, you may already know, but basically a compromise is when two people who disagree about something find a space in the middle where one side gives up something and the other side gives up something so that they can agree so that they can come to some sort of agreement. So the parent who wants their son to study a lot after school is over here. The parent who wants their son to have a lot of free time after school is over here. Well, they need to meet in the middle. It's not going to be on Lee this or Onley this. They need to find somewhere in the middle in this spectrum where they agree so that they can actually get somewhere, right. So they have to find common ground. This space in the middle between the two extremes of the spectrum. This is the spectrum. This area is common ground. Maybe if our son takes four classes a week for extra classes a week, then he'll still have time to hang out with friends. Okay, I could agree to three or four classes a week as long as he can do things. He enjoys more creative things three times a week. Yes, OK, that sounds fair. So they're in here, not on the extremes. They have found common ground. They've met in the middle. They have. And this could be a noun or a verb. Could be a noun or a verb. They have made. They have made a compromise. They have. They have compromised. That's a verb. They have made a compromise. They have compromised. Okay, so that's the meaning of compromise. Now we can look at a couple of expressions when we're ready to compromise. Okay, so let's look at a few of those. Now. Let's take that situation with the two parents who want to compromise. They have two different views on an issue, and they want to compromise. Well, one parent might say, I'll tell you what. I'll tell you what. So this is a way to suggest that compromise the thing that you're willing to give up, tell you what? If he can take three classes a week and also play with his friends a few times a week, then I think we have a deal. I think we can agree. Let's talk about a cellar, for example, A seller wants to sell something. Buyer wants to buy something. Cellar is giving a very high price. Buyer doesn't want to pay a high price. They want to pay a low price, Obviously. Okay, so they are at opposite ends of the spectrum. But the person in the shop who wants to buy something has made it very clear they don't want to pay the the full price. I think it's too high. The seller is ready to compromise to give up a little bit. So the seller might say, I'll tell you what? Instead of 400 how about 350 we use? How about as a way to recommend the new price is very common and we'll look at another situation in a moment. How about this? How about this 350 I'll give you a free bubble? Whatever and something. How about this is to recommend it to suggest the new thing, that compromise? Would you be willing to consider 303 100? That's my final offer, although that wouldn't really be a compromise if you added that. But sometimes people say that final offer in a negotiation when you're bargaining with the seller bargaining with the seller. Would you be willing to consider this? If you want to get somebody to do something, you can recommend it in this way. Would you be willing to consider helping me move my sofa tomorrow? Would you be willing to consider that it's very, very polite, Very gentle. Okay. Could you meet me in the middle on this now? This 1 may not be used so much when it comes to Price in a shop. I mean, you could you could say, Could you meet me in the middle on this? I think 300 is fair. 350 is still too high. Could you meet me in the middle on this, please? All right. All right. I guess so. You've got a deal. Okay, maybe. Maybe, but I think this one is probably more common for situations more like the husband and the wife who disagree about their child. Listen, I just don't want him to be in class all day, including after school. I think it's reasonable that he should have some free time. Could you meet me in the middle on this? Let's find some common ground Okay, now, a couple more expressions we can use when we're in this sort of bargaining negotiation type situation. Negotiating by the way, is what we're doing. We are negotiating. If it's money that we're dealing with, then we're bargaining where bargaining. When we're talking about money, especially in a shop sometimes haggling but usually bargaining, I think what I'm asking is reasonable. Now, this is just a comment. This is just a thing to say to sort of support the number you gave so four classes a week. I think what I'm asking is is reasonable, don't you? Then the other side has to say something. Yes or no? Probably. Okay, I'm not saying we have to do it my way or only my way. But I think, for example, if one parent wants the boy to take two classes every day after school, OK, that would be my way. That's my way. My way is what I want. What I think is right. In fact, we have an interesting expression my way or the highway, My way or the highway. It's my way or the highway. That means if you don't agree with what I think is right, with what I want to do. Leave, get on the highway, go away. It's like that. It's my way or the highway. So when you're compromising, you can't say that, can't say my way or the highway if you want to compromise. So I'm not saying we have to do it my way or I'm not saying we have to do it on Lee. My way means I'm willing to be flexible here. But I think it is important that he takes some classes, is very important that he takes, um classes so that he can stay ahead and compete with the other students. So this one is really good for negotiating in situations. We're talking about actions, what should be done, not usually about price. And when you're ready to compromise, you can use these phrases to kind of support your side and sort of explain your side to show that what you're saying is reasonable. It's reasonable, very reasonable 114. Expressions for Disagreement and Difficulty - Compromise Examples: all right. Now, let's actually look at a compromise. A situation where two people disagree about the price of a car. We've done this a little bit before when we were talking about the apartment. But I wanna make sure we look at the situation with some of the phrases that we've talked about so far. Okay, so on the website, this is the buyer, the person who might buy the car. And this is the This is the seller. This is the seller. Okay, here we go. On the website, the car is listed for 5800. That means that's the price that it says on the website. But I think that's a little steep. That's a little steep. By the way, we could say here 5800. Sometimes people say $585,800. But $5800 is more common. Steep means too expensive Given how many miles are on it. I think $5200 would be fair. So this is the offer. Okay. This is the offer. The low offer. I just don't see it that way. I just don't see it that way. We could say, I don't quite see it that way. We don't have to say it like that. As I said, the car has been kept in excellent condition. In fact, I think this car could go 4 $6000 go four means that's the price that some people might be willing to pay. Sometimes we use go for when we're talking about the amount that you could sell something a little more expensive for. We don't usually use it for small things like candy, our bottles of water. But for things like houses and cars and sometimes clothes, sometimes we can use go for I can't believe that these go for $58. Thes shoes go for $58. It's so expensive. Okay, go for All right, Let's go to the next part of this negotiation. So far, we've used this phrase. I just don't see it that way. I just don't see it that way. Okay, then the buyer says it's just so far out of my price range. Too expensive so far out of my price range. Would you be willing to consider $5300? Would you be willing to consider so It's another offer. $100 more. There's another phrase. Okay, I'll tell you what this is When the seller is going to show that he or she is ready to compromise, I'll tell you what it means. I'm going to give you a better deal. Now, if you can pay in cash, I could do 5600. Do that. If you can do something, it's like saying that works for me. Hey, um, I want to meet around four o'clock. Does that work for you? So, yeah, that works for me. Or you can say Yeah, I can do for I can do for That's fine. I can do that. I could do $5600. I can pay cash. Fine. If you can meet me in the middle on the price, meet me in the middle On the price to people on two ends. 410,400. That would be about the middle, right? Meet me in the middle on the price. Then maybe the seller will say Oh, okay. Okay. Uh, you've got a deal. You've got a deal. You've got yourself a deal sometimes. So we've used some of the phrases for how we can negotiate and, more importantly, compromise when we're ready to give up something. It's very important in many conversations. You have this opinion. They have this opinion. It's necessary to sometimes give up a few of your ideas, a few of the things you want in order to make other people happy and come to a solution to your problems. All right, we're going to go on and talk about some difficulty and how we can describe some difficulties. 115. Expressions for Disagreement and Difficulty - Phrases for Difficult Choices: so far in this lesson, we've talked about how we can show disagreement with others, either in a very polite way or a more direct way and how, when we have disagreements, we can come to a compromise, for example, in a negotiation or when we need to bargain and how we can use phrases to express that. We're ready to give something up. Now we're going to talk about another type of difficult situation. Ah, difficulty, choice. When you have to make a choice, that's not fun. There are two really common expressions, and I want to teach you the two expressions because they are very common, very useful. And then we're going to actually look at some examples. One of them could be a choice between two good things. That it's difficult still right. But the two choices air good positive. The other is definitely for bad things, definitely for negative things. So let's learn these two and then look at the examples. Have you ever been in a situation where you have two choices? It's just so hard to make one or the other. It may be that it's because this choice is not great, and this choice is not great, but it may often be because this choice is very good, very attractive. And this choice is very good. Very attractive. Choice and choice be are both great choices. You don't know which one to go with, which means choose to go with. Okay, so on the fence is the expression. I'm on the fence. I'm on the fence. Well, what does that mean? Let's break that down. Well, offense is something that divides two things. For example, there's a home here with a yard and a home here with a yard. Let me draw very fast and very ugly home. It's a home here, tree who? And, ah, yard and, um OK, And there's a home here and another little tree. This was bigger old. This is a bigger tree and a yard. Okay, so two houses in the middle in the middle, there's a fence. There's a fence here, and it divides the two properties. When property to properties. Now you can imagine walking on the fence, right? If you're walking on the fence, it takes great balance. We use this visual idea, this visual idea to communicate that we don't know if we should fall off on this side or fall off on this side. We don't know. That's why were on the fence about whether to a or B, whether to go with a or B. I'm really on the fence about whether whether often I should do a or go with B. I just don't know. So let's look at an example. We talked about the two houses, so we should have a pretty good idea about what on the fence means. Let's actually look at, ah, case where we can use it. Okay, I got offers from both talking about two two companies here. If you go to a job interview, you apply to a company and you go to an interview and you do Well, maybe you do that at two different companies and you get an offer that means they would like you to work for them. That's a good thing. I got offers from both, and I'm completely on the fence about which one to choose. We could also remember say about whether to choose that or, uh, okay, X box game company Xbox offers great benefits a great benefits package. Benefits are the extra things besides your salary, basic things, your salary. If salary benefits are things like health insurance and sometimes ah, sometimes we haven't expense account, which means you can have a credit card. You just swipe it when you buy stuff and expense account. Anyway, X box offers a great benefits package, and the pay is fantastic. Means the salary is fantastic because they're two different things. But Apple seems tohave better. Long term prospects, prospects in terms, off promotions. I could really go either way at this point, and I could use some help so we would maybe give advice to this person. Oh, you poor you poor you. You have the choice to work it to very good companies with a great salary and you can't choose. Oh, no, I say follow your heart or go and live in a cave. Okay, so here, when we say in terms of promotions, that means chances to get a better job in the future. Better prospects means you have some good possibilities in the future. If you're standing on a hill and you look out over the horizon, your prospects are the things that are possible for you have no prospects. Uh, he could be for your relationships could be for your career, often for a career. So here's how we use on the fence. And, uh, usually it's for two good things. But again, not always. Now let's look at another expression, which is very similar and can also express a difficult choice. But it is for two negative things. The next expression for describing a difficult choice where both choices are bad is between a rock and a hard place. Now this has a very interesting physical sort of visual description connected to it, which helps us really understand it. There's a movie called 127 Hours, and it's about a man who goes hiking in. He ends up in a canyon, the rock wall okay, and there's a boulder, which is a big stones or canyon is to two stone walls on both sides of you. We could also call it a crevice if it's smaller. So maybe it's a crevice, whatever. And a boulder, it is a big stone, okay, and he gets his hand stuck between the rock and the wall, and he can't get it out. And he's there for days. This is a true story. The movie is not the real thing, but the story. Israel. And he has to make a choice. Should I stay here and die? That's choice. A one choice. A stay here and die from starvation or lack of water. Choice. Be choice number two. Also not good. Cut my hand off. I have a very old, not very sharp knife. I would have to break the bone and cut my arm off because that's what stuck between the wall and the boulder. So there are two choices. Both choices. Air Terrible. So we say I'm between a rock and a hard place. The interesting thing about this one is that he's actually between a rock. This thing, which is a rock heading the hard place the wall. So it's very physically meaningful to their can. Picture it very clearly, I think. Don't picture it too Clearly, he ended up cutting his arm off by the way he survived, but he had to cut his arm off very slowly. No fun. So we use this expression when we're in any kind of situation like this to difficult choices to make. We don't know which one to choose. It's not fun, so let's look at an example. This example comes from a business owner, someone who's owning a business, and it's a small business. It's a shop. It's a shop, maybe a bookshop coffee shop. And it's not doing well. It's not doing very well, not making very much money. Maybe customers aren't coming in for some reason. So the shop owner says hoof things aren't looking good either way. Either way means it could be that way or that way. Both options are bad. You could go either way means you could go this way. Go left, go right, Okay, Things aren't looking good. Either way. I could either close my shop and file for bankruptcy. Bankruptcy is when you basically announce formally, legally, that you cannot pay back money that you've borrowed. And it's sort of like a restart on your financial situation. File for bankruptcy or borrow more money and try to breathe new life into the business. This is another expression to breathe life into something is, too, to try to give it a fresh start or something new, something fresh so that it can change. Wow, that change in my diet really breathed new life into my daily routine. I have much more energy. Now, be a simple example. Okay, I guess you could say I'm between a rock in the heart place. Or you could say I'm really between a rock and a hard place, or you could just directly say I'm between a rock and a hard place, so this one doesn't fit very well. Within the description of what the two bad choices are, it's usually a sentence by itself, unlike the other one, I'm on the fence because we say I'm on the fence about whether to A or B. But this one, we say, between a rock and a hard place. I'm really between a rock and a hard place, either at the beginning or the end off the description of what the two things are. So it's used differently. It's usually separated from the actual description. So when we want to actually recommend what our friend should do in either situation, either the on the fence situation with the two companies or the company that's about to go bankrupt unless the owner borrows more money. Okay, how do we give advice to thes people? Well, we can use the phrase best bet. Best bet is a way to say this is what I think would be the smartest choice it is. Most likely it is most likely the best choice when we're giving our opinion about something we might be talking about, the probability of success or how likely it is that this idea is going to be the one that you should choose, the one that works out in the long run. Finally, basically, is the meaning. Okay, so best bet your best bet is to your best bet is to let's look at the examples for the first situation. Your best bet would be to go with the company that has better long term prospects. Long term means not. Not just now, not just money now, but in the far future. Go with remember, go with means choose the company that has better long term prospects. And again, basically, it means that's what I think is the smartest choice, the most likely to be successful to be. Good for you in the long run. In the second situation, number to your best bet might be to hire a marketing team and try to revive the business Okay, Revive means to bring it back to life. It's almost dead to come back to life, come back to life, revived the business. If you give up now, you may never get another shot at it. This shot is another. Try another attempt another. Try another attempt at it. This may be your only chance to follow your dream of having a bookstore. So your best bet the smartest thing for you to do the thing that's most likely to lead to success for you is to hire a marketing team. In this lesson, we've learned quite a few new phrases for describing difficult situations and describing disagreement as well as compromise. So what I'd like you to do is try to describe a situation in which you've had to make a difficult choice, a difficult choice. Try to describe both the pros, the good things and the cons of both choices of the choices. Record yourself so speak into your phone and then listen to it again. Make sure to use the expressions from this lesson and write down any mistakes you find so that you could become Mawr aware of those mistakes so that you can hear them when you're saying them next time. Good luck 116. Technical Descriptions - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about expressions we can use for tough situations like negotiations, tough decisions and compromises. In this lesson, we're going to focus on technical language. That means we're going to talk about how we can order things. For example, days in the month we're going to talk about math problems now. It's not anything very, very complicated, but we need to be able to say that sort of technical language, that sort of technical English. We're going to talk about dates. We're going to talk a little bit about addresses, symbols, things like that that you need to be able to say naturally without thinking in order to express basic things so that people can understand, for example, when you need to do something exactly where you need to go, exactly how much of something you have or you need. This is, ah, basic stuff, but it's necessary to know it, and it can be a little bit complicated. So let's get started. We're going to start with order. We're going to start with the really easy stuff, and then we'll slowly get a little bit more complicated. Let's begin 117. Technical Descriptions - Numbers in Order: So let's get started with order ordering things. When do we use the endings for numbers? Like you probably know first. Why do we sometimes say one? Why do we sometimes say one S t or F i r S t OK, well, if we have one thing, then we don't need to use this, okay? We don't need to use that. We just have one thing. So we say I have one apple, Okay? There are two people were just counting. OK, But if things go in order, if there is a sequence and we're focused on the sequence, that means this one and then this one and then this one and then this one and then this one , there's a sequence than often We will use this. The endings for numbers. We use it very simply for days in the month, all the way up to 31st which is the longest. A month can be the 31st. Okay, so things in sequence not everything but often things in sequence. Could you say my 31st birthday? Yes. Yes, you can. 31st birthday. Because birthdays are in sequence, you can also say that you're 33 years old. You can certainly say that 33 years old, but you can say it's your 31st birthday because that's in sequence. What else goes in order like that? When else might we use this sort of language in sequence? Well, if we have something and then we get rid of it or we get another thing of the same type, then we can start to use this because we have one, and then we have another of the same kind of thing. It's a kind of sequence. So let's say I buy a bike by the company. Maybe, you know the company trek. It's a bike company. Let's say I buy a trick. I have one track bike, Okay? And I like it. So I decide. Well, this one was cheap, so I'll buy another one. Now I have to trek bikes. Well, this one, this one tried draw bike. Oh, my God. This is a terrible is a bicycle. This one is my first trek bike. And this one, Let's just say there's another one here, Okay? This one is my to second. Now, I know that you probably know this, but I just want to be very clear when we use it and when we don't usually. If it is a sequence of things, maybe it's my third bike and my second Trek bike. That's possible. Third bike, Second Trek bike. Totally fine. Totally fine. Let's just read through these very quickly just so that you know the pronunciation. And then I want to talk about the floors of a building. Okay, this 1 21st this 1 32nd 32nd this 1/3 this 1 74th this 1 65th This one's tough to say. 5th 5th 65th. Another one that's tough to say is the next 1 106th 66 You have to actually say six and then with the TH sounds 66th 66 at 106th 47th 47th 7th 7th adding th 88th. So this one, we have a kind of 888 We don't say eighth like that. We just say eight and we stopped the voice hope Eighth, 9th 9th 9th So when it has th we do have to make that sound. And what about this one? If it's on on even 10 10th 20th 30th 40th 50th. So this is 50 50 years 50th. Okay, now it gets a little different if it's teens, but those are all the same. Except for 12. So this one is 12. 12 12. It's difficult. 12th than the other ones are all the same. 13th 14th 15th 16th. All of them are th and you just say the number 13. And then except you have to be careful about this and this. You got to watch out for that pronunciation. This is that, uh this is, uh uh If it's a 10 then we use Ah, If it's a teen, then we use, Ah, 30th 40th 50th 13th 14th 15th 50th and the 15th are very different. But it's the tone that we also have to pay attention to. So in a building, when you're describing the floor in the building because they're in sequence going up there in sequence going up, then we're going to use these endings as the floor names. So you have a tall building here. Okay. And maybe this is the 32nd 32nd floor, the 32nd floor, the 52nd floor, the 52nd floor. So once, you know, the endings and you know how to say them. It should be easy, but just pay attention to the fact that these numbers become the names of those things. And if we say, How old are you? I'm 33. That's not the name of your age, right? That's not the name of your birthday. But if we say it's my 33rd birthday or my 40th birthday, that's kind of the name of your birthday, Isn't it the name of your birthday? So it helps us to name things and specify exactly which thing we're talking about. Which floor you're going to. I'm going to the 80 second floor. Wow, that's pretty high up. 82nd floor. Cool. You live very high up okay, or the 13th floor. And if if you go into many buildings in Western countries, you will not see 1/13 floor on the buttons in the elevator, why not? Because 13 in a lot of Western countries is an unlucky number. It's a bad number, so you won't see 1/13 floor for that reason, in many places, many places, not all but many all right, that's pretty simple. I realize hopefully it's clear 118. Technical Descriptions - Dates: Now that we focused on the order of things and how we use those numbers in sequence, we can now talk about dates and dates are actually written many different ways. But the standard format for America. Okay, so I'm an American teacher. I can teach you the standard format in the US you often see on an Internet form. You'll see. Mm D D. Why? Why? Why? Why? Like that? So months, day year, you're at the full year and Onley he for the month. You write to numbers and for the day you right to numbers like that in that order. So what would this be if we were going to write it before we say it? Let's write it well and then would be 07 07 d d would be 15. And why? Why? Why would be 2017? Can we say 2017? Yes. So for years, if it's well, we'll talk about these years. But if it's in this century, the century were in. We say, For example, this one we say 17 4000. We also say 2017. 2017 2017. Now that's usually only for teens. Back when it was, for example, this most people would say 2005 instead of 2005 You could say 2005 but most people will say 51 6009. You don't have to put end in there either. You don't have to, okay, and we'll talk about then. This is well, and this so that it's comfortable to say years, even if it's a long time ago. Now this one would be August August. This is the abbreviation for August A. You G if we want to write it out and then even though we don't have the RD here, usually when we say it will imagine there's an R D here, so we'll say August 3rd, 17 73 17 73. So it's like saying 2017 17 73. Okay, we would not say 1773. No, we would not say usually 1773. Usually not. You could, you could, but usually not. We can say it here if it's an even one, but otherwise we don't. So, for example, this one would be D. C, which is the abbreviation of December, December This one, we imagine a little s t here because there's a 1 December 31st. And then for this we say we say, Let me make a little space down here we say 1919 118 117 116 100. If it's this, though, 1902 then we would say 1902 1902 we would use 00 to 1902 1903 1913. Okay, so December 31st 1900 August 3rd, 17 73 July 15th 2017 And again, if we were going to write this, how would we write it? In America, we would write an M 12 d d 31. Why? Why? Why? Why? 1901 900 Okay, that's how we'd write it. But because it's long ago in history, it will probably be written this way. Okay, probably will be written like that. If you read it in a book. It's probably written like this because it's something that happened a long time ago. We usually right today's date on a doctor's form or something like that will write that in this format or If we're feeling out a filling out a form, filling out a form or an application, perhaps an application online, then we use this format. Usually, and not every country is the same, and sometimes you will see it written in other ways you might see. Sometimes you might actually see the RD there you may. You may. Sometimes you'll see. 3 August 17 73 sometimes with no comma. It's there sometimes not in America. Usually you'll see D d M M y different countries air different, and there are a lot of different ways to do it. But I'm trying to give you a feeling for how it's typically typically done. For example, let's say the date is Let's say it's 10. 22 1993 Okay, so how would we say that? I want you to say that to yourself right now. Okay. If you said October 22nd 1993 you are correct. October 10. 22nd at a little end, either 1993 year. Right now. Sometimes dates don't quite fit into the very simple category of one day, but there's actually a range, a range of dates. How would we say that if we have a, we have a range of dates. That means it begins here and and could be all the way over here or anything in between. Well, what do you mean by that? Well, I'll give you an example of an American holiday called Thanksgiving. It's a harvest celebration. We're celebrating our thankfulness to our family members that we have them around and our friends. We eat a lot of food. It's it's anyway. It's an American celebration. It's the fourth Thursday in November. That's when it's held. So that's not always on the same day, is it? Sometimes that might be the 26th sometimes the 25th. So how can we say that? Well, we could say Thanksgiving is on the fourth Thursday in November. The abbreviation of November is, by the way, N O v. Energie, the fourth Thursday in November and usually falls falls. Yes, it's like it's sort of landed there and usually falls between the 26th and 28th of the months usually falls between the 26th and the 28th of the month what month? November November, Because I already said November, I shouldn't say November twice I can just say the month. So that's how you would say different years. That's how you say the months in the days on those years and how you often see them written . And that is how you describe a range when a certain date might be within a certain period of time. So I hope that's clear. Now let's move on and talk about symbols. We're going to talk about symbols next. 119. Technical Descriptions - Symbols: so far in this lesson on technical language, technical descriptions. We've talked about things in sequence and dates. Now we're going to focus on symbols, not every symbol that are billions of symbols. We're going to talk about the common symbols that you find on your keyboard, and we're not going to talk about everyone. But we're going to talk about the ones that you come across relatively often when we need to say them and when we don't need to say them. This is one of the more confusing things that I find a lot of English learners come across . Should I say this or not? Is this symbol here as just a mark to let me know or to organize something so that I kind of know what's going on? Or do I actually need to speak something here? How did I know? Well, we can go through some of these things, okay? I mean, obviously, you know, at the end of a sentence, you have this thing. It's called a period, and you don't say period. You don't say Mary had a cat named Bob, Period. Unless you're dictating nowadays, you can use your phone or your computer or whatever to speak. And many kinds of software at the moment require you to say, period when you want to end a sentence. So, yes, usually you don't need to. But recently you need two more often. I often use dictation with my phone, and I speak. And I say Mary had a cat, period. Her cat was yellow, period to it writes down a period when I want to. There are I guess what I'm trying to say is there are always some cases when you need to be able to actually say all of these otherwise useless. All right, this symbol called a percent Think you know it. 70% of people living in love a little. Okay, this is a percent symbol, percent symbol. And it is almost always actually said when written almost always, actually said when written, Sometimes you might see it just as a visual reference, but usually when you come across it, you should read it. Okay, Uh, we could say maybe a 0.2% interest rate. There will be some cases when you might see it in front of the number, but you should still say 0.2%. So one of the difficult things when you're reading out some technical language is you'll see symbols in different places. And what you say is actually not the order that you're reading it. In Esso, you're reading percent 0.2. Sometimes you're saying 0.2%. It's the same four, for example, the dollar sign. This is called a dollar sign, but I'm sure you already know that. So we don't really need to focus on it in this lesson. But you would see something like that. You don't say dollar five. You don't say dollar sign five, you say $5. So in many cases, for different symbols, you will have to read things out loud differently than your eyes actually see them. All right, let's go on to this one. This one can be called a number. Sign a hash or pound. When is it used for each of these? So the number sign is generally not spoken. Okay, if it's spoken, you would just say number. You won't say number. Sign of just say number. So if you see this written down somewhere, things in order, maybe you're calling out names number seven whose number seven is number seven here. Okay, so you would say just number seven. Number 553 maybe. I don't know. Maybe there's some sort of drawing, and there's a random number in a bucket and you take one out. Number 62. Where's number 60 to see here? Number 60 to say number. Okay. Generally, it's there to just reference the number, and we don't say this part. Okay? Hash, also called a hash. This started to become much more popular recently in the last, I don't know, maybe 10 years, because it's part of another word, which is hashtag on social media. That's a G on social media, Twitter Web or Facebook. Facebook, Facebook have hashtags, I think so. You see Hashtags to let you know what's going on with the post that's been that's been shared on your your home feet or whatever or what it's related to. You can search for other posts that have the same idea, or they're related to the same topic called hashtag. So when I'm recording this, instagram is quite popular. That, of course, always changes from year to year. But let's say there is a hash tag insta Instant. Good, I think, is the number one hashtag. I'm not even sure what it means to be honest with you or hash tag who I could make my own. If I write my name here, will you make Will you post things on instagram if it's still there? Hash tag look pretty. You say the word hashtag. Okay, so that's become much more popular recently. Pound is something that you hear on the phone. If you get an automated message on the phone, they'll say, Please press pound. Once you're finished with your recording or when you're finished with your recording, please press pound so you'll see that symbol on the phone and you push it. If you'd like to speak with an operator, please press pound. So you hear that often in a recorded message, so generally you won't need to say pound. You might often more often say hashtag and ah, sometimes you might need to say number but not number Sign. Now the next one is very common, and sometimes it said, sometimes it's not, said minus Sign is just like number sign. We don't say sign, but we do say minus and we'll talk more about it when we're talking about math problems. But we would say, for example, seven minus seven, seven, minus seven. Or sometimes we'll say I'll have tomatoes and onions minus cucumber, minus cucumber. That means please take away the cucumber. Now. Sometimes it's a dash. And if it's written in a number, not for an equation, not for a math problem but in a number like in an email address, for example, or maybe a user name, then you will say Dash, dash, dash. Okay, you actually should speak dash for phone numbers. Don't actually say it. The best way to think of it is if you need to take action on that and actually input it actually input input that then you should say it. For example, if you're typing out someone's user name to find them, then OK, say dash B A. B a dash B A B A. Whatever it is. OK, phone numbers not don't say dash, because if it's a phone number, it's just there to separate the numbers, and you don't actually put that into the phone. So don't say it. Okay? Hyphens are for words. For example, 32. We don't say 30 hyphen, too. But when we're talking about words, when we're talking about sentences, then we use hyphen. Is there a hyphen between 30 and two? Yes, there is. There's a hyphen between 30 and two. Okay. So we can use the word hyphen to describe this thing between words, but we don't actually speak the word hyphen when we're reading out a sentence. Never, Never, never. We only use the word hyphen to describe what that is. Between words. Okay, so minus sign for math minus to take something away. But we don't say sign Dash for things like email addresses, user names, but not phone numbers and hyphen. But we don't say it. It's just a name for what we see. If there's this symbol between words like this one Okay, I realize I've killed my S h here, so let me fix that. There we are. Sorry, sir. Okay. So let's talk about underscore. Underscore. We pretty much always say underscore when we see it. Sometimes it might be in a user name sometimes in an email address, but because you actually need to put it in to input it. And if you don't, it will be wrong. You'll find the wrong person than it has to be, said Steve Underscore Steve at blah, blah blah dot com. That is, maybe an email address. So we should say it. We should say it. The next one is parentheses. These always pretty much always go together. You don't see one alone. You don't see just this one or this one. So we pretty much always say parentheses. I will say the word parentheses first and then say the thing inside of it Now Sometimes we would just say Alex, co founder Alex, co founder. That's his role or his what he does in this company. Maybe this is at the end of an email. Alex, co founder. If if we want to make sure people know, maybe were on the phone that this is within parentheses, maybe it's in a sentence. You can say Alex Parentheses co founder Alex Parentheses, co founder. Okay, so that's when we would actually say parentheses. Or if we're going to describe it, you could say it's by the way. Co founder is in parentheses. Co founder is in parentheses. If it's a phone number, though, we don't say it. So if you see parentheses in a phone number. Never say it, because why not? Because when you're putting in the number, you don't actually put that in. You don't input it, so usually we don't need to say it because most of the time it's It's in that sort of situation. Often we don't need to actually say parentheses because it just tells us a little bit of extra information. So on Lee, if it's necessary to know that it is inside of parentheses, do we actually say it? And sometimes we can make the decision whether or not to say it based on whether or not we feel it's important for people to know who are listening, that it is inside parentheses. So quotes or quotation marks often tell us that something was said. And so when we're reading something out, we don't have to say quotation mark, because it is so we're just saying what that person said, she said. I can't I can't. But sometimes maybe if she said, isn't there, and I just want to say I can't and I want to make sure you know, that it's something someone that said, and I'm not saying it then I have to say, by the way, that's in quotes. That's in quotes. That's in quotation marks usually will say quotes. So, by the way, I can't is not what I'm saying. It's in quotes so we won't actually say Quotation Mark. I can't quotation Mark no, we'll say I can't That's in quotes or quote. I can't quote. I can't So we'll say Either quote, I can't or that's in quotation marks or that's in quotations or that's in quotes. This one, as I mentioned, is air quotes. If someone is looking at you, she said, I can't I can't. I'm telling you that I'm not saying my own words. I'm saying someone else's words, and it's a way to sort of mark that. Forward slash and back slash almost always said, because usually it's in a U R l Most of the time when you see these in the u. R. L. You need to be able to type that in when you're when you're putting in the u R L. So we'll say forward slash backslash. Sometimes it's just set as slash if it's in a sentence, for example, and there are two options. For example, you could have banana or apple, and it's telling you that you can choose. It's a banana slash apple banana slash apple. Okay, or sometimes you could say banana or apple, banana or apple because you could say war there where you could say slash there if it's in a URL, it's very, very important to make sure to say this one or this one, because forward slash goes this way and back slash goes that way. So it's very important to say which one you're talking about. Comma is pretty much never said It's on, Lee said. To describe what this thing is. This thing is called a comma. This is a comma. If you're doing dictation like I mentioned before, then you might actually say Comma. I said, Comma the other the other Okay, but most of the time you did not need to actually say it when you read it. 99.99% unless you're dictating. What about Colon? What about Colon? If you remember in our email class, we used a colon to create a list. It's called a colon colon. We used it to create 123 things or two things I think it was that needed to be done. A request. So we'll often say Please do the following. Then we'll write a colon. Then we'll say 12 and three. So usually you do not need to say colon colon unless you're describing something like what you're doing. And then I wrote Colon 123 But if you're actually just reading, for example, the email that we read inthe e class about writing emails, you do not need to say colon. So this is very similar to comma and in fact, semi colon is the same way. Most of the time. You do not need to read out semi colon unless you're describing what you're doing. You need a semi colon here. I think if you put a semi colon there, then the whole sentence will make more sense. We have a good idea. So you need to know these things like commas, Coghlan's periods to help other people, maybe with their grammar with their sentences. Otherwise you don't need to actually say them. An asterisk is usually used to reference or mention something below. Maybe this is beside a name or a ah statement about a product on a box and then at the bottom. You need to read more details about that. So if you see an asterisk, you don't need to say Asterisk, you just look at the bottom of the box. So in that way, it's kind of similar to these where you really only need to say it if you're talking about that thing, or you really need to say, Oh, there's an asterisk there I wonder what it says at the bottom of the page or at the bottom of the box Star, then is used on a phone. If it's on a phone, it's called a star. If it's on a page, a product of box, it's called an asterisk. Okay, sometimes you'll need to say You need to press star. You need to press star, Usually not. Not many things require you to push the Starkey, but sometimes right sometimes on a computer keyboard, it's an asterisk on a phone. It's a star. That's a simple way to remember it. All right, Well, how about this one? The old classic period that we talked about at the beginning of our symbols discussion? Well, it's called a dot It's called a period and it's called a point, just like comma colon, semi colon and asterisk. We typically don't need to and also, uh, hyphen. We typically don't need to say this when we read it, period. But as I mentioned earlier, if you're dictating, you do. Or if you're making a clear point about something and you want to focus on the fact that there's no way around it, I'm going tomorrow. I don't care if it rains. I don't care if you say no, I an going period the meaning of that period. If I say it is, there's no other option. There's no alternative. I am very, very clear about my opinion, and nobody can tell me not to. Nothing can stop me usually, so it's very certain this is the end period. It's usually very serious. Okay DOT would be for things like email addresses, so we can consider this one more like email or a U r L website. We always say dot com and appoint for a number. So, for example, 0.3 or 6.2 or 7.1. So point for numbers period for sentences and dot for girls, e mails and things like that. Hopefully you're clear on these symbols. There are lots of others, certainly. But at least you should have an idea about when you can use thes when you should say them when you shouldn't say that. And when they're just meant to describe that thing. And you only use it when you're talking about for example. Ah, hyphen. You need a hyphen there, I think. Really? Yes. You need a hyphen there. Okay. At a hyphen. Now let's go on and actually look at a real example. 120. Technical Descriptions - Symbols Example: Let's actually look at an example real life example so that we can put into practice actually use some of the things we've been talking about so far in this lesson about technical descriptions. We're going to look at a notice. Pay attention to how we mention dates. Also pay attention to how we mention symbols and when symbols are not read. I'm going to read through this. Then we'll just quickly talk about why certain things are said and why certain things are not said. All right, so let's read through this. If you can do it in your head just before I do it, that's great. From March 14th 2 April 18th 2013 Cafe Kael dot com will be under maintenance. We apologize for any inconvenience caused. Those with questions Can email Miss Alice Munro at k l underscore. Be dot t R I X. Dash 439 at yahoo dot com dot CN or call the store at 141975 to 7383 Please visit one of our two locations during the following store hours Monday to Friday. 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday and Sunday 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. OK, now let's look at this. I want to mention one thing. I didn't say this because this is only here because my computer is putting the rest of this email on the next line. Actually, if this were on one line, that wouldn't be there. So I didn't say Dash there because it's not a really it's not a real dash. It's something my computer, my computer did. All right, Now let's start with the date. So I said, notice that this is not Mm. Okay, So sometimes dates are written just as the month instead of 03 just written as three. But I added words I said from Okay from March 14th. Well, why didn't I say from March 14th 2013? The reason is because I'm saying it the second time, so I'm not going to say this time from March 14th 2 April 18th 2013. I could say 2013 but I am adding th to the 18 and th to the 14 cafe Kael dot com. I'm saying dot here, because it is a u r L K U R l will be under maintenance. That means it's being fixed. We apologize for any inconvenience caused again. This this one here is just to basically say, Hey, we move this to the next line so we definitely don't need to read those. Okay, Those with questions can email. Miss is an abbreviation, Alice Munro. At now, we need to say everything here, every symbol, because you have to actually put this in. K l underscore, be dot t r i X. The reason I didn't say tricks is because tricks can also be spelled as t r i c k s. So I'm going to say t r I X dash 439 t r i X dash for 39 at yahoo dot com dot CNN's We say everything here, this is going to be dash instead of hyphen because it's in an email address. Okay, now, what about this one? Why did I say at here? Well, sometimes we used this symbol, right? This is at at this is the at symbol. I think you know that. That's very basic. But because a phone number is after this, we can say at here we don't usually do that. Usually a colon will not be said is at it will just be a list. For example, like this one. We don't say anything here, but here it's a special case. We have a phone number after it, so we can say at if you don't say it or call the store 1419 Okay, notice in the phone number, we don't say parentheses. We don't say hyphen or dash because we don't put that in the phone. And we don't say this during the following store hours. Notice that I added from Monday to Friday, I could say between Monday and Friday from Monday to Friday. Okay, here I'll say from from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. But I'm not really saying from because of the colon, I'm saying beginning here, too, this time from 8 a.m. To 10 p.m. I don't say this. Don't say that. OK, then I say Saturday and Sunday, not from Saturday to Sunday, but just Saturday and Sunday. I could, I suppose, but usually because this is only two days, I'll use and to make it simpler Saturday and Sunday from 10 AM to six PM, or between 10 AM and 6 p.m. So hopefully that gives you a better feeling about how some of these symbols and how dates can actually be used in real life situations, like a notice on a website. Okay, there are lots of other examples, but hopefully you have ah, better feeling about thes. And when you're looking around on the Internet or you see this kind of thing, notice and phone numbers, email addresses this pay attention to how the symbols are used and try to keep in mind some of the things that we've talked about with regards to how to use those when to say them and when not to say them. OK, now let's go on and talk about numbers. 121. Technical Descriptions - Pure Numbers: in this lesson. We've talked about order things in sequence. We've talked about dates. We've talked about symbols. Now let's talk about numbers. Now I know this lesson might be not as interesting, a little little boring compared to the other lessons, but it's very important. Basic stuff. Let's go through basically, how we can say numbers. We'll move pretty quickly so that it's not too hopefully not too dry. One very, very important thing to remember when it comes to numbers is all you have to do. To say numbers clearly is group them in threes, not including this the decimal, but to group them in threes and within each group of three between commas, you just say the number. So this would be, I think you can probably guess, 107. This would be 349. And the best way to know how to say a very big number is to count commas. That's really all you have to do. You need to know how to say the number between zero and 999 okay? And you need to know how to count commas, and you need to know what each of these Comus means or what each of them represents. This is 1000. The first comma is 1000. The 2nd 1 is 1,000,000. The 3rd 1 is 1,000,000,000. And if you really want to know, the next one is trillion. But you don't often need to say that. OK, so 2,000,000,000. If there are three comments, you're going to say 1,000,000,000 then 1,000,010,000. If there are two comments, you're going to say 1,000,000 then 1000. If there is only one comma, then you're just going to say 1000. Okay, that's all you need to know. If there are no comments, then you don't need to say any of them. And you just say either 100 or if it doesn't have 100 then we don't even need to talk about that because you already know. Okay, count commas. The other thing you need to know is this You do not need to add, and between every number, that makes it much more complicated. You don't need to do that. You usually only need to use. And if there's a zero in front of the last number in front of the very end of the number That's the only time you usually need to use. And OK, so for example, this might be 107. You don't have to say end, but you could say 107 107. This might be 1000 and seven. Fact. You should probably say 1000 and seven. If you say 1007 it's OK, it's OK. But that's when you would usually use and otherwise don't do it. It just makes it harder, and you have more to think about. Okay, The last thing that you need to know is after this shall we say dot Point period after this 0.0.0 p o i n t and we say point point after that, just say the number. You don't need to think about hundreds, thousands, millions or anything. Just say the number directly. So let's go through these. Okay, this 1 107 107 This 1 171 170 next 1 1000 and 7 1000 and seven. Okay. 1000, 71,000 70. You can say 1000 and 70 if you want to, but you don't have to. Okay? this. 1 1700 1700 1701 1701 Okay, let's get a little bigger. 17,000 because there's one comma 17,587 I don't need to use and at all. Then we can save more quickly. 17,587 17,587. You have to be able to say numbers very quickly. 17,587. 17,587 should be very natural. Very easy, immediate. Okay, numbers air getting bigger, but it doesn't get harder. Okay. 107,107 0.107701 Easy. 107701 Can we say 107? 701? Yeah, that's OK. You can say that 107701 No problem. OK, now we have 1233 commas. So that means we need to say 1,000,000,000 million and 1000. Okay, so let's try this. Very easy. One billion 171 1,000,001 170,701 0.13 Very easy. 172,000,170,701 0.13 Very simple. Okay, last one. Wow, it looks so long. So scary. But it's actually not. It's actually not. I realized that I've killed all the comments, but I can read it without, and I think you can, too. All right. 349,230,467,304 0.765 349,230,467,304 0.765 Practice that until it's really easy, go online. Just read an article and find some numbers, big numbers, small numbers and just practice saying them again and again. Follow the simple rules that we just talked about. Remember how many commas you see is the words that you need to say this this or this. Remember that after the decimal, you don't need to think about hundreds or thousands and remember that usually we don't use . And unless there's a zero in front of the last number, and if you remember those things, you don't need to know anything else. The most important thing is that you get fast at this. When it comes to numbers, you shouldn't have to think for a long time about just how to say the number it should be. Automatic should come out of your mouth completely naturally, all right, so hopefully that's relatively easy. Practice it until it's really smooth and you can speak at, say, numbers without thinking. Now we're going to quickly go on and talk about math. 122. Technical Descriptions - Math: All right, So we're getting close to the end of our lesson on technical descriptions. Technical English. We're going to quickly talk about math or math equations. Sometimes they're called equations. Sometimes they're called problems math problems. And we sometimes need to actually speak these out. So let's just quickly go through this. Well, if we're doing this one we're doing addition, if we're doing this one, we're doing subtraction. If we're doing this one, we're doing division. And if we're doing this when we're doing multiplication, we are multiplying. If we're going to make these into verbs, we're going to add seven and seven. We're going to subtract, add the verb, going to divide, we're going to multiply, and these words thes verbs. Divide, multiply, subtract and add. These words are very common outside of math equations. So if you know these these words, then you'll start to notice them spoken in lots of other situations. Well, we should. We should work hard so that we can multiply our success. We need to divide. We need to divide the land, divide the area. Whatever. Okay. Could you please subtract my salary? Could you please subtract my salary? I'd like you to add cucumbers. I'd like you to add cucumbers or extra cheese, so these verbs are very, very common outside of math equations. Okay, Just to be very clear when we're actually saying these math problems, though, we use the propositions. So let's do it. Seven plus seven equals or is so sometimes we say equals. And sometimes we say, is an Either one is okay. Seven plus seven is 14 7 plus seven equals 14. Okay, seven minus seven equals +07 minus seven is zero seven, divided by seven. Divided by seven is 17 Divided by seven is one equals 12 divided by same same thing, different symbol divided by its a forward slash. Here it's ah, special division symbol here. Two divided by four equals 0.5 equals 0.5. Okay, seven times seven times seven is 49 7 times seven is 49. So we just need to be careful in knowing what we're doing. Okay? These air less common what we can say if it's a verb which are very common words outside of math and what we should say for actually saying the math problem, saying the equation plus minus, divided by and times. Once you know those words, though, it's pretty easy and pretty simple. And there's really nothing else to know. Of course, if you get deeper into math, there are lots more words and lots more things to describe. But these are the basics, and the most common words probably are these. Add, subtract, divide. Multiply these air, the most common out there in the English language. 123. Technical Descriptions - Abbreviations: So we've talked about the most important stuff within this. This lesson about numbers and dates, about symbols, thes air, the things you see most often. But I feel like because this is the class on technical description and we're trying to get through this stuff, which is what many people would say a little less interesting. It's important to make sure that you're clear on one point about the difference between abbreviations and acronyms. What's an abbreviation? An abbreviation is when you have one word that is shortened. One example would be S T, which is the abbreviation of the word street. One word shortened one. You probably know D. R is the abbreviation of the word doctor, or sometimes drive. Sometimes pH El is the abbreviation of philosophy. E. T. C is the abbreviation of the word etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. People say both etcetera, etcetera. Now notice that when we write abbreviations, we usually have this period at the end to market. But sometimes it becomes so common that it's basically the only thing we say, and we often get rid of that. If that's the case, example this one, we often just say now, an app and we don't even write the period anymore. This is short for application because it's so commonly said as app now instead of application, we often just get rid of that period and say app, And now we say things like Apse, What do you do for a living? Oh, I build APS. I build APS. Okay, so that's very common. And because it's so common, we get rid of the period. Now what about an acronym? Acronym is a way to shorten things, but each letter is capital capitalized, and each letter stands for or represents its own word, for example, and be a or BBC or a T M. A. T M, for example, stands for automatic teller machine. One mistake people often make is that they'll say I need to go to the A T M machine. What people should say is, I need to go to the A. Tm not. I need to go to the A T m machine because if you're saying that you're saying automatic teller machine machine. I've made that mistake before as well, but it's it's something that you hear quite often. So each first letter is used in the word and Some of them are really long, like scuba. If you hear people say I'm going to go scuba diving, that's a common word means you're going to go underwater and breathe underwater. But because each letter is kind of a long thing, it's much easier just to say scuba scuba gear, scuba diving, right, great scuba spot or location for scuba diving. Okay, so that's the difference between acronyms and abbreviations. Since we've talked about abbreviations, we should just very quickly go over addresses because you do see addresses from time to time so you'll typically have the street first and then the building and then sometimes another part of the location. And we might then under that have the state and what's called the zip code of the city, the state in the zip code. Or, if it's in Canada, the province city, the province and the zip coat ZIP code tells you where in the world or where in the country it is. It's a number. Okay, so 200 bay s t means street, 200 Bay Street. Sweet, sweet. It's kind of like room 180 sometimes 1 80 instead of 180. Royal court. C t s c o U R t. OK, but this is how we would read that 200 Bay Street, Suite 1 80 Royal Court. Pretty simple. This one apartment to building 18 apartment to building a P T is apartment bldg. B L G D is building and sometimes things air abbreviated differently in different places. So, for example, in England and America, things might be abbreviated a little differently. So apartment to building 18 5899 So if it's an address, you don't need to say 5899 No. Five. Just say the numbers if it's an address. 5899 Callister Boulevard A boulevard is a big road boulevard. Okay, Callister Boulevard, Des Moines, Duh Moines. This is pronounced Des Moines. I know it looks like desk Moin is, but it's pronounced duh and then Moyad. Des Moines, Des Moines, Iowa. So in America, states always have two letters. It's a kind of a it's a special abbreviation. It's a special sort of code. For example, I come from Ohio, and that one is O. H. New York is N Why, Okay, So Iowa is I A Des Moines, Iowa. They're all different. There are 50. Okay, then you have the ZIP code. Des Moines, Iowa. 78554 So you also read this one just like the street. You don't say 78,554. Just say the number. So that's how you would read addresses. And that's how you would include the abbreviations. Notice for the abbreviations. We say the whole thing, usually for APS. We don't because it's so common to shorten it for acronyms. We don't because that's the reason we make the acronym because it's shorter. But for most abbreviations, we'll say the whole word. All right, so we've covered a lot in this lesson. We've covered how to say dates. We've covered how to talk about addresses, abbreviations, acronyms, numbers, symbols, things in order. We talked about a lot of things, including math problems. A lot in this lesson, and the best way to really practice it is to look out for it. And when you see it, the things that we went over in this lesson, whether it's a long number or a website, URL or email address or the address of someplace or an abbreviation anything related to what we talked about, a symbol that's used. Speak it out loud to say it out loud. That's the best way for you to get used to saying it. One of the problems with these is not that they're hard, but it's that it's hard to do it quickly. And when we say these things things that are related to technical descriptions, it's tough to say it quickly. It's tough to get it out, so you have to do it a lot, and the best way to do it is just to practice. Next time you type in it, you are l quickly say it out loud. Okay, that's the best way to actually get the feeling for it. The best way to get comfortable with it. Good luck. See you in the next lesson. 124. Expressions in Common Situations - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about technical language. We talked about dates. We talked about numbers. We talked about math problems, addresses. In this lesson, we're going to focus on common situations that we need to deal with in daily life and expressions we can use to handle those situations. So I want to be clear from the start. The expressions that we use can be used often in many different situations, but we're going to learn them in the context, off everyday situations that you will probably come across on a regular basis. OK, so let's get started. I'm going to introduce thesis situations. And then I went to introduce the expressions that could be used in those situations, and they will talk about maybe some other ways that those expressions can be used. So let's begin 125. Expressions in Common Situations - Expressions for Control: So the first situation we're going to look at is addiction addiction. Somebody is doing something too much. Well, if you have a good friend who's doing something too much, you might want to help them. You may need to mention to your friend that there, Hey, there is a problem. Maybe this is not healthy for you. Well, let's focus on video games. Not to say that video games are bad. I like video games. But sometimes people can get addicted, addicted to video games. And if they get addicted to video games, well, what happens? Maybe other things in that person's life may be out of balance, right? So you think your friend is spending too much time playing video games? How can you bring up invention the topic and make it softer? This means we don't want to be to direct, because if we're to direct and we say something like, Hey, friend, you have a problem. What do people do when you say that to them? What they become defensive? They might say, No, I don't. I don't talk about her and not want to talk to you. If you criticize people to directly, usually they become defensive and they don't want to listen to what you're saying. So how can we say that we can bring up the topic of Hey, you have this problem without being too straight? How can we do that? Well, there's one very common expression that we can use to express the idea of addiction, and we can use it for many other situations to and that is, that is out of hand. Now, out of hand is sort of like saying, out of control, not in control, and we'll talk about other situations in which we can use it. But let's just focus on this situation first. Okay, let's let's say it like this. Hey, Tom, can I Can I talk to you for a second? Um, yeah, what's up? So we might say, Listen, listen. It's a way to begin a serious topic. I think I think your gaming habit is getting a bit. Remember, we use a bit when we want to make things softer, right? So it's always useful a bit out off hand, and this is the expression that we're learning how to use Now. That's a big difference between saying you have a problem and I think your gaming habit is getting a bit out of hand. This is so soft that Tom is likely to be more receptive and listen to what you're saying. Do you think so? Yeah, I know, but I can't stop. Well, then we can talk about solutions. So a bit out of hand, I do want to get into using out of hand inm or situations how else it could be used. But very quickly, we could also say, I think your gaming habit is getting a bit out of hand and we could add, and you really need to draw the line somewhere. Okay, so this one to draw the line somewhere is to create a limit. Any time you want to talk about giving yourself a limit or giving others a limit, we might say, Draw the line. I'm going to draw the line with you. You can only watch TV for an hour a day. Maybe a mother will say that to her son. I'm really going to have to draw the line. Well, you could say it for yourself, and you really need to draw the line somewhere. That means you need to create a limit for yourself about how much you're going to play right an hour a day, two hours a day and then stop. Draw the line somewhere. All right, let's go back to out of hand and other places where we can use it to express, Ah, situation that is no longer in control. Have you ever seen on the news crowd of people we could say, even a mob of people smashing windows in the streets and flipping over cars? Sometimes it's after Ah, sports match or some other reason doesn't matter. Well, in this case, maybe the police no longer have control over the situation. Maybe they did. They had control, they had control. And then it reached a point where the police no longer have control. So we can say the mob, the mob. The mob started to get out of hand out of hand so you can use it for yourself. Your habits, what you do if you do something too much when you lose control of that thing. But it can also be used to describe something out there in the world with people and, for example, maybe the police have control or should have control, but now they don't and so it's out of hand. It's out of hand, Okay, so it's very, very useful and it could be used in all kinds of situations. Let's go on and look at another situation and another very useful expression we can use in that situation. 126. Expressions in Common Situations - Coffee Shop Expressions: This is a situation that happens to me quite often because I like to go to coffee shops to work. Okay, so I go to the coffee shop and I'm working on my computer, and then I need to go to the bathroom. But if I take my computer with me to the bathroom that I might lose my seat, Maybe I have a very good seat. Well, that's not good. But if I leave my computer, we'll then maybe it will be stolen. It will be stolen. I don't want that to happen. Actually. Recently, I had a bicycle stolen. So it's not fun to have your stuff stolen. Okay, so you look over there and there's a person and they have a computer. So you think they must be pretty reliable, reliable, and they're probably not going to steal your computer. You would like them to watch. Look at not all the time. Not like staring, but pay attention to your computer while you go to the bathroom. Okay. You're gonna ask them to do that? This is a common thing to do in America. Very common. And then you can come back and then you can have your seat back now. It is, uh, something that we do that requires trust a little bit because you don't know that person, but they seem fairly reliable. Your judgment, it's your judgment that they seem reliable. So you're at a coffee shop and you need to go to the bathroom. But your computer is on the table. You see a stranger sitting nearby and they seem fairly reliable. What can you say? OK, now we're going to use a very common expression to go up to this person, gonna put it in the situation. So I walk up to that person and I say, Excuse me Now I could add here. Sorry to bother you. Sorry. Sorry to bother you. Sorry to bother you. You could take this out. You could take this up. You could say just sorry to bother you. You could say hi there. Sorry to bother you there. A lot of different ways that you could begin. Excuse me, is a very common thing to say in general to a stranger when you want to say something to them. Okay. Excuse me. It's a great way to if you need to talk to somebody. You don't know to begin that whatever it is you need to say, Excuse me. Sorry to bother you. Could you could you know, here's the expression keep and I on my computer while I go to the bathroom and you could add, Then I'll be back in a minute. Back means you'll return. I'll be back in a minute. I'll be right back. Or I'll we could say also ill. I'll just be, Ah, minute, I'll just be a minute. I'll just be a minute. So this is very common thing to say in this situation. There are other things you could say, but keep an eye on is the is the useful expression here. Excuse me. Sorry to bother you. Could you keep an eye on my computer? Well, I go to the bathroom. I'll just be a minute. I'll just be a minute. Or would you mind? Would you mind keeping if you use Would you mind? Then we can say keeping, but it's the same expression. Would you mind keeping an eye on my computer while I go to the bathroom? I'll be back in a minute. I'll be back in a couple of minutes and they'll probably say. Yeah. Sure. Yeah, sure, sure. No problem. All right. Okay, fine. That's OK then. When you come back, you have to because your computer is over there. Don't do nothing. You have to do something that sort of polite. It's unspoken rule. When you come back, you look at them. If they're far enough away, you don't have to actually shout across the coffee shop. Thanks like that. You can just say thank you like that and whisper it to yourself, wave like that and say, Then you have acknowledged that they did something for you. You don't need to go over to them and say thank you very much for helping me. Here's my business card. I see a little too much because it's a very simple common thing. Okay, with this expression, keep an eye on can be used in lots of other ways. Now, if I'm watching the computer, does it really mean that that person has one eye on their computer and one eye on my computer? No, doesn't mean that what it means is they're paying attention to it. They're not looking at it. Every moment that I'm gone, they're just paying attention. so we can use it to mean to pay attention to something, or to care about the condition of something so we could use. Keep an eye on, for example, for Children for a week, maybe. For example, I'm going on vacation. I have a young child, and I asked my my mother, Do you think you could keep an eye on Joseph for the week while we're in vacation? Could you keep an eye on him? Well, that means, could you could you let him come over and live with you and take care of him? But keep an eye on means to care about that thing or pay attention to it. We could also use it, for example, of price. You know, prices go up and down for things and maybe we want to buy something. But we're waiting for that thing to be cheap enough. Price is too high right now. Waiting for it to go down. I'm keeping an eye on the price of the latest iPhone. When it gets low enough, I'm gonna buy it. I'll buy it. I'm going to get it. I'm going to get it. Keeping an eye on the price. The prices and not not exactly a really thing is it goes up and down. So that's the thing I'm paying attention to. Okay, there's a really useful expression, and it could be used in all kinds of different situations for physical things and non physical things nonphysical things. I'm keeping my eye on you. That one's a little critical. Keeping my eye on you. That means I may be expected to do something bad. That's okay, too. You can use it in that situation as well. 127. Expressions in Common Situations - Expressions for Availability: so far in this lesson on expressions in common situations we've talked about keep an eye on and out of hand. Now we're going to look at another situation, moving to another place. Okay, so you're moving to another city and you don't need a lot of stuff in your house that you have now the one you're living in now. So you've decided to give it away your stuff to whoever asks for it first. So if you move to a new house, you buy a new house. Sometimes your old stuff, you want to get new stuff, so you want to leave it behind. Maybe the sofa, the pots and pans, pots and pans, or what? You used to cook this stuff you don't want to take to the new house. You want to get brand new stuff, but it's still useful. Maybe somebody wants it. Maybe you'd like to give it away for free to your friends. Know that's possible. Okay, so that's the situation. What expression can we use to get it across to announce it to our friends? Let's say I'm going to make a post on social media. That's the best way to let a lot of people know something, right? Maybe its Facebook. Maybe it's instagram. Maybe it's whatever you use. Maybe it's we chat. Maybe it's line. I don't know. Whatever you use, whatever you use, you're going to post make a post. You could say this to a person, Sure, but it's better if it's said to a whole group of people. All your friends. All right, So my sofa, my sofa. You could say my sofa at the old place at the or my old place is now the expression up four grabs if anybody needs it. Or we could say once it my sofa is up for grabs. Hopes I wrote easier. My bad if if anybody needs it if anybody wants it. Okay, what does that mean? Well, it's sort of like they're all my friends over there and I throw my sofa to them. I throw myself out. I don't want it. Anybody want it? Whoever reaches up and grabs it and takes it there The one who gets my sofa. Okay, grab. Remember, we learned Grab before, grab means to get to take like that. But saying that you want it is kind of the same is reaching out and doing that and grabbing it with your hand. It's kind of the same. So we use up for grabs when something is available to anyone to take. Could be a sofa could be physically grabbing something. It could also be, for example, for a position. So this one is. Somebody's going to say, I, me, me, me, me, me. I want it. I want the self up. Meet me, meet me, meet someone might say dibs, dibs, dibs on the sofa. Dibs on the sofa. Dibs. That means, I claim that, said informal expression. I claim that sofa, that's my sofa. The first person. Okay, you got it because it's up for grabs. But we can use this expression up for grabs. For example, in maybe a political race, two people running for the presidency, they want to get it. It's up for grabs. We don't know who is going to win. Often, we describe situations as up for grabs when we have no idea who's going to win. So, for example, there are two teams playing in a championship, a final right, maybe its World Cup or whatever, and they're equally matched. We really don't know if this team is going to win or this team. If it's not equal and this team is way better than this team, then we probably won't say it. But if it's pretty much equal, will say, I don't know who is going to win this year. It's really up for grabs. It's really up for grabs, so that's how it's used. That's how it's used. And dibs is used to claim things in a kind of informal way. People will just say dibs, dibs or dibs on that dibs on that very common expression up for grabs. 128. Expressions in Common Situations - Expressions for Colleagues: Okay, So let's continue and look at another situation and another common phrase we can use to express ourselves in that situation. So have you ever experienced a coworker? Another person may be getting fired, and then another person, your colleague said something negative or insulting about them. And you don't like that Actually can work for a situation where anybody says something and you don't like that. They said it and you think it's not appropriate that they said it. You think it's wrong that they said it. You want to express that? You think that well, don't say Don't say that. I suppose you could, but there's a better way. Okay, so your co worker just got fired and another co worker makes an insulting comment about them. The person who got fired like they were useless anyway. Well, that's not nice. That's mean as mean. That's cruel. Hey, that's what we can use to express our emotion are sort of surprise or shock. Hey, that's a bit uncalled for. Uncalled for. Uncalled for. Nobody's perfect Nobody. Nobody is perfect. So when something happens or something is said and the thing that happens with the thing that is said is may be rude, Inappropriate, not the right thing in this situation, just not good. And you want to declare it Use uncalled for could be in action. For example. You're watching a sports game and one player just punches another player. You could say Whoa Oh, that was uncalled for. He shouldn't have done that. That was not necessary. Basically, the meaning of this is not necessary. Not necessary. Unneeded. Okay, you don't need to say something negative about the co worker who just left, right? I mean, they just got fired. That probably having a terrible day. Why do you need to say something negative about them? That's really uncalled for. That's really uncalled for. But at the same time, it's polite. If I say that to my co worker, who said the negative thing, the insulting thing and that's pretty uncalled for. I'm being kind of polite but still mentioning that I'm not OK with the comment. Then maybe my coworker will say, Yeah, yeah, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that. I shouldn't I shouldn't have said that I shouldn't have said it. Maybe they apologize. Whatever, but uncalled for is the expression I use to bring up the fact that it's not OK. It's really common for actions for things that are said. One more example of uncalled for might be the company's cos decision to ban Ban means you're not allowed to do that. To ban shorts is uncalled for. Maybe we work in a company that's pretty informal generally, and a lot of people wear shorts when they come into work. Okay, but the company has decided, no, they will not allow shorts. But I don't like that. My opinion, That's not okay. So I'll say, Hey, this decision to ban shorts is uncalled for, unnecessary, unnecessary. So that's how we use it. A similar expression to this that we can use in the coworker situation is like, This is that Is that really necessary that really necessary? So we can actually say, Is that necessary to express our feelings? It's the same meaning the same meaning. Okay, when you're doing this, what you're doing is you're sticking up for that person. To defend someone, usually in words, is to stick up for them. If somebody says something bad about your family member, what will you do? You'll say Hey, that's uncalled for is my my brother you're talking about. What am I doing? I'm sticking up for my family. Well, maybe I'm sticking up for this person who got fired. They're not even here. But I'm still sticking up for them because the comment was made behind their back. They weren't there. They can't defend themselves. They didn't hear it. The comment was made behind their back. So I want to stick up for them. So whenever you defend someone with your words, usually you're sticking up for them. You're saying Hey, No, not okay. I protect the people behind me. That's the idea anyway. Very common expression. Both this one and uncalled for. 129. Expressions in Common Situations - Money Expressions: so far in this lesson, we've been focusing on one expression for each situation in this one. In this situation, I want to share a couple because there are a couple different ones that are really relevant to this situation and can be used in other places as well. Okay, So you're relying on your parents for money. That means you don't have your own money. Maybe you don't have a job. You can't find a decent job to support yourself. Support yourself means you can buy your own food. You can pay your own rent. Could buy your own clothes. This is what it means to support yourself. Okay. Well, very simply, if you want to express that, you don't have money. We often just say that I'm broke. I'm totally broke. B R o k E broke. Hey, do you want to go get a drink now? I can't. Why not? I'm broke. I have no money. Oh, I'll lend you $20. No, no, that's okay. I don't want to borrow any money. I'm broke or just stay home. Okay? So being broke is not fun. Having no money is not fun. But it's a common expression and sometimes people add if it's really bad situation flat. F L A T flat broke after my vacation to Japan. I was flat broke. I had to save up for two years before I could take another trip. I was flat broke, okay. Could be used in a lot of different cases where you want to say that you don't have any money left right now when we're in this situation where you rely on your parents, at least in America. I know in some countries, relying on your parents and getting money from your parents is fine is not an issue. Well, in America it is. I read a news story about a man who was 30 years old and hadn't moved out of his parents home and was sued by his parents for not leaving. So this is kind of American culture. You've gotta get out and support yourself as soon as possible, maybe even as young as 18 years old. Really? Really? Yes, yes, it's kind of American culture. So if you find yourself in the situation where you can't support yourself in American culture, at least you might feel like a failure. You won't feel good. Maybe you were doing okay before and then you lost all your money. Not happy. Okay, so you can say I've really hit rock bottom. I've really hit rock bottom. I can't go lower. Imagine falling down into the ocean. You reached the bottom of the ocean. You can't go any deeper So you've hit rock bottom there as far down as you can go And it's not a happy thing now. Doesn't have to only be for money. So broke is only about Onley about money but hitting rock bottom ISMM or an emotional thing . A thing related to your life and the situation of your life. So you could emotionally be completely unhappy because everything went wrong. Maybe you have lots of money. You can still say I hit rock bottom. I've completely hit rock bottom because for whatever reason, you're extremely depressed. You're extremely sad and you feel like there's no lower that you can go. OK, so just to be clear that this one broke is for money. Rock bottom is not so Maybe there's a man who lost his lost his job, still has money, but lost his job. Then his girlfriend broke up with him, and he still has his own apartment. But hey, just feels like he doesn't know what to do with his life. He has money. But he might say, I just feel like hit rock bottom and I don't know what to do with myself. That would be a common thing. Someone in that situation might say it's emotional, negative, negative. So, as a response to that friend might say, Well, you hit rock bottom, it's It's all uphill from here. That means it can't get any worse. And that's something that people will say to Well, it can't get any worse. Look at the bright side. It can't get any worse. It's all uphill from here. If it's really rock bottom. Okay, that would be really optimistic. That's looking at the bright side. Looking at the bright side of something means you're looking at the good point that's there , even if it's very small. And if it is very small. If there's a very tiny positive thing about a very bad situation, we often call that the Silver Hoops S I L ve are lining lining a silver lining Is that if it can't get worse if you've really hit rock bottom. Then all you have to do is pick yourself up, go out there and get a new job. Got a new girlfriend. It's all uphill from here. It's going to get better. That's the silver lining. That's the silver lining. Yeah, maybe you're right. Thanks. You made me feel better. You made me feel better. Okay, So these air, the expressions that we can use in negative situations on these to the bright side and silver lining are positive aspect of the negative situation, the good points of the bad situation and the bad feeling. I'd like to stick with this situation for one mawr expression because I think we need to focus a little bit more on money we talked about being broke. Means you have no money left. But there's a more general one that can be used to talk about a bad financial situation because saying I'm broke is a little strong, and some people might not be willing to express something that directly so we could say here it was. It was really difficult to make ends meet, so I had to move back home. So maybe I was living alone. I was living in my own apartment. I was doing OK, but things got worse. Maybe my financial situation, my financial or money situation was not great. So I was having trouble making ends meet. That might mean I have some money, but I can't pay all my bills. I have some money, but I can't completely support myself. So I had to move back in with my parents. Couldn't make ends meet. Another common expression. This one is on Lee only for money. This one is used to talk about being able to afford whatever lifestyle you have. Okay, if you can make ends meet, then maybe you don't need to move in with your parents. But if you cannot make ends meet, you may need to move in with your parents. And in American culture, that's generally not a good thing. People might judge you negatively, although in lots of other places in the world, it's fine. It's fine. It's interesting how different cultures are different and judge things differently. I told some of my friends in in China the story about the man who, um, who was sued by his parents for living at home too long and they couldn't believe that it was really because, generally speaking, in China, if you live with your parents, that's a good thing, because it means you're willing to take care of them. And generally, parents are very happy to have their kids living with them, even if they're 30 maybe maybe even older. Now that's, of course, changing a little bit in the modern modern era. But it's still quite different Americans they generally focus on. Being very independent is a good word to use independent. All right, let's go on and look at another situation and learn another useful expression. 130. Expressions in Common Situations - Expressions for Choice: Now, here's a very common situation that you may come across. You want to do something with a friend, but you don't really care what exactly you do. For example, you're going to go out to dinner. But where you eat is not important to you, right? You're a bit apathetic toward where you're going to go out to eat, and you want your friend to choose. You want them to decide? Okay, you don't care now. You could say I don't care, I don't care. But there are a couple of specific expressions that we can use here that could be used to push decisions to other people. Okay, so let's look at those and these air. Pretty simple. One friend says, Do you wanna go out to eat later? Yeah, sure. That sounds fun. Sounds good. Any ideas? Any ideas? It's your call. It's your call. C a L l call. Yes, this call means decision. This call means decision. It's your decision. I'm taking my option to give a decision or to decide I'm giving it to you. And whatever you say is what we will dio. So you say Let's see Thai food and I say OK, OK, I don't care. I don't care. It's your call. It's your call. Can you can use it for lots of other social situations where you want other people to decide. It's your call. It's your call. Whatever. Maybe you're going on a vacation and you want to choose where to go on vacation. Lots of different situations. You can use it anywhere. Also, you can use up to you to you now, up to you could be about a responsibility. It's up to you to make sure that everyone is safe. Okay, that's your responsibility. So that's OK, but up to you can also mean I'm lifting up the decision and allowing you sort of offering it to you to choose up to you. I'm holding it here and you can decide this or this. Where do you want to go for dinner? Up to you. It's up to you. Okay. You left it up to me to decide where we were going to go on our vacation, and I decided that we would go on a skiing trip and now you're all complaining to me about choosing to go on a ski trip. So then why did you say it's up to me if you didn't really mean it. If it's really up to me, then you can't complain, Okay, so sometimes when people say it's up to you, it's not. It's not really what they feel. And then later, when someone else makes the decision, they complain to come and common situation that I face its case. So that's another way to push decision on others. And we can also say here, whatever, whatever. What do you want to eat? Whatever sort of like saying you choose and you could add whatever is fine, whatever. It's fine, whatever is okay. Whatever is good with me could also say good with me. So these are three very common expressions we can use in many, many, many, many, many situations to express the idea of. I don't want to decide. I'm giving you the decision. Basically, that's what these mean. Okay, 131. Expressions in Common Situations - Expressions for a Party: One thing about me that's not so good is that I often show up late to social things. If there's a party, I'm often there 20 or 30 minutes late. I know that's not good, but for some reason I just have a difficult time getting to social things on time. And when that happens, there are a few expressions that my friends might use with me to express either that they don't understand why I'm so late. Or perhaps just to express some impatience, some impatience or maybe a little bit of frustration at my late nous. So what could we say here? Well, if it's not frustration and I'm late and I just got there and you were worried about me, right? And you may be our thinking. Is he going to actually show up? Is he going to be here? And then I do. But im late. Okay, so someone might say you made it. You made it. You made it. And that's a happy expression. Positive. It's to say you're here. You arrive. Doesn't mean you've actually made something. It means I recognize that you are here. Hey, you made it. It's very positive, OK, but But if it's a little bit of frustration that I'm late, then someone might say, What took you so long? What took you so long? And this can be used in lots of different places, lots of different cases, lots of different situations where something happens later than it probably should have. Maybe it's a task. For example, I ask you to go and get the umbrella from the other room and it takes you five minutes. You come back five minutes later and I say, Hey, what what took so long? What took you so long? I'm expressing a little bit of impatience there. Or if I show up 30 minutes late to the party and the host is there waiting for me because I'm the one who brought the wine, for example, and everybody's waiting for the wine. Then the host might say, What took you so long? Now that's a rhetorical question. Remember the meaning of a rhetorical question? It's a question that doesn't really need an answer. I could I could say I'm sorry I'm late. We got a little bit stuck in traffic. That's an excuse. Okay, but this one doesn't actually have to be answered. We're not actually asking why are you late? It's often just in expression of the feeling of frustration or impatience at my late nous. And it can be used in many, many, many, many, many ways. Another one that's similar to this is Where were you? Where were you? Where were you? This one is very similar to what took you so long. But there is a difference. So what's the difference between what took you so long? And where were you? Well, if we say where were you were talking about being at a place stuck in traffic, for example, an explanation for not arriving somewhere on time. This one is usually specifically for arrival being somewhere. Whereas this one what took you so long might be used for other things. What took you so long? Could be about a task. You didn't finish a task on time on assignment, a paper homework. So that sort of thing going to get something, for example, it could be about maybe a response to a question. Maybe I take 30 seconds to respond to your question. Then I say something you could say. What took you so long? So what took you so long as more general and I would say much more useful in lots of other situations besides just this party situation. Whereas that where were you is more specifically related to arrival being there. Okay, so that's really the difference between them, although in this case, they're used in the same way. 132. Expressions in Common Situations Expressions for Searching: Now let's look at the last situation in this lesson. The last one we're going to talk about. And it is quite a common one. So we'll dive into two different expressions for it. Kind to people are in a car. One is the driver, the other is the passenger in the front seat. They're looking for a certain restaurant, but neither are sure where it is. The driver needs to focus on driving, so he tells the other person to carefully watch for the place they want to go. So maybe the restaurant, Let's make a name. Let's say the restaurant's name is Cleo's and it's Ah, we know it's gonna be a blue, a blue sign. We know the sign on the restaurant is blue and we know it's called Cleo's. Okay, But I need to drive. I can't be doing this right. Maybe we're not using GPS. Okay, I can't look back and forth all the time, so I need your help. That's the situation. I need you to help me. So you need to be doing this while I'm driving. So what can we say? Well, we can use an expression that we learned earlier in the lesson. The 2nd 1 that we learned was to keep an eye on something. We can change it slightly and use the same expression, almost to say to watch for something. We can say it like this. Hey, hey, keep an eye out for a blue sign that says Cleo's Okay, so that means doesn't have to be one. I right, but it just means to be aware of what's going on around us so that you can spot it when we're close. We can use this expression, keep an eye out for lots of other things. It just means to be aware of what's going on around you so that you can catch something or spot something when it appears when it's there, doesn't mean you actually look, look, look, look, look for it and just do what you do normally, but make sure you have your awareness. Make sure you're aware of what's going on. So can you please keep an eye out for any opportunities? Job opportunities that you think would be good for me? If you hear about any opportunities, please let me know. So that doesn't mean you need to look for a job for me. But if you do talk to anybody who mentions that there's a job opening or an availability, well, maybe I would be a good fit. You can tell me about that. Keep an eye out for that. Okay, Keep an eye out for articles about maybe this thing I'm trying to understand better. Maybe there's a topic that I'm trying to learn more about. Maybe a I. For example, keep an eye out for articles about a I research, and if you find any, send them to me. That doesn't mean you need to go and look for a bunch of articles. But you need to be aware of what's going on around you so that if you do find any as you're browsing on the Internet, then you can send them to me. Keep an eye out for that. It was really useful. It's really useful cause it's very versatile because it could be used in so many different ways. Okay, but there's another one that we use for the car situation, which is not so flexible, which cannot be used in as general away. And that is, and that is, keep your eyes peeled. Keep your eyes peeled. Four. The blue sign that says Cleo's That one is generally only four things that we're looking at with the articles with the job opportunities. That's not something that we necessarily see. We could hear about it. We could just know about it. We can find out about it in any way. So it's not only about your eye seeing something, but keep your eyes peeled for something. Usually is Onley your eyes. Keep your eyes peeled for a sign that says Cleo's It's Blue. Okay, I will. I will. I will keep your eyes peeled for the shore. Were out on a boat, Okay? And we're trying to get back before the storm comes. Keep your eyes peeled for the shoreline. There it is. There it is. I see it. So keeping your eyes peeled is actually looking out for something specific. You know what you're looking for? You don't know exactly where it is, so that's the difference between them. Keep an eye out for is much more general and very useful. The expressions that we talked about in this lesson are all really common, and so are the situations that we learned them in. I hope you found this lesson both useful and interesting. So what I'd like you to do to practice is to try to write two examples for each of the expressions that we learned more generally, I'd like you to try to use them when you find yourself in similar situations to the situations we talked about in this lesson. One thing that it's very important to keep in mind is that situations offer the context within which we can really understand what an expression means. If you just learn the expression, it's really hard to get the actual meaning, and it's very hard to actually use it naturally. But when you learn it in a situation in context, that becomes much easier, You understand? Oh, this works here, but not there. And I hope I have made in this lesson I hope I've made those those distinctions clear. So when you're watching movies, when you're having conversations with others, when you're reading whatever pay very careful attention to not only the new expressions, the new words pay very close attention to the context. Context can give you the usage, and that is actually really important. Just because something means this doesn't necessarily mean you should use it all the time. You have to know when people usually use it. Okay, so practice this and I will see you in the next lesson. 133. Booking a Hotel - Overview: in the last lesson. We focused on common situations and expressions we can use in those situations. In this lesson, we're going to talk about how to book a hotel room, and we're going to do it as a phone call. Now. I realize that most of the time when you need to book a hotel room, you can do it online. I understand that, but I believe that it's important to know how to do it if you need to and through the exercise of learning how to do it will also come across a lot of the useful vocabulary related to hotels and customer service that you can use in lots of other situations. Lots of other cases as well. Okay, so hopefully, by getting the feeling for this you have a better feeling for dealing with customer service people and also have a deeper understanding of hotel related words and phrases. So we're actually going to go through this as a dialogue. I basically written a dialogue, and we're going to go through it line by line, and we'll also talk about some of the alternative phrases that can be used instead of the lines that where we're going through. So let's get started with our hotel booking situation, 134. Booking a Hotel - The Greeting: Okay, so let's get started with the dialogue. One person, the guest. I'm Britain here G that stands for guest is calling the room Veldt. The Oval Hotel. I don't think that's a really hotel. I've I've used this word. It means something completely different. But it's a funny word I enjoy. Enjoy the sound of it. So I've decided to make up a hotel called the Belt. If there's really a hotel called the belt, that is very cool. And then this one are will be our receptionist. Now, the receptionist is the person who works at the often the front desk of the hotel. This person is sometimes called the front desk person. So they could be called a receptionist. That could be called a front desk person. Sometimes this person is called up a clerk, but usually front desk person and receptionist. We have our receptionist. We have our guest, and this is the very beginning. This is how the receptionist may answer the phone. Hello. Thank you for calling the Roosevelt Hooiveld Hotel. My name is Luke. How may I help you? This is very common. Beginning to any sort of service phone call any time you call a company and a customer service person answers, they'll probably say, How may I help you? How can I help you? Okay. Yeah. Hello. I'm calling to book a room. Okay. Can we say reserve a room? Can we say make a reservation? Yeah, I suppose you can. You could say, reserve a room, book a room, make a reservation. However, book a room is generally the most common way to express the idea of doing it in advance. Now, the most important information is usually not your personal information at the beginning. That's actually not so important right from the start. So you don't always have to say your name at the beginning because they're probably the receptionist is probably not writing it down. But you should give them the details of the reservation, The details of the booking. Okay. Most important is generally the dates you want to book s. So they'll probably ask. Which dates would you like to book now? This person could say the guests could say Yeah, Hello. You don't have to say Yeah, you could say hello or it could say hi. Hi. I'm calling to book a room when we want to say our purpose in calling. I'm calling to I'm calling to is very, very common Any type of situation where you want to get something done. You could say I'm calling to book a room from the and you could say this one and then they're not asking, but generally they will ask so that you know that they're ready to hear what you're going to say. The date you're going to say they might not be ready, So it's a good idea to just say one step at a time. One thing you should not do in this sort of situation is say all of the details together. Yes, I'd like to book a room between the 18th and the 22nd and I'd like it to be on the 22nd floor. And I want blah, blah, blah. And my name is Bob on my phone number is, but don't do that. Do you think they're writing down everything very quickly? No. One step at a time. Follow their pace. Wait for them the receptionist or the person on the other end. Who is going to be putting your information in the system? Wait for them to ask the question because they need to be ready. You know what you want? Okay. Which dates? Which dates would you like to book now? Sometimes they'll say how many nights? How many nights? So sometimes when we're booking a hotel instead of dates, we use nights because you're staying overnight. We don't say days, because actually, the most important thing that they need to know is the number of nights because you're checking out on the last one. But you're not staying for that tonight. So, for example, if you want to stay three nights the 23rd 24th and the 25th that's the night of the 25th. Okay, so you're going to check out on the 26th. So staying 23rd 24th 25th checking out on the 26th. You're leaving on the 26th. You're not staying the night of the 26th. If that makes sense, they're always checking out on the following day. That's why it's more clear to use nights when you're talking about a hotel. Okay. Now, could we do what we learned before in our technical descriptions class where we say between the 20 are between the 18th and the 22nd. Yeah, yeah, you can do that. You could say between the 18th and the 22nd. Okay, So, generally, that's how we'll do the beginning of the call. They might start with the room type, but we'll go to the room type next. So it could. Could be a different order. Doesn't have to be this order, but generally they want to know when you're going to stay, and sometimes they want some clarification, so we'll talk about that, too. 135. Booking a Hotel - Booking Nights: All right, So let's continue with our dialogue, and we're going to get a little bit mawr into the actual dates. The nights that were staying, I'm going to start with the previous line that we talked about from the 18th to the 22nd. So the receptionist will often try to confirm information to be very clear, So there are no misunderstandings. So four nights just to confirm Is that right? Any time you want to confirm information, we often say, Is that right? You first say the detail and then you say, Is that right? So you want 30? Is that right? Is that right? The very useful way to confirm information. Okay, checking out on the 22nd checking out on the 22nd. No, sorry. Five nights checking out on the 23rd. So it's important to get clarification because sometimes the guest may be confused about as I talked about the difference between days and nights. It can be a little confusing. So 18th 19th 20th 21st 22nd 5 nights checking out on the 23rd not staying the night of the 23rd. Checking out means that's when you're going to leave That's when you're going out. OK, OK, I got it. I got it. Is it just you now? They could also ask how many guests? How many guests? If it's a larger booking, then they might say, How many rooms? If you suggest something about you needing maybe multiple rooms at the beginning, they'll say, Oh, how many rooms do you need? Maybe you're looking for a group of people. But here you just said I need to book a room. I need to book a room. So we want to know how many people will be in that room. How many guests is it? Just you OK? Me and my wife, I could say to two guests, and I could if I wanted to say this one. Just me and my wife Onley, too. I could also say Onley. Two guests just's just two guests. All of those air. Okay, ways to say this Now, sometimes the guest, you, the person who's going to stay there, will want to know if there are rooms available on those dates. You might ask, for example, do you have Do you have any vacancies? Instead of saying just the dates, Maybe it's a very busy weekend coming up. You know, there many, many people coming to the city for maybe a conference or something like that. And you're worried that maybe the hotel have no space. So you could say, Do you have any vacancies for the weekend of the 28th? For example, for the weekend of the 28th. Do you have any vacancies? Unfortunately, sir, we don't have any vacancies. We don't have any vacancies. We are fully booked. So if a restaurant or hotel has no more space, no more vacancy. And sometimes there will be a sign outside of a small hotel which says, no vacancy, no space available. They're fully booked. Okay, so maybe you're calling around to different hotels. Finally, you've found the Veldt. Maybe not a very popular hotel. And they have some vacancies. So you could ask like that. Normally, you don't need to do that. Normally you just say I'd like to book several nights. I'd like to book three nights from the 23rd. Okay, so that's only when you think that maybe they won't have spaces available 136. Booking a Hotel - Types of Rooms: So we figured out the dates. You've got the receptionist to understand when you want to stay. How long you want to stay? How many people? Okay, now we need to get into the different room types, and there are many different room types for different hotels. Obviously, we can't cover. All of them Were going to try to get into them a little bit. Sure. The last thing that was said was me and my wife, right. Who's staying? Me and my wife. That's two people. Sure. This is just to acknowledge something. This is a very, very useful word to say Yes. Hey, can I Can I go? I need to I need to finish something. Yeah, sure. Okay. Or to confirm that you've got information. Okay. I have to leave tomorrow at three PM. Ok, Sure. Sure. That could mean I understand. Yes. Where it could also mean I recognize that you said that. I understand. And if you tell me that tomorrow I will remember it, probably all right. Sure. And which room type would you like? Which room type would you like? Could you tell me more about your room types? Maybe. I've never stayed at the Inn Veldt Hotel before, so I need to know more. We have a standard room standard is often described as the basic option of something, the basic option. So if you get a car with standard features, that means it doesn't have anything extra. It's kind of the basic thing, and there's nothing about it. That's maybe premium premium premium has. That's an I, um, Premium has lots of extra things. Have a standard room, which has two double beds, two double beds. That's $127 per night. Okay, notice that when we read this, we don't say dollar 1 27 we say 127 and then we say dollars. Okay, even though it's before, even though the dollar sign is before that's $127 per night. Then we also have a queen room, which is 140. But the room is the same size. Okay to the Queen room has a queen bed. Okay. The bad sizes, Queen. General sizes for beds in hotels are double and then queen and then king, and this is in order of size. Sometimes you'll see a twin bed twin is generally smaller, so twin is one person, but you don't usually see that in a hotel. You'll see Double Queen and King. Okay, so the next one. But the room is the same size. The deluxe Room Deluxe is a word that's used to describe something that does have extra, sometimes premium things added onto it. If you go to a fast food restaurant and you get something that has extra, it's often a deluxe, for example, a deluxe burger, their extra things on the burger. The deluxe room has a king bed, and the room is bigger. That's $180 notice, I say, Ah, 180 dollars, not 180. You don't have to say one. We often say, Oh, if it's anything that is one on our a day, a year, a month, ah, 100 that's $180 per night. Then, of course, we have the suite, which has a separate bedroom. Ah, big balcony and a Jacuzzi. A balcony is basically an outside an outdoor area. Building is here, and then there's a balcony that comes out like that. It's a very ugly balcony and not every hotel room has one. So that's nice. That's a kind of a deluxe thing, right? Suite room is usually the nicest room in the hotel and a Jacuzzi. Wow, A Jacuzzi is often called a hot tub hot tub, and this is kind of like a bathtub. But it's more a public thing that multiple people can share. And it's not actually for bathing. It's for relax ation and it bubbles. It's hot. It's got jets of water. It's called a Jacuzzi or a hot tub. So this is a very nice room. Okay, you have to decide which of these rooms we want. We have the standard, which is the basic. We have the queen. We have the deluxe, and we also have the suite room. Which one are we going to pick? 137. Booking a Hotel - Prices: so far in our hotel dialogue, we've been able to confirm that dates. We've also been able to confirm the number of guests, and we've talked about the different room types and the prices. So now it's time to decide before we decide where the guest. Before we decide which room type, we might want to know how much The suite room is probably pretty expensive. It's 320 dollars per night each night. 320. Well, that's pretty expensive. And maybe that's a bit out of my price range. Tobe it out of my price range. All right now, I've tried to make this as natural as possible. I've tried to make it as realistic as possible, So by adding things like, all right, it's not really adding a lot of meaning, but it is adding what people often say when they're in this kind of conversation. Who is what we use when we think all right is when we've decided something, or when we've agreed to something all right? I guess I guess. And again, this doesn't really add anything, either. We often just add, I guess, two things to soften what we're saying or when we're not really sure. We're not really confident about what we want to say. I guess I'll have. Ah, well, I guess I'll have a burger. You're not really sure. Okay, so I guess we'll go with go with means choose. Choose. I guess we'll go with the deluxe room as long as it has WiFi. So there is a now condition, a condition. If it has WiFi, I'll stay there. If it doesn't, I won't. Of course it has WiFi. It's the 21st century has has gotta have WiFi. Could we get? It's higher up the wife. I know. We're talking about the room. We could say, Could we get a room that's higher up? Could we get a room in an upper floor, an upper floor? We could say that, too, but could we get it higher up? They will know what we mean. We want a view me, one of you. We want a room with a view, if possible. Now that's just a preference. A preference is when maybe we have three choices A, B and C. What I write see their A, B and C on A is the preference, but be is okay to maybe see is okay, but a is our preference. So if there are two rooms one on the 10th floor and the one on the 30th floor, they're both deluxe rooms. They both have WiFi there. The same price. Well, I'm gonna choose. My preference would be to have the one on the higher floor, not the one on the lower floor. OK, it's just a preference. I'll take either one if I have to, but that one is better, because I like the view. Okay, So we used, if possible, when we want to state our preferences. Sure. I can book a deluxe room on the 24th floor if that works. And yes, it does have WiFi. It does have WiFi. So we're doing all that together. And I realized I forgot to mark who's saying what I think you can guess here, But let's just do that. How much is the How much is the sweet? This is said by the guest. It's $320 per night. That is the receptionist who? All right, that's the guest. And then the receptionist is confirming. Sure means That's okay. I can book le look, that means there are probably several rooms on maybe the 24th floor or on higher floors on the 24th floor if that works, and yes, it does have WiFi. Do you have any questions that means about other things? For example, we've got the room. Now it's set. It's all good. I've got your preferences. I've booked the room that you want. It's on the 24th floor. That's pretty good. Sure confirms it. And then if that works, is to say if you have any problems with me doing this, I'm doing it now. The receptionist is doing it now. If there are any issues with me doing that now, say it now. Say Wait, wait, wait. No, no, no. The 20 24th floor is not high enough, for example, but it saves time. We can get through the interaction faster. If I don't need to say, Is that okay? Because you've told me that you want a deluxe room on the 24th floor or higher floor, so I can assume that what I'm going to do now is okay. Okay? And yes, it does have WiFi. Do you have any questions? Is a very common question to ask to make sure that all of the needs of the guest are met. If you're not really confident in your English and you're in this situation, one good idea might be to write down your questions before you call. That way you can focus on being polite and getting the really important things correct, like the type of room and the dates. And then you don't have to try to remember your questions. If you if you don't feel very confident to to do the English situation. If you need to do this right, your questions doubt that's my advice. That's just personal personal advice. 138. Booking a Hotel - Common Questions: The receptionist has asked us if we have any questions and we may have several. I know when I want to stay in a hotel for the first time. I usually have quite a few questions, and sometimes I will book a room on the phone because I have questions. I don't want a book online sometimes because I want to ask some of these important questions. So let's explore a few of them. Of course, there could be many more. What are the gym hours And when is breakfast? What are the gym hours And when is breakfast? Okay, now, Jim Hours. That means when is the gym open? Okay, maybe. Maybe you like to work out, or you like to have a workout. And when you travel, it's very important for you to exercise. So you need to go to the gym in the hotel. Okay, so you want to know when you can and when you can't And when is breakfast? What time is breakfast served? I want to mention something really quickly about this W o r K O U T and W o r K o ut. One word or two words. Well, it depends on how we're using it. We could say Workout as one word. If we use it as one word, then it's a noun. If we say it as two words than now, it's a phrase Alvar verb. And it's the same, for example, for take off and take off these two words. That's a phrase. A well verb phrase. A verb usually has a proposition and a verb together. First, it's a verb than a proposition or a verb, followed by an adverb. And there are many phrase of herbs you can learn them on your own. Very important to learn them, though, because they're a very important part of spoken English or take off and that becomes a noun . How would we use thes? Well, the plane will take off in 10 minutes. That's an action that's going to happen. So we should use the phrase Olver verb. Two words, however, when the plane does take off and then we're able to take off our seat belts, different meaning of take off. Then we could say we took off our seat belts after takeoff. Now take off is being used as a noun because it's an event after this'd event happened. So before takeoff and after takeoff now the plane will take off phrase a verb. Same here. Workout after my workout, my work out. How is your workout? It was very good. My workout. My workout was very good. I need to work out every day to stay saying to stay happy, I need to work out every day. So this one phrase a verb, this one now basically, that's how it works. There are lots of examples like that. I just wanted to mention it quickly. Okay, so answer breakfast is included with your room. I didn't ask that question, but it's useful information. It means I don't need to pay extra. Maybe the standard room doesn't have breakfast included. Maybe I need to pay extra for breakfast. That's a big extra cost. OK, so it's nice to have the deluxe room because breakfast is included. Remember, that means it's part of the cost of the room. And, um, that's from 7 a.m. To 11 a.m. Now you could say 7 to 11 a.m. and that would be fine to could we say between seven and 11 a.m. off course. Of course, we've learned that by now. All right. The gym is always open. We could also say, if something is always open 24 seven. Sometimes it's written like that. Sometimes it's written like that. What does that mean? People often ask me, What does 24 7 mean? Well, it means 24 hours a day, 24 days a week. 24 7 That means it's always open. It's never closed, so that one is very common. You often will see that in front of things like convenience stores. Okay, We could also say that Jim is always open, so you don't need to worry about that. Don't need to worry about that. You can go to the gym at 2 a.m. If you want. Will you be needing transportation from the airport? Okay. This one is asking, Basically, Are you flying in? And if so, do you need a way to get to the hotel from the airport? If you're coming from another city, you could be driving. If so, you wouldn't need transportation from the airport. You could if you're flying in, take another type of transportation like a taxi. But maybe this hotel offers a shuttle service often called the airport shuttle S H U T T L E Service, which is just back and forth like this, offered by maybe a specific hotel and the airport shuttle. The difference between that and a bus is generally that a shuttle only does this and only has two stops. Hotel, airport, hotel, airport. Where is the bus? Usually stops along the way. She makes all the stops. That's the general difference. Okay, so that's the answer to the question. Now let's get into the shuttle situation and how much that will cost. If we do want to get the airport shuttle, if we're flying into a city, we're planning to stay at a hotel. We often need to get to the hotel, which is usually downtown. But usually the airport is rather far away from downtown. Most of the time, airports are not in the middle of the city, although sometimes they are, which is interesting and very convenient. Four people flying, but maybe not for the local people. So we've been asked if we need transportation from the airport to the hotel, that suggests that they offer it, but we should still confirm Yes, actually, yes, actually means I do need that sort of transportation. This is the guest. This is the receptionist. And this is the guest. Okay, Yes. In fact, we used actually, when we want to say this is the reality. Actually, I'm really, really hungry. For example, do you offer shuttle service shuttle service? We can call it that. And if so, how much is it? We often use this. If so, structure toe. Ask a question about one thing. If the answer is yes, before we get the yes answer. So, for example, do you have a vegetarian menu? Vegetarian means someone who doesn't eat meat. If so, could I look at it, please? If the answer is yes. Could I please look at the vegetarian menu? Do you have that? If so, could I look at it? That's before I get the answer. Yes, because maybe it's yes. Maybe it's no. It's a very useful, very useful way of asking questions. Actually, it's complimentary. Now this complimentary is often used by hotels and restaurants, a lot of customer service or service oriented businesses to mean free. Basically, it means free. Oh, sir, that is actually complementary. We would like to give you this towel, complementary this complimentary towel with our logo on it to remember your stay here. Whatever. It's complimentary. Maybe a complimentary breakfast is a free breakfast, and it's sort of a fancy way, More formal way of saying it's free. If we say yes, we have free shuttle service. It just sounds a little, maybe a little cheap, although it is the same meaning. Okay, the shuttle leaves every hour on the hour. If we say every hour, that could be a little confusing, because that could be 10 2011 2012 20 write. What we want to say is, when we say every hour on the hour leaves at 11 it leaves it 12. It leaves at one. It leaves it to on the hour. Doesn't leave. It doesn't leave it 11 10. It doesn't leave it. 11 05 It leaves at 11. And if you miss the 11 you need to take the 12 12 PM, for example. So just look for the one what the shuttle the shuttle is often used to replace. The word bus means the bus. Okay, look for the one with the, um belt hotel logo in the parking lot in front of terminal to Terminal two t two. Sometimes t wan t to a terminal is the long area where all the planes are. Okay, great. That's a way to say awesome. Fantastic. Because nothing else needs to be done, right? If I really want to take a taxi when I get there, I can. But now I know that I don't need to arrange the shuttle service. It's just there, and it leaves every hour on the hour, so I don't need to do anything else here. I have this information. I'm done. That's my question. I'm finished. 139. Booking a Hotel - Confirming Information: so far in our hotel dialogue, we've finalized the number of guests, dates, room, type any preferences and answered any questions. OK, now we need to get down to the personal information because that's what's needed in order to make the booking actually put it into the system so that when you arrive, you're able to actually check in. Checking is what you do when you get to the hotel. The reason you usually don't do that at the very beginning is because they're probably not ready to write down that information. So generally they will ask that toward the end. Different places are different. But I used to actually do this job. It was one of my first jobs, and I had to take reservations over the phone very often. Take bookings over the phone every day, and this is how it went step by step. We had a step guide that we had to follow as receptionists. Anyway, let me just get your personal information so I can finalize the booking. So I've got everything down, but I need to connect it to something so that we can maybe call you if there are any problems or charge you if you don't show up, for example, for the first night. Okay, let me get let me get Could also say just like we're ordering in a restaurant. Could I have? Could I have? Let's find two. Okay, Let me get your personal information so I can finalize Finalized means to make something final. It's a verb form, any sort of process that has steps. And then you want to make sure these steps are finished. You could say we should finalize this before we go on to the next thing. Let's finalize it. Very useful verb. OK, let me just get your personal information so I can finalize the booking. Could I have your full name and phone number now? Full name is generally first name. Middle name, last name in English. The last name is the family name. First name is the given name. And the middle name is also given names. You have family name and given name given name is the one that is given to you. Family name is the one that you get because of your family. So my family name is pretty and my given name is Luke short. That means all right? No problem. It's look pretty now. Most people know how to spell Luke. Generally, it's either spelled l u k e or L. You see, if I have ah, French accent, maybe I have to spell it. L u C and, uh, because that's how it sometimes spelled in France. But because I have an American accent, they will write down probably L u k E because that's how it's spelled in America. Typically. Okay, so last name, last name, my last name is weird. I need to spell that because a lot of people think my last name is pretty. Actually, it's p r I D D y. But if you say it pretty, pretty pretty, it's pretty much the same pronunciation as pretty because when we say pretty, actually, we usually say that as a light d pretty, pretty, pretty, basically exactly the same. Okay, so I need to be very careful, and I need to spell out each letter and when you want to do that over the phone, Did it? It it it it it it it it it A. You will spell out the letter, say the letter and then another word that starts with the same letter. Just so it can't be confused. We do that with, as in this is the phrase we use as in. Okay, sure. It's look pretty. Last name P as in penguin. Pop up a penguin. Are, as in rhino I as in India. D as in dog D as in dog, you want to use the same one If it's two letters that are the same. Why? As in yellow, the phone number is 41975 to 7383 And again, I could write that with the parentheses around it. Like that. Okay, let me repeat the number back to you. We should should do these. Got to write the roles again. Receptionist, Guest, Receptionist. Guest. All right, so the receptionist says, Let me repeat the number back to you. Now there's going to be a mistake for 19 753 7383 Okay, So is actually too right now. If somebody gets a number wrong and you want to correct them, don't say the whole number again. If you say no. No, no, It's for 1975 to 7383 You say the whole thing again. You're going to get into a situation where they're confused. They're confused about which one was wrong. It's It's difficult because it's on the phone. Being on the phone with someone can be confusing. For example, hearing pretty and pretty pretty and pretty could be very difficult, right? So that's why we use this as in sort of structure to clarify it. And then when we have a mistake with numbers we use when we want to correct something only three numbers, not the whole thing. You can use the wrong number in the middle or the wrong number at the end or the beginning , but you need to stress it. Stress the wrong number and then the right number and the other two should be unstrung est unstrung est like this? No. Sorry. Not 753 It's 752 No, sorry. Not 753 It's 752 That means all of the other numbers are correct. You don't need to change them. Okay, Got it. Okay, I see. I see. So that's how we do that on the phone. This is a way to clarify when a mistake has been made and another very important thing is when you're dealing with Americans. Don't use, for example, double Double to double six. Triple three. Don't do that. Don't do that. You will confuse American English speakers a great deal. Avoid it. Just say the number one by 11 by one. Okay, so let's move on. The receptionist says. Got it means I understand the number. I've got all that information. Got your name, and I need your credit card information or credit card number to hold the room. Hold the room. That's the purpose of a booking. It needs to be held. Usually, hotels have the policy of charging you for the first night, not all the nights, but the first night. If you don't show up, if you make the booking and then you don't cancel 24 hours before then they're going to charge you for the whole first night, sort of as a ah, punishment or a fee. Sure, it's and then you say the number and what's the expiration date? It's done edited and the code on the back. It's so there's that code on the back. There's the expiration date when you want to say that very simply just used its or it is very, very basic stuff. But they were usually get those three details from you. Your name, your phone number. Sometimes your email address to send you may be a confirmation confirmation, and they will also get your credit card info in case you don't show up and they need to charge, you may need to reserve it for you so that they don't lose a bunch of money not being able to put other people in a room where nobody is going to stay. 140. Booking a Hotel - Confirmation: we've reached the end of the dialogue. Hopefully, you've learned a lot about how different things air described in hotels and if you need to how to actually make a booking now at the end, it's the job of the receptionist to confirm, to confirm the booking, all the details just to make sure it's all right. Okay, now we did a confirmation before when we were talking about inviting a friend to do something. The person who calls needs to confirm Well, in this case, it's the business that needs to confirm because they're the ones who are going to provide the service. They're the ones we're going to take your money, right? So they should confirm. But we confirm in the same way we always confirm with the words. So it's so easy to confirm things. So then you just say the basic details. You're all set. All set means nothing more needs to be done. Nothing more needs to be done. You're all set with five nights in the deluxe could say deluxe room from the 18th checking out on the 23rd. Thank you so much. Okay, now, if somebody says all set, they might be answering the question. Do I need to do anything else if you buy something? If you want to, maybe refund something or whatever you can ask them. A customer service person. What else do I need to do? Do you need my card? What? No. You're all set. You're all set. Means nothing else needs toe happen. Go, go, go. You're finished. Have a nice day. Very, very common. Okay, we look forward to seeing you on the 18th and thanks for booking with us. Have a great day now. Why use us? Why use we? But because this is just one person representing the organization, the hotel. And so if they say I look forward to seeing you, it feels like you're the only person who works here. You're gonna be here when I come. How do I know that? How do you know that? Right. So it's actually very professional to use we look forward to and us when it's a situation where there's not a personal relationship between the person who called and the receptionist, it's a relationship between the business and the person who called. So if it's that sort of relationship, we means anybody who's working here when you check in is going to be the person who sees you on the 18th right? So that's why we use we. That's why we use us when you're talking about your company that you represent and you're just one person. And maybe you're going to have a day off when this person actually comes to the hotel and maybe also when they check out. Or maybe today's your last day of work and you're never coming back here again. Well, that's why it's best to use. We okay, look forward to seeing you. Thank you for booking. Have a nice day, right? Thank you so much is a very polite way to say thank you. That's a little bit formal, but it's very common for service related situations. So that's it for our dialogue. We are going to go on, though, and I'm going to show you just a couple other ways. We can say goodbye just so you know, okay, but I hope that you feel comfortable now to call the hotel and make a booking, and I would encourage you next time you want to book a hotel instead of doing it on a website or an app, try to call, challenge yourself 141. Booking a Hotel - Saying Goodbye: before we finish this lesson on our hotel booking dialogue, what I'd like to do is just quickly share with you a few ways to say goodbye formally and informally. So for a business, one common thing to say is Thanks for coming. Thanks for stopping by. Thanks for calling. Thank you for calling. Thanks for coming. If somebody comes over now, it could be used informally as well. If I go to your party and then it's time for me to leave, you say Okay. Well, thanks for coming. Okay. Bye. See you. OK. It's also quite common. Have a nice one or have a good one. Have a nice day. These air also quite common. Have a nice day is for both friends could say it. And also people in ah business could say it to people who aren't leaving. If you go to their shop, then you leave. They might say Have a nice day. Have a good one. Same. I say this one to my friends all the time. All right. Have a good one by sometimes I say both have a good one and goodbye. But you could just say have a good one. Take care. Take care again. This is for both. But I also use it when I'm saying goodbye to my friends in person and over the phone. Many of these can be used for both. Thanks for stopping by. Can be used for both. Thanks for calling. Maybe, but it would be a very special situation. That's informal. Where you would say thanks for calling with your friends. Thank you for calling, friend. It sounds a little bit weird, but maybe, maybe thanks for calling. I really needed to talk to you. That might work. OK, see later is always with friends. Okay, If we're doing that as a business, see later, it's It's okay. I guess it's all right if that's the way that you communicate. But you're sort of communicating in a way as though you're that person's friend and you wouldn't here it in, for example, the the hotel dialogue situation, they wouldn't say. All right, see you later. That would be generally to relax. That would be too informal, and they might actually get in trouble for saying See you later. Now this is very, very informal, and you wouldn't see this in any business will be very unlikely, maybe a skateboard shop where all of the people who work there very relaxed later. But this is Ah, this is for friends only, and it just means goodbye just means goodbye. Take it easy is pretty informal. Take it easy. See you. You can say both or you could just say Take it easy. Used with friends typically stay warm and stay cool are related to the context. The actual weather. If it's a hot day, it's summer. Okay, stay cool. Stay cool. You want the person to feel comfortable, right? So when you want them to feel comfortable, if it's cold, you want them to stay warm. If it's warm, you want them to stay cool so we can use either of these in context, but usually only for very warm days or very cold days. If it's nice weather, you probably wouldn't say either of these. You might instead to say later. See you later. One very traditional Goodbye is so long, so long, so long. But I pretty much never used this one. This one is becoming very, very rare, and I would recommend that you do not use that one. There are others too. But these are some of the common ways to say goodbye both formally, for example, if you are a front desk person or a receptionist in a hotel, or if you're with friends, okay, very common. So to practice this record the dialogue several times. Record yourself speaking through it in both roles. Several times you can get a friend involved. That's great. But make sure you record it on your phone, for example, so that you can listen to it again later. Okay, if you can, then next time you're booking a hotel. As I mentioned before, I try to do it over the phone. It's a great way to practice, and you're gonna put yourself in a feeling of pressure. No, no, I don't know how to handle this, and that's going to that. Discomfort is very healthy. It's going to push you past your limitations so I would encourage you to any time you have the chance. Engage in real situations with riel people, especially customer service people. Okay, make sure to write down your questions before you call so that you don't have to try to remember them, and that will make it a little bit easier. You'll have a bit less pressure. All right. So good luck with that. And I will see you in the next lesson. 142. Meetings - Overview: in the last lesson, we focused on how to book a hotel room on the phone. In this lesson, we're going to talk about meetings, how to handle meetings in English. Now we're gonna focus first on why we have meetings, the function, the purpose of meetings. Then we're gonna go into proposals how to make a proposal and then for the other people listening to a proposal, how to give feedback and give comments. Then we're going to actually go into for the person running a meeting. Different things you can say to keep the meeting focused because that's one of the things you need to do as a moderator. Moderator is usually the person who's responsible for the meeting. So meetings are, of course, for many different things, and meetings could be with one person. Meetings could be with a group of people. I should be very clear at the beginning. We're not going to cover every aspect of meetings. We could probably do a full course just on meetings and the relationships between people in the office, right? We could maybe do another course on that in the future, but in this class, we're going to really try to cover the most important elements of the typical meeting with a group of people. We won't really focus on the one toe, one type of meeting, because that's really just a conversation. But you should be prepared for this because we did our presentations class before and a proposal is just a type of presentation. So let's get started and just quickly go over some of the reasons that we need to have meetings. 143. Meetings - Meeting Functions: Why do we need to actually hold meetings? Whether it could be a huge number off reasons to hold, hold a meeting and whether it's a group of people or just to one of those might be negotiation? We've talked about that. But maybe, for example, two groups from two different companies might get together to negotiate some very large deal. For example, they might discuss terms they might try to compromise, or they might decide that they can't come to an agreement. And then they at least know why. Because they had the meeting. Maybe it's a brainstorming meeting. These are, in my opinion, the most fun brainstorming is when everybody is giving ideas often to solve a problem or to come up with something new that people haven't thought of before, maybe in a company, for example. So let's say there's a problem with one product in this company, and that's what they sell. One of the things they sell and it's not working, it's not. They're not selling a lot of that. We're trying to figure out why. So they get everybody together, Maybe the people who are responsible for making strategic decisions. Strategic is the adjective strategy means planning and making decisions about what, what can help the company or what can accomplish goals. OK, so basically everyone's throwing out ideas, and when we brainstorm, there's a ah storm going on in your brain. We're not usually focused on coming to an agreement about which one we're going to do. Maybe, But the general idea is, you say what you think, then you say, then you say, and then you say, and I'll write it down on the white board and we'll get all the ideas down or on the board , and then we can discuss them and decide which one is best. But first, let's brainstorm, and it can be a lot of fun. And often if you have five or six people in a room together, brainstorming, that could be really, really fun. Really interesting. Another reason you might have a meeting is to discuss policy changes. Now policies are rules within, usually an organization or a company, and sometimes policy needs to be changed based on something that happened. So let's say there is a new law in the country that this company is in, or the state or whatever, and so because of that law, the company that needs to make a change. Well, they will have a meeting to discuss how the company's rules will change based on that change in the law. Or perhaps there is a problem that's come up recently could be related to company culture and how employees interact with each other. Or maybe it's related to payment. Whatever. Maybe some changes need to happen. These air policy changes and the management staff staff is a group of people, By the way. It's not each person. You're not a staff. Usually you're a staff member. Each person is a staff member, so the management staff might get together and discuss what policies might need to change in order to resolve the problem or adjust or whatever needs to happen. Something needs to change in the rules of the company. So policy changes. So the management staff or the sometimes senior staff may get together to decide what policy changes to make. Or perhaps if they've already decided how to implement how to implement those changes. If we implement something that means we put it into place, we put it into action. This is the plan. Okay, great we have a plan. Now let's talk about how we implement the plan or how we actually make it riel. How we actually put it into place into place. Put it into place. Now similar to a brainstorming meeting, we might have a problem problem solving meeting. This could be a little bit different than brainstorming. We know exactly what the problem is, and we're trying to find solutions. Maybe there are only two options. So we're not really brainstorming about what to do. But we're trying to decide maybe which option is best A or B. And maybe we're weighing the pros and cons and having a discussion about what are the pros , mawr or the cons? More. We could say, for example, the the pros outweigh the cons. Or we could say the cons outweigh outweigh the pros. It goes either way. So in order to figure out whether a is better than B or B is better than a, we'll get together and talk about which one is going to be the best in the long term. So we're talking about long term or short term. We're talking about immediate benefits or benefits down the road in the far future down, we sometimes say down the road. Well, I think that I think that A is a good choice, but it really only solves the immediate problem. I think be will be better down the road. I think be will be better in the long term. The last one I want to mention is alignment. Now this one might just be for each department in a company, each department or maybe each department head to update everyone else about what's going on in their department. This is just to make sure that everybody is on the same page on the same page. We often use this expression we need to make sure we're all on the same page so that decisions I make don't negatively affect decisions you make so that we can all make the right decisions so that we can move in a direction altogether so that we can have alignment . Alignment means we are in the same sort of direction, all going together, right? It also say to keep someone in the loop to keep someone in the loop means that they know what's going on. If one person is going to leave for a week and won't be able to maybe take part in any of the meetings he might say to his. Or, she might say to her colleague, Please keep me in the loop. That means give me updates, Let me know what's going on. So maybe once a week there's an alignment meeting alignment meeting in which everybody just talks about what's going on so that nobody is out of alignment. Nobody is out of the loop, which is a very common phrase as well. Right now, we're going to go on and we're going to actually talk about ah, proposal and how we can make a proposal in a meeting situation. 144. Meetings - Proposal: What's the difference between a proposal and an idea? Well, they're not that different, But an idea might be something you just kind of throw out there to solve a problem or for any other reason. And a proposal is meant to be a little bit more serious and is usually something that you would prepare for. So proposal is more like or could be more like a presentation. You might even prepare ah PPT a power point presentation when you discuss a proposal for solving a particular problem. Now let's say the particular problem is that staff members for the whole staff, they're just not getting along very well. Maybe there are some issues and disagreements, and a lot of we could call it drama, maybe coming up every day. And maybe this is because they just don't know each other very well. They don't have a chance to socialize. And so there's a bit of frustration among the staff. Let's say this is the issue and one person is going to propose a solution to the problem, okay? And I'm going to just read out this proposal. I don't want to focus too much on the proposal because really it has the basics or the essentials of giving a presentation. And we've talked about that before because you could stand up and you could make a little hook. So you might say, What do you think really is the core of this issue. It's pretty clear to me that the core of the issue is that the staff, they have no chance to socialize in form bonds with each other. Okay, so we've maybe used a bit of a rhetorical question there. Why do you think that we're not asking anybody to answer it right there, just thinking about it. So we're using a lot of the basics of the presentation that we learned in another lesson. So I don't want to focus too much on it, but basically, I just want to make it clear that an idea is more casual on a proposal is more formal and often something that you would prepare in advance. Okay. So, to the problem of issues with company culture, bad morale, company morale is low. Morale is thes sort of energy level or level of happiness among the staff. I propose a big monthly dinner for the whole staff. This will promote company culture and boost morale. Boost means to increase or to make it better. OK, then I would probably go into more detail about why I think this is a good idea. Let's say we have a power point behind us based on the power point that we have. You could say, for example, so this would be a good investment for us because right now, if we have this issue with low morale, having a big company dinner is something we only need to do maybe once a month. That can allow the whole staff to get to know each other, better, create new bonds in a relaxed setting. And when they can do that, when they could have fun with each other, then they're going to build trust. And when they build trust, those bonds are going to translate back into the workplace. Okay, then we could go on and we could go through our outline point a point B in Point C with examples. I don't want to get into the whole thing, but basically, when you're giving a proposal, follow the basic structure of the outline that we learned in the other lesson 145. Meetings - Giving Feedback: so far in this lesson, we've talked about the reasons we have meetings, and we've proposed a very simple solution to an issue with company culture. This is the situation, okay? There are five or six people at this meeting. The person in charge of the meeting is called the Moderator. Now, this could be the boss of these people, but not necessarily. Perhaps not. They say. All right. So I've asked each of you to prepare proposal for this issue that we're talking about today about morale among the staff. Larry, I'd like you to start. Could you give your proposal about the company dinner? So then Larry stands up and he gives his proposal about the monthly dinner, The idea that that I just mentioned. Now the other people might have some questions and some feedback. Once he's given his proposal, sometimes it will be after Larry finishes with the proposal, and sometimes it will be in the middle. They might want to stop him. Now, that's usually not the best idea. But there are times when you need to cut in, and I'm going to share some basically phrases that you can use when you want to then give feedback on an idea when you want to cut in. Sometimes when you want to just offer an opinion whether you agree or disagree. So Larry has given his proposal on the monthly dinner and how he thinks it could solve the issue. Now there might be a simple questions. Of course you can. Once it's over, just ask what what costs, what costs would be associate ID with holding the dinner and and who or which department would maybe be responsible taken by R. E S P responsible for the budget. Okay, so this is just a follow up question, a follow up question. Larry didn't give a lot of detail about the cost involved, so I have a question about that. So this is a good way to often explore something. And if you disagree with somebody, make them realize that their suggestion is maybe not great. I'm not saying Larry suggestion is bad, but, for example, I think it's way too expensive. And instead of saying I disagree, I think it's too expensive. Instead, I say what costs would be in involved, and then Larry has to answer the question. And maybe when he answers the question. Maybe he realizes that it's too expensive. So one way of disagreeing is making the person who suggested the idea realize that there's something about their idea that's not realistic. That's one way to do it Now. Maybe you just used this question. What costs would be associate ID or involved? They also say, involved with holding the dinner. Maybe we just want to know, Maybe we're not actually trying to criticize. Maybe we're not trying to say I disagree. That's okay, too. This is very simple, and asking these sorts of questions is very important. So you can just once the person is finished talking, ask these simple follow on or follow up questions. But what if we want to stop Larry in the middle of his proposal in the middle of his presentation about this? This idea? Well, then we can use a couple of expressions we could use if I may. If I may, we can use if if I can cut in four second or we could say moment, and if we really wanted to, we could say, Hold on a moment, hold on a moment and then we say our opinion now that one could be considered a little bit rude to say Hold on a moment because it's like saying Wait, stop talking. I need to say something and it's urgent. Generally you want to give feedback in a meeting after, but if it's really, really important to say it now, then you can use these phrases. So let's look at examples for each of these. If I may, I would like to say that the cost isn't justified. I don't think I don't think it's worth it. Okay, now then we can start to have a conversation about that point. Or maybe Larry can continue with his presentation, and then we can talk about that after. But I use, if I may, if I may, I don't think that the cost is really justifiable. Pretty expensive toe hold a monthly dinner. Is it really going to be worth it? I think the cost might outweigh outweigh the advantages of holding a monthly dinner like that. So that's a wayto get in there to cut in and stop it. The other one, then, is if I can cut in. If I can cut in, I think there might be other ways to boost morale without breaking the bank such as. And then we could say the idea, such as some, for example, team building exercises during working hours. That would be a lot cheaper. All we have to do is hire a trainer or someone who does team building exercises, for example. Okay, if I can cut in or we could say, If I can just cut in again, it's an interruption. Another way to suggest this. Hold on For a moment I mentioned before, Hold on for a moment. I don't quite see how a meal is. The best way to address address here means deal with deal with address this. Each person would be at a small table. That means, for example, if the reason for this proposal is to make everybody talk with other people and create bonds or connections between them. Well, if you're sitting with four or five other people, it is there really a huge benefit, right? Maybe if there's a way to get everybody to really do something together, maybe that would be a lot better. Okay, so this person again disagrees. I don't quite see how a meal. Okay, now this is a very gentle way. So hold on for a moment is not super polite. This could be considered, ah, bit rude. If it's an interruption, pulling for a moment, hold on for a moment. But then this. I don't quite see how what you said is correct. I don't quite see how what you're saying makes sense is a very soft and gentle way to communicate the idea that you completely disagree again, adding quite quite makes it a lot softer. If you say I completely disagree, then that's a lot more direct. Okay, so any time you want toe softly or gently disagree, use this. I don't quite see how that would work or I don't quite agree. One way to tell somebody you disagree is too create a hypothetical possibility that if it's put into place, there will be some negative result. So you can say it like that. Let's say his Larry's presentation is over. It has ended, right? He's done with his proposal now, and I don't agree with it. Okay, so I could say if we did that, if we did that, it I would completely destroy our events. Budget one meaning of budget is an amount of money that you have for a specific purpose. It's there for events, things that happened within the company. So if we did this every month, well, then we're not going to have any money for anything else. So if we did that hypothetical, if we did that, it would. Can we use would when we want to create a hypothetical, non riel situation hypothetical, and it's a really powerful way to disagree because we're stating a fact what we think is effect, that would happen if this specific plan is put into action. So it's actually very powerful. It can be very powerful if you use it well, create that hypothetical and make everyone else realize, Oh, yeah, wow, We would have no money for anything else That sounds terrible. And then if we really wanted to add it, we could add it to any of these disagreements. We could just say I don't think it makes sense. I don't I don't think it makes sense. Whenever somebody gives you an idea about what they think should be done. Generally we can use. I don't think it makes sense or it doesn't make sense. It's a great way to disagree, But then usually you have to explain why it doesn't make sense now. Maybe you're thinking, Wait a second. Everything you've said so far is to disagree. Well, that's because it's very easy to agree. If you agree, then you could just say, Yeah, I agree where you could say, Great idea, Brilliant proposal. I like it. But then you could maybe mentioned one specific issue. I like it, but do we have enough money for this? Just to ask the question? Let's do it. Let's do it. Great idea. Let's do it. I think it's perfect. I think it's a great plan. So it's very easy to agree with the proposal and then ask a follow up question about some of the details. It's a little bit more complicated to disagree, So I hope these phrases that we've learned about how to respond and give feedback based on a proposal are clear because they're all very, very common, and most of them can be used in many in many other situations as well. Outside of just meetings 146. Meetings - Moderating: so far in this lesson, we've talked about why we hold meetings, have talked about basically giving a proposal and how it's different from just throwing in an idea and then how to respond to proposals or ideas from other people in a meeting. Now, what if we're actually the moderator of the meeting? This means the person who's in charge of the meeting doesn't necessarily mean the boss, but someone who is responsible for keeping the meeting going well, The primary responsibility. The main job of this person is to make sure that things don't get out of control, out of hand or off track. We often use the phrase off track to say that things are going in the wrong direction. We're supposed to be focused on Topic A, but now we're talking about this and, well, it's a problem. OK, so the moderator is responsible for making sure that doesn't happen, also making sure people are not fighting or disagreeing. Also making sure that maybe the meeting finishes on time, making sure maybe the ideas are on the white board if there is a white board or on the blackboard, if there's a blackboard, but I haven't ever seen a meeting on a blackboard before? But anyway, they're responsible for orchestrating. We could say the whole thing, and I want to talk about a few phrases. We can use a few things we can say to keep things focused. So what I want to do is just share with you a few things that the moderator might say to make sure that the meeting doesn't get off track doesn't stray from the purpose. Here's an example. Larry has given his proposal about the monthly dinner, and let's say Nathan disagrees. He thinks it costs too much money. Then Lisa. Here's Nathan's idea that it costs too much money, and then she starts talking about the budget and she says, Yeah, actually, I'm thinking maybe we should increase the budget for events because if we had a bigger budget than we could afford blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. OK, so now things are getting off track, right? This is not good. We're not talking about proposals for resolving the issues that we have with morale. That's what we're trying to talk about here. So the moderator, Linda, whoever says Good point. But let's stick to the plan for today's meeting, so it's a good way to make her feel. Hey, your idea is not bad. What you're saying is not crazy. That's fine. Let's stick to the plan for today's meeting and you're bringing her back. It's a way to say Hey, hey, come back, Remember, we're talking about something else, but it's not insulting. You're not hurting her feelings by saying it that way. We were about to go off on a tangent about the budget. Maybe we were about to go off on a tangent off track. But thank goodness our moderator is able to deal with that Good point. But let's stick to the plan for today's meeting. We need to stay focused or we won't get out of here by six. Okay, so now the moderator is from mining everybody the reason to stay focused. And everybody is suddenly realizing Oh, right. If we don't stay focused, then we'll have to be here until we resolve this issue and we might have to work overtime. And maybe I want to go home on time today. So the moderator is also providing everybody at the meeting with a little bit of a of motivation sort of like a treat we could call. It may be a carrot as something to push them, to drive them to stay focused and stay on track. It's actually really good way to manage the situation. Another way to express this. I think we're getting a little off track now. This is like saying a bit. Remember, we use a bit to soften things. I think we're getting a little off track. Let's not focus on the budget. We're supposed to be talking about ways to promote the company culture. Let's focus. So this is pretty much the same, right? The same basic function, the same basic idea, almost the same phrasing. This is a slightly different way of saying this. A little makes it gentle, er okay, but we're still stating the reality very clearly. We're supposed to be talking about ways to promote the company culture. Let's focus now. This is balanced between tough and gentle, the words air gentle. The meaning is tough if you say to everybody. Hey, stop talking about the budget. What's wrong with you people? You call them. I don't know. Stupid or you. You say things very directly. Sometimes some people like to communicate that way, whatever. But sometimes that can make you come across as maybe too strict and it could make other people shut down. They don't want to share their opinions anymore because I don't want to get yelled at, so they just be quiet. So by saying things in a soft way, but with a tough and direct meaning, were able to make sure that everybody is on track and people are contributing because they feel like they're also respected. So this is another good one, but it is pretty much the same as the previous one. Finally, if we're the moderator of the meeting and we're trying to get things back on track, we might say I think it's a good point. So Linda says something about the budget. We should increase the budget. We need more money for events. I think it's a good point. So we've recognized her and her idea. We haven't shut her down. Stop talking about that. Maybe will shut her down. That's a good point. Makes her feel maybe good about herself, right, so that's great. But again, it's off topic. So after we've given someone a compliment, we then need to say something a little more directly to help people focus. This is often how we give feedback as well when you want to give someone feedback. One method is called the Sandwich method. It has other names, too. I like the sandwich method because it's very visual. Say something positive and encouraging. Then you say the meat of the idea, really what you're trying to communicate, and then maybe another bun of the burger or sandwich, which is another gentle and soft thing. But really, it's the meat that you want to communicate, so I think it's a good point, but it doesn't quite fit with our plan for today. Why don't we deal with that in the next meeting? So that's the bottom of the sandwich, the bottom of the sandwiches. Hey, your idea is a wonderful thing to talk about, but if we talk about it in the next meeting, then we're still able to stay on track for today. Then we can deal with today's issue and the budget issue. Maybe tomorrow it's a win win. So the first part, the top of the sandwich is this. The real meat of it is This doesn't quite fit with the plan for today. And then the bottom of the sandwich is this and you can do it. If you're moderating a meeting to make people focus on something right, say something positive and encouraging, then the meat, the real thing you want to communicate, then the bottom bun of the burger. Why don't we deal with that in the next meeting? That's how good your idea is. It's worth talking about later, okay? And I really like to use this when I give people feedback. I like to give direct and honest feedback, sometimes very critical. But if I say it's terrible directly, they feel hurt. Maybe they don't want to ask me next time. But if I use the sandwich method, if I use this structure, then I can communicate my idea. But at the same time make the other person feel like I respect them enough. And of course you've got to try to be honest. It may be a good idea. Okay, so those are some common ways that when you're moderating a meeting, you can make sure that things don't go off track. You can keep things focused, I hope, even though we didn't cover every possible thing that can happen in a meeting that could be done in a whole course on meetings. Probably. I hope that you feel more comfortable with how you can communicate in these specific areas , particularly proposals giving feedback on proposals and moderating a meeting and keeping things on track. Okay, so to practice this, what I'd like you to do is come up with another idea for helping boost the morale of this company. Okay, imagine you're doing it in a meeting. Do it until you can say your proposal or speak your proposal. Naturally, record yourself. It's okay if you do it three or four times. Go back and listen to it and try to make corrections and revisions each time. Then give some critical feedback on the idea. Express. What's wrong with the idea? As though you were another person in the meeting? Practice this a few times until you feel comfortable doing both the presentation and the feedback. Good luck and I will see you in the next lesson. 147. Cooking and Cuisine - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about meetings who talked about how to give feedback on a proposal and also how to keep a meeting on track. In this lesson, we're going to be talking about food, not everything about food. We're gonna focus mostly on cooking. If you don't know how to describe cooking than in this lesson, you are going to learn how to talk about cooking food, how to describe cooking. And it's actually not as hard as you might think. There are some simple things that we will learn, which will be very useful when you want to describe how to make something. But at the beginning of the lesson, we're going to talk about cuisine. What exactly that means, because that's often a word that's misused and misunderstood. Then we're going to talk about actions related to cooking. Then we're gonna focus on some vocabulary and phrases, useful vocabulary and phrases that we need to know. Then we'll get into a recipe will actually go through step by step, a recipe for a particular dish. We're actually going to do a Chinese dish. I'm not a cooking expert, but it will help us to practice the basics of describing how to cook. So let's get started and talk about cuisine 148. Cooking and Cuisine - Describing Cuisines: when we discuss food and which kinds of food we like, we often need to use the word cuisine. What exactly does it mean? Kind of easy to misunderstand? Well, cuisine generally is a type of food that is specific to or connected to a particular place or culture. Now it could be a country, but it doesn't have to be a country. For example, you could have Japanese cuisine, but then there might be a particular city that's famous for food. You might have, for example, New Orleans cuisine, which is, ah, famous type of cuisine in America. Or you could have, for example, a province name, like in China. You have Sichuan cuisine. Okay, so that's a particular area in China, then for each area. In China you have different cuisines, so usually it's related to a place. But not necessarily. It could be just cultural Anyway. We can say it's a type of food. A cuisine is a type of food. So often, when you hear people say, what cuisines do you like or what is your favorite cuisine? You can just say the type of food you like. Oh, I like French cuisine. I like Japanese cuisine. I like Indian cuisine. I like Italian cuisine. Whatever you want to say now, sometimes those things are not clear. For example, if you say I like American cuisine, you might have to describe what exactly you mean by that, because that's less clearly defined than perhaps other countries, such as French cuisine and Italian cuisine or Indian cuisine. We often use subjective adjectives, and we're talking about the feeling we have about particular cuisines or the feeling that we have about maybe the taste of a particular food. And it could be the overall feeling. Or it could be something more specific about the taste. Let me explain what I mean. So take Indian food. I like Indian food. How would you describe Indian food? Well again? It's quite it's quite subjective in some way. I would describe Indian food as a bit heavy, and that's because after I eat Indian food, I feel a bit a bit heavy. So I feel Indian food is a bit heavy. That's kind of subjective, but generally speaking, it's more spicy than other cuisines, many other cuisines, so it's also spicy, and that's more related to the particular taste of the food. It's got a lot of different spices in it, and it's very hot when you eat it. Some of it is OK, so it's a bit heavy. That's my feeling. And it's spicy. How about German food? Well, German food, generally people describe as heavy and again that's because the feeling of the food people eat it. Generally, they feel it's quite heavy compared to other types of food. Like, for example, Japanese food, which people often describe, is very light, so heavy and light aren't exactly tastes their overall feelings. What about the taste of Japanese food? Well, it doesn't have a very strong taste typically, for example, like Indian food, which might be very spicy, which uses a lot of spices. Japanese food is often very simple, and you could say it's very simple. You could also say it's very mild. M i L D. Mild. If something doesn't have a particularly strong taste, it's often described as mild. Mild is a word that can also be used to describe whether you live in a place that doesn't have extremely hot weather in the summer and not extremely cold weather in the winter than maybe you live in a mild climate. So mild climate sort of not too strong, not that weak, kind of in the middle. Gentle, a bit gentle. And you could go on with other adjectives that you feel are related to particular cuisines . Sichuan food from China is famous for being very spicy and very oily. It's very oily and very spicy. You could say German food, as I mentioned, is very heavy. But you might also say that it can be a bit bland. That means no offense to German food can be a little bit boring. It's not very exciting, like, for example, like, for example, Indian food or maybe Thai food is kind of an exciting cuisine. Both of those are a bit exciting. They are that can be very spicy or Mexican food. Mexican cuisine. So, Ah, lot of these are words that you choose based on your feeling. But there are general words, common words that are associate ID associated to each type of food, for example, German food being heavy and Sichuan food being, for example, spicy and oily. Okay, so when you're talking about cuisine, use subjective adjectives and focus on the type of food, whatever you want to say about it, 149. Cooking and Cuisine - Cooking Actions: let's focus on the actions that we do to prepare food or to cook food. One interesting thing to keep in mind when we're preparing food is that whatever action or verb that we do to a particular food then changes the name of that thing. So all we do then is used the verb to say what we did to the food or the ingredient. That's the particular thing that's going to be in it like carrots or whatever. And then we add e. D to that, and it becomes an adjective becomes an adjective for that thing. And that's the new name. Okay, so let's start with cutting how we cut things. Well, you can just cut things. That's a very general word. But there are four common words that are used to describe cutting different things. There's chop, slice, dice and cube. What are the differences between these? These words Okay, so chop is generally when we don't really care about the size of whatever it is that we're cutting, but it's not usually long and thin. It's usually irregular, and we usually just doing this action on maybe a cutting board. Okay, so, for example, if you're making soup and you need a carrot that's cut into many pieces. We often call that chopped carrot, chopped carrot, chopped carrot So P P. E D. That's the action. We're doing this cutting into many pieces Now. We have chopped carrot, chopped lettuce, for example. You could have no chopped vegetables of any kind could chop meat, whatever it is. Usually we're not too focused on the exact size, and we are not too careful when we're doing it. Okay, slice is for long, thin things. Generally speaking, you have, for example, sliced tomato. So if you have a sliced tomato, you take a tomato and you cut it into long, thin pieces. That is a sliced tomato. So as I mentioned, when you do in action, then it changes the name. So put sliced tomatoes at the top or on top of the salad. Okay, so that becomes e. D. Sliced noticed the pronunciation is not duh. This one is chopped because is unveil waste. This one is sliced because is unveil waste. You don't use your voice so we say we could say sliced cucumbers. We could say sliced bread. We could say sliced ham. Whatever we need to say. But generally we're focusing on longer, thinner things rather than cutting things up in an irregular shape, which would be chopping okay, dice will. Dicing is very similar to chopping something, except the pieces will be smaller. Ticket. We went very small pieces, so if we do that to an onion that instead of having a chopped onion, maybe the sizes air this big. Now we're going to have diced onion. So chopped onion like that. A sliced onion, circular pieces generally right thin and then a diced onion. Tiny little pieces of onion they were going to put into a dish, for example. Okay, diced onion again chopped, sliced, diced the pronunciation of D for all three of these is this one will be different. Okay, now, when you cube something, this is a verb cube to cube. Cuba's also announce you cut it into the shape of a cube. So, for example, cubed beef or cubed potato notice. I'm saying Cube, why am I saying cubed and not cute like the others? I said for the others, what's because, But But this sound book uses the voice. But if we have a voiced sound that it's going to be pronounced as duh. So cubed potato and Q beef. Whatever it is, for example, for a soup that we're making is the shape generally doesn't have to be exactly off a cube, which is a three d three d square. So we're maybe a little bit more focused on what the shape is, and we care maybe more than if we're chopping something. Okay, so I hope that's pretty simple. Chopped, sliced, diced, cubed, all cutting actions. And every time you finish doing it than it is that thing e d. And then the original ingredient that you used cubed beef, chopped onion, sliced tomato, diced cucumber. Okay, I hope that's pretty simple. Now, here are some other actions that follow the same rule we have mixed, peeled and washed. XX unveil voiced. So we say it mixed peel ole voiced. So we say peeled and wash. Unveil voiced. So we say washed. Okay, So, for example, we could say mixed greens. That means the vegetables that were using are all green. Maybe lettuce. Maybe spinach, for example. Lettuce. Spinach. Okay, we have those together. That would be mixed greens. Okay. And we have peel which means we cut the skin off of something. OK, we wouldn't use that, for example, for a banana. Although the thing on the outside of a banana is a banana peel, we usually don't say peeled bananas. I guess you can, but it's not so common. Usually it's when we cut off with a knife, the outside or the skin of something. For example, peeled apples. Or, we might say, peeled potatoes, peeled potatoes. Okay, if you have peeled potatoes, then you don't have to say Peel the potatoes. You could say add peeled potatoes to whatever thing you're making. Then you don't need to say you need to peel the potatoes because in order to get peeled potatoes, you first have to peel them. Otherwise, they're not peeled, right? So that can be actually Ah, useful little tool for making a description of what you're cooking. Easier and simpler. You don't have to say things twice, Okay, obviously washed. Whatever it is, you might wash. Hopefully, you wash most things like fruit and vegetables before you before you actually eat them, For example, you could say that washed lettuce or whatever it is, whatever it is, OK, so I hope that's pretty straightforward. Now let's get into the ways that we cook things and these air that the common ones and it follows the same rule. If you do these actions, then that thing then becomes that with E. D. After it as the adjective. So baked potatoes, baked potatoes, fried potatoes, Stir fried potatoes. Yeah, maybe if we're making Chinese food. Boiled potatoes? Yeah, sure. Steamed potatoes. Maybe I don't know any steamed potatoes, but I guess it's possible Grilled potatoes. Why don't we just do a very quick example for each of these? So I will bake a potato. Now I have baked potatoes, and I have done that in an oven. I will fry mushrooms. Why not? No, I have fried mushrooms and and I will fry them in a pan. Okay, now stir fry is usually where you have constant motion, but it's kind of the same thing. Deep frying is when you put it deep in oil. Stir frying is often connected with Chinese cuisine, so I could have, for example, I could have stir fried stir fried tomato and eggs, and I might do that in a walk. It's a special sort of pan, which is bigger. It's more bold shaped. Okay, boil. They boiled and we boiled. O I l E d boiled cabbage boring. And we'll do that in a pot. Steam esteemed could have steamed dumplings. That's Chinese cuisine, and we'll steam that in a steamer. But you could also steam it in a pan, I suppose, and then grill grilled chicken and we would grill it on a hot grill. Okay, so I hope that's pretty easy. Hope that simple. Let's now go on and talk about some common cooking phrases that we can use, which are related to what we were just describing. 150. Cooking and Cuisine - Useful Cooking Phrases: So far, we've been talking about cuisine and simple actions that we may need to do when we're going to describe how to cook something that we're going to continue with a few common phrases that we can use as we're describing the process of cooking before we actually get into an example recipe. Okay, battery it in breadcrumbs. Now, batter can be a verb or noun, but it means to completely cover something in what's called batter batter. Batter is a mix of different different ingredients, so batter it in breadcrumbs, so we're going to basically roll it around in the breadcrumbs, cook on low heat for 20 minutes. So we often need to describe how hot the if we're using a burner for using a burner, how hot that is. We have low heat, and I think you can probably guess we have. Then medium heat and we have high heat, cook on high heat, cook on low heat, cook on a medium heat, and then we can say how long we should do that. Okay, but sometimes we don't know how long exactly that will take. We don't know if it's 20 minutes, right, So instead of saying how many minutes to cook it. Describe the condition, described what it should look like before you do something else. Cook until golden brown, golden brown. That's the color of it. So once it becomes golden brown, then do the next thing. Add the lettuce or whatever else you need to do. Cook it until it's golden brown. Okay, stir fry the onions and slowly add the sauce. Now to stir fry as an action is to move the food around in a pan or a walk as we talked about a walk is generally what we used to cook Chinese food. OK, and then slowly as we're doing this, we're adding Another thing were adding sauce, we're adding sought. So we're doing this and another action at the same time. So when you need to describe to actions at the same time, do it like this. Do this action right, boil it and then slowly add, or whatever you need to say that you need to do at the same time steam it for 15 minutes and let it cool. Let it cool. Okay, that's pretty straightforward. It's saying to actions in a row, you're not doing those two at the same time. First you steam it with a steamer, for example. Then you turn off the heat and then you leave it. You don't touch it for 15 minutes, then maybe you can eat it. Or maybe you do the next step. Okay, then we have these three phrases, which can allow us to basically describe a next action. Next you need to, for example, Next you need to stir fry the onions and slowly add the sauce. Whatever the next action is, it's a way to sort of move onto the next thing. Once that's done, make sure to so as a reminder, when we're describing a specific step, we can say this one. Once that's done, steam it for 15 minutes and let it cool. Once that's done, make sure to know poor little bit of soy sauce on top or whatever it is OK when it's finished Now, maybe we could talk about a specific step here or the whole thing when it's finished, serve it in a bowl or when it's finished at a little bit of sugar on top, we could say Sprinkle. We have all kinds of little words like this that you can learn separately because there are so many of them. Sprinkling is basically adding a powder, salt or sugar or something like that to the top of something grains of something or a powder of something to the top to Sprinkle with your fingers. Okay, we also use, for example, pinch a pinch is when you grab something with these two fingers. A pinch of, for example, a pinch of salt, a pinch of sugar. When it's finished, Sprinkle a few pinches of salt on top and serve it in a large serving bowl. Okay, so that's pretty simple. These air. Some common phrases Certainly not all the phrases that we could possibly talk about or use , but some of the common phrases that we'll come across when we need to describe the process of cooking a dish. 151. Cooking and Cuisine - Recipe Vocabulary: now that we've gone through the common actions and phrases that we need to describe how to prepare a particular food, we can actually get into a real example. Before we do that, I want to just cover four simple words that I think you probably already know. But I just want to make sure these are very, very clear before we get into the example thes our recipe dish servings and ingredients okay, so very quickly. The recipe is basically how to make that particular food. Whatever it may be, it includes the actions, descriptions of the actions as well as how much of each particular thing that you need. That's what a recipe is. So how much I need and what I need to do with that amount of each thing. Pretty simple. That's usually the hard part. It's basically like a computer program. Do this and then do this with this much and then do this with this much. Okay, so you just follow it step by step, and it usually includes some of the phrases that we were just talking about after that's done. When you finish that or when it's Golden brown, add, then it will say an amount. For example, a tablespoon, a teaspoon, a cup and different countries have different ways to measure things that are needed in America. We often use cups. We use tablespoons we don't usually use, for example, grams so much or milligrams. We don't use that as often. Okay, then we have ingredients. Ingredients are the things that we actually put in, what we're making. The vegetables, the meat, the spices, all of the things that we need, all the stuff. Those are the ingredients, so the ingredients go into the recipe. And once we do the recipe, then we have finished preparing a particular dish. So dish could be a little confusing. One meaning of dishes, something like a plate or a bowl. But one meaning of dish is a particular type of food, so we're going to talk about the dish we're going to talk about is stir fried tomato and eggs. It's a classic Chinese dish, okay, and maybe your country, wherever you may be from, has classic dishes, things that everybody knows. And maybe everybody knows how to cook those dishes. Or maybe at least many people know how to cook those dishes. Some people just cannot cook. And that's okay, too. Okay, now, when you're preparing dishes using a recipe with ingredients, you need to know how many people you're going to have and the reason that you need to know that is because you may need more or less ingredients. Okay, so the way that we count how much we need to make is usually by using the word servings, we might say three servings of this. If you make, for example, a box of brownies or cake on the box on the back, it says four servings. That generally means that it's enough for four people. Now the way that that's exactly calculated and measured is not so clear. But generally speaking, we're talking about how many people are going to eat. How many people need to eat that particular dish? So how many servings do we need to make while 30 servings? We need a lot of ingredients. We need a lot of ingredients. We're having a huge party tonight, 30 servings of whatever you're making. Okay, so I hope those four words are very clear, because they're very important when it comes to describing how to make a particular thing. Okay, now let's actually go into our recipe 152. Cuisine and Cooking - Recipe Example: now we know pretty much everything we need to know to actually get into the recipe. Let's first talk about the ingredients we need to make stir fried tomato and eggs, a classic Chinese dish which, actually, I really enjoy making something I can actually make To make stir fried tomato and eggs, you will need three eggs or more. If you prefer two chopped and peeled tomatoes, some people slice them. Some people cut them into wedges, sesame oil, salt, sugar, olive oil and scallions. You can add dice ginger if you like, so that's an option. It's an optional thing. Also, you'll need steamed rice on the side. Okay, so we're not gonna actually add that to the walk to the pan. But we will need it when we actually eat it. So have steamed rice on the side, so these air the ingredients. This is what we need to actually prepare our dish. Now let's get into the recipe itself, so we're gonna add two tablespoons of olive oil into a preheated walk. Remember, that's a kind of pen and wait for the oil to heat up. Next, add diced scallions to kind of like an onion and when you smell the aroma of the scallions , beat the eggs, beat the eggs and pour them into the pen once they're almost fully cooked, poor than back into the mixing bowl. So that's really Step one after we take the eggs and we pour them into the mixing bowl again. Now the walk is probably cool, so we need to reheat it. So reheat the pan and add another tablespoon of olive oil. If you're using ginger. If you're using ginger, add that, then immediately add the tomatoes and cook them until they start turning golden brown. OK, so that's the condition We're not going to use time. We're going to use a description instead of saying this many minutes because maybe you're cooking on a higher or lower temperature. Okay, until they start turning golden brown. Then put in the sesame oil a tablespoon of sugar that's a measurement of sugar, a tablespoon of sugar and a few pinches of salt to taste. If you add something to taste, that means basically, you add it until it's enough for you. Some people like saltier food. Some people like food that's less salty, so add it according to what you like. Add a few pinches of salt to taste. Finally, add the eggs into the walk and stir fry for another two minutes. So now we want to use time because we want to make sure we don't over cook the tomatoes or overcook the eggs. We're going to cook on Lee for two minutes more. Stir fry for another two minutes, Okay, and then it's done. Basically, we could say, Add the eggs back into the walk. You could say back because they've been in before and you could say Stir fry for two minutes or until and then you could make a description. If you want to do that that way, you want to make sure it's not overcooked. So, for example, if you say or until the tomatoes start getting very soft. So in other words, if they start getting very soft before two minutes, then take everything out. Sometimes having to instructions a time or a description can make sure something that you don't want toe happen doesn't happen. Finally, turn off the heat and let it cool for five minutes. Serve over steamed white rice. Okay, so just turn it off. That means turn off the burner, weaken, sometimes. Call that burner and just leave it there. Don't touch it. Then, after five minutes, you can put it on top of steamed rice. When we serve something over something that we don't mix it in, you don't want to mix it into the rice. Here's the white rice. Here's the tomato and egg on top of it, and then people can sort of mix it as they're eating it if they want to or not. That's the difference between mixing things in and serving over. Hopefully, at the end of this lesson, you feel more comfortable talking about food and how to prepare it in English. At the beginning, we talked about cuisine and how we can describe our feelings about cuisine, some common cooking actions and some useful phrases. And then we actually looked at a really recipe, including the ingredients that we need for that recipe. Now, to practice this, what I'd like you to do is write down a recipe, describe a recipe in detail, talk about the ingredients and all of the actions, the amounts, and then give it to a friend and see if it comes out OK have them make it and then maybe go over to their house and see if your description of the dish actually worked. Remember to do it on Lee in English. That's a real test of how well you're able to describe a particular food that you know how to cook. So good luck with that, and I will see you in the next lesson. 153. Picking Someone up at the Airport - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about cooking and cuisine, how to talk about different types of food and how to describe a recipe how we prepare a particular dish. In this lesson, we're going to talk about AH, situation picking someone up at the airport. Now. This is a relatively common situation, but we'll find as we go through this lesson Ah, lot of common things that happen in regular conversations with people we meet, usually for the first time, that we can also use in lots of other ways, lots of other situations. I've written a dialogue similar to what I did for the hotel class. So what we're going to do in this lesson is go through it, step by step and explore the phrases that we use at different points in the conversation. And then we also expand that and talk about how we can use those phrases, for example, in other similar situations. So actually we're learning things that can be used in a wide variety of cases, not only picking someone up at the airport, so let's begin 154. Picking Someone up at the Airport - Greetings and Breaking the Ice: before we get started with the dialogue, let's just set the scene. That means described basically, what's happening and talk about the roles or the characters involved with this little story . So one person, let's call him Mr Vincent and his first name will be David is taking a business trip to New York to visit the company where another person works the other person's name. The person who lives in New York and works at that company is Luke. Same person maybe could be me. Maybe not. And David Vincent or Mr Vincent has a wife and she's coming along now. She is not on a business trip, but she wants to come to New York. She's coming with him. She can maybe hang out, go shopping or do whatever she wants. Okay? And her name is Lydia. L Y D A. OK, so Mr Vincent or David Vincent is visiting the company where Luke works on business, for whatever reason, and Lydia is his wife. She's coming along. She's going to accompany him, okay, And Luke lives in New York. So Luke is going to actually pick up Mr Vincent or David Vincent and his wife at the airport. They have never met before. Never. Okay, so maybe they've communicated by email. They've discussed things before. They talked about details, but this is their first in person in person meeting. All right, so that's the scene. That's what's going on. And these are the characters that we will encounter in our dialogue. Let us begin. David Vincent and his wife have landed, and they've gone through to the baggage claim area to get their bags. And now they're going through the arrivals gate God, the arrivals gate where people come out. And often there are many people in front of the arrivals gate waiting for family members or whatever. If sometimes, if you're waiting for someone and you've never met them, you might have a sign that says David and Lydia Vincent. Maybe, maybe not. If you've seen a picture of each other, maybe it's not necessary. But anyway, here's Luke, with his very poorly drawn head and crazy hair and sleepy eyes waiting for waiting for the Vincent's. And he sees who he thinks are Mr and Mrs Vincent, David and Lydia Vincent coming out of the arrivals gate, and they're pulling their pulling their bags along there pulling their luggage along their luggage has wheels. Okay, And there's a certain look right. Maybe they see the sign. If there's no sign, maybe they just guess that it's the other person. But still, you need to confirm. So let's Let's go through what we need to say when we need to confirm who this person is, even though we're pretty sure okay. Excuse me. Luke might say so. This is what Luke says. Excuse me. Are you Mr Vinson? So Mr Vincent sees Luke with sign holding the sign and he walks up to the sign so clearly it is. But you still have to confirm Excuse me, Are you Mr Vinson, or just a question, Mr Vincent? Mr. Vincent. But it's very important to ask with a question tone, if you say ah, question and you don't want to use are you? That's very, very important to make sure that you add a question tone so that your voice goes in and in it, Mr Vincent. Hungry? Ready, Sleepy. Ok, very important to have that question tone. Then Mr Vincent or David says yes. Please call me David. Please call me David. You must be Luke now, this could be switched. Luke could say, you must be David, because David has walked up to the sign. So that's OK to both of these work. You must be or with a question tone. Mr. Vincent look like that it could go either way. All right. Yes, that's right. Nice to meet you. Yes, that's right. Nice to meet you. Okay, we can Then add here if we want to weaken, Say nice to finally meet you or nice to meet you. And then we could add here in person. Or we could say nice to finally meet you in person. That means we've kind of met before, but maybe we just met by email, so we didn't really meet. So we say, in person, that means face to face. So all of these can work. They can be flipped around. But these were the phrases that are typically used here. But Mrs Vincent is also here. So it's very important that she become part of the conversation right at the beginning. Because if she doesn't, then she feels left out. She feels uncomfortable and the situation will be very awkward. We want to avoid an awkward situation something that's awkward is where people who are they're talking to each other don't feel comfortable. So if Luke doesn't recognize Mrs Vincent or Lydia? Or maybe if David doesn't introduce his wife, things will get awkward very soon. Even though Luke and David are the ones who know each other who have corresponded, maybe over the last few weeks. So let's look at the phrases we use for that. So let's get Lydia involved in the conversation. Luke might say, You must be Mrs Vincent. So you could do the same thing as before, but with the person who, uh, who is with Mr Vincent. Okay, then she has to confirm I'm not gonna write l because that would be confusing to have two l's, but I am going to write M V. OK, Mrs Vincent. Yes, that's right. Good to meet you. Good to meet you. We could say nice to meet you. Pleasure to meet you. Pleasure to meet you or it's a pleasure to meet you is more formal, so be careful with that. You can say it here, but you could also say Good to meet you. And then you can use the name. Good to meet you, Luke or Mrs Vincent could say This is an alternative one. Yes, I am. You must be Mrs Vincent. Yes, I am. Yes, I am, Mrs Vincent. You can call me Lydia. You can call me Lydia. This is a good way to give people more relaxed and informal feeling in, ah, basic conversation. Especially when you've just met somebody by by saying you can call me blah, blah, blah. It makes it feel a little informal. And that's good, because then you can get to know them. And if you're always saying, Mr Vincent, this is Vincent, then it feels a little bit a little bit stiff and not unfriendly, but maybe too formal. Okay. Yes, I am. You can call me Lydia. It's nice meeting you. It's nice meeting you. Now we look at what Luke and say down here, but Luke could say, of course. Likewise. It's nice to meet you two or you two sometimes Luke, and say that as well. Now, this is what David Vincent Mr Vinson says. By the way, whenever you want to suddenly change topics, whatever it is, you want to mention something else that's unrelated. Then we can use. By the way. Now, another way to do this is to say, instead of by the way, Oh, as though you forgot something. Oh, yes. Which might make Mrs Vincent feel little uncomfortable. Like he forgot his wife. Right. So it's probably better here to use. By the way, by the way, this is my wife, Lydia. Okay. And then Luke would say Hi there. I've heard a lot about you from David. I've heard a lot about you from David. This is a common expression to use when you first met someone. And you know the person who is introducing them, whether it's a brother or a sister or a friend or ah, spouse in this case, husband or wife. Okay, I've heard a lot about you. Means maybe David has told me about his wife in our email exchanges X, the exchanges over the past few weeks. Okay, so this is also very common. It's great to meet you both. It's great to meet you both. This one could be used if Luke hasn't already said. Nice to meet you too, David. So David has said maybe you must be Luke. Yes, that's right. This is my wife, Lydia, and oh, it's it's nice to meet you both. Blue could say, Okay, so you can cover to people with one. It's nice to meet you there if if it hasn't already been said so that's possible. And then whenever you want to return what somebody says to you, you feel the same way you can say likewise. Likewise, as I mentioned up here. So if I say tonight nice to meet you both, they both say likewise. Or maybe they say it's nice to meet you. Maybe Lydia says It's very nice to meet you, and I say Likewise. Likewise, That means it's nice to meet you, too. You can use likewise in a lot of other places you could say. For example, I really like your shoes. Likewise, that means I like your shoes, too. So it's a way to say you two sort of like playing Ping Pong. Okay, Yeah, you too. Now this one is a little bit less formal. This one might be too informal for this situation, so kind of have to be careful with that, But you can say you to you, too. You could say it's nice to meet you too. All of these are okay. All right. So now all people, all three of us are in the conversation in the dialogue. Now we can continue and go to the question that we must ask if we've just picked someone up at the airport. And if you don't ask this question, it's pretty much rude. So you have to ask this question. Which question? You ask. Let's look at it. Now. If you pick somebody up at the airport, you have to ask them how the flight waas You could say, How was your flight? Or you could say, How was the flight? Both of those are okay, but you really have to ask this question. They're going to expect you to ask it. It's really just a formality. Formality is something in usually social situation. Not only but something that kind of has to be done. That's expected. Expected, basically. Okay, So how was your flight? This is this structure really an important part of speaking English naturally, in communicating with other native English speakers and in fact not not every culture uses questions to get people to tell you what they think about something. Sometimes on different different cultures. You just say your opinion. But in America, particularly American English, you have to ask questions like, How was your day? How was the flight? How was work? How's your family doing? Whatever it is? Has your job going this way? We're able to get other people to share and then start a conversation is very, very important. So in this situation, you really have to ask this. How was your flight? If you don't ask, maybe they want to talk about the flight, but they don't have a chance. They feel like they have no opportunity to share their opinion. Often, native English speakers, particularly in America, need a question as a way to begin talking about something. And even if they want to say something, they won't unless they get a question. First part of the culture. Okay, it was fine, but the in flight meal could say the food. We could also say the food, the food was really not good. Really not good or not great, or we could say terrible or we could say fantastic. If it was good, OK, but then we wouldn't say, but it was fine. But the in flight meal was really not good. The flight attendants, those are the people who work on the plane. Basically waiters and waitresses called flight attendants. That's male and female, by the way. Male flight attendants, female flight attendants were all really friendly, though. Okay, so this is a way to say, but they were all very friendly. Okay? The flight attendants were all very friendly. That made it more comfortable. What made it more comfortable? The friendly flight attendants. Okay, so we have We have a bad thing, the food. We have a good thing, the flight attendants. Okay. Anyway, anyway, this is another way to make a final comment or sometimes go on to your last. Your last point. If you're describing something or finish, at least finish what you're saying. Anyway, we're glad to finally be here, so that suggests, finally suggests it was a rather long, rather long flight. Okay. How was your flight? It was pretty good. Pretty good. Sometimes instead of using pretty good, we say something like, Well, I can't complain. OK, not bad. So So really horrible. Really horrible. Really. What? Why was it so horrible? Uh, the whole flight we had terrible turbulence. This is when the plane shakes in the air. That's a horrible flight. If that's happening the whole time, Terrible turbulence, Okay? Or we could say it was pretty good. But were we are. We're quite tired after our long trip and looking forward to a bit of rest. Now what that tells me, if I'm picking them up is they want to go back to their hotel and maybe take a nap or just hang out for a little while and do nothing because they feel tired. Okay, so I might want to say that next. Because I have recognised. That's what they want because they're looking forward to a bit of rest. Now, if this is an international flight and they've come from another country at least six or seven hours away, then maybe we can talk about something called jet lag and jet lag is the idea of because you live in another place far away. You in your mind believe you feel that it is a different time. So where you arrived? It's seven PM, but maybe you feel it's only noon, depending on where where you are or maybe you feel instead of it. being 7 p.m. Maybe you feel it's 7 a.m. This is called jetlag. I I am so jet lagged. I am so jet lagged. I really need to just sleep. So jet lag is how we describe that feeling of our brain thinking it's a different time than it actually is. 155. Picking Someone up at the Airport - Making Suggestions: so far in our dialogue about Luke picking up Mr and Mrs Vincent at the airport. We've made the basic introductions and gone through the can say the basics, asking how the flight waas Now we need to actually recommend or suggest what to do next. Luke needs to say what the choices are. Now. I want to mention one point about American culture in particular. It's usually a good idea to offer options or ask whether what you're suggesting is okay. If you say we're going to do this and then we're going to do this and then we're going to do this and then we're going to do this. Generally speaking, Americans will feel like they're trapped and they don't have a choice. And that could be an uncomfortable feeling now. It's not true in every culture, certainly, but that's generally the idea in America. So I would recommend if you find yourself in a situation like this with Americans, offer some options, give a few choices or make one recommendation, and then at the end, just ask if that's okay, which is pretty easy to do. Let's look at how we can do that. Okay? So how about? We go to your hotel first. This is Luke speaking. Okay, this is Luke speaking. How about we go to your hotel first so that you can unpack? Okay. Unpack means take your stuff out of your bag. Maybe put your your coat on the hangar. And if you take your shoes out of your bag, whatever you need to do, unpack your bags and relax for a while. Okay? That's a recommendation. Then we can meet the others and have dinner. Maybe around eight. So we do have a question there at the end. Maybe around eight. Now, if they wanted to, they could say, Well, we're really not feeling up to or in the mood for going out and having, ah, dinner tonight. So maybe we can just relax at the hotel. All right, that's fine. That's fine. Okay. Or sorry to hear about the flight. Maybe They said it's a terrible was terrible flight. Had turbulence the whole time. I was sorry to hear about the flight. Now we need to change the topic anyway. Very good way to do that. Anyway, I hope you enjoy your stay in New York, so I'm trying to shift the discussion. Shift the conversation to a more optimistic or positive light. Okay. Trying to push it into more optimistic territory. Okay, an optimistic space. Anyway, I hope you enjoy your stay in New York. I think we can go to the hotel first so that you can unpack your bags and rest for a bit. Does that sound good? So this is a straight recommendation. This is what I'm saying we should do. Then I want to confirm it. So you want to avoid saying we will go to your hotel so that you can rest for a bit? How about makes it sound softer? And then does that sound good? Allows them to confirm that that's OK. And if it's not, then they can say so. Now, sometimes we want to give several choices. Maybe maybe they want to go to the hotel. Maybe they want to eat right away. That I can ask, Would you rather this is a great way to offer options? Would you rather go out on, have lunch and then go to the hotel or go directly to the hotel so that you can rest? Then they can say what they want to do. Okay, now, generally, in this situation, if I say, what do you want to do next? It's a little weird because, well, we're at the airport, so we're not going to just stay here. I guess you could say something like, Well, where would you like to go? But in this situation, it's better to offer choices. Would rather go to the hotel now or have lunch first. Okay, give some options. All right, this is how we do that. Finally, Lydia or David says, Yep. Sounds perfect. What sounds perfect. This plan. This thing I'm suggesting sounds perfect. I like the plan. Anytime you like a plant, you can say, Sounds perfect. We learn that with the with the lesson about inviting friends. We want to change and take a shower as well. Okay as well. Change means to change your clothes. Then dinner sounds great. Dinner sounds great. What do you mean? Dinner sounds great. Well, what it really means is going to dinner. Sounds great. Want to grab a coffee? Coffee sounds great. Coffee sounds great. Well again. Yes, it is a noun, but what you're really saying is it sounds great to me the idea of going to get a cup of coffee, but it's just a simple way to say that 156. Picking Someone up at the Airport - Currency and Phone Service: What if the Vincent's are not from America? What if there from England or some other country? Well, then we have some other things to deal with. So let's say that Mr and Mrs Vincent, Lydia and David are from the UK, and their phones do not work in the United States. And I'm thinking about this because because meat, I'm not me, Uh, Luke. Sorry. Luke is thinking about this because he's a very thoughtful person. So he asks them or needs to talk about whether or not they need to get sim cards in the airport. One good place to get a SIM card is the airport. You don't have to. If you need to get a SIM card, you might go to maybe, ah, shop in the downtown area. That might be okay to Maybe it's cheaper there. But let's just look at how we can describe that if we need to. How can we ask Mr and Mrs Vincent about this? So here are the questions. Do you have phone coverage here? Coverage is what we use when we talk about whether or not we're able to get a signal and it doesn't have to be going to another country. It could mean, for example, that there's no signal where we are now. Even if we're in our own Our own country, maybe because we're out of range were underground, were in the desert. Whatever. There's no coverage here. There's no coverage. Maybe in the desert. I can't get a signal underground. So anyway, we can say it. In this case, do you have phone coverage here? Here means maybe if they're from another country, this means in the U. S. A. Because they're in New York. Okay. Or do you need a local SIM card while we're still at the airport? This suggests still at the airport that this is a good place to get it a good place to get it. Where still here means we're going to leave soon. Okay, We're still here. That means we're about to go. Does your SIM card work in the States? Sometimes we call America just the States. The USA. We just say the States, the United States of America does your SIM card work in the States? Does it function? Does it function in the States? Okay, so this is a common question that we will ask in this sort of situation. Or if you have maybe a friend who is a guest in your country on maybe they're staying at your home. Whatever similar situations you might need to help them. And you'll ask this question. These three are quite common, and you can ask variations of these as well. Now, this might come after we've started walking to the car. So I just want to mention, by the way, if it's time to do that right, we've done the introductions. We've talked about how the flight waas we've said the plan. Well, then we're going to say, All right, all right. Well, well, um, I've I've got the car parked outside. Shall we? Shall we? That means Shall we go now? It's a very common question when you want to recommend what we do. Well, I've got the car parked outside. Shall we or are? Are you ready to head head out? Now? Head out just means go. So we could just say that or we could add to the car. You ready to head out to the car or or another one? We could say, Shall we? Shall we go? I'll take that I'll take that. Lydia. Take what? Her bag. She's carrying a bag. It's very polite if you pick someone up at the airport to take, especially if it's Ah, lady to take a lady's back. Very polite. I'll take that video. Or can I take that for you? If you want to ask it. Can I take that for you? Lydia? She might say, Oh, no, that's okay. I've got it. I've got it or it's no trouble. It's no trouble. That's okay. Thanks anyway, if you want to refuse someone politely. Thanks anyway. Thanks anyway. I'm okay. I'm okay. Finally, we could say, Please follow me. We can go out to the car. Please follow me. Please follow me. Or sometimes after me, please. After me, please. Or if you want to be very informal. Well, let's go. Let's go. Although that is pretty informal. Usually we use Let's go with friends. Ready? Yeah. Let's go. Let's go. So anyway, we're walking along in the airport and I've asked the question, Do you need a local SIM card while we're still at the airport? And one of them answers. Maybe it's Lydia. Actually, I think we will need to get at least one, and then she might turn to her husband and say Right, David or baby? He says, Actually, I think we will need one. Or maybe two. Do you need one? Maybe they need to talk with each other as well. Okay, but I think we will need at least one means Yes. Let's stop and buy one here at the airport where okay, Actually means they don't need one were Okay. Actually, our plan works abroad. What does plan mean? While your plan refers to what you have in your home country, either for internet or your phone, it's often called a calling plan. Or sometimes it's called a data plan. Or sometimes it's called a service plan. The company that provides your service is sometimes called a service provider. Sometimes in America, for example, T Mobile, A, T and T, the's companies are also called carriers carriers. Okay. Cellphone carriers anyway were okay. Actually, this is a way to say no. Would you like some chocolate? I'm OK. Actually, Would you like a piece of pizza? I'm OK, actually. Do you need me to help you with that bag? I'm okay. Actually, it's a great way to say no very politely. We can also say I'm good, but that's less formal. We can say I'm fine. Actually, it means No, it's very, very nice way to say no. And, uh, it's really easy. Okay? Our plan is what we pay for each month to our carrier. Maybe maybe for our phone abroad works abroad abroad just means in other countries, not your own country. Not your local country, not just domestically. Domestically just means in your own country. Domestically. We may also need to maybe ask a question about exchanging currency, exchanging money, exchanging cash if they haven't done that before, before they left. If they haven't exchanged their money into, for example, us dollars, then they may need to do it on arrival toe. Ask that Luke will say, Do you need to exchange any cash or money or currency while we're here again? Same question. While we're in the airport, it's a good idea to do it before you get out of the airport. That's a travel tip, actually, Yes, I'd like to says maybe David. Yes, I'd like to again, if they've already done it, David might say No. We already have some local money or we've already done it. Or we did it before we left. Okay, maybe they're very responsible. Prepare? Well, actually, yes, I'd like to. Would you recommend using an A T M or going to an exchange counter? So sometimes you can get cash using a credit card, even if it's not in your country, go to the A TM. Put it in credit card and you get local currency. It takes it out of your own, maybe credit from from your own currency. Maybe there's a feat. That's what I usually do, by the way, because I'm a little bit lazy about that kind of thing. OK, so would you recommend using an ATM or going to an exchange counter? This is the one that you usually find in the airport. Now it's probably better to do exchanging in the airport because you don't usually find exchange counters around around the city sometimes depending on where you are. But the airport is a good location for it. Okay, now what should we recommend? Well, we could say I would recommend or my suggestion is we could say my suggestion is or would be to just use the A T M. It's very convenient. Just use your credit card or I'd I would recommend going to an exchange counter because it's just over there. It's just over there, or there's one right over there. Sometimes we say right over there if it's nearby, right over there, the exchange rate is pretty good. Exchange rate means the amount of local currency you get from your own currency means money , right? The local currency you get and the exchange rate goes up and down. If we say it's a good exchange rate, that means you get more money from your money. Basically. Okay, if it's a bad exchange rate than kind of lose money, okay. And also we could talk about fees. Exchange rate is nothing about what you pay to the people at the counter. The exchange rate is just the value of your money compared to the value of the money you're getting. The feed is what you pay extra. So I could say, if I want to talk about fees, the exchange rate is pretty good right now, and maybe the fees the fees there over there at that counter are low. The fees are low That means they don't charge very much. Okay, thanks. That means he has David has accepted my recommendation. Okay, So this is something that comes up sometimes? Not as often, maybe as the phone situation. But whenever you need to help somebody who's come to your country, this is how you would express basically whether or not they need to get local money. 157. Picking Someone up at the Airport - Small Talk in the Car: Now we've been through basically the whole dialogue, how we can deal with picking somebody up at the airport, The things we need to say and how to be polite. Now the hardest part could be the car ride home. So before we finish this lesson, I just like to talk about how we can make conversation on the way home. If we have a 30 minute car ride, we need to have something to talk about. And it's a great opportunity for us, me, Lydia and David to get to know each other better, because before all I've had our emails back and forth with David. Okay, now in the airport, we were just talking about essential stuff, stuff we need to talk about, like how their flight waas, whether or not they need a SIM card or they need to exchange currency or they want to go to their hotel. That's the basic stuff. Now we can actually have a conversation. I don't want to talk too much about this because we really did focus on the important aspect of it when we were doing our lesson about asking good questions right, However, let's just go through a few things we can say and I want to mention one or two questions, which are kind of standard, but in my opinion, not that interesting. So anyway, they might ask me questions. Not sorry, Luke questions. Not me. They might ask blue questions on the car ride home. I'm driving. Maybe it's 30 minutes or 40 minutes to downtown. I don't know why I'm driving like this. I guess the car is going like this to with Insane Driver. I don't even have my driver's license. Okay, so they might ask me questions and I can, of course, talk about New York, and I can talk about my job, but I can ask them some questions, too. So, Lydia, uh, what plans do you have while you're here in New York? She's not here on business, so it's a good opportunity to know what she wants to do. Then we might be able to continue a conversation if she says, Oh, I'd really like to love la, blah, blah, blah or I don't know. Then I can recommend something, and we can get a conversation going. Or I could ask David a similar question. I could say David, after we finish every day. Do you have any plans? Or I could say, David, besides work. What would you like to do while you're here in New York? We can have a conversation about that. That's a whole conversation that could take the whole 30 minute car ride. So, Lydia, what do you do? Is a very common question. I know David's job because he's here for business, but I don't know what Lydia does. So maybe I can ask this and this means What is your job, Lydia? Maybe she says, Oh, I'm just a housewife. Okay, so then we can talk about that, Or maybe she has a job. Then we can talk about that. Okay. This is just the beginning of a conversation. So is this one. I like this one very much. This is what I will usually ask. Okay, Uh, you mentioned in your email, David, that you have two Children. So are they in school or now Notice? I don't really finish the question here. This is an interesting way to ask a question that we know other people would like to talk about. You know what people love talking about their Children. So If you know they have Children, they will probably go on and on and tell you about their Children for 40 minutes. And that's fine. That's great. So by just say eso are they in school? Or it's like saying I'm giving you permission to start talking about them. But you would only use this if you know that the other person probably has a lot to say. If you're not sure, then don't use this style of sentence can be risky, because if you say or and then they have nothing to say that it can be very awkward. Okay, so you can use it, but only if you know they have a lot to say. I love to hear more about your life and your family in London. Maybe they're from from London. Okay, this is a similar question, but I'm not suggesting that I know anything about their background. This is more of a statement, but it's really a request for information. This question, in my opinion, is a little bit boring. I'm not crazy about this one because it's not really focused. Your life talk about your life. They could really talk about anything. So on one hand. It might be good if there's something they would like to talk about. On the other hand, it might not be so good if they don't really know where to begin. Okay, So I could start with this. Have you ever tried really New York pizza? Okay, then if they say no, then I can recommend some places, or if they say yes, I can ask them what kind of pizza they've had, and we can talk about that. I love talking about New York pizza. I can talk about that for three hours. So what do you think about New York so far? Now, this question you have to be careful about, because if we're just driving home Sorry to the hotel and they have barely been in New York . Really? Then they don't really have any impression of New York. So you have to be careful. We might want to use this one after. Maybe they've been here for a day or two. Then I meet them for dinner after they've been in New York for a couple days, and I say so. What do you think of New York so far? That might be a better question in that situation. OK, so David So, David, do you follow any sports? Now? This question I find to be very boring personally, but honestly, a lot of people do ask it, So I'm including it because it's a common discussion question. It's a common question that comes up in regular conversations when you've met somebody new and you're trying to get to know them, talk about sports, maybe talk about movies. It's OK, but personally, I think it's a little boring. Now you might have heard. What about the weather, Right? So we might ask. So how's the weather in London this time of year? How's the weather in England this time of year? You can say it. People say it personally. I never asked this question because it's so boring. But anyway, people do say it. So that is how we deal with picking somebody up at the airport, going through small talk with them and handling the essentials, the important things we need to handle and having discussions or a least a polite conversation with them on the way back to the hotel on the way downtown. Now that we've been through all of the phrases and things you can say in the picking up someone at the airport dialogue. I'd like you to practice it. I'd like you to record yourself doing all of the different roles in the dialog. Think about it in this lesson. I've done all the roles. I've recorded it. You're watching it, right? So you can do it by yourself. I'm I'm doing it by myself. I'm here in this room, right doing this by myself so you can play all of the roles and imagine that you're picking someone up at the airport who you've never met before and try to make it interesting. Tried a couple times. Go back, listen to the recording. See if you can make corrections, find mistakes and then try it again. Try it again. It's a great way to practice. All right. Good luck. And I will see you in the next lesson. 158. Explaining Information - Overview: in the last lesson. We talked about different phrases we can use when we're picking somebody up at the airport . Very important social situation. And this lesson. We're going to talk about how to describe data in graphs. So usually when we express or want to show a large amount of data, which means information and communicate that to someone, we don't just say all of the different numbers or all of the different facts that we want to say we represent it or show it in a graph or or a chart were some type of we could say visual ization. Visualization is a way to show something in a way that people can see right so that people can easily understand it. Maybe they can understand it in a more intuitive way. Well, let's say you're in a meeting and you want to communicate what you're seeing in a chart or a graph, because maybe there's somebody on the phone. It's important to be able to express information simply and say what you're looking at. Now we've We've worked on that early in this course we talked about, for example, the house, so we described that, but what about when it's a graph. Well, in this lesson, we're going to be focused on how we can do that. How we can express what we're looking at. A data visualisation. Now, this may sound very difficult. The best way I think for me to show you a way to do this is to do an example. So what we're going to do is we're going to look at a look at a graph and we're going to then talk about what it means. First, we're gonna go through some keywords, some useful, some useful words. Then we're going to actually look at the graph, and we're gonna talk about how we can describe what's going on there. I'm going to give you a clear example. Then we'll go over a few phrases we can use to express an analysis of that. What it means, really, If we start asking deeper questions now, this part is actually the more challenging part. But also, I think, the more the more interesting part. So let's get started with some of the vocabulary, and then we will look at the graph 159. Explaining Information - Key Vocabulary: Now, some of these things that we're going to look at will make a little bit more sense once we actually look at the graph. But I just want to go over some of the basic words we need to know before we get into the description. So 1st 1 analysis well, analysis is a noun. Analyze is the verb form. Analysis means you study something and then you decide what it could mean and you interpret it. You don't just look at it and say, What's there? You look at it, maybe say what's there, and then ask yourself, So what does this tell me about the world? What does this tell me about this topic? Whatever it may be. So analysis kind of means studying something more deeply, thinking about something more deeply and telling yourself or telling others what it actually means on a higher level. So you would look at data study data, analyzed data and then hopefully come to ah higher or better understanding of the topic, where your own opinion may be OK now, fertility. This might not make sense. Now why am I talking about this? But this just means it's related to birth women giving birth. We're gonna look at a graph that shows fertility. That means the number of babies born how many babies are born. So when we hear things like fertility rate, we're talking about usually how many Children women give birth to. Maybe in a country, maybe in a city, what's the fertility rate? And that's gonna be an average case, on average, an average. Okay, I think you know what an average is. If you add them all together and divide by the total number, you have the average fertility rate. Okay, Trends now a trend is usually a way to talk about the direction that something is happening in. Now. One way to talk about a trend is toe is to discuss fashion. It was very cool. Right now. This is a trend. This is a trend. But you could also talk about trends like this. Well, every summer, maybe the price of this type of clothing gets more expensive, and it happens every year. So it didn't just happen once. Okay, so that's a trend. So something happens on a more regular basis. What happens more frequently or it's easy to predict that it will happen again. Usually we use this word. It's used also in the fashion sense to their related, but not exactly the same. Okay, so analysis fertility, By the way, the opposite of fertility, just to mention that quickly, is mortality. Mortality is related to the opposite of birth, which is death. So if you ever hear someone say high mortality, you're talking about a lot of people dying GDP per capita. Now, I guess you probably know GDP. This is gross domestic product, and this represents basically how wealthy a country is. Sometimes you'll see GDP per capita. Don't be confused. It's pretty simple, actually. Let's imagine that. Let's imagine that in a year a country makes 1000 dollars. Let's say this country has 1000 people so that GDP per capita is one. So basically all you do is you take the total GDP and you divide by the total number of people. Then you have the GDP per capita. So on average, how much money does each person have in a year? Basically, that's GDP per capita, and some people say it's not a good way to judge how much money people have because you could have five people with billions of dollars and a 1,000,000 people with $10 Right? So maybe not the best way to talk about how much money everybody has. But it's a It's a way to measure the wealth. We could say the wealth or status of a country's economy. OK, decline and drop. Now, if you see something going down, there's less of something less money, less people, whatever it may be, we often say there is a decline in that. For example, recently we've seen a decline in violence, a decline in violence. Violence means maybe crime where people get hurt. Okay, Why, Oh, maybe there, I don't know. Maybe their arm or police. Maybe the culture is changing. Whatever it Maybe there's a decline in violence, but that doesn't tell us how quickly that's happening. It may be over 10 years unless we say how long that is. We could say over a six year period, there was a major decline in violence. Okay, if it's sudden, though, then we'll probably use the word drop. And we might even say, a sharp, a sharp drop. Its if its sudden. If you look at a graph and it goes straight down to say a sharp decline. You could say that or a sharp drop or a drop doesn't have to be over a period of time. It could be, well, anything. On a graph that goes like this group, you could say a sharp drop. And the opposite of that would be rise. A sharp rise in crime, a sharp rise in income. How much money people make. For example, Sharp suggests it looks like this. The line in the graph looks like this. So I think this will make more sense. Once we actually look at the graph. Let's just take a look at it. Talk about what it means. Then we'll look at how we can actually describe it. 160. Explaining Information - The Graph: All right. So let's look at the graph. And I'm going to ask you to remember it because, well, remember the the basic idea of it, because I'm going to get rid of it to go over the example of how we describe it because I don't have that much room on the screen. Okay. Um, so total fertility rate that means the number of babies born and GDP per capita. We know what that means. OK, now, here we have on this graph, we have the total fertility rate over here. That means the number of Children per woman in what those cities states. What? Well, there's Saudi Arabia. There's Israel. So it's going. It's going to be countries. It's gonna be countries. Okay, so each dot is a country. We can know that because we see that these two dots are countries. Okay. And maybe you can look up where your country is. What is the GDP per capita of your country? What is the fertility rate of your country? May be interesting to look up to research. Look up means research. OK, so and by the way, I'm just getting this information from the Internet. If it's incorrect. For some reason, I apologize, but we're using it for the example to describe the data because we need to know how to do this. All right, now we have the fertility rate here and on the that's called the Y axis. And on the X axis y axis on the X axis, we have the GDP per capita, and this is in U. S. Dollars, and the year we can see is 2004. So this information comes from 2004. So we have here we could say very, very poor countries, low GDP per capita. Wealthier countries up to 40 looks like about 41,000 dollars GDP per capita. And then on the side of the poor countries. You have generally higher fertility rate. That means Mawr. Women are having mawr babies. Okay, Women are having more babies on average, and then you can see a sharp drop or a sharp decline in the number of babies that women have as the GDP per capita increases. Now, if that's complicated and you can't understand what I'm saying, don't worry. We're going to go over it in text. I'm gonna read through the example that I've made to describe this, and hopefully it will be very clear. I'm using this as a way to show you the language we can use to describe visualizations to describe charts, graphs, data. Okay, So I hope I hope you can sort of take a mental picture of this and notice the trend here. Notice that these countries are the poor countries. The wealthier countries over here noticed that we have two countries here in the middle. And notice these numbers of nine at the top here. 45,000 at the top or at the farthest end over here. Okay, so take a mental picture. Ready? 123 All right, let's now go on and talk about how we can describe this. No analysis yet. We're not going to talk about what it means yet, but we're going to talk about how to describe it clearly. 161. Explaining Information - Describing the Graph: Now let's get into the actual description of this graph of this data. Remember, our goal is to help someone who's hypothetically on the phone in our meeting. Visualize what we're seeing. They can't see it. We can see it. We need to make it clear what it is. We're seeing the first sentence, just like our previous description. Class is, it is very important now. We don't need to use so many adjectives because we want to be as clear and simple as possible. But we do need to very clearly state what the relationship is between the why and the X axis. That's probably the most important. Once we say that, then we can go into some trends that we see and we can talk about the shapes right, the structure of the points on the graph. So let's let's look at it. This graph shows the relationship between the total fertility rate or Children per woman, the total for fertility rate in countries around the world and the GDP per capita off those countries in 2004. There is a sharp drop in the fertility rate of poor countries between zero and about $5000 GDP per capita. When the GDP is low, the fertility rate tends to be high. In general, wealthy countries tend to have fewer Children per woman, or we could say have a lower fertility rate. Okay, there are far more countries near the lower end of the graph in terms of GDP and relatively few at the higher end. We don't actually have to say that last part. We couldn't leave it out because if there are the majority in the lower end, then that means that there aren't that many in the in the higher end. Remember, there are a few over here in the wealthier countries and a lot of them over here. Okay, but sometimes it helps just to be extra clear to state exactly what you're seeing, even if it might be a little redundant. Okay, let's just go through that one more time with a little bit more breakdown. The graph shows that means this is what I'm looking at. This is what it's telling me. Okay? We can't say tells. We have to say shows shows. Okay, you could say I can see on the graph, but I think this is probably a better way the graph shows keyword there the relationship. That's the best word to use when we're talking about two things you and me. We're talking about the relationship between us we're talking about, Ah, y and and X, or talking about the relationship between the Y in the X relationship means they have some connection to each other, right? It suggests that they're not completely independent. That means if you change one, you change the other. That's what relationship means Doesn't just mean that I'm putting them on this graph. It means, Hey, there's something here a correlation that we can talk about we can discuss. Okay, This graph shows the relationship between the total fertility rate. Now, if you want to say the number of Children per woman, that's OK. You can say the number of Children per woman if you're simplifying it. But because you actually see fertility rate on the graph, it's better to use that term. Better to use what you see. Okay, if you want to clarify something, though, all you have to do is add or and then say the other way to say it. Total fertility rate or number of Children born per woman in countries around the world. OK, we could say all countries around the world, but actually we don't know if it's all countries. It probably is. But it doesn't really say that, does it And the GDP per capita of those countries. So that helps us make it clear that the relationship is between this and this we're not talking about different countries, makes it very clear. We use those to reference to talk about the previous countries that we said, Okay, then we just say the date in 2000 for when did this data come out? Basically, we don't know. We don't know when exactly. They did the study when they got the information, but this comes out in 2004. That's that's the the year we have. Okay, there is a sharp drop in the fertility rate of poor countries between zero and about $5000 because if you remember, it's shaped like this, we need to help that person on the phone visualize this. If we say there is a gradual a gradual decline, the feeling will be like this. If we say sharp decline, that's still not so clear because it could be like that could be like that could be like that. So if we say numbers, even if it's about we help clarify. Okay, Weaken, say, around 5000 between zero and around 5000 or about 5000 GDP. If we wanted to add the highest number, we could say the highest is around $41,000. That's okay, too. If we don't need to say that and we can leave it out, we're still just trying to describe basically what we see here. When the GDP is low. Now we're talking about It's not quite analysis, but we are talking about a specific trend that we can see. We're talking about what happens when this thing happens. Okay, When the GDP is low, the fertility rate tends to be high. That is a trend. So if there is a trend we often use, the word tend to describe it. It is a trend that when the GDP is low, the fertility rate is high. It tends to be high. Don't be confused between 10 and trend there used to usually talk about the same kind of thing tends to be high in general. In general. That helps us say, Well, it's not always true. Maybe, I don't know. But it seems to be true. It looks to me like when the country is wealthier, when there's more money or the GDP is higher than there are not that many Children. That's interesting. Okay. But we can use in general to say I'm not saying everyone is like this. I'm just trying to communicate what I see here in general, wealthy countries tend to have fewer Children per woman. Okay? Or we could say fertility rate. In general, wealthy countries tend to have a lower fertility rate. Same thing. There are former move. There are far more countries near the lower end of the graph, so we could talk about the high end and the low end. What does that mean exactly? Well, usually, when we say end, we're talking about the X axis, not the Y axis, usually usually on the low end, will be closer to zero. The high end will be the higher number. That's very useful phrase. The low end and the high end. Very useful. This is to help us talk about a maybe a spectrum, remember, from here to here. Okay, so There are far more countries near the low or lower end of the graph in terms off GDP. Now, in terms of, is to help us clarify which exact thing we're talking about in terms of wealth, in terms of Children per woman in terms of what, So if we want to clarify exactly what it is that is this way at the low end is going to be GDP per capita in terms of you can use to talk about well, this is my topic in terms of wealth. Yet maybe maybe this country is doing quite well. But in terms off equality not so well on in terms off nutrition again, not so well. But in terms off the quality of entertainment, then you can talk about whatever you want to talk about, to say if something is good or bad in a specific place. I love to visit. For example, I love to visit San Francisco in terms of interesting things to do. It's awesome, but in terms off, maybe cost. It's not so awesome. It's very expensive in terms of cost and relatively few at the higher end. So this is a very simple way to describe this graph we could ADM or we could talk about the highest country being at around 41,000 GDP per capita. We could include that. If we wanted to do that, we would say simply, the highest country or the country with the highest GDP per capita is at around $41,000 the average Children per woman there is about to Okay, so if we want to say that, we certainly can, saying what's at the end might be useful in some cases so that it's clear what is the highest number. Sometimes that can help. So I hope from this description you can pick out some of the useful phrases that we can use to talk about graphs and always imagine that even if it's not the situation, imagine that you're describing it to someone who can't see it. That will force you to use very clear language. And I think if we use this description and say it over the phone to somebody, or for some reason someone is closing their eyes, they can get a pretty good picture of what we're talking about. If we use this description, they can get a good image in their mind. What does this graph look like? Next? We're going to talk a little bit about how we might analyze this graph. How we might break it down, break it down, can say break, break it down. Remember, analyze means to talk about maybe what it means, even though it might be a guess. So let's let's see what that could look like just for fun. 162. Explaining Information - Graph Analysis: now just for fun. Let's try to analyze this graph a little bit. Let's take the trends that we can see and talk about what they might mean. The most obvious thing is that there is that sharp decline and also the fact that in poor countries with a very low GDP, the fertility rate is extremely high, much, much higher than in countries that tend to have, ah, higher GDP per capita. That's quite shocking. It's not a small difference, almost nine over here and only one or two on the other side. Why is that? That's the interesting thing that I would want to analyze. So this is just a example and notice that I'm going to put phrases in here that make it clear that it's my opinion or I'm just guessing that it's not extra research I'm doing. I'm just kind of thinking about it and wondering why I'm using some language in here that lets you know that I am just doing my own analysis and giving my own opinion. Since many people in poor countries, our farmers, having more Children means having more workers to do manual labor, manual labor is often work with your hands like farm work. OK, which means the farm can be more successful. That means, I'm guessing. I'm guessing that in countries that are poor, maybe people want to have more Children because if they have more Children, those Children can work. And if they can all work, then the farm could be more successful. Just guessing. I think the fertility rate is also high due to poor living conditions and insufficient insufficient means. Not good enough. Not sufficient sufficient means. It's enough. It's enough sometimes if something is enough, we say that's sufficient, although that's quite formal, insufficient not enough due to insufficient basic healthcare and nutrition in Third World countries, Third World countries, we're usually talking about countries that are quite poor. So I know that in many Third World countries, in some places, not all places there are poor conditions, living conditions, and in fact, maybe people are hungry, sometimes starving. Sometimes there's disease and because maybe babies can't eat enough or there's no basic healthcare. You have high mortality, which is very sad. But again, I'm just guessing here. I'm just guessing that because because high mortality is caused by the poor living conditions, maybe women need to have more Children to compensate. So if you have high mortality than maybe you need to have more babies to meet that and balance it, we can say compensate. Two. Compensate for something is if you have too much of this, you need doom or of this just to make it balanced. I think the fertility rate is also high due to poor living conditions and insufficient basic healthcare and nutrition in Third World countries. It tells me again, this is a phrase that lets you know it's my opinion. It tells me that infant mortality is high, so I'm just saying in many cases young babies infants die because they don't have enough Nutrition tells me that infant mortality is high. Women need to have more Children just to compensate. It's really tragic. Tragic means is it's very sad. It's a terrible thing. Perhaps in developed countries, developed countries are countries that maybe have a higher standard of living, or maybe a higher GDP per capita, perhaps in developed countries like Canada or the U. K. The average number of Children per woman is low due to the high cost of raising and educating Children now that one, I can say more confidently. I mean, I can still use the word perhaps, perhaps lets you know that it is a guess. And it's just my opinion notice. I'm using things like, I think, and perhaps and it tells me to give you a feeling of Yeah, this is just my view, my opinion. But still I can be a little more confident about that end thing because I can see it around me, right? I know how expensive it is to have kids here. You have to send them to school, and it's costs a lot of money. Okay, so the average number of Children per woman is low due to because off the high cost of raising and educating Children. Okay, so that's just one way to analyze when you're doing the analysis. I would recommend using those phrases to show that it is subjective. And don't just state your opinion. Make sure you're referencing the data. You're referencing the graph. They are talking about countries with the low GDP or countries with a higher GDP. You're talking about what you've just described. And having that link is very important, because if there's no link or connection between your analysis and the original data and the graph, then people might begin to feel confused. So, you know, maybe this class is a little bit difficult, but I encourage you to try this out a few times. And if you get used to it, I think you'll find that it's actually interesting to try to analyze graphs and see why is it this way? Why is this data like this? Also, if you could describe this clearly, you will be the hero at meetings. You'll be able to clearly communicate things that might not be that easy for some other people to communicate, and that will make you a very powerful speaker. As always. Of course, it's very important to practice and practice makes perfect could also say, perfect practice makes perfect. What I'd like you to do is find a graph or some sort of data visualization based on your interest or based on your career, perhaps, and then describe it. Describe the data points, talk about what the whole thing looks like, and again, imagine that you're talking to someone who cannot see it. Then give a simple analysis. Make sure to use subjective phrases to show that it's your opinion. But also make sure to reference things from the graph or the chart or whatever it is you're looking at. Practice this, record it and then go back and listen to it and see if you can correct yourself. Good luck. I'll see you in the next lesson. 163. How to Debate - Overview: in the last lesson, we talked about how to describe data, how to describe graphs. In this lesson. We're going to focus on debates. Debate is when two sides disagree on something and they need to argue their side or make a case, we're gonna work on some useful phrases. We're going to talk about the purpose of a debate. We're going to talk about how we can make a point, use analogies and also concede a point. And then we're going to look at a real example two sides of a debate issue. So I hope you've enjoyed the course up to this point. This will be our last full lesson. Hope. You've noticed that my hair has gotten longer throughout the course, and I wonder if you've asked yourself. I wonder how many times he's had toe wash this shirt and this shirt during the course. Theano sir is probably about 15. I've been shooting this course over the last couple months, in fact, and I have tried to make my appearance about the same throughout the course to make it consistent. So I hope you've enjoyed the course. I hope you've got a lot out of it. to this point, and I hope that once we're finished with this course, you can go out there and actually use all of the stuff that you've learned anyway. Let's get started with our last full lesson on how to debate. 164. How to Debate - Reasons to Debate: before we really get started and talk about the phrases that we need to have a debate, we should talk about why we would have a debate. One. Why is it useful for an English learner to practice this? And two, Why is it useful in general toe? Have a debate? Well, the answer to the first question is, if you have to debate, you're not only, for example, giving a presentation and explaining an idea, you have to listen to what other people say. Process that and then think very quickly of how to respond in a way that makes their side look weaker and your side look stronger. That's generally what a debate is all about. You have to do it clearly if to use everything that you know your ability to describe your ability to maybe express data or technical details. Organize your thoughts. This can be very challenging, but by practicing this and I would recommend having debates as often as you can. By practicing this, you're going to really develop the ability to have quick conversations, get back to people right away and have a discussion where you have to engage your mind So it's a great way to actually practice your English language spoken English language abilities. But on the other side of that, a debate is useful in many other many other situations. Many other cases imagine you have a company or you're in a company and you're going to launch a product. Okay, launch a product. And maybe there's a question about what? Feature Tow launch. OK, so let's say a feature is one of the things a product may have. Okay, let's say that if you add the feature, let's call it feature A. It's going to take two more months before the product can be launched, and if you don't have the feature, you can launch it right away. But then it won't have the feature, and maybe it's not as attractive to customers. So one thing you could do is set up a debate in may be your team where you have two sides to people. Your job is to argue that we launched in two months with the feature. Your job is to argue that we launch now without the feature, and we will decide maybe, or it will help the person who's going to make the decision decide soon, faster or at least with a better understanding off the pros and cons off each side. So it could be a very, very valuable thing. Having a debate in companies in groups, sometimes even with friends okay, so weakened by having a debate, maybe explore all possible Avenue's. This is a common expression. It means, I don't know all of the possible ways that this thing can be done. So I'm going to have a debate to help me figure out what possibilities there are to explore all possible avenues. Avenues are roads. Okay, we may want Teoh. We may want to work out, work out the kinks. The kinks of an issue, the kinks. A kink is something that's sort of a problem that may stick or cause other things to stick . So, for example, if you have a hose and there's a kink in it in the middle, that means water cannot flow through it. So having a debate here might mean talking about in a debate format where the problems are and then figuring out the best ways to resolve them. Looking at both sides of it, we can also, as I mentioned before, look at the pros and cons. This is a very simple way to say the advantages and the disadvantages, the good things and the bad things. We often just say, What are the pros and cons of this? What are the pros and cons of this? It's a very common expression. While the pros are blah, blah, blah. The cons are data and we often need to explore these. For example, should we launch the product? What are the pros of that? One of the cons of that? OK, the debate format is great for that now. What's the difference between having a debate and having an argument? I use the word. Make an argument for one side when I say that expression when I say to make an argument, I could also be saying to make a case or to build a case that basically means to come up with things that support one side. It doesn't mean to argue in the way that we normally think of it. An argument in most uses or most cases is two people fighting, shouting at each other, maybe throwing glasses of red wine at each other. Our ah, that's an argument. OK, usually. But we can use argument in this way when we're talking about a debate to make an argument, to make a case for something when we want to express. I believe this. This is my view, and I'm going to then make points that support this. I'm going to build a case for this. This is my conclusion, and my points are A, B, C and D. This is my argument. These are all the things I'm going to say to support this basic idea. So that's what we mean when we use the word argument or case when we're talking about a debate. Now the last thing I want to mention before we get into the phrases for having a debate. The last thing I want to mention is this interesting thing, which we call devil's advocate. Now The Devil's advocate basically means it's a role the person who always disagrees or says the opposite as a way to explore or force you to think about things in another way. So if you say I want to start a new business and I'd like to start maybe ah, convenience store, then I say, Well, what about all of the other convenience stores in the neighborhood. There are so many, there's a lot of competition. Have you thought about that? And maybe that person says So why are you? You should be excited about my idea. Why are you disagreeing with me? Hey, I'm just playing playing Devil's Advocate. That means I'm just trying to help you explore why you have this opinion and whether or not it's the right view to have. I'm helping you. So this is kind of a role. And when you're having a debate, sometimes you need to play Devil's Advocate as a way to explore the other side. Maybe you both agree with the same side. In fact, right? Well, the devil's advocate role can allow you to figure out what both sides are, at least so it's an interesting It's an interesting role to play. I really like playing devil's advocate when I have debates, either with my colleagues or when I have debates with my friends. Sometimes I'll take the opposite view that I actually have just for fun, just to see if I can make an argument for that. It's fun 165. How to Debate - Poking Holes in a Case: Okay, so we've talked about why we might have a debate. And we've discussed some of the roles of the debate and some of the different the different words related to having a debate. Okay, let's now talk about some of the phrases we can use in the debate itself. And we're going to look at phrases for how we can poke holes in a case. What does that mean? Well, as I said before, when you have a debate, you build a case for something, right? This is my case. I'm making a case for whatever it is. Maybe we're talking about the drinking age here to poke holes in that is to show where the weak points are and make it look weaker on the other side. Imagine you have a bag full of water and you think, think, think, poke holes in it. What will happen to the water? It will leak out. So when we're having a debate, one thing we can do is use a couple of specific phrases to show the weaknesses of the other side, not the other person, but just the arguments being made. Okay, so let's look at how we can do that. Let me introduce this topic first, the drinking age of 21 in the U. S. A. Is a good way to prevent drinking problems later in life. Now, I don't know if you know this, but in the United States you have to be 21 years or older in order to in order to actually buy alcohol. You say it's the legal drinking age 21 years or older. Okay, some people say it's a good idea. Some people say it's a bad idea. It's very controversial. Okay, well, it doesn't matter how you feel about it, okay? We're not gonna focus on your opinion or my opinion, But let's just say we're going to disagree with this. We're going to either actually disagree or play the devil's advocate. Okay on, we're going to look at some phrases we can use. Well, one thing we can do is ask a question and we ask a question to force the other side to say yes about something related to a point that is against what they said or against their own argument. Okay, you want to find or pick out true statements, small statements that might disagree with their side, and they should be factual statements. That means they should be facts f a C T s. They should be true. And then the other side has to say, Yeah, that's true. Yes, that's true. Uh, yeah, that's true. And if you make them agree the other side to small points that are smaller than the main argument you force them to do that, then it makes their side look weaker. This is a very simple thing to do, but this is a common debate tactic or strategy. You can off often use the word tactic. Okay, so how can we do that? Well, it's very simple. And you might see this in movies about court cases where there's a lawyer talking to someone in court. Isn't it true? Isn't it true? Now, this is a very powerful beginning because all they have to say to answer this is yes. And if they say no, then they have to defend it and say why a fact that you're stating is not true. You So you should say something that's true. So they have to say yes. Isn't it true that that many high school students get drunk at least once before age 21. Now you have to say yes to that because it is true. There are movies about it. It's a fact. Okay, Many high school students do get drunk at least some point before they turn 21. It's true. So you have to say yes. That's true. So I'm building to something. Maybe I then make another statement like this. Now, isn't it true that blah, blah, blah we can make another one? So I'm slowly breaking down your position, your view, your case. Okay, Now, how about this one? And I'm not saying this is a fact. I'm I'm not totally sure, but isn't it true that the rate of alcoholism hasn't decreased over the last 40 years? Now, if what you're saying is true, the drinking age of 21 is a good idea of what you're saying is true. Then we should see that alcoholism or people being addicted to alcohol, which is what alcoholism is addicted to alcohol. We should see it going down right? If it's working. Okay. So if I say this, isn't it true that the rate of alcoholism hasn't decreased? Hasn't gone down over the last 40 years. Maybe I have a graph here. Right? As you could see from this graph, this is the rate of alcoholism. It hasn't gone down. Isn't it true that the rate of alcoholism hasn't gone down over the last 40 years? The other side has to say, Yeah, that's true. So this isn't it true? Think can be a very, very powerful tool when you use it correctly. When you ask, the right questions can always use it. But in many cases, you can. And I really like it that we're going to look at one more question phrase that we can use when we want to show that we believe the other side is wrong and provide an opposite fact. 166. How to Debate - If that were true...: I often use this expression, this phrasing when I want to disagree with someone because it's really cool. It's very powerful. It's very interesting. I'll show you how it works. But basically what we say is, if that were true, why and then given opposite example. Now let me explain what that means, If that were true, means it is not true. Or at least I believe it is not true. So you have made a statement saying that something is true. You have said the drinking age of 21 in the U. S. A. Is a good way to prevent drinking problems later in life. Okay, I believe that's the opposite. If what you said were true, it's not. If it were, remember were is when we want to talk about something that's not really something that's hypothetical, and what I can do here is given opposite example or say something that is not true. That should be true if you were correct, which you're not, So I could say if that were true, then why isn't the rate of alcoholism decreasing? It's not decreasing right? Why isn't it decreasing? If that were true, the rate of alcoholism should be decreasing. You could make a statement like that. If that were true, that would just leave wide to the side for a second. If that were true, the rate of alcoholism should be decreasing, right? But it isn't, but it isn't. It's not. See have this graph here. It's not. It's the same. So it's a great way to show how what you're saying is illogical or there's something wrong with your facts or whatever. Now we can also then state. We can also then state something that is true. That shouldn't be there if you were correct, OK, which means you're not correct. So now I'm gonna bring back why I really like this one, especially. Why? Because it makes the other side have to explain something at any time. You use the word why the other side has to explain. And if they explain something or try to explain something that isn't right, then it's It's hard to do, and maybe they're going to make themselves look very silly. So if that were true, if that were true, why are there This is true now this part is true. Why are there so many underage drinking hyphen related deaths now, Or I could say, with the drinking age as it is with the drinking age as it is with the drinking age as it is or now, Okay, now you have to answer this question. The fact is that many underage people, the underage means under the age of 21 many die, maybe car accidents, driving under the influence we say, or drinking too much. Whatever the reason, there are lots of different possibilities. It's very sad. It's very unfortunate, But I'm pointing this out to say, I think you're I think you're incorrect. If that were true, why Why did I write why Twice. Okay, you get the idea. Why are there so many underage drinking deaths now? Question Mark. Good question. You might have a difficult time answering that. If you are the other side. Right. Okay, so this is another very powerful way After you say why you say something that is true. That contradicts or is opposite to What would be true if the other side was correct, which they're not, or you say something that should be true if they were correct. But that is not currently true. Okay, so there are two ways to do it. But this beginning phrasing here, if that were true, is quite useful and quite powerful. Not only in debates, but any time you really want to disagree with somebody and show the other side very simply and effectively why they're probably incorrect, very powerful. 167. How to Debate - Analogies: Now let me just point out one thing quickly before we go on to how we can concede a point. And that is the power of analogies and basically, how we do that, I'm going to just give you a quick example and an explanation for what an analogy is. Basically, an analogy is a simplified example that helps people understand a more complex thing. So if we're having a debate or a discussion about politics around the world or whatever, and we're talking about the United States and Canada, okay, let's say let's say we're talking about the United States and Canada. Well, things when we're talking about countries can be very complicated, really complicated. So we might make an analogy or a simplified example as a way to help people understand the picture. I don't want to set up the whole debate here. I don't even want to make a real point. I just want to show you what an analogy is and how you could make one. And they can be used everywhere in a debate. Because if you make things too complex, too complicated, then people who are listening to the debate might become confused. The audience, if there is an audience, will wonder what you're talking about because you can't explain your ideas simply so that's why analogies or simplified examples can help. That's really what an analogy is. Simplified example. So making examples is a powerful tool in helping the other people who are listening understand what you mean guy. So here's an analogy, and this is how we can begin an analogy. One way we can do this is to say, Here's an analogy. Imagine there are two brothers. One is big and confident, and everyone knows about him. The other is more laid back and easier to get along with. This is the relationship between Canada and the United States, or this is the situation with Canada and the United States. Now I'm not sure if that's a great analogy. I don't really care about world politics that much, but I'm just trying to say the view that people have of countries and politics with countries. That's very complicated. But the idea of two brothers to help people understand something that's a lot simpler and people can understand the relationship between two brothers. People can understand the characteristics of a person or two people side by side. Okay, so I've used that simpler example to help you get an idea of the larger and more complicated point I'm trying to make when you can use analogies. If you can't make an analogy, that's okay. Explain your point in more detail, but could be very useful way to get the audience on your side and to get them to understand you more easily than maybe the other side. 168. How to Debate - Conceding: Sometimes you want to agree that the other side is right about something, whether you're having a regular conversation or a debate, right? Maybe a part of what they're saying is correct, but they're not seeing the whole picture. And you still think you're right about the whole picture. Or maybe you want to agree with one point but say that maybe that point is not as important as this point. Whatever we need to be able to concede the point. Sometimes that means we need to be able to show other people that we agree a little bit. We agree, but we need to say usually but okay, we're now going to look at three expressions we can use to say, OK, what you said just now that's probably true. Maybe that's right, however, and then make another point that hopefully disagrees with with that point or shows that maybe it doesn't matter if they're correct. Whatever. Okay, so let's look at these three phrases. There's no denying that alcoholism is a problem, but okay, so you're saying alcoholism is a major problem? Okay, well, I don't disagree with that. There's no denying that alcoholism is a problem, but Okay, so one side says we have to do something about this. Decreasing the age is a terrible idea because it will increase this this major issue. There's no denying that alcoholism is a problem. But is this the best solution? I think level block. Okay, So I'm giving the point to the person who said it. No disagreement. It also is a way to help define where the agreement and disagreements are. And this could be a really good way to clarify your point and clarify your position or your case or your argument while you're right, that many deaths have been caused by underage drinking. Okay, so this would be on the other side now, maybe the other side has used the Isn't it true? Okay. And I want to admit that it is. But then I'm going to say something else. While you're right, that many deaths have been caused by underage drinking. I agree with that point. I also feel, or I think, okay and then say something else. I don't know what that point would be, but the point is to learn this expression in this way to agree to that point and then move on and focus on something else. This could be a really good way to focus on another point, even though that point is a very good point and not really answer it directly or spend a lot of time talking about that point. Okay, the other one is I'll admit that alcoholism hasn't declined much, but so one person has said, Well, listen, the drinking age of 21 it's not working very well because alcoholism is the same. See well, I'll admit that alcoholism hasn't changed that much. But But then I can make another point, either a point that contradicts were disagrees with what you just said, or to show that maybe something else is more important, or the kind of shift. Focus and change the topics a little bit and focus on something else, a stronger point that I have. So this is sort of a way to fight against some of the phrases that we learned earlier on in the lesson very useful as well. Okay, so these air the ways that we can first make points, make arguments and poke holes in another person's case, and then also how we can fight against or avoid really focusing on the points that other people have made. So hopefully these three ways of giving the other side of point come in handy or are useful to you when you're disagreeing with someone who has a very good point. Next, we're going to talk about how we can actually debate a topic. 169. How to Debate - Making an Argument: so far in this lesson, we've talked about why we debate, and we've learned some basic vocabulary that we can use to talk about debates. Then we went into some phrases, some expressions we can use when we're having debates to poke holes in a case or someone else's argument. Then we looked at a couple more we can use when we want to concede a point as a way to shift the focus away from maybe a weak point we have or make what we call a counterpoint. Now we're going to look at a riel example. We're going to look at a debate topic, and then we're going to look at two sides, and we're going to see if we can actually use some of the things that we learn earlier on in this lesson. So our topic will be video games, particularly violent video games. Violent video games means video games with violence. Maybe that's fighting. Maybe that's killing, for example, and usually that involves blood or something rather rather horrible, sometimes disturbing. We could say the question is, do violent video games have a negative effect on youth? Okay, a negative effect that means a bad effect. So when we're talking about very young people like kids, should they be allowed to play violent video games? If they do, will they be negatively affected or not affected? Okay, and that's the debate. Going to look first at the side that says, Hey, actually, this is a really bad thing. We should not allow very young people to play violent video games. Then we'll look at the opposite view, and again, we're going to try to use some of the things we learned early on in this lesson. All right, so this is the side that says yes, yes, video games have a negative effect. Bad effect. It goes without saying that Children are far more likely to learn behaviors from their environment than adults or older teens. It goes without saying that means it's very obviously true. If you want to say something is very obviously obviously true, you can say it goes without saying that it goes without saying that summer is warmer than winter. Okay, it goes without saying that Children are far more likely to learn behaviors from their environment. That means the things around them. Your environment is what's around you from your environment than adults or older teens. So maybe what we're talking about here when we say youth are young people very, very young people like Children or maybe people in their early teens 13 maybe 14 years old . So it stands to reason that if Children are exposed to violent games at a young age, they may begin to see violence as a solution to their problems, just like it is in games. Okay, exposed. If we use the word exposed, it means you're around that a lot. If you're exposed to violence, that means you see a lot of violence. If you're exposed to very good things, that means maybe you will begin to actually learn and do those good things we can say exposed to the sun. Okay, exposed just means you're around that okay, stands to reason is a way to say similar to this. It's obvious, but it's very reasonable to say this stands to reason is often a way to say it is reasonable that okay, so it stands to reason is just a common phrase that we use when we're having discussions making points and especially when we're trying to convince other people to agree with us may begin to see violence as a solution to their problems. A solution to your problems would be how you deal with your problems, how you solve your problems. Here's a problem. Oh, if I just punched this person or kill this person, that will solve my problem because that's what I learned in games. That's what it's saying here, just like it is in games. Because it is in games. You have to kill the bad guys in order to win. Okay, so the basic argument here is the rules of video games are kill. Bad people win. And the argument is, if kids play a lot of violent games, then they're going to see everything like that kill people. Win or do violence went beat. People win. That's the basic point. Here's an analogy. An analogy would be the way IK shows up more clearly on a white cloth. So again, we're trying to help the audience or the other side very clearly visualize or cr point, and we can use analogies to do that. We have a white cloth and you drop some blue ink, some red ink on the white cloth. It will be very vivid on the white cloth. If you drop it on a brown cloth, it won't be as vivid. That is to say, maybe young people. Children are more pure, they're pure, and so whatever they are exposed to at a young age, they will be very impacted. By that. It will be like ink showing up on a very pure white cloth. It's more Pierre, so the effect is stronger. Isn't it true? Remember this expression we used? We want to ask the other side to say Yes, we want them to agree. Isn't it true that kids arm or impressionable than adults impressionable means that they're more likely to be affected? Okay, it's more likely that whatever they are exposed to, they will do those things or be more likely to do those things. Or it's like saying the ink is going to show up more brightly or more vividly on the white cloth. And there the white cloth, very impressionable. Oh, I see everyone around me being very polite, so I will do the same thing because I'm very young. I'm more likely to do that. Okay, hopefully all that's clear. This is I think a reasonable argument on one side. Now let's look at the other side and see how the other side deals with this argument, saying that violent video games are a negative thing for very young people. 170. How to Debate - The Counterargument: all right. So let's look at the counter argument to the idea that video games are bad or do have a negative effect on young people. So now the answer is no. And this is our counter, which means against or opposite argument argument. OK, now we're going to use some of the expressions we've learned. So look out for those if that were true. Remember, the previous person said that there is ah ah on effect of being very impressionable and so kids will learn that behavior. If that were true, little kids would be would be running around outside right now with knives and guns, because violent video games are everywhere. Okay, because anybody can play violent video games, many kids play them anyway. We know that. That's a fact. If what you're saying were true, then we would see violence all over the place. We would have little kids running around stabbing people and shooting people. That's the interesting point, right? Okay, remember what we do here is we show. Either we ask the question, why? To show either why What you're saying is not true, because this is true or were saying if what you're saying were true. This thing should be true, but it's not. In fact, we don't see kids running around with knives and guns. So that means what you're saying is probably not true. Okay, because violent video games are everywhere. There's certainly no denying. Now remember, this is the way that we can agree with another persons point and then change the focus. The point? Waas. Isn't it true? Isn't it true that young people arm or impressionable, there's no denying? Here we are. There's no denying that young people are more impressionable than adults. Okay, so I'm giving you that point. That's true. That's true. But they are also clearly capable of distinguishing riel life from video games. So I'm saying, yes, they're impressionable, but they can tell the difference. To distinguish means to be able to tell the difference. If you can distinguish between different types of coffee, that means you can tell the difference. All this one is from Colombia, and this one is from Africa, for example. Okay, they're capable or able to distinguish riel life from video games. The rules of the game are to shoot and kill. The rules of the game are to shoot and kill. If you do those things you win in real life. If you do those things you lose, lose maybe means, you know, go to jail or something. Kids aren't stupid. It's up to parents to teach kids what is right and wrong. So on this side, it's saying, Hey, what you're saying is not right, because if what you're saying were true, you'd have kids running around with guns. In fact, kids can tell the difference in a game you have to kill in real life. You can't do that in a game. Violence is good in real life. It's not. It's up to parents to teach kids what is right and what is wrong. Kids aren't stupid. They're able to tell the difference between this a game and out there in real life, the rules that you have to play to maybe succeed. Okay, so this is just a counter argument to the previous one, and this could go back and forth. We could do another one, but notice we have used some of the expressions that we learned earlier on in this lesson. Now I hope that you have a feeling for how debates go now. and that you could if you had to, then go on and support one side or the other and give more reasons why either violent video games are very negative or why violent video games are no problem. Hopefully, you could use some of the expressions. We've learned to do that, but I'm going to give you another topic to work on as an assignment. And I want you to make sure to use the's expressions and use the things we learned in this lesson to to do that now, to practice this, what I'd like you to do is, as usual, record yourself actually doing both sides of a debate. Both sides of a debate play devil's advocate with yourself. Make sure to record it. Okay, give us much detail as you can make analogies if you can, to help clarify things to your audience, which may be yourself. And make sure to use the expressions that we learned in this lesson. The debate topic is medical testing on animals is right or wrong. That means we should test medicine, new medicines on animals like rats, or we should not okay, and there are a lot of different reasons why we should maybe and why we shouldn't try to explore those guy and explore also the expressions we learned. So good luck with that. And I will see you in the next video. 171. Course Conclusion: Hey, welcome to the end of the course. You made it. You did it. Congratulations. You should be should be proud that you were able to stick with the entire course I realize is very long, certainly. And in parts, maybe a little dry. So I'm very pleased that you got through the course, and I want to just thank you for taking the time to do it. And I honestly hope that it was useful to you. I hope this course has been valuable. And I hope it's something that you're glad that you did. I really spent a lot of time and a lot of energy put in a lot of thought, and I hope that you were able to feel that as you went through this course, I have actually been working on this course four years. So again, genuinely great job and thank you very much. And I want to just go over a couple of things. A couple of recommendations. I have things I hope you can keep in mind for how to improve your English abilities going forward, things to keep in mind in your English learning journey. Number one is the importance of review as you were going through the course, I hope that you took the time to take notes. I hope that you took the time to seriously consider each each lesson and that you didn't just rush through it. Now if you did that, it's very important to review to keep all of those things fresh. If you just go through something once, it can easily fade away. So try to review the notes that you took. And don't be afraid to actually go back and watch specific lessons if you need to. In fact, you might take a break and go through the entire course again. If you're really, really crazy. I do that when I read a book, I usually go back and read the whole book again. Why? Because I want to make sure I didn't miss anything that maybe I didn't catch the first time through. So don't be afraid to do that. If you enjoy the course, it might be valuable to you to go back and actually go through the course again. Review your notes from time to time and, most importantly, most importantly, try to use the stuff that you learned in this course in your daily life. I hope that everything you learned in this course is actually useful in real life. I was very careful to make sure all of the phrases and and the different words we learned, and all of the different skills that we learned in this course can actually be used in real life. So I hope that you start using them, because if you start using them in your conversations and situations that you encounter, then you're going to remember more clearly all of those things, and it's going to become part of your ability to communicate. So again, review. Don't be afraid to go back and re watch and certainly start using everything that you learned as much as possible in your daily life. Number two is extremely important, and I mentioned it a lot. And it's the reason why I always recommend that you record yourself when you're speaking. If you don't have others to practice with, because awareness is really the key to moving forward in building better habits, I'll say it 1000 times if I need to. It is the key to success if you don't know what you're saying and you're not aware of what you're saying, then you're really never going to sound more fluent now. You might use the new words and phrases that's great, and you're going to be able to handle more situations. That's wonderful. But you really need to develop a keen awareness of what is coming out of your own mouth in order to become more fluent and to use the things that you learned in this course well and properly to actually take the next step. Awareness is key. So do the exercises that we practiced in this course and also reduce some of the things that are attached to each lesson in the in the review part. By practicing on a daily basis by giving yourself little tasks and recording those tasks and then listening to them again, you're going to become more aware of what you say When you speak, you're going to be able to hear yourself better. And the more you do that, the better your habits will be. The stronger your good habits will be and the faster you'll be able to correct or to fix your bad habits. So I hope that you continue to practice and I hope that you continue to record that practice so that you can build that awareness so that you can then develop proper habits and get rid of the habits that you don't like about your spoken English. Finally, I would encourage you if you're working on other aspect of your spoken English, for example, pronunciation or how to think in English and other things. I would encourage you to check out my other courses because they're really meant to focus on specific areas of spoken English to help you improve in other ways. In addition to this course, those things can help you build out those good speaking habits. I want to wish you the best of luck in your English language journey in the future, and I hope to see you in another course.