节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2014-01-29
难易度:Medium
关键字:flick, dart, touch up, apologize
Today we're enjoying the last part of the story True Colors, a story full of
colorful idioms, idioms and phrases that have to do with color.
Today we looked at two so far:
Amber caught a monkey red-handed.
And this monkey was not ready to show the white flag.
But did you notice that the characters are also colors?
Amber is like yellow.
Violet is close to purple.
Bruno is actually a name that means brown-haired.
And even cinnamon is not just a spice but the name of a brown, red color.
Well, let's see if we can spot anything else colorful in the rest of the
reading.
And then we'll visit Michelle in the Language Lab.
(Music).
True Colors.
Cinnamon had spilled some paint on the poster, but this time it matched Amber's
work.
She cleaned off the monkey hair, touched up the poster and smiled.
Now it was perfect.
Her boss agreed.
He gave her the green light to turn her poster into an advertising campaign -
with Violet on her team.
Slightly red in the face, Amber apologized to Violet, who quickly forgave her.
As they worked together, Amber saw Violet's true colors.
Violet was thoughtful and hard-working, and they became good friends.
(Music).
All right.
(Chinese).
And now let's go to our teachers.
Thank you, Michelle.
Well, let's go back to the beginning of this section.
We read that Cinnamon had spilled some paint on the poster, but this time it
matched Amber's work.
What does that mean? The color was exactly the same?
No. It means it fit in well with the rest of Amber's poster.
It's like how we use the word "match" when talking about clothes.
They could be different colors or even different styles, but they could go
together.
All right. So Cinnamon contributed to Amber's poster in a good way.
Good monkey.
Amber cleaned off the monkey hair, touched up the poster and smiled.
Well, I want to talk about that phrase: touch up.
When you touch up something, that means you improve it in little ways here and
there.
You can do this with lots of things.
Obviously you can do this with art.
You can also do this with a paper you're writing or a poem or something creative
like that.
You write a few drafts, and then you touch up the paper by changing little words
here and there to make it better.
And you know, this can also be a noun: a touch-up, with a hyphen.
Notice the hyphen.
All right.
Here in the studio, Carolyn and I, of course, need to wear makeup.
Throughout the day of filming, the makeup artist will come and do touch-ups.
And we could also say that Amber is doing some touch-ups with her poster.
Now it's perfect.
And her boss thinks so, too.
He... so he gave her the green light to turn her poster into an advertising
campaign.
Now let's look at that color idiom: to give someone the green light.
This means to give permission to do something.
It's pretty easy to remember.
It's like a traffic light. Green means go.
If you have an idea at the office and your boss gives the green light, then you
can go ahead and get started with your idea.
So Amber has the green light to turn her poster into an advertising campaign.
Well, I like that phrase there: to turn something into something else.
This means to change something in some way.
So Amber's work used to be just a poster, but now it would be a way to advertise
for green air conditioners.
Well, how else can we use that phrase?
Are you feeling blue?
I hope you turn your frown into a smile.
Or something like this: Freddy turned his house into a bed and breakfast.
And I think this experience turned Amber and Violet from not getting along to
good friends.
We read here: Slightly red in the face, Amber apologized to Violet.
And that brings us to the last colorful idiom of the lesson: red in the face.
What does that mean?
Well, friends, I think you can guess what this means.
Amber was red in the face when she apologized for having a bad attitude.
Do you know what it means?
That's right.
Being red in the face means to be embarrassed about something.
Sometimes I get red in the face when I call someone by the wrong name.
I might get red in the face if someone is sharing an embarrassing story about
me.
When do you get red in the face?
Talk about that with someone in English.
Well, Amber was wrong about Violet.
She is, after all, a good person and a good teammate.
And we read here that Amber saw Violet's true colors.
What are her true colors? That she is hard-working.
What are your true colors?
Well, I really like all of this talk about colors and colorful idioms, Gabe.
Do you have a particular favorite color idiom?
A favorite color idiom?
Well, there is one that I really like - The grass is greener on the other side.
Sometimes in life we feel like someone else has a better situation than we do.
We want their situation.
But then when we go over there, we look back on our side and we think: Oh, that
was a good situation.
The grass is always greener on the other side.
And then you get to the other side and it's actually not as green.
Right.
Well, good color idioms, and I hope that you've learned a few.
But right now it is time for us to enjoy a review skit.
And then, of course, we'll be joining Linda for our Editor's Summary.
Hey, let's review some colorful idioms.
OK. But where do we start?
Well, let's start with blue.
Oh, blue. OK.
Well, if you have the blues, it means you're sad.
That's right. Oh, no...
I have the blues.
Don't cry.
Here's another one.
If something happens out of the blue, it's unexpected.
Yeah. Maybe an old friend calls you out of the blue.
What a surprise!
Um, how about some idioms with... oh, the color red?
Sure.
If a company is losing money, they are in the red.
But what if someone is seeing red?
It means they are very, very angry.
Oh. What if someone is caught red-handed?
It means they're caught doing something wrong.
A-ha!
And if someone is caught red-handed, they might be embarrassed or red in the
face.
Yeah.
Well, how about some green idioms?
Well, someone can be green with envy.
It means they're jealous.
Hey, I wanted to say that.
Well, don't be jealous.
Just think of another idiom.
Oh, OK.
If someone gets the green light, it means they're allowed to do something.
Yes. A green light means go.
Just like now?
Huh?
Well, time's up.
We have the green light to go, to say goodbye.
Well, goodbye.
Goodbye.
Amber flicks on the lights, expecting to see Amber.
But surprise! It was Bruno's pet monkey, Cinnamon.
The chase is on!
Amber grabs him finally as he is running across her poster because he gets stuck
to the wet paint.
And in the end, Amber's boss loved the poster and gave her the green light to
use it.
And Violet?
Well, after Amber apologizes, they become very good friends.
Thank you, Linda.
Well, I'm glad the story turned out great for Amber and Violet.
They used to rub each other the wrong way, but now they get along just fine.
And we heard a lot of color idioms in the story.
Which of these idioms did you already know?
Are you going to practice using them?
I sure hope so.
Well, we know that people love idioms.
So just for fun, we have a few more color idioms.
One is "once in a blue moon." What does that mean, Carolyn?
Well, it means that it doesn't happen very often.
Blue moons are very rare, so it's something that's seldom, so it doesn't happen.
You can say: Oh, that never happens. It's once in a blue moon.
All right. And another one here is: to pass with flying colors.
That means you didn't just pass a test or something but you did really well, you
did an excellent job.
You passed with flying colors.
And you pass with flying colors here at Studio Classroom today.
You sure do.
And we can't wait to see you next time right here on Studio Classroom.
We'll see you then.