节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2014-02-24
难易度:Low
关键字:possession, entertain, impressive, commercial, commercial, Super Bowl,
touchdown
Welcome back.
Today we're learning about the Super Bowl, the NFL's most-watched game of the
year.
The Super Bowl is always on a Sunday.
And millions of people are glued to their TVs as they eat pizza, buffalo wings
and chips and cheer on their favorite team's every move.
Go, favorite team, go!
But why are Americans so crazy about football?
Something's happened unexpectedly, and that makes anything exciting.
But there's more to the Super Bowl than a football game.
Let's read about that now.
(Music).
Super Sports, Super Fan!
The Super Bowl also entertains its audience with a great halftime show.
The football field is turned into a stage.
Then an impressive performance of dancing and singing with special effects
occurs.
Since the Super Bowl is the most-watched TV program in America, commercial
airtime is also very expensive.
Big money is also spent on the commercials.
They draw the viewers' attention and advertise their image or products during
the commercial break.
(Music).
All right.
(Chinese).
And now let's go to our teachers.
Thank you, Michelle.
It sounds like a lot of time and energy go into planning the Super Bowl every
year.
Not only do football teams prepare to play their best against their opponents,
but the Super Bowl also spends a lot of money on entertaining its audience in
many ways.
You're right about that.
Of course much of TV is entertainment.
Even Studio Classroom, though it is an educational program, also seeks to
entertain its audience.
I call it edutainment, educational entertainment.
Edutainment.
Gabe, you're not the only one who calls it that.
That term has been around for years.
Oh... I guess so.
Anyway, it can be used to describe shows like Studio Classroom, Sesame Street
and other shows that try to teach something but also try to be fun.
But back to the lesson, the Super Bowl is not a form of edutainment, it's purely
entertainment.
Right.
We can be entertained by a fun halftime show.
Now halftime is just what it sounds like:
the time right in the middle of a sports game to give the teams a break and let
the audience get up and walk around.
Yes. In sports games, the middle is called halftime.
But friends, remember something important.
If you go to another kind of show, like a play or a long concert, for example,
and there is a break in the middle, that's not called halftime.
That's called an intermission.
Yes. Most plays you see at a theater will have an intermission.
You can get up, take a walk and buy something to eat or drink during the
intermission.
Do movies have intermissions?
Um, not usually anymore.
Long movies from many years ago like Gone with The Wind and The Sound of Music
did.
But actually, when I was in India, I watched a Bollywood movie in a movie
theater, and it had an intermission.
I was pretty surprised.
Anyway, you can get up and stretch during the intermission, but just make sure
you get back to your seat before the movie or play resumes.
Ah. Now there's a word that both dramas and sports games use: resume.
This is when people continue what they started.
A show resumes after the intermission.
The football game resumes after the halftime show.
We resumed teaching after our break.
Yes, we did.
Now we read further: Since the Super Bowl is the most-watched TV program in
America, commercial airtime is also very expensive.
Later we read: Big money is also spent on the commercials.
Commercial is an adjective that describes many things that have the purpose of
making money.
And a commercial can also be a noun.
Right. I usually use it to talk about the advertisements I see on TV.
If I'm watching a movie on certain TV channels, the movie will be interrupted by
commercials.
Man, I hate that.
I'm in the middle of the great movie.
And just when it's pretty exciting, a commercial comes on.
But that's just how they make their audience stay on their channel.
I know.
Anyway, some channels... or some commercials are actually pretty interesting,
perhaps especially the commercials that are made for the Super Bowl.
They usually cost a lot more money to make than normal commercials.
And some of those commercials take a lot of time, too.
It could take many days to shoot a 30-second commercial.
Look up some Super Bowl commercials sometime on YouTube.
Some of them are quite funny.
It's true.
Now there's something to remember about commercials.
If you're in America, you would call them commercials most of the time.
You would rarely call them advertisements.
But if you are in England, you might call them TV adverts.
Hmm, TV adverts, yes.
While we do teach standard American ways of speaking English here at Studio
Classroom,
you should do your research if you ever have the chance to visit Great Britain,
Australia or New Zealand.
They do say some things differently.
Yes, they do.
Now let's take a look at something else in this sentence about commercials.
We read that big money is spent on commercials.
Well, what is big money, money bills that are really big like this or big coins?
No... Gabe. Big money is just a term that means a lot of money.
For example, you could say that it cost big money to make that Hollywood film.
Or that guy makes big money at his company.
I see.
So as we shared earlier, sometimes it takes big money to make a commercial,
especially for the end of the football season.
Well, right now it's almost the end of our lesson for the day.
Would you know how to summarize today's lesson?
If not, listen to how Linda does it.
Let's listen to the Studio Classroom Editor's Summary.
It's February, and we see that Pauline wrote about America's favorite pastime,
sports.
Her description of Super Bowl Sunday is very accurate.
People glued to their TVs, eating snacks and watching the Super Bowl, the World
Series of Football.
The two best teams are playing for the top honor.
The Super Bowl also provides great entertainment with stars performing at
halftime, and the commercials are some of the best and funniest on TV.
Thank you, Linda.
Well, that's about it for American football and Super Bowl Sunday.
We learned a lot about America's most-watched football game.
Now Gabe, have you ever been to a football game?
Hmm, I went to a couple football games in university but not a lot.
Did you ever go?
I've been to a lot of football games.
Today we talked about the National Football League, but there's also a college
football league as well.
And I've been to many, many college ball games.
Well, I like that.
Carolyn, you had a good answer.
And for that, I'm going to give you some big money.
Um... well, thanks, Gabe. But I don't think I can actually use this money.
You don't appreciate my big money, then give it back.
Well, thank you, friends, for joining us here learning about the Super Bowl
today.
And of course, we have more to learn about in our next lesson right here at
Studio Classroom.
See you.
Goodbye.