节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2013-09-23
难易度:Medium
关键字:interpret, fluent, preposition, get in touch
Hello, and welcome to Studio Classroom.
My name is Gabe.
And I'm Carolyn.
And your English will improve today.
Our lesson is called Answer That Telephone!
Well, do you answer the telephone often?
Do you make phone calls often to other people?
Of course, lots of people have cellphones and smartphones.
And maybe you even use your home phone and your office phone to talk or
communicate with other people.
But usually you do that in your own language.
Do you ever get nervous if you have to answer the telephone in another language?
Carolyn?
Well, I used to get very nervous if I had to talk on the telephone in something
that wasn't English.
And since I have moved to Taiwan, a lot of people here speak Chinese, and
sometimes I get phone calls in Chinese.
And at first I was very nervous, and I would hand the phone off to one of my
friends.
But now it's OK.
All right, so you're getting better.
You're getting used to it.
I would agree.
I think that I improve as time goes on.
And I would also say it depends on who the other person is, who I'm talking to.
If they are a very important person, I might get a little more nervous.
Well, you might have this question.
You might feel nervous sometimes talking on the phone in English.
Don't worry about it.
We're going to learn about what you can say in English in today's lesson.
(Music).
Answer That Telephone!
How to say what you need to say on the telephone.
When the telephone rings and you know you have to answer it in English, do you
get nervous?
Maybe you do because you have to depend only on your ears to understand.
When you talk to someone in person, you can use body language to help interpret
the meaning.
In reality, though, you don't have to be fluent in English to use the phone.
Let's try to calm those nerves by looking at some of the verbs you'll hear - or
use.
All right.
So the lesson title is Answer That Telephone!
And we see here: How to say what you need to say on the telephone.
So that's it.
That's what we're going to be talking about for the next couple of days is
learning what you need to say on the telephone.
That's right.
And we begin our article.
When the telephone rings and you know you have to answer it in English, do you
get nervous?
We discussed this a little bit earlier.
It can make you feel very nervous if you know you must speak a different
language when you answer the phone.
And there's a reason for this, right, Gabe?
Well, we read here:
Maybe you do because you have to depend only on your ears to understand.
Well, why is this a special reason?
Because usually you have your sight to help you out a little bit.
Of course communication is 90 percent nonverbal.
And so if you're talking with somebody, you can kind of see how they're feeling
by how they're standing.
You can... you can pick up on different things if you're talking with them
face-to-face.
But here on the phone, you're just using your ears.
You're depending only on your ears to understand.
That's right.
And we go into that a little bit more in the next sentence.
When you talk to someone in person or face-to-face, you can use body language to
help interpret the meaning.
So you were talking about those nonverbals, the body gestures, body language.
It's what motions you do when you're talking, so.
Lots of people talk with their hands, and it can be very helpful when you're
trying to understand what a person is saying.
Well, I think we need to look at some words from this sentence.
The first one is a phrase: to do something in person.
And if you do something in person, we also use the phrase "face-to-face," that
means you're not on the phone, it's not over email, you're with the other
person.
That's right.
So sometimes it is best to do things in person.
Maybe you want to have an interview for a new job, you have the option of doing
an in-person interview or an interview on the phone.
If you have trouble talking to people on the phone, you may want to go with the
in-person interview so that you can be more comfortable.
That's right, a face-to-face interview.
Well, it's sometimes more important do things in person.
Here's my question.
When is it important to talk about something in person?
Think about that.
Talk about it in English with somebody.
But first, let's talk about this word from our Word Bank: to interpret
something.
If you are interpreting a meaning of some kind, that means you are trying to
figure out what something means.
That's right.
And usually we use this to talk about two different languages.
You are interpreting from one language to another to try to understand the
meaning - so what the other person is saying.
Now some people have a profession of being an interpreter,
I-N-T-E-R-P-R-E-T-E-R.
And they are translating, but they're doing it verbally, OK, orally, with their
mouth interpreting from one language to another.
How is interpreting different from translating?
Well, if you're a translator, you are writing, you're translating from one
language to another in writing of some kind.
That is generally true.
But here we have the word "interpret." And it's important to understand the
other person's meaning.
Now moving to the next sentence:
In reality, though, you don't have to be fluent in English to use the phone.
And I think this is very true.
You don't need to be fluent - a word from our Word Bank.
If you are fluent in a language, that means that you have a very high skill
level, you are very comfortable speaking that language and you have little
difficulty doing it.
That's right.
Now these jobs I was talking about earlier, if you're a translator or want to be
an interpreter, then of course you need to be fluent in at least two languages.
So what languages can you speak?
Well, I know you're fluent in at least one.
But are you fluent in at least two languages?
Many of you are here learning with Studio Classroom because you want to be
fluent in English.
Well, keep up the good work.
That's right.
We want you to be fluent, too.
So keep studying here with us.
And perhaps one day you could have that job as an interpreter and interpret for
other people.
Well, you don't need to be fluent to answer the phone in English, so.
Let's try to calm those nerves by looking at some of the verbs you'll hear - or
use.
All right.
We see a phrase here: to calm those nerves.
That means to relax somehow.
But I think Liz wants to share more about those words with us in the Grammar
Gym.
And of course, Michelle is with us every day.
She does a very good job explaining and interpreting the meaning of some things
as well.
So let's go and visit Liz and then Michelle.
Hello, friends.
Welcome to the Grammar Gym.
My name is Liz.
We see this statement in today's article:
Let's try to calm those nerves by looking at some of the verbs you'll hear...
That's our Grammar Tip focus.
Today we're looking at the phrase: to calm nerves.
It just means to make someone feel not so nervous.
So the writer is inviting readers to take a look at some verbs so as in to not
feel so nervous.
Let's look at some example sentences.
You can use this phrase to talk about how a person calms himself or herself
down, like:
Before John went to take his test, he listened to some music to calm his nerves.
You can also use this phrase to talk about helping someone else feel less
nervous about something.
For example: Tony brought Mina a glass of water to calm her nerves.
If you'd like to see some more example sentences, you can find them in today's
Grammar Tip section in your magazine.
And that's it for today.
This is Liz from the Grammar Gym.
See you next time.