Pratica di Shadowing: Unit 4: Family structures | Collins - Listening for IELTS. - Impara a parlare inglese con i video
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track 21 My family isn't very big, there's just my son and me.
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I'm a single parent.
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For the last ten years I've been concentrating on looking after my son James, who's now fourteen.
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But now I've met someone special, and we've just got engaged.
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My fiancé has four kids of his own and we're gonna get married in July.
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James is really excited about it.
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He's looking forward to having brothers and sisters in his new stepfamily.
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We live as one big extended family.
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There are seven of us in our household.
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Besides my husband and me and our children, there's my aunt and two of my cousins.
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I stay at home and care for my mother because she's quite old and can't look after herself.
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Obviously, we suffer from a lack of space in the house, but we all get on well.
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Track 22.
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1. Firstly, I am going to talk about the role of the parent.
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Secondly, I'll discuss the role of the child.
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And lastly, we'll look at the family unit as a whole.
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2. Parenting is a difficult job because no two children are ever the same.
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3. Families are important because they form the basis for socialization.
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Additionally, they educate and protect the next generation.
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4. The family structure has varied greatly over time
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that is different times have had different views of what a traditional family structure is 5.
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Many argue that less traditional structures are not as effective.
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However, there is little evidence to support this.
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6. Many people are having families later in life.
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Consequently, the rise in the number of single people may only be temporary.
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7. Families in other parts of the world differ from the Western norm.
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For instance, in some cultures, having multiple husbands or wives is the norm.
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8. although there are many arguments for trying to keep the traditional family structure strong
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I feel the key issue is the economic necessity of having a normal family structure.
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Track 23.
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As we have seen, changes in the structure of the family are constantly occurring,
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Extend it to nuclear patrifocal to a more equal footing between the sexes and dual parenting to single parenting.
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However, a recent phenomenon in the UK, which is changing the traditional family,
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is the increasing number of adults who continue to live with their parents until their 30s or sometimes even their 40s.
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The UK has traditionally been a society where offspring leave the family home in their late teens
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or early twenties to set up their own home and families.
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But in the last 25 years, this has decreased.
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Official statistics released by the Office of National Statistics show that today, 10 % of men in their early 30s still live with their parents.
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This compares with 5 % of women in this age range.
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The reasons for this are complex and varied.
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It cannot be denied that some people are choosing to stay at home.
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Living with parents can be an easy option.
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Food is provided, heating and electricity are paid for, and rent, if any, is minimal.
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However, a third of those surveyed claimed they are living with their parents
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because it is too difficult to get on the property ladder.
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House prices in the last few decades have risen dramatically, Property is now five times the average annual salary,
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whereas it was only three times the average annual wage in the 1980s.
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This fact, coupled with high unemployment amongst young people, makes it virtually impossible for a single person to buy a home or even rent.
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The number of students going on to higher education has also been steadily increasing.
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Many of these students return home after finishing their studies as a result of the student debt they have accumulated.
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It can take many years to pay this off, and if the burden of rent or a mortgage is added to that, It can be just too much for a young adult's pocket.
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However, help is now at hand.
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The government is tackling some of the problems that cause people to remain with their parents with a new scheme.
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The Affordable Housing Scheme
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This aims to help people part -buy a house or flat by making housing more affordable for first -time buyers,
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and possibly taking the strain away from elderly parents.
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Track 24.
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The family is a topic which we will look at in great detail this term.
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For sociologists, the family is often seen as the beginning of socialisation.
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Indeed, it is the seed of society itself.
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In recent decades, many old people have no longer been able to rely on their offspring for support, which was common 50 years ago.
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Many children are brought up by only one parent, something virtually unheard of before the 1960s.
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We can certainly say that during the last half -century, we have seen an enormous change in traditional family structures.
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The extended family lasted well into the early 1900s, and this kind of strong family unit was essential due to property ownership.
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Housing often was scarce and it was necessary for people to live with parents
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and take over the property when their parents died.
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Of course, people still benefit from their family line.
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Still today, people generally inherit any money that their mother or father might have.
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In the UK, the last fifty years has also seen a decrease in the number of offspring parents have.
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Whereas in the 1950s, only 10 % of offspring were only children.
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This number has risen.
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Nowadays, this is the case for just over a third of children.
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Track 25.
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In Victorian times, the upper classes made up less than 3 % of the entire population of Britain.
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Yet this class held more than 90 % of the country's wealth.
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This shows the massive gap there was between rich and poor.
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a gap which has shrunk considerably in the last century.
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Today we're going to look at the wide differences in family life between rich and poor in Victorian times.
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Let's begin with the upper classes.
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The upper classes of the Victorian period were generally the nobility or the clergy.
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Most of their servants were very poorly paid, but were always accommodated within the homes of upper -class Victorian families,
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so they didn't have to pay for accommodation, food and often clothing.
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The money which they did earn, they normally send home to their families.
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Many Victorian servants came from the countryside, where the effects of the Industrial Revolution had resulted in job losses.
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Amongst these servants were cooks, housemaids, stable -hands and butlers, The family would also employ a nanny, who although employed by the family,
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was not traditionally seen as a servant.
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A nanny's primary role was to care for the children.
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She was responsible for teaching the children how to behave, looking after them when they were ill, and instilling discipline into them.
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Nannies did not, however, educate the children.
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Generally, children from wealthy families did not attend school outside the family home.
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Tutors would come to the house to do this, and although on occasion mothers taught their children to read, and fathers gave their children some instruction in Latin,
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this was not a common occurrence.
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Now, the Victorian upper classes had the reputation of being quite cruel, but this wasn't always the case.
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They were also quite charitable.
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Ragged schools were set up with funding from the upper classes, so that poor children could have some form of education.
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Additionally, most Victorian parents were very proud of their children, who were often seen as prized possessions.
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This goes against the common idea that parents were very hard on their children, In fact, the opposite was generally the rule.
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However, The situation for lower class families was very different.
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In the lower classes, child labour was rife.
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Children as young as eight earned a living as chimney sweeps for wealthy houses.
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Now, let's move on to looking at the lower class families in more detail.
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Track 26.
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section four You will hear a lecture on changes in family structure.
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First, you will have 20 seconds to look at questions 1 to 10.
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Now listen carefully and answer questions 1 to 10.
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We are all familiar with the nuclear family, which has been the dominant family structure in the UK for the last 60 years at least.
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However, recent changes show that our idea of the traditional nuclear family as the cornerstone of British family life is changing.
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There have been emerging patterns which are eroding this structure, namely the rise of stepfamilies,
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cohabitation, lone parenting and the rapid increase in those living alone.
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We are going to explore these areas in turn and look at their effect in terms of the family.
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Firstly, stepfamilies are becoming more and more common.
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Stepfamilies are created when one or both partners have a child or children from a previous relationship.
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In 1980, the percentage of children under 13 who were living with one parent and their new partner was just 4%.
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In 2008, this figure had increased to 20%.
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The USA has seen an even greater rise.
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New statistics show that almost half of under -13s are living in a stepfamily.
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Now, we can still call the stepfamily structure a nuclear family, as it does follow the structure of two parents and dependent children.
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However, it also creates somewhat of a nuclear blur.
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Stepbrothers and sisters may belong to two family units, so where do we draw the line at which family they belong to?
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Cohabitation, when partners do not marry yet live together as a family, has also increased.
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In 2006, of the 17 .5 million families in Britain, nearly 3 million of these comprised unmarried couples.
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What does this mean to the nuclear family?
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Firstly, the traditional view of a nuclear family requires married parents, so we can't put these types of family under this umbrella.
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Statistics show that even if cohabiting couples have children, they are more likely to separate than their married equivalents.
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Lastly, we need to look at the rise of the DINX, which stands for Dual Income, No Kids.
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As Clark and Henwood outline, many cohabiting couples are choosing a life without children, putting consumer spending first.
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Lone parenting is a relatively recent family structure which has rapidly grown in the last half century.
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In 1972, only one in 14 children lived in a lone parent family.
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When we compare this with today's figure of 1 in 4, we can see that this is a rapid increase.
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In the past, lone parenthood was overwhelmingly the result of a death of a parent, Nowadays, however, it is increasingly a choice.
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Some sociologists argue that this increase is due to the outlook of women.
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Where women once were willing to accept an unhappy or abusive marriage, now many will choose lone parenthood.
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Often this can be just a transitory phase before they find a new partner, This view of women's attitudes and lone parenting is highly debated
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because some figures show that the largest group of lone parents are mothers who have never married.
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You can find counter -arguments for these ideas in Butler and Jones.
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One difficulty for single parents is
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that they are a social group who are much more likely to suffer from poverty and hardship.
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They are more likely to live in rented accommodation and have childcare issues.
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Lastly, an increasing number of people are choosing to live alone.
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The number of people living alone in Britain has more than doubled in the last twenty years.
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In 1990, just over four million people lived alone.
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Now this figure has reached 8 .5 million, an incredibly rapid growth, which has had enormous effects on the traditional nuclear family.
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This number represents a great chunk of the population who either by choice or necessity are outside the traditional family unit.
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Some think that these changes may not help the community.
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In fact, there are many arguments
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that this rise in alternative household structures will create a more isolationist and less community -based society.
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where close bonds, which are usually formed within the family, have no place.
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Leaving aside whether or not the housing even exists for this boom,
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an important factor which must be looked at is the disproportionate expense for those living on their own.
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By this I mean the burden of all costs is shouldered by one wage instead of two,
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and of course, one person is using the energy which could be shared between a group, having a greater impact on the environment too.
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However, on a more positive note, people, especially women, are proving to be extremely...
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That is the end of the listening test.
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In the exam, you will have half a minute to check your answers.
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Cosa imparerai
Questo video ti aiuterà a rafforzare due competenze chiave per l'IELTS: la capacità di seguire conversazioni su temi familiari con flusso naturale e la pronuncia di frasi complesse con connettivi come "however", "consequently" o "for instance". Inoltre, imparerai a identificare e ripetere strutture discorsive tipiche, come l'elenco di punti (prima, poi, infine) o l'analisi di cause e effetti, fondamentali per lo speaking.
Ascolta questi suoni
Nella video, nota come le parole si connettono: ad esempio, "gonna get" diventa /ˈɡɔnə ɡɛt/ e "look after" si trasforma in /lʊk ˈɑːftə/. Queste connessioni (linking) e riduzioni sono essenziali per capire l'inglese parlato. Ascolta anche la pronuncia di "fiancé" (/fiˈɒnseɪ/) e "patrifocal" (/ˌpætrɪˈfəʊkl/), termini specifici che appaiono nel contesto familiare. Usare il metodo "shadowing in inglese" (ripetere immediatamente dopo il parlante) ti aiuterà a internalizzare questi suoni.
Parla come un madrelingua
Per imitare il ritmo e l'enfasi dei parlanti, concentra ti sulle parole chiave: in frasi come "the key issue is the economic necessity", "key" e "economic necessity" sono sottolineate. Usa la tecnica "shadow speak" (ripetizione sincrona) per seguire l'intonazione, specialmente nelle frasi condizionali o nelle opposizioni ("however", "but"). Inoltre, nota come i connettivi vengono pronunciati velocemente ma con chiarezza: "additionally" (/əˈdɪʃənəli/) e "consequently" (/ˈkɒnsɪkwəntli/) mantengono l'accento sulla seconda sillaba. Praticare così, anche con "shadowspeaks", ti renderà più fluido e naturale.
Imparare l'inglese con YouTube è un modo efficace, e questo video è perfetto per esercitare il shadowing. Ricorda: la chiave è la ripetizione costante, per internalizzare non solo le parole, ma anche il flusso e l'intonazione del madrelingua.
La grammatica di questo video
Le strutture che chi parla usa di più, con le parole esatte del video:
| Struttura | Nel video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — un’azione iniziata prima e ancora in corso | I've been concentrating · have been emerging |
| Present perfect have/has + participio passato — un’azione passata che conta ancora adesso | I've met · has varied · have had |
| Forma passiva be + participio passato — conta ciò che accade, non chi lo fa | cannot be denied · is provided · is added |
| Frasi relative who / which + frase — un’informazione in più su una persona o una cosa | support, which was · gap which has · family, which has |
Cos'è la tecnica dello Shadowing?
Shadowing è una tecnica di apprendimento delle lingue supportata da studi scientifici, originariamente sviluppata per la formazione dei traduttori professionisti e resa popolare dal poliglotta Dr. Alexander Arguelles. Il metodo è semplice ma potente: ascolti un audio in inglese di madrelingua e lo ripeti immediatamente ad alta voce — come un'ombra che segue il parlante con un ritardo di solo 1–2 secondi. A differenza dell'ascolto passivo o degli esercizi di grammatica, lo shadowing costringe il tuo cervello e i muscoli della bocca a elaborare e riprodurre simultaneamente i modelli di discorso reale. La ricerca dimostra che migliora significativamente la precisione della pronuncia, l'intonazione, il ritmo, il discorso connesso, la comprensione dell'ascolto e la fluidità del parlato — rendendolo uno dei metodi più efficaci per la preparazione alla prova di speaking dell'IELTS e per la comunicazione reale in inglese.